From 948f19db2fa3b5fc6823c6c78ba992037b2cf567 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001 From: Travis CI Date: Sat, 30 Apr 2016 11:27:37 +0000 Subject: [PATCH] Site updated at 2016-04-30 11:27:37 UTC --- atom.xml | 183 ++++++-- blog/2014/12/18/website-launched/index.html | 12 +- .../index.html | 12 +- .../index.html | 12 +- .../index.html | 12 +- blog/2015/01/13/nest-in-da-house/index.html | 12 +- blog/2015/01/24/release-notes/index.html | 12 +- .../2015/02/08/looking-at-the-past/index.html | 12 +- blog/2015/02/24/streaming-updates/index.html | 12 +- .../index.html | 12 +- blog/2015/03/08/new-logo/index.html | 12 +- blog/2015/03/11/release-notes/index.html | 12 +- blog/2015/03/22/release-notes/index.html | 12 +- blog/2015/04/25/release-notes/index.html | 12 +- .../05/09/utc-time-zone-awareness/index.html | 12 +- blog/2015/05/14/release-notes/index.html | 12 +- blog/2015/06/10/release-notes/index.html | 12 +- .../index.html | 12 +- .../index.html | 12 +- .../index.html | 12 +- .../index.html | 12 +- .../index.html | 12 +- .../index.html | 12 +- .../13/home-assistant-meets-ifttt/index.html | 12 +- .../index.html | 12 +- .../alarm-sonos-and-itunes-support/index.html | 12 +- .../index.html | 12 +- .../index.html | 12 +- .../index.html | 12 +- .../index.html | 12 +- .../index.html | 12 +- .../11/22/survey-november-2015/index.html | 12 +- .../12/05/community-highlights/index.html | 12 +- .../index.html | 12 +- .../12/07/influxdb-and-grafana/index.html | 12 +- .../index.html | 12 +- .../index.html | 12 +- .../index.html | 12 +- .../index.html | 12 +- .../index.html | 12 +- .../01/19/perfect-home-automation/index.html | 12 +- .../index.html | 12 +- .../index.html | 12 +- .../index.html | 12 +- .../index.html | 12 +- .../multi-room-audio-with-snapcast/index.html | 12 +- .../02/20/community-highlights/index.html | 12 +- .../index.html | 12 +- .../index.html | 12 +- .../index.html | 12 +- .../index.html | 12 +- blog/2016/04/07/static-website/index.html | 8 +- .../index.html | 12 +- .../04/17/updated-documentation/index.html | 12 +- .../04/19/to-infinity-and-beyond/index.html | 12 +- .../index.html | 12 +- .../index.html | 391 ++++++++++++++++++ blog/archives/index.html | 48 ++- blog/categories/community/atom.xml | 2 +- blog/categories/community/index.html | 12 +- blog/categories/esp8266/atom.xml | 2 +- blog/categories/esp8266/index.html | 12 +- blog/categories/how-to/atom.xml | 2 +- blog/categories/how-to/index.html | 12 +- blog/categories/ibeacons/atom.xml | 155 +++++++ blog/categories/ibeacons/index.html | 278 +++++++++++++ blog/categories/internet-of-things/atom.xml | 2 +- blog/categories/internet-of-things/index.html | 12 +- blog/categories/mqtt/atom.xml | 2 +- blog/categories/mqtt/index.html | 12 +- blog/categories/organisation/atom.xml | 2 +- blog/categories/organisation/index.html | 12 +- blog/categories/owntracks/atom.xml | 155 +++++++ blog/categories/owntracks/index.html | 278 +++++++++++++ blog/categories/presence-detection/atom.xml | 155 +++++++ blog/categories/presence-detection/index.html | 278 +++++++++++++ .../public-service-announcement/atom.xml | 2 +- .../public-service-announcement/index.html | 12 +- blog/categories/release-notes/atom.xml | 2 +- blog/categories/release-notes/index.html | 12 +- blog/categories/survey/atom.xml | 2 +- blog/categories/survey/index.html | 12 +- blog/categories/user-stories/atom.xml | 2 +- blog/categories/user-stories/index.html | 12 +- blog/categories/website/atom.xml | 2 +- blog/categories/website/index.html | 12 +- blog/index.html | 155 +++---- blog/posts/2/index.html | 148 ++++--- blog/posts/3/index.html | 128 +++--- blog/posts/4/index.html | 133 +++--- blog/posts/5/index.html | 126 +++--- blog/posts/6/index.html | 70 ++++ .../owntracks_beacon_setup.png | Bin 0 -> 124399 bytes .../2016-04-ibeacons/owntracks_red_beacon.png | Bin 0 -> 76480 bytes sitemap.xml | 24 +- 95 files changed, 2726 insertions(+), 789 deletions(-) create mode 100644 blog/2016/04/30/ibeacons-part-1-making-presence-detection-work-better/index.html create mode 100644 blog/categories/ibeacons/atom.xml create mode 100644 blog/categories/ibeacons/index.html create mode 100644 blog/categories/owntracks/atom.xml create mode 100644 blog/categories/owntracks/index.html create mode 100644 blog/categories/presence-detection/atom.xml create mode 100644 blog/categories/presence-detection/index.html create mode 100644 images/blog/2016-04-ibeacons/owntracks_beacon_setup.png create mode 100644 images/blog/2016-04-ibeacons/owntracks_red_beacon.png diff --git a/atom.xml b/atom.xml index 0c500877d8..132646fbc4 100644 --- a/atom.xml +++ b/atom.xml @@ -4,7 +4,7 @@ <![CDATA[Home Assistant]]> - 2016-04-30T11:04:27+00:00 + 2016-04-30T11:26:57+00:00 https://home-assistant.io/ @@ -13,6 +13,145 @@ Octopress + + <![CDATA[iBeacons: Making presence detection work better (part I)]]> + + 2016-04-30T06:50:09+00:00 + https://home-assistant.io/blog/2016/04/30/ibeacons-part-1-making-presence-detection-work-better + This is a guest post by Home Assistant contributor Greg Dowling.

+ +

In 2013 Apple introduced iBeacons: a class of Bluetooth low energy (LE) devices that broadcast their identifier to nearby devices, including most smartphones. At first glance it’s hard to imagine why they might be useful. In this two part blog I’ll try and explain why they are useful and how you can use them with Home Assistant.

+ +

The reason I started using iBeacons was to improve presence detection (and I think that’s the case with most people) so that’s what I’ll discuss in part 1. In part 2 I’ll talk about using iBeacons to track devices that can’t track themselves.

+ +

Using beacons to improve OwnTracks location data

+ +

When you use OwnTracks in standard major move mode (which is kind to your phone battery) it sometimes fails to update when you’d like it to. In my case I found that it would often send a location update as I was on my way home, but then not update when I got home. The result would be that Home Assistant would think I was 500M away from home, and take quite a while to notice I was home. It would also mean that the automation that should turn on my lights when I got home didn’t work very well! There were a few times when my phone location updated at 2am and turned the lights on for me. Fortunately my wife is very patient!

+ +

Luckily, OwnTracks supports iBeacons so I could use them to make presence detection more reliable. When OwnTracks sees a beacon it recognises, it will send an update. This means that if you put a beacon at your front door - OwnTracks will see it within a few seconds of you arriving home - and send an update saying it has seen this iBeacon.

+ + + +

Getting Started

+ +

To do this you first need to set up MQTT and OwnTracks in Home assistant - and make sure that HA can track your phone.

