this post was submitted on 14 Jun 2023
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homeassistant

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Home Assistant is open source home automation that puts local control and privacy first. Powered by a worldwide community of tinkerers and DIY enthusiasts. Perfect to run on a Raspberry Pi or a local server. Available for free at home-assistant.io

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  • I have no garage door opener so I added a tag in my car to open the smart garage without having to open the app and fiddle with things.
  • I added a tag to our light switch that turns on our bedroom lamp (softer, more pleasant light at night).
  • I added a door tag to unlock the door (no information contained on the tag so nobody can break in).
  • I added a tag that pauses an automation at night so my stair lights don't come on with motion sensing.

This is literally just the tip of the iceberg. I think of a new one every couple hours. Anyone have any other cool ones to share?

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[–] [email protected] 11 points 1 year ago (2 children)

I started with NFC tags but whipping out my phone everytime I needed to scan a tag got annoying so I switched to bluetooth beacons. I have automations fired by button taps and proximity. MUCH easier and less hassle.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Definitely curious, how do you set these up and what do you recommend getting?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I don't want to make any specific recommendations but any ibeacon signal emitting BLE beacon works perfectly with HA's default bluetooth integration, Bluetooth Low Energy integration and ESPresense.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Can you use BLE for presense detection such that your phone is beaconing and when you enter an area an ESP32 (or something like it) picks it up? Or is this really only useful the other way where there's a beacon and some s/w on the phone picks it up?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

Using the phone as a beacon drains battery like stupid in my case. My ble ibeacons are tied to HA, I don't use the phone for any kind of beacon tx or rx.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

@bpnine you can definitely use it like that. Look at espresence.com for some examples or esphome.io Bluetooth low energy device. The first site has some good info. Not all phones / watches are compatible

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I've been thinking about getting into Bluetooth beacons lately. What kind are you using?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

Anything that broadcasts ibeacon format will work flawlessly in HA.