Do you want SSH to the host or to the Home Assistant Container? Are you running Home Assistant Supervised?
Both. It’s my understanding that using the ssh add-on allows me to ssh into the Home Assistant folder in the container as well as host folders. But native SSH would not allow me to access folders in the container.
My Home Assistant computer (an Intel NUC) is in the basement along with my MQTT broker and Plex servers. SSH is a lot easier than going to the basement with a thumb drive to do anything.
I have always run Home Assistant supervised. I realize that the ops want to depreciate Supervisor, but no one has ever explained why, or how would a
I access snapshots, addons, system and other features of supervisor.
I can’t help but feel that your post is on a complete tangent from how you started the thread, but here’s an attempt at a response.
‘Native SSH’ (as you described it) will work fine with a supervised install. The files ‘in the container’ will be perfectly accessible as they are, in fact, mapped data directories and do not exist solely inside the container.
That said, it doesn’t explain why you cannot locate the addons, which would imply there is something else wrong with your system. If I were you I would want to fix it.
Accessing “snapshots, addons, system and other features of supervisor” is done by tapping on the supervisor menu item in the sidebar. The supervisor is designed to be operated entirely via the Web interface, you do not need SSH to achieve anything in this regard.
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Not a complete tangent, but my rant about the depreciating of supervisor would be better in another thread. But, on your last paragraph, how do I access the features of supervisor if supervisor is depreciated in a future update?
But that has nothing to do with SSH which I use for maintenance, access to backup files, etc.
Native SSH refers to installing SSH with
sudo apt-get install openssh-server
You said:
“That said, it doesn’t explain why you cannot locate the addons, which would imply there is something else wrong with your system. If I were you I would want to fix it.”
This is precisely why I am here. Nothing in the log files look amiss, so how would you fix this? I thought of doing a snapshot then reinstalling Home Assistant again.
Your thoughts are appreciated.
There’s this weird feeling of a disconnect between what we’re saying to each other here.
Presuming you mean deprecated, if supervisor is ever deprecated then you won’t needs to access it because it won’t be there. I can’t see supervisor ever being deprecated, it’s part of the whole homeassistant ecosystem.
Yeah, and if you’re planning on accessing ‘the host system’ because you’ve multipurposed your machine, I would have expected setting up SSH to be one of the first things you did, in fact I would have expected that was done before installation of homeassistant.
Well, I guess that depends on what else you’re seeing. Is it only a couple of addons that you can’t get? If it’s several are they all the ones that you need advanced mode for? If so, then it looks like advanced mode hasn’t carried through for your user. If not, is there any other relation between the addons you can’t get? Or indeed the addons you can get? Etc
Normally adding SSH server is one of my pre-HA steps, but I was informed that this would not allow me to SSH into folders in the container, and that I should use the SSH add-on instead.
I see lots of available add-ons, just not SSH. (The original topic of this thread).
The only reason I got onto this tangent about supervised is because you asked if I was running supervised.
There was a discussion last May (you were there) that said that the main dev team wants to discontinue Home Assistant Supervised and the Supervisor service.
Let’s roll the clock back.
I have been happily running Home Assistant on an Intel NUC with Ubuntu for the past year. I am also running an NAS and a WikiMedia server on that NUC.
Recently, I am rudely reminded that Ubuntu is not supported. Rude in that I can’t update my HA or any add-ons because of Ubuntu.
So, I make the decision to change the OS to Debian. Installing HA on Debian went fairy easy because of the completeness of Snapshots. The pain is in migrating my MediaWiki server to Debian. (Database issues).
I know that you think running an Intel NUC for a single application is silly, but that is my new plan. I would rather run HA in its own dedicated NUC/Debian than go through the pain of moving all of the MediaWiki databases and image files. They will stay on the existing NUC/Ubuntu.
So, my migration to Debian is on hold until the new NUC arrives, then I will install Debian 10 Buster and HomeAssistant on that.
Whew!
There’s definitely a disconnect between what we’re talking about and I don’t know why, but ignoring most of your post and focusing on…
If you’re running a NUC for homeassistant only then the best option would be to use homeassistant OS.