+ +

You then have to (A) tell Home Assistant where the beacon is located and (B) tell OwnTracks to recognise the beacon.

+ +

A. Tell Home Assistant where your beacon is located

+ +

You tell HomeAssistant about fixed locations by creating a Zone with the longitude and latitude of your beacon. You should also give the zone a name which you will also use when you set up OwnTracks. An an example this zone specifies the location of my where my drive way.

+ +

Example configuration.yaml entry

+ +
+ 
+zone:
+    - name: 'Drive'
+      latitude: XXX
+      longitude: YYY
+      radius: 100
+
+
+
+ +

The radius isn’t used by the beacon code, but it is used by the GPS location sensing code. I’ll come back to this a little later. For now just use 50 or 100.

+ +

Once you’ve created the zone - you need to restart HA. The next step is:-

+ +

B. Tell OwnTracks to track your beacon

+ +
    +
  1. Go to the OwnTracks app on your phone
    2. +
  2. Touch the Regions menu at the bottom of the screen
    3. +
  3. Touch the + symbol at the top right of the screen
    4. +
  4. Give the beacon a name e.g. -drive ’(start the name with a - see below for the reason)
    5. +
  5. Turn Share to On
    6. +
  6. Skip the Circular Region section
    7. +
  7. Enter the UUID of your beacon - this may be written on your beacon - or you can copy it from the management app that came with your iBeacon device. It’s a long number – so it’s easier to copy if you can!
    8. +
  8. Enter the Minor and Major numbers for your iBeacon - or leave them at 0 which will match all beacons with that UUID
    9. +
+ +

+ +

+ +

Once you’ve added the iBeacon - you should be able to see it on the OwnTracks region screen. If your phone can see the packets from that beacon, OwnTracks will turn the relevant Region red.

+ +

+ +

+ +

When OwnTracks sees the beacon (and turns the region red), it also sends an MQTT packet to HA to say that you have entered that region.

+ +

The result of the configuration above would be to set the location of device.phone to Drive , (and the GPS location to XXX,YYY) when your phone sees the beacon.

+ +

So with the steps above you should be able to improve the reliability of tracking your phone - and send timely updates to HA. I did this for my home - and the lights now turn on before I reach the house on foot. If I arrive by car they turn on within a few seconds of arriving, before I can get to the front door.

+ +

I’m also pleased to say I no longer get an arrive home event at 2am that turns the lights on. I hope I’ve convinced you that iBeacons are worth trying!

+ +

Mixing Beacons and GPS locations

+ +

You will probably use beacons to make entry into your existing GPS zones more reliable. By default either a beacon or a GPS location can cause you to enter a zone - and HA has some logic that should make them two work well together (it ignores GPS updates when you’re in an iBeacon Zone).

+ +

However you can also use beacons for situations where GPS doesn’t work well.

+ +

This might be because the zones are too close together - or even on top of each other!
+For example, my wife works next door - and I couldn’t detect whether she’s at home or in the office via GPS because the accuracy wasn’t high enough. However I can do this by using two beacons.

+ +

To make this type of presence detection work you need to turn GPS off for a zone in Home Assistant by making them passive. This is important because otherwise HA will try to decide between two close together zones without enough data. This doesn’t work well.

+ +

A passive zone can only be entered via an iBeacon, so a GPS location update will always pick the other zone.

+ +

I set up my Home zone to be a standard region, and my office zone to be passive, so the home zone can be entered in the normal way via either GPS or a Beacon.

+ +

Example configuration.yaml entry

+ +
+ 
+zone:
+    - name: 'Office'
+      latitude: XXX
+      longitude: YYY
+      radius: 3
+      passive: true
+
+
+
+ +

You could use this technique to try to detect which room someone is in. This might allow you to notice whether someone is in the living room or the bedroom - even though one is above the other (although beacon packets do pass through walls and floors).

+ +

To get this to work you’ll probably need to experiment with the beacon signal strength to try to match the beacon reception area to the location you want to track. Let me know if you get this to work (it doesn’t make sense in my open plan house)

+ +

Conclusion

+ +

Presence tracking sounds easy - and it’s an important part of Home Automation. Trying it shows how difficult it is to get presence detection right. I’ve found that iBeacons have improved the reliability and timeliness of knowing where I am, and I hope I encouraged you to try them too.

+ +

Tips

+ +

You can find out more about configuring the OwnTracks application and beacons here

+ +

There is information about configuring Homeassistant to use beacons here

+ +

Connections and disconnecting

+ +

Owntracks treats a region name with a leading - as a hint that it shouldn’t disconnect after a single missed packet. This improves the ability to keep a connection to a beacon.

+ +

However, even when using this feature I’ve noticed that you can still lose connections (although it seems to vary by beacon manufacturer and type - I’ll talk more about this in part 2). This means that it’s best to take into account that you may see false enter/leave events in HA. You may be able to improve this by changing how often the beacons send packets - and by increasing the signal strength (both will drain your beacon batteries more quickly). You can usually change these parameters in the app supplied by the iBeacon maker. You can also find some high power beacons (which have worked well for me).

+ +

In automations you can use a for: to avoid triggering during a brief disconnect, or use a script with a delay. Stay tuned for part 2 for an example of this.

+ +

Using Multiple beacons for the same Zone

+

iBeacons have a UUID (usually set to the same value for beacons from the same manufacturer), as well as a minor and major number. If you set two beacons to have exactly same details then OwnTracks will think multiple beacons are at the same location.

+ +

This means you can have more than one beacon around your home - and a connection to any of them will count as home to OwnTracks and HA. This reduces disconnections.

+ +

You can achieve the same effect by using the same the same UUID but different major / minor numbers - and tell OwnTracks not to worry about the minor / major numbers for a particular region by setting them to 0).

+ +

Stay tuned for part II where I’ll talk about how to use iBeacons to track any object.

+]]> + + <![CDATA[0.18: Bluetooth, LG WebOS TVs and Roombas.]]> @@ -1359,48 +1498,6 @@ sudo docker run -it --rm -p 443:443 -p 80:80 --name letsencrypt \

Big thanks to Fabian Affolter for his help and feedback on this article.

-]]> - - - - <![CDATA[[Update: decision reversed!] Philips Hue blocks 3rd party lights]]> - - 2015-12-12T18:44:00+00:00 - https://home-assistant.io/blog/2015/12/12/philips-hue-blocks-3rd-party-bulbs - Update Dec 16: Great news! Philips has decided to reverse their decision and is working on a software update to allow 3rd party light bulbs again.

- -

- -Philips Hue FAQ entries regarding reversing the decision. -

- -

Original post:

- - -

Philips Hue was one of the first to get smart lights accepted by the mainstream. Their Zigbee-based hub is rock solid, never crashes, great API and worked with other Zigbee light bulbs too. They are a bit expensive but the platform was worth every penny, till now.

- -

Yesterday a thread on /r/homeautomation published that Philips Hue now blocks all but their own bulbs and those of “friends of Hue”. I have been able to confirm this in the Philips Hue FAQ (Update Dec 14: they have removed the entries - mirror here):

- -

- -Philips Hue FAQ entries regarding 3rd party light bulbs. -

- -

This means that after you update your Hue bridge to the latest version:

- -
    -
  • As of now, you can still use your existing paired 3rd party light bulbs
    • -
  • You cannot pair new 3rd party light bulbs
    • -
  • You’re out of luck if for some reason you have to pair existing 3rd party light bulbs again
    • -
  • Resetting your hub will force pairing of all your bulbs again
    • -
- -

If you own a Philips Hue hub and are using 3rd party light bulbs, make sure you do not upgrade your hub if you want to be able to pair new 3rd party lightbulbs. But do realize that you are sitting on a ticking time bomb.

