Why are people asking the same questions over and over again? (Or the Regulars' Chatroom) 🤷

[Mats789]

Probably for some but if someone, as I am, only are there from time to time, it’s just a mess of statements, questions and posts that is really difficult to follow. I have probably not understood the format

[petro]

It’s just a place to chat. Not a forum to have a long extended conversation over 20 days. Think IRQ or AOL instant messenger but everyone in one place.

[boheme61]

I actually only partly follow the beta-channel( even after i dropped out of beta-testing, to get pre-info, upon what’s to come.
Have Tapo-camera as-well in discord, and as it’s limited in both functions/features and users, it’s another “experience” , compared to walking into a clothes/jeans shop VS walking into a huge Shopping Mall

[Mats789]

@boheme61

I actually only partly follow the beta-channel( even after i dropped out of beta-testing, to get pre-info, upon what’s to come.

Same here, when I chime in it’s for this channel to be prepared for what I need to place attention to when I upgrade

[MissyQ (Missy Quarry)]

This is why Discord is my current focus. With 132k members, there is no denying it is a popular space for our community members to hang out. It’s just not very friendly to all types of community members and there are a lot of new community features Discord has introduced that aren’t utilized in that server currently. It will massively improve structure to implement some of those features which will help make the space more enjoyable and valuable to most members.

When I have a solid plan for what I want to do, I will be asking the Discord members their opinion on the changes. Depending on that, I may make adjustments to what I propose. This really isn’t a short process, folding in and considering community feedback is important, and I will have to do the same here on the forums. Discourse is a whole other beast, though.

[Sir_Goodenough ((SG) WhatAreWeFixing.Today)]

Thanks Missy for updating us!

Back to the task.
I know what is going to be said. This is not a cookbook entry, it is way too long, but this thread should be on everyone’s bookmark list.
The first 2 posts encompass the cookbook idea, even if the next 350 posts don’t…
The EPIC Time Conversion and Manipulation Thread! - #2 by finity.

[Stiltjack]

Added a link from the cookbook post.

[uSlackr (Greg Martin)]

Which is great, right!!!

[nickrout]

And tidied up my contribution, much tidier!

[PeteRage]

I think I’d ask this question (after reading and liking every post of this thread to get my stats up )

Why doesn’t a home automation system have out of the box capability to do light control (and account for all the nuances like doors that bounce, TOD constraints, luminance sensors, no trigger on door exit, etc) and have a UI to manage and view the performance of the light circuit (how long does it take for the light to actually turn on, what last triggered it, adjust the no occupancy timeout, etc.)

We’ve all built these from scratch. There’s a lot of ways to approach it. Lots of variation in posts.

[Sir_Goodenough ((SG) WhatAreWeFixing.Today)]

Because look at the blueprint for motion light that comes installed.
I’ve had more than half a dozen people try and fail to adjust that thing to get it to do the 1 extra thing. Any pre-canned thing you provide will be just a little wrong for half the people.

[PeteRage]

Exactly, the current solution doesn’t really work and is missing extensibility. That does not mean that there isn’t a solution. Just means HA doesn’t have it yet.

[Stiltjack]

@PeteRage

he current solution doesn’t really work and is missing extensibility.

Mine does. I don’t see the problem.

[parautenbach (Pieter Rautenbach)]

It’s all about the exceptions.

@PeteRage

doesn’t really work

@Sir_Goodenough

Any pre-canned thing you provide will be just a little wrong for half the people.

[langestefan (Stefan de Lange)]

That’s why I made the energy FAQ.

Mainly because I was getting tired of answering the same questions over and over again

[Stiltjack]

Added a link from the cookbook post.

[Sir_Goodenough ((SG) WhatAreWeFixing.Today)]

I like that.
Looks like it could be pulled into a community guide here as well. This should be able to handle the markdown.

I have many things I maintain on git and just copy the md file into here. When I edit them for my Blueprints and custom templates, the README is what I share in the forum.

The pictures have to be a global link so the forum can see them, but otherwise it just goes.

[Sir_Goodenough ((SG) WhatAreWeFixing.Today)]

Here’s one that maybe don’t fit, but maybe it does…
We have a search one, how about one to help them with discourse itself?
How to get the Certified Badge - community - Discourse Meta.
There is 2 courses people can take to learn the discourse tools. Hard to find, no one clicks on them on their first interaction when they do their first post, and after that you don’t know how to find them…

They came up in a convo about the strange badges discourse has and how many people have them. Well I have proof that I am certifiable because discobot tells me I and licensed and certified.

I’ll be glad to write something up if we agree it fits. I’m fine if not as well.

[tom_l]

I have another one for your cookbook.

I answer this question every couple of weeks:

How to use Utility Meter Tariffs to conditionally measure things

The Utility Meter integration is used to measure accumulating values like energy, gas, water, heating and more. You can apply a cycle to make it reset whenever you want. So, for example, you can make a daily energy meter from a sensor that always increases. You can also use the tariffs option to create multiple conditional sensors from the one utility meter. Every tariff you define gets its own sensor and you can automate when that sensor starts accumulating. This is a powerful tool allowing…

[parautenbach (Pieter Rautenbach)]

Another one from an answer Petro gave to me earlier. I knew some of it, but not all of it, and not as nicely put together as here to explain how template sensors will update:

Trigger-based template sensor using time_pattern not updating

FYI Templates will update once a minute if you have the following functions in the template: now() today_at() relative_time() Templates will update when a state changes if you use states.xxx.xxx states() states_attr() is_state() is_state_attr() expand() has_value() Templates will render at most once per second if you use states.<domain> Templates will render at most once per minute if you use the states object without specifying a domain or full entity_id, e.g. states