Personally I would have saved the money, backed up the contents of your current NUC, installed proxmox on it, put homeassistant OS in one VM, and then restored your old nuc image to another VM - but it’s your money 
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I appreciate the dialog even though we have long passed up the original question.
“If you’re running a NUC for homeassistant only then the best option would be to use homeassistant OS.”
Why?
And how?
I originally installed Home Assistant following the tutorial by Jason Reibelt (Kanga_Who) titled “Home Assistant Supervised on Ubuntu 18.04.04”, dated May 28, 2020. But it was about the same time that Ubuntu was declared unacceptable. I missed that memo.
Is the image for Home Assistant at Generic x86-64 - Home Assistant
bootable? (I would assume that an image is bootable). Is it HassOS plus supervisor? The instructions at Generic x86-64 - Home Assistant stop at burning the SD card. It doesn’t mention that you can’t boot from the SD card on a NUC. You have to go through the BIOS to do that.
Or, is this guide still appropriate?
The reason I want to silo my Home Assistant apart from other functions on its own NUC is really that I want to isolate my MediaWiki. The last time I moved the MediaWiki database to a new server, it took me two days to get it completely working again. Moving Home Assistant is really painless- after deciding on which of five installation methods to use.
Because running homeassistant as an ‘appliance’ is exactly what homeassistant OS is designed for.
By following the NUC installation instructions (and, unless the doc has been fixed in the last couple of days, replace ‘SD’ with ‘SSD’ wherever it appears).
Thanks, that’s what I will do.
Will HomeAssistantOS have SSH access?
I use SSH to backup my snapshots, and to access my Node-Red log files.
It will if you can get the addon. We never got to the bottom of why you couldn’t get it this time but hopefully whatever it is will be negated by your fresh installation when the new hardware arrives.
Yes, using Debian 10 is still an approved installation method.
I will update this thread after the new hardware arrives and I install Debian and Home Assistant.
Your patience with me is appreciated.
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If you are running HA in docker, you can set the folders for snapshots and log files to be on the host’s filesystem, as it should be.
Then if you have SSH to the host, you have access to all the files. You can always use docker shell to access HA from the host SSH connection
UPDATE
The NUC instructions simply say to download the NUC image, then straight into configuring Home Assistant.
I flashed an SSD and tried to boot, but all the NUC would say is “nothing bootable found”. (The SSD thumbdrive is my first boot device in the BIOS).
Next step, install Debian.
UPDATE
Installed Debian, then Home Assistant.It went pretty well, but I may reinstall both because I was not too methodical in my installation process.
I never could boot from the NUC image of Home Assistant.
One weird thing noticed after the install. Supervisor-System Core shows the current version as “core-2021.2.3”
In the add-on store, the Z-Wave JS add-on won’t install:
“You are running Home Assistant 2021.2.3, to install this add-on you need at least version 2021.3.0b0 of Home Assistant”
This warning appears in a couple of add-ons, neither of which I plan to use, but it’s curious that an add-on wants a Home Assistant version that is not yet released.
Just regarding ssh…
You should be able to access the host on port 22 via open-ssh that is normally installed with Debian. I change that to a different port number BTW.
When you install the addon for ssh & web terminal from the community store, you would NOT set that to listed on port 22 as well… Pick something else for that. I use 622 for that one.
Putty, WinSCP etc will all work fine with both ssh’s installed.
Use the ssh on the host for debian updates etc and the ssh on the addon for using the HA cli etc…
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Hi @DavidFW1960,
I just migrated my Intel NUC to Debian 10 HA supervised install, no particular issues. I didn’t install openssh on Debian because I read it would lead to an “unsupported” status of HA, is this still true? Obviously I’d like to have ssh access to the debian os in order to properly maintain it. I’d like to maintain the “supported” status of the installation.
Thanks for any advice.
I threw my hands up from the incredible matrix of routes to install Home Assistant. I bought another NUC and installed HassOS. Done. Now, I dare HA to tell me that I am using an unapproved OS.
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