- -

I have read, but have been unable to confirm it, that resetting your hub will force a software upgrade. So beware of that too.

- -

I will no longer suggest people to buy into the Philips Hue ecosystem.

- ]]> diff --git a/blog/2014/12/18/website-launched/index.html b/blog/2014/12/18/website-launched/index.html index 9740d7fe7e..d4a016f5f8 100644 --- a/blog/2014/12/18/website-launched/index.html +++ b/blog/2014/12/18/website-launched/index.html @@ -179,6 +179,12 @@ diff --git a/blog/2014/12/26/home-control-home-automation-and-the-smart-home/index.html b/blog/2014/12/26/home-control-home-automation-and-the-smart-home/index.html index 1c41f69e38..18cb3b2c1f 100644 --- a/blog/2014/12/26/home-control-home-automation-and-the-smart-home/index.html +++ b/blog/2014/12/26/home-control-home-automation-and-the-smart-home/index.html @@ -234,6 +234,12 @@ This article will try to explain how they all relate.

diff --git a/blog/2015/01/04/hey-pushbullet-nice-talking-to-you/index.html b/blog/2015/01/04/hey-pushbullet-nice-talking-to-you/index.html index 295cd4e1d7..a471b447c7 100644 --- a/blog/2015/01/04/hey-pushbullet-nice-talking-to-you/index.html +++ b/blog/2015/01/04/hey-pushbullet-nice-talking-to-you/index.html @@ -218,6 +218,12 @@ api_key=ABCDEFGHJKLMNOPQRSTUVXYZ diff --git a/blog/2015/01/11/bootstrapping-your-setup-with-discovery/index.html b/blog/2015/01/11/bootstrapping-your-setup-with-discovery/index.html index bdb2800dff..589f169853 100644 --- a/blog/2015/01/11/bootstrapping-your-setup-with-discovery/index.html +++ b/blog/2015/01/11/bootstrapping-your-setup-with-discovery/index.html @@ -193,6 +193,12 @@ diff --git a/blog/2015/01/13/nest-in-da-house/index.html b/blog/2015/01/13/nest-in-da-house/index.html index c7d47789a2..0ace217950 100644 --- a/blog/2015/01/13/nest-in-da-house/index.html +++ b/blog/2015/01/13/nest-in-da-house/index.html @@ -196,6 +196,12 @@ password=YOUR_PASSWORD diff --git a/blog/2015/01/24/release-notes/index.html b/blog/2015/01/24/release-notes/index.html index 62a76c95e1..63a99b3792 100644 --- a/blog/2015/01/24/release-notes/index.html +++ b/blog/2015/01/24/release-notes/index.html @@ -202,6 +202,12 @@ Home Assistant now supports --open-ui and --demo-mode diff --git a/blog/2015/02/08/looking-at-the-past/index.html b/blog/2015/02/08/looking-at-the-past/index.html index d032f9af6a..020911066b 100644 --- a/blog/2015/02/08/looking-at-the-past/index.html +++ b/blog/2015/02/08/looking-at-the-past/index.html @@ -210,6 +210,12 @@ Events are saved in a local database. Google Graphs is used to draw the graph. D diff --git a/blog/2015/02/24/streaming-updates/index.html b/blog/2015/02/24/streaming-updates/index.html index a9e45e5091..467f0db846 100644 --- a/blog/2015/02/24/streaming-updates/index.html +++ b/blog/2015/02/24/streaming-updates/index.html @@ -195,6 +195,12 @@ diff --git a/blog/2015/03/01/home-assistant-migrating-to-yaml/index.html b/blog/2015/03/01/home-assistant-migrating-to-yaml/index.html index 60bf98a2c4..06168db032 100644 --- a/blog/2015/03/01/home-assistant-migrating-to-yaml/index.html +++ b/blog/2015/03/01/home-assistant-migrating-to-yaml/index.html @@ -185,6 +185,12 @@ diff --git a/blog/2015/03/08/new-logo/index.html b/blog/2015/03/08/new-logo/index.html index e361f4213a..3d2d94a2cb 100644 --- a/blog/2015/03/08/new-logo/index.html +++ b/blog/2015/03/08/new-logo/index.html @@ -186,6 +186,12 @@ The old logo, the new detailed logo and the new simple logo. diff --git a/blog/2015/03/11/release-notes/index.html b/blog/2015/03/11/release-notes/index.html index a59ce479df..a0e6a37537 100644 --- a/blog/2015/03/11/release-notes/index.html +++ b/blog/2015/03/11/release-notes/index.html @@ -225,6 +225,12 @@ An initial version of voice control for Home Assistant has landed. The current i diff --git a/blog/2015/03/22/release-notes/index.html b/blog/2015/03/22/release-notes/index.html index 7e7e4ece8f..bb9ef543a7 100644 --- a/blog/2015/03/22/release-notes/index.html +++ b/blog/2015/03/22/release-notes/index.html @@ -262,6 +262,12 @@ I (Paulus) have contributed a scene component. A user can create scenes that cap diff --git a/blog/2015/04/25/release-notes/index.html b/blog/2015/04/25/release-notes/index.html index e69c9a1bf7..599c25f70d 100644 --- a/blog/2015/04/25/release-notes/index.html +++ b/blog/2015/04/25/release-notes/index.html @@ -273,6 +273,12 @@ diff --git a/blog/2015/05/09/utc-time-zone-awareness/index.html b/blog/2015/05/09/utc-time-zone-awareness/index.html index 61383ba635..c7473c4a1d 100644 --- a/blog/2015/05/09/utc-time-zone-awareness/index.html +++ b/blog/2015/05/09/utc-time-zone-awareness/index.html @@ -208,6 +208,12 @@ diff --git a/blog/2015/05/14/release-notes/index.html b/blog/2015/05/14/release-notes/index.html index fddc792102..36a03886cd 100644 --- a/blog/2015/05/14/release-notes/index.html +++ b/blog/2015/05/14/release-notes/index.html @@ -300,6 +300,12 @@ Before diving into the newly supported devices and services, I want to highlight diff --git a/blog/2015/06/10/release-notes/index.html b/blog/2015/06/10/release-notes/index.html index f346ffe50e..53656c8a04 100644 --- a/blog/2015/06/10/release-notes/index.html +++ b/blog/2015/06/10/release-notes/index.html @@ -353,6 +353,12 @@ This switch platform allows you to control your motion detection setting on your diff --git a/blog/2015/07/11/ip-cameras-arduino-kodi-efergy-support/index.html b/blog/2015/07/11/ip-cameras-arduino-kodi-efergy-support/index.html index ff8faa529b..2a98251f44 100644 --- a/blog/2015/07/11/ip-cameras-arduino-kodi-efergy-support/index.html +++ b/blog/2015/07/11/ip-cameras-arduino-kodi-efergy-support/index.html @@ -305,6 +305,12 @@ Fabian has added support for Forecast.io to g diff --git a/blog/2015/08/09/mqtt-raspberry-pi-squeezebox-asuswrt-support/index.html b/blog/2015/08/09/mqtt-raspberry-pi-squeezebox-asuswrt-support/index.html index f40e5f048e..4786e73a67 100644 --- a/blog/2015/08/09/mqtt-raspberry-pi-squeezebox-asuswrt-support/index.html +++ b/blog/2015/08/09/mqtt-raspberry-pi-squeezebox-asuswrt-support/index.html @@ -294,6 +294,12 @@ Support for Temper temperature sensors has been contributed by +
  • + iBeacons: Making presence detection work better (part I) +
    • + + +
  • 0.18: Bluetooth, LG WebOS TVs and Roombas.
    • @@ -317,12 +323,6 @@ Support for Temper temperature sensors has been contributed by - Static website - - - diff --git a/blog/2015/08/17/verisure-and-modern-tp-link-router-support/index.html b/blog/2015/08/17/verisure-and-modern-tp-link-router-support/index.html index fda7183b59..8e1a9eff96 100644 --- a/blog/2015/08/17/verisure-and-modern-tp-link-router-support/index.html +++ b/blog/2015/08/17/verisure-and-modern-tp-link-router-support/index.html @@ -204,6 +204,12 @@ diff --git a/blog/2015/08/26/laundry-automation-with-moteino-mqtt-and-home-assistant/index.html b/blog/2015/08/26/laundry-automation-with-moteino-mqtt-and-home-assistant/index.html index 61de75ccc4..940424c3cb 100644 --- a/blog/2015/08/26/laundry-automation-with-moteino-mqtt-and-home-assistant/index.html +++ b/blog/2015/08/26/laundry-automation-with-moteino-mqtt-and-home-assistant/index.html @@ -317,6 +317,12 @@ The automation and script syntax here is using a deprecated and no longer suppor diff --git a/blog/2015/08/31/version-7-revamped-ui-and-improved-distribution/index.html b/blog/2015/08/31/version-7-revamped-ui-and-improved-distribution/index.html index 7b18803fcb..55a020b9c8 100644 --- a/blog/2015/08/31/version-7-revamped-ui-and-improved-distribution/index.html +++ b/blog/2015/08/31/version-7-revamped-ui-and-improved-distribution/index.html @@ -291,6 +291,12 @@ diff --git a/blog/2015/09/11/different-ways-to-use-mqtt-with-home-assistant/index.html b/blog/2015/09/11/different-ways-to-use-mqtt-with-home-assistant/index.html index 39e827090d..ee2724c90d 100644 --- a/blog/2015/09/11/different-ways-to-use-mqtt-with-home-assistant/index.html +++ b/blog/2015/09/11/different-ways-to-use-mqtt-with-home-assistant/index.html @@ -494,6 +494,12 @@ PubSubClient client(ethClient); diff --git a/blog/2015/09/13/home-assistant-meets-ifttt/index.html b/blog/2015/09/13/home-assistant-meets-ifttt/index.html index 9532fde716..91d9b11b9b 100644 --- a/blog/2015/09/13/home-assistant-meets-ifttt/index.html +++ b/blog/2015/09/13/home-assistant-meets-ifttt/index.html @@ -353,6 +353,12 @@ diff --git a/blog/2015/09/18/monitoring-with-glances-and-home-assistant/index.html b/blog/2015/09/18/monitoring-with-glances-and-home-assistant/index.html index 70b6385084..4762aaa67c 100644 --- a/blog/2015/09/18/monitoring-with-glances-and-home-assistant/index.html +++ b/blog/2015/09/18/monitoring-with-glances-and-home-assistant/index.html @@ -254,6 +254,12 @@ Glances web server started on http://0.0.0.0:61208/ diff --git a/blog/2015/09/19/alarm-sonos-and-itunes-support/index.html b/blog/2015/09/19/alarm-sonos-and-itunes-support/index.html index 3d7a6d05c1..3f4b2d7d9d 100644 --- a/blog/2015/09/19/alarm-sonos-and-itunes-support/index.html +++ b/blog/2015/09/19/alarm-sonos-and-itunes-support/index.html @@ -233,6 +233,12 @@ Automation has gotten a lot of love. It now supports conditions, multiple trigge diff --git a/blog/2015/10/05/home-assistant-goes-geo-with-owntracks/index.html b/blog/2015/10/05/home-assistant-goes-geo-with-owntracks/index.html index 6df8e399dd..df358e98ef 100644 --- a/blog/2015/10/05/home-assistant-goes-geo-with-owntracks/index.html +++ b/blog/2015/10/05/home-assistant-goes-geo-with-owntracks/index.html @@ -209,6 +209,12 @@ Map in Home Assistant showing two people and three zones (home, school, work) diff --git a/blog/2015/10/11/measure-temperature-with-esp8266-and-report-to-mqtt/index.html b/blog/2015/10/11/measure-temperature-with-esp8266-and-report-to-mqtt/index.html index 47f0fa9fab..fc60e54f81 100644 --- a/blog/2015/10/11/measure-temperature-with-esp8266-and-report-to-mqtt/index.html +++ b/blog/2015/10/11/measure-temperature-with-esp8266-and-report-to-mqtt/index.html @@ -540,6 +540,12 @@ Adafruit_HDC1000 hdc = Adafruit_HDC1000(); diff --git a/blog/2015/10/11/rfxtrx-blinkstick-and-snmp-support/index.html b/blog/2015/10/11/rfxtrx-blinkstick-and-snmp-support/index.html index 35f8b1416f..fd7e394e63 100644 --- a/blog/2015/10/11/rfxtrx-blinkstick-and-snmp-support/index.html +++ b/blog/2015/10/11/rfxtrx-blinkstick-and-snmp-support/index.html @@ -198,6 +198,12 @@ diff --git a/blog/2015/10/26/firetv-and-radiotherm-now-supported/index.html b/blog/2015/10/26/firetv-and-radiotherm-now-supported/index.html index 61d0615c32..eca92dec9b 100644 --- a/blog/2015/10/26/firetv-and-radiotherm-now-supported/index.html +++ b/blog/2015/10/26/firetv-and-radiotherm-now-supported/index.html @@ -220,6 +220,12 @@ This makes more sense as most people run Home Assistant as a daemon

    diff --git a/blog/2015/11/16/zwave-switches-lights-and-honeywell-thermostats-now-supported/index.html b/blog/2015/11/16/zwave-switches-lights-and-honeywell-thermostats-now-supported/index.html index 4f4b5665b7..15742c7ef6 100644 --- a/blog/2015/11/16/zwave-switches-lights-and-honeywell-thermostats-now-supported/index.html +++ b/blog/2015/11/16/zwave-switches-lights-and-honeywell-thermostats-now-supported/index.html @@ -216,6 +216,12 @@ diff --git a/blog/2015/11/22/survey-november-2015/index.html b/blog/2015/11/22/survey-november-2015/index.html index c96a9691e9..4f1e5ed62c 100644 --- a/blog/2015/11/22/survey-november-2015/index.html +++ b/blog/2015/11/22/survey-november-2015/index.html @@ -256,6 +256,12 @@ diff --git a/blog/2015/12/05/community-highlights/index.html b/blog/2015/12/05/community-highlights/index.html index ce28158f28..d74a934a30 100644 --- a/blog/2015/12/05/community-highlights/index.html +++ b/blog/2015/12/05/community-highlights/index.html @@ -189,6 +189,12 @@ diff --git a/blog/2015/12/06/locks-rollershutters-binary-sensors-and-influxdb-support/index.html b/blog/2015/12/06/locks-rollershutters-binary-sensors-and-influxdb-support/index.html index 91d3701f83..ab727fc23c 100644 --- a/blog/2015/12/06/locks-rollershutters-binary-sensors-and-influxdb-support/index.html +++ b/blog/2015/12/06/locks-rollershutters-binary-sensors-and-influxdb-support/index.html @@ -198,6 +198,12 @@ diff --git a/blog/2015/12/07/influxdb-and-grafana/index.html b/blog/2015/12/07/influxdb-and-grafana/index.html index 847ec730d6..c646878a45 100644 --- a/blog/2015/12/07/influxdb-and-grafana/index.html +++ b/blog/2015/12/07/influxdb-and-grafana/index.html @@ -289,6 +289,12 @@ $ sudo systemctl status grafana-server diff --git a/blog/2015/12/10/activating-tasker-tasks-from-home-assistant-using-command-line-switches/index.html b/blog/2015/12/10/activating-tasker-tasks-from-home-assistant-using-command-line-switches/index.html index b39bb2d396..c2640059f9 100644 --- a/blog/2015/12/10/activating-tasker-tasks-from-home-assistant-using-command-line-switches/index.html +++ b/blog/2015/12/10/activating-tasker-tasks-from-home-assistant-using-command-line-switches/index.html @@ -239,6 +239,12 @@ requests.get(' +
  • + iBeacons: Making presence detection work better (part I) +
    • + + +
  • 0.18: Bluetooth, LG WebOS TVs and Roombas.
    • @@ -262,12 +268,6 @@ requests.get(' - Static website - - - diff --git a/blog/2015/12/12/philips-hue-blocks-3rd-party-bulbs/index.html b/blog/2015/12/12/philips-hue-blocks-3rd-party-bulbs/index.html index 2ded56adad..ae23a73237 100644 --- a/blog/2015/12/12/philips-hue-blocks-3rd-party-bulbs/index.html +++ b/blog/2015/12/12/philips-hue-blocks-3rd-party-bulbs/index.html @@ -211,6 +211,12 @@ Philips Hue FAQ entries regarding 3rd party light bulbs. diff --git a/blog/2015/12/13/setup-encryption-using-lets-encrypt/index.html b/blog/2015/12/13/setup-encryption-using-lets-encrypt/index.html index 5c31f25f7e..33087dc563 100644 --- a/blog/2015/12/13/setup-encryption-using-lets-encrypt/index.html +++ b/blog/2015/12/13/setup-encryption-using-lets-encrypt/index.html @@ -276,6 +276,12 @@ sudo docker run -it --rm -p 443:443 -p 80:80 --name letsencrypt \ diff --git a/blog/2015/12/22/amazon-echo-icloud-and-templates/index.html b/blog/2015/12/22/amazon-echo-icloud-and-templates/index.html index 4e3cd53609..86b082e3fc 100644 --- a/blog/2015/12/22/amazon-echo-icloud-and-templates/index.html +++ b/blog/2015/12/22/amazon-echo-icloud-and-templates/index.html @@ -232,6 +232,12 @@ diff --git a/blog/2016/01/17/extended-support-for-diy-solutions/index.html b/blog/2016/01/17/extended-support-for-diy-solutions/index.html index 7ffcf76525..833bf660c5 100644 --- a/blog/2016/01/17/extended-support-for-diy-solutions/index.html +++ b/blog/2016/01/17/extended-support-for-diy-solutions/index.html @@ -212,6 +212,12 @@ diff --git a/blog/2016/01/19/perfect-home-automation/index.html b/blog/2016/01/19/perfect-home-automation/index.html index 53d9191382..e2e72a455f 100644 --- a/blog/2016/01/19/perfect-home-automation/index.html +++ b/blog/2016/01/19/perfect-home-automation/index.html @@ -216,6 +216,12 @@ diff --git a/blog/2016/01/30/insteon-lifx-twitter-and-zigbee/index.html b/blog/2016/01/30/insteon-lifx-twitter-and-zigbee/index.html index 5d815b7fe9..02a4ee720d 100644 --- a/blog/2016/01/30/insteon-lifx-twitter-and-zigbee/index.html +++ b/blog/2016/01/30/insteon-lifx-twitter-and-zigbee/index.html @@ -218,6 +218,12 @@ Example of the new views in the frontend. Learn mor diff --git a/blog/2016/02/09/smarter-smart-things-with-mqtt-and-home-assistant/index.html b/blog/2016/02/09/smarter-smart-things-with-mqtt-and-home-assistant/index.html index 451b4c937b..59c861b442 100644 --- a/blog/2016/02/09/smarter-smart-things-with-mqtt-and-home-assistant/index.html +++ b/blog/2016/02/09/smarter-smart-things-with-mqtt-and-home-assistant/index.html @@ -405,6 +405,12 @@ Z-Wave light bulb | diff --git a/blog/2016/02/12/classifying-the-internet-of-things/index.html b/blog/2016/02/12/classifying-the-internet-of-things/index.html index c2a959a9cb..8495a50c27 100644 --- a/blog/2016/02/12/classifying-the-internet-of-things/index.html +++ b/blog/2016/02/12/classifying-the-internet-of-things/index.html @@ -355,6 +355,12 @@ diff --git a/blog/2016/02/13/speedtest-bloomsky-splunk-and-garage-doors/index.html b/blog/2016/02/13/speedtest-bloomsky-splunk-and-garage-doors/index.html index e936b78f71..807bd9bc6c 100644 --- a/blog/2016/02/13/speedtest-bloomsky-splunk-and-garage-doors/index.html +++ b/blog/2016/02/13/speedtest-bloomsky-splunk-and-garage-doors/index.html @@ -221,6 +221,12 @@ diff --git a/blog/2016/02/18/multi-room-audio-with-snapcast/index.html b/blog/2016/02/18/multi-room-audio-with-snapcast/index.html index fc471f3927..d2f9c8c231 100644 --- a/blog/2016/02/18/multi-room-audio-with-snapcast/index.html +++ b/blog/2016/02/18/multi-room-audio-with-snapcast/index.html @@ -323,6 +323,12 @@ output = audioresample ! audio/x-raw,rate=48000,channels=2,format=S16LE ! audioc diff --git a/blog/2016/02/20/community-highlights/index.html b/blog/2016/02/20/community-highlights/index.html index 3ec3f7bf2d..5cb58cf636 100644 --- a/blog/2016/02/20/community-highlights/index.html +++ b/blog/2016/02/20/community-highlights/index.html @@ -229,6 +229,12 @@ Hold your NFC tag against the belly of Garfield to unlock the alarm. diff --git a/blog/2016/02/27/steam-d-link-smart-plugs-and-neurio-energy-sensors/index.html b/blog/2016/02/27/steam-d-link-smart-plugs-and-neurio-energy-sensors/index.html index 7b22e9bb00..8941e24740 100644 --- a/blog/2016/02/27/steam-d-link-smart-plugs-and-neurio-energy-sensors/index.html +++ b/blog/2016/02/27/steam-d-link-smart-plugs-and-neurio-energy-sensors/index.html @@ -220,6 +220,12 @@ diff --git a/blog/2016/03/12/z-wave-pep257-templated-service-calls/index.html b/blog/2016/03/12/z-wave-pep257-templated-service-calls/index.html index 11092b808b..96fce2acc6 100644 --- a/blog/2016/03/12/z-wave-pep257-templated-service-calls/index.html +++ b/blog/2016/03/12/z-wave-pep257-templated-service-calls/index.html @@ -226,6 +226,12 @@ player state attributes. This change affects automations, scripts and scenes. +
  • + iBeacons: Making presence detection work better (part I) +
    • + + +
  • 0.18: Bluetooth, LG WebOS TVs and Roombas.
    • @@ -249,12 +255,6 @@ player state attributes. This change affects automations, scripts and scenes. - -
  • - Static website -
    • - - diff --git a/blog/2016/03/26/embedded-mqtt-broker-uber-yamaha-growl/index.html b/blog/2016/03/26/embedded-mqtt-broker-uber-yamaha-growl/index.html index 35d83f9658..a789b0380e 100644 --- a/blog/2016/03/26/embedded-mqtt-broker-uber-yamaha-growl/index.html +++ b/blog/2016/03/26/embedded-mqtt-broker-uber-yamaha-growl/index.html @@ -237,6 +237,12 @@ diff --git a/blog/2016/04/05/your-hub-should-be-local-and-open/index.html b/blog/2016/04/05/your-hub-should-be-local-and-open/index.html index ac5cce2a92..04d1fc6ab8 100644 --- a/blog/2016/04/05/your-hub-should-be-local-and-open/index.html +++ b/blog/2016/04/05/your-hub-should-be-local-and-open/index.html @@ -189,6 +189,12 @@ diff --git a/blog/2016/04/07/static-website/index.html b/blog/2016/04/07/static-website/index.html index 65043e1b0a..743c1e0ea6 100644 --- a/blog/2016/04/07/static-website/index.html +++ b/blog/2016/04/07/static-website/index.html @@ -195,6 +195,12 @@ diff --git a/blog/2016/04/09/onkyo-panasonic-gtfs-and-config-validation/index.html b/blog/2016/04/09/onkyo-panasonic-gtfs-and-config-validation/index.html index f5788a9d56..49ab980361 100644 --- a/blog/2016/04/09/onkyo-panasonic-gtfs-and-config-validation/index.html +++ b/blog/2016/04/09/onkyo-panasonic-gtfs-and-config-validation/index.html @@ -203,6 +203,12 @@ diff --git a/blog/2016/04/17/updated-documentation/index.html b/blog/2016/04/17/updated-documentation/index.html index 79629ff634..131286e271 100644 --- a/blog/2016/04/17/updated-documentation/index.html +++ b/blog/2016/04/17/updated-documentation/index.html @@ -187,6 +187,12 @@ diff --git a/blog/2016/04/19/to-infinity-and-beyond/index.html b/blog/2016/04/19/to-infinity-and-beyond/index.html index 1c906c02ab..08c4a3c156 100644 --- a/blog/2016/04/19/to-infinity-and-beyond/index.html +++ b/blog/2016/04/19/to-infinity-and-beyond/index.html @@ -204,6 +204,12 @@ diff --git a/blog/2016/04/20/bluetooth-lg-webos-tvs-and-roombas/index.html b/blog/2016/04/20/bluetooth-lg-webos-tvs-and-roombas/index.html index 9d88a7078e..c3fe13730c 100644 --- a/blog/2016/04/20/bluetooth-lg-webos-tvs-and-roombas/index.html +++ b/blog/2016/04/20/bluetooth-lg-webos-tvs-and-roombas/index.html @@ -222,6 +222,12 @@ diff --git a/blog/2016/04/30/ibeacons-part-1-making-presence-detection-work-better/index.html b/blog/2016/04/30/ibeacons-part-1-making-presence-detection-work-better/index.html new file mode 100644 index 0000000000..2ae5e302c8 --- /dev/null +++ b/blog/2016/04/30/ibeacons-part-1-making-presence-detection-work-better/index.html @@ -0,0 +1,391 @@ + + + + + + + + + + iBeacons: Making presence detection work better (part I) - Home Assistant + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +
    +
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    + + + Home Assistant + +
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    + +

    iBeacons: Making presence detection work better (part I)

    + + + +
    + + Greg Dowling + nine minutes reading time + + + + + + Comments + +
    + +
    + + +

    This is a guest post by Home Assistant contributor Greg Dowling.

    + +

    In 2013 Apple introduced iBeacons: a class of Bluetooth low energy (LE) devices that broadcast their identifier to nearby devices, including most smartphones. At first glance it’s hard to imagine why they might be useful. In this two part blog I’ll try and explain why they are useful and how you can use them with Home Assistant.

    + +

    The reason I started using iBeacons was to improve presence detection (and I think that’s the case with most people) so that’s what I’ll discuss in part 1. In part 2 I’ll talk about using iBeacons to track devices that can’t track themselves.

    + +

    Using beacons to improve OwnTracks location data

    + +

    When you use OwnTracks in standard major move mode (which is kind to your phone battery) it sometimes fails to update when you’d like it to. In my case I found that it would often send a location update as I was on my way home, but then not update when I got home. The result would be that Home Assistant would think I was 500M away from home, and take quite a while to notice I was home. It would also mean that the automation that should turn on my lights when I got home didn’t work very well! There were a few times when my phone location updated at 2am and turned the lights on for me. Fortunately my wife is very patient!

    + +

    Luckily, OwnTracks supports iBeacons so I could use them to make presence detection more reliable. When OwnTracks sees a beacon it recognises, it will send an update. This means that if you put a beacon at your front door - OwnTracks will see it within a few seconds of you arriving home - and send an update saying it has seen this iBeacon.

    + + + +

    Getting Started

    + +

    To do this you first need to set up MQTT and OwnTracks in Home assistant - and make sure that HA can track your phone.

    + +

    You then have to (A) tell Home Assistant where the beacon is located and (B) tell OwnTracks to recognise the beacon.

    + +

    A. Tell Home Assistant where your beacon is located

    + +

    You tell HomeAssistant about fixed locations by creating a Zone with the longitude and latitude of your beacon. You should also give the zone a name which you will also use when you set up OwnTracks. An an example this zone specifies the location of my where my drive way.

    + +

    Example configuration.yaml entry

    + +
    + 
    +zone:
+    - name: 'Drive'
+      latitude: XXX
+      longitude: YYY
+      radius: 100
+
    +
    +
    + +

    The radius isn’t used by the beacon code, but it is used by the GPS location sensing code. I’ll come back to this a little later. For now just use 50 or 100.

    + +

    Once you’ve created the zone - you need to restart HA. The next step is:-

    + +

    B. Tell OwnTracks to track your beacon

    + +
      +
    1. Go to the OwnTracks app on your phone
      2. +
    2. Touch the Regions menu at the bottom of the screen
      3. +
    3. Touch the + symbol at the top right of the screen
      4. +
    4. Give the beacon a name e.g. -drive ’(start the name with a - see below for the reason)
      5. +
    5. Turn Share to On
      6. +
    6. Skip the Circular Region section
      7. +
    7. Enter the UUID of your beacon - this may be written on your beacon - or you can copy it from the management app that came with your iBeacon device. It’s a long number – so it’s easier to copy if you can!
      8. +
    8. Enter the Minor and Major numbers for your iBeacon - or leave them at 0 which will match all beacons with that UUID
      9. +
    + +

    + +

    + +

    Once you’ve added the iBeacon - you should be able to see it on the OwnTracks region screen. If your phone can see the packets from that beacon, OwnTracks will turn the relevant Region red.

    + +

    + +

    + +

    When OwnTracks sees the beacon (and turns the region red), it also sends an MQTT packet to HA to say that you have entered that region.

    + +

    The result of the configuration above would be to set the location of device.phone to Drive , (and the GPS location to XXX,YYY) when your phone sees the beacon.

    + +

    So with the steps above you should be able to improve the reliability of tracking your phone - and send timely updates to HA. I did this for my home - and the lights now turn on before I reach the house on foot. If I arrive by car they turn on within a few seconds of arriving, before I can get to the front door.

    + +

    I’m also pleased to say I no longer get an arrive home event at 2am that turns the lights on. I hope I’ve convinced you that iBeacons are worth trying!

    + +

    Mixing Beacons and GPS locations

    + +

    You will probably use beacons to make entry into your existing GPS zones more reliable. By default either a beacon or a GPS location can cause you to enter a zone - and HA has some logic that should make them two work well together (it ignores GPS updates when you’re in an iBeacon Zone).

    + +

    However you can also use beacons for situations where GPS doesn’t work well.

    + +

    This might be because the zones are too close together - or even on top of each other!
    +For example, my wife works next door - and I couldn’t detect whether she’s at home or in the office via GPS because the accuracy wasn’t high enough. However I can do this by using two beacons.

    + +

    To make this type of presence detection work you need to turn GPS off for a zone in Home Assistant by making them passive. This is important because otherwise HA will try to decide between two close together zones without enough data. This doesn’t work well.

    + +

    A passive zone can only be entered via an iBeacon, so a GPS location update will always pick the other zone.

    + +

    I set up my Home zone to be a standard region, and my office zone to be passive, so the home zone can be entered in the normal way via either GPS or a Beacon.

    + +

    Example configuration.yaml entry

    + +
    + 
    +zone:
+    - name: 'Office'
+      latitude: XXX
+      longitude: YYY
+      radius: 3
+      passive: true
+
    +
    +
    + +

    You could use this technique to try to detect which room someone is in. This might allow you to notice whether someone is in the living room or the bedroom - even though one is above the other (although beacon packets do pass through walls and floors).

    + +

    To get this to work you’ll probably need to experiment with the beacon signal strength to try to match the beacon reception area to the location you want to track. Let me know if you get this to work (it doesn’t make sense in my open plan house)

    + +

    Conclusion

    + +

    Presence tracking sounds easy - and it’s an important part of Home Automation. Trying it shows how difficult it is to get presence detection right. I’ve found that iBeacons have improved the reliability and timeliness of knowing where I am, and I hope I encouraged you to try them too.

    + +

    Tips

    + +

    You can find out more about configuring the OwnTracks application and beacons here

    + +

    There is information about configuring Homeassistant to use beacons here

    + +

    Connections and disconnecting

    + +

    Owntracks treats a region name with a leading - as a hint that it shouldn’t disconnect after a single missed packet. This improves the ability to keep a connection to a beacon.

    + +

    However, even when using this feature I’ve noticed that you can still lose connections (although it seems to vary by beacon manufacturer and type - I’ll talk more about this in part 2). This means that it’s best to take into account that you may see false enter/leave events in HA. You may be able to improve this by changing how often the beacons send packets - and by increasing the signal strength (both will drain your beacon batteries more quickly). You can usually change these parameters in the app supplied by the iBeacon maker. You can also find some high power beacons (which have worked well for me).

    + +

    In automations you can use a for: to avoid triggering during a brief disconnect, or use a script with a delay. Stay tuned for part 2 for an example of this.

    + +

    Using Multiple beacons for the same Zone

    +

    iBeacons have a UUID (usually set to the same value for beacons from the same manufacturer), as well as a minor and major number. If you set two beacons to have exactly same details then OwnTracks will think multiple beacons are at the same location.

    + +

    This means you can have more than one beacon around your home - and a connection to any of them will count as home to OwnTracks and HA. This reduces disconnections.

    + +

    You can achieve the same effect by using the same the same UUID but different major / minor numbers - and tell OwnTracks not to worry about the minor / major numbers for a particular region by setting them to 0).

    + +

    Stay tuned for part II where I’ll talk about how to use iBeacons to track any object.

    +
    + + +
    +

    Comments

    +
    +
    + + +
    + + + + +
    +
    + + + + + + + \ No newline at end of file diff --git a/blog/archives/index.html b/blog/archives/index.html index 236f45086a..899cf31a0e 100644 --- a/blog/archives/index.html +++ b/blog/archives/index.html @@ -98,6 +98,42 @@

    2016

    + + + +
    @@ -1939,6 +1975,12 @@ diff --git a/blog/categories/community/atom.xml b/blog/categories/community/atom.xml index bffda2849e..71475dbfe5 100644 --- a/blog/categories/community/atom.xml +++ b/blog/categories/community/atom.xml @@ -4,7 +4,7 @@ <![CDATA[Category: Community | Home Assistant]]> - 2016-04-30T11:04:27+00:00 + 2016-04-30T11:26:57+00:00 https://home-assistant.io/ diff --git a/blog/categories/community/index.html b/blog/categories/community/index.html index a0e27c2fee..9eabcb89ba 100644 --- a/blog/categories/community/index.html +++ b/blog/categories/community/index.html @@ -230,6 +230,12 @@ diff --git a/blog/categories/esp8266/atom.xml b/blog/categories/esp8266/atom.xml index f159f68c1a..a6f6d29741 100644 --- a/blog/categories/esp8266/atom.xml +++ b/blog/categories/esp8266/atom.xml @@ -4,7 +4,7 @@ <![CDATA[Category: ESP8266 | Home Assistant]]> - 2016-04-30T11:04:27+00:00 + 2016-04-30T11:26:57+00:00 https://home-assistant.io/ diff --git a/blog/categories/esp8266/index.html b/blog/categories/esp8266/index.html index a75a9de261..f2f4e63832 100644 --- a/blog/categories/esp8266/index.html +++ b/blog/categories/esp8266/index.html @@ -199,6 +199,12 @@ diff --git a/blog/categories/how-to/atom.xml b/blog/categories/how-to/atom.xml index 4b7bc465a1..913e912eee 100644 --- a/blog/categories/how-to/atom.xml +++ b/blog/categories/how-to/atom.xml @@ -4,7 +4,7 @@ <![CDATA[Category: How-To | Home Assistant]]> - 2016-04-30T11:04:27+00:00 + 2016-04-30T11:26:57+00:00 https://home-assistant.io/ diff --git a/blog/categories/how-to/index.html b/blog/categories/how-to/index.html index 59b736db95..9e80253f49 100644 --- a/blog/categories/how-to/index.html +++ b/blog/categories/how-to/index.html @@ -496,6 +496,12 @@ diff --git a/blog/categories/ibeacons/atom.xml b/blog/categories/ibeacons/atom.xml new file mode 100644 index 0000000000..2f94956e85 --- /dev/null +++ b/blog/categories/ibeacons/atom.xml @@ -0,0 +1,155 @@ + + + + <![CDATA[Category: iBeacons | Home Assistant]]> + + + 2016-04-30T11:26:57+00:00 + https://home-assistant.io/ + + + + + Octopress + + + + <![CDATA[iBeacons: Making presence detection work better (part I)]]> + + 2016-04-30T06:50:09+00:00 + https://home-assistant.io/blog/2016/04/30/ibeacons-part-1-making-presence-detection-work-better + This is a guest post by Home Assistant contributor Greg Dowling.

    + +

    In 2013 Apple introduced iBeacons: a class of Bluetooth low energy (LE) devices that broadcast their identifier to nearby devices, including most smartphones. At first glance it’s hard to imagine why they might be useful. In this two part blog I’ll try and explain why they are useful and how you can use them with Home Assistant.

    + +

    The reason I started using iBeacons was to improve presence detection (and I think that’s the case with most people) so that’s what I’ll discuss in part 1. In part 2 I’ll talk about using iBeacons to track devices that can’t track themselves.

    + +

    Using beacons to improve OwnTracks location data

    + +

    When you use OwnTracks in standard major move mode (which is kind to your phone battery) it sometimes fails to update when you’d like it to. In my case I found that it would often send a location update as I was on my way home, but then not update when I got home. The result would be that Home Assistant would think I was 500M away from home, and take quite a while to notice I was home. It would also mean that the automation that should turn on my lights when I got home didn’t work very well! There were a few times when my phone location updated at 2am and turned the lights on for me. Fortunately my wife is very patient!

    + +

    Luckily, OwnTracks supports iBeacons so I could use them to make presence detection more reliable. When OwnTracks sees a beacon it recognises, it will send an update. This means that if you put a beacon at your front door - OwnTracks will see it within a few seconds of you arriving home - and send an update saying it has seen this iBeacon.

    + + + +

    Getting Started

    + +

    To do this you first need to set up MQTT and OwnTracks in Home assistant - and make sure that HA can track your phone.

    + +

    You then have to (A) tell Home Assistant where the beacon is located and (B) tell OwnTracks to recognise the beacon.

    + +

    A. Tell Home Assistant where your beacon is located

    + +

    You tell HomeAssistant about fixed locations by creating a Zone with the longitude and latitude of your beacon. You should also give the zone a name which you will also use when you set up OwnTracks. An an example this zone specifies the location of my where my drive way.

    + +

    Example configuration.yaml entry

    + +
    + 
    +zone:
+    - name: 'Drive'
+      latitude: XXX
+      longitude: YYY
+      radius: 100
+
    +
    +
    + +

    The radius isn’t used by the beacon code, but it is used by the GPS location sensing code. I’ll come back to this a little later. For now just use 50 or 100.

    + +

    Once you’ve created the zone - you need to restart HA. The next step is:-

    + +

    B. Tell OwnTracks to track your beacon

    + +
      +
    1. Go to the OwnTracks app on your phone
      2. +
    2. Touch the Regions menu at the bottom of the screen
      3. +
    3. Touch the + symbol at the top right of the screen
      4. +
    4. Give the beacon a name e.g. -drive ’(start the name with a - see below for the reason)
      5. +
    5. Turn Share to On
      6. +
    6. Skip the Circular Region section
      7. +
    7. Enter the UUID of your beacon - this may be written on your beacon - or you can copy it from the management app that came with your iBeacon device. It’s a long number – so it’s easier to copy if you can!
      8. +
    8. Enter the Minor and Major numbers for your iBeacon - or leave them at 0 which will match all beacons with that UUID
      9. +
    + +

    + +

    + +

    Once you’ve added the iBeacon - you should be able to see it on the OwnTracks region screen. If your phone can see the packets from that beacon, OwnTracks will turn the relevant Region red.

    + +

    + +

    + +

    When OwnTracks sees the beacon (and turns the region red), it also sends an MQTT packet to HA to say that you have entered that region.

    + +

    The result of the configuration above would be to set the location of device.phone to Drive , (and the GPS location to XXX,YYY) when your phone sees the beacon.

    + +

    So with the steps above you should be able to improve the reliability of tracking your phone - and send timely updates to HA. I did this for my home - and the lights now turn on before I reach the house on foot. If I arrive by car they turn on within a few seconds of arriving, before I can get to the front door.

    + +

    I’m also pleased to say I no longer get an arrive home event at 2am that turns the lights on. I hope I’ve convinced you that iBeacons are worth trying!

    + +

    Mixing Beacons and GPS locations

    + +

    You will probably use beacons to make entry into your existing GPS zones more reliable. By default either a beacon or a GPS location can cause you to enter a zone - and HA has some logic that should make them two work well together (it ignores GPS updates when you’re in an iBeacon Zone).

    + +

    However you can also use beacons for situations where GPS doesn’t work well.

    + +

    This might be because the zones are too close together - or even on top of each other!
    +For example, my wife works next door - and I couldn’t detect whether she’s at home or in the office via GPS because the accuracy wasn’t high enough. However I can do this by using two beacons.

    + +

    To make this type of presence detection work you need to turn GPS off for a zone in Home Assistant by making them passive. This is important because otherwise HA will try to decide between two close together zones without enough data. This doesn’t work well.

    + +

    A passive zone can only be entered via an iBeacon, so a GPS location update will always pick the other zone.

    + +

    I set up my Home zone to be a standard region, and my office zone to be passive, so the home zone can be entered in the normal way via either GPS or a Beacon.

    + +

    Example configuration.yaml entry

    + +
    + 
    +zone:
+    - name: 'Office'
+      latitude: XXX
+      longitude: YYY
+      radius: 3
+      passive: true
+
    +
    +
    + +

    You could use this technique to try to detect which room someone is in. This might allow you to notice whether someone is in the living room or the bedroom - even though one is above the other (although beacon packets do pass through walls and floors).

    + +

    To get this to work you’ll probably need to experiment with the beacon signal strength to try to match the beacon reception area to the location you want to track. Let me know if you get this to work (it doesn’t make sense in my open plan house)

    + +

    Conclusion

    + +

    Presence tracking sounds easy - and it’s an important part of Home Automation. Trying it shows how difficult it is to get presence detection right. I’ve found that iBeacons have improved the reliability and timeliness of knowing where I am, and I hope I encouraged you to try them too.

    + +

    Tips

    + +

    You can find out more about configuring the OwnTracks application and beacons here

    + +

    There is information about configuring Homeassistant to use beacons here

    + +

    Connections and disconnecting

    + +

    Owntracks treats a region name with a leading - as a hint that it shouldn’t disconnect after a single missed packet. This improves the ability to keep a connection to a beacon.

    + +

    However, even when using this feature I’ve noticed that you can still lose connections (although it seems to vary by beacon manufacturer and type - I’ll talk more about this in part 2). This means that it’s best to take into account that you may see false enter/leave events in HA. You may be able to improve this by changing how often the beacons send packets - and by increasing the signal strength (both will drain your beacon batteries more quickly). You can usually change these parameters in the app supplied by the iBeacon maker. You can also find some high power beacons (which have worked well for me).

    + +

    In automations you can use a for: to avoid triggering during a brief disconnect, or use a script with a delay. Stay tuned for part 2 for an example of this.

    + +

    Using Multiple beacons for the same Zone

    +

    iBeacons have a UUID (usually set to the same value for beacons from the same manufacturer), as well as a minor and major number. If you set two beacons to have exactly same details then OwnTracks will think multiple beacons are at the same location.

    + +

    This means you can have more than one beacon around your home - and a connection to any of them will count as home to OwnTracks and HA. This reduces disconnections.

    + +

    You can achieve the same effect by using the same the same UUID but different major / minor numbers - and tell OwnTracks not to worry about the minor / major numbers for a particular region by setting them to 0).

    + +

    Stay tuned for part II where I’ll talk about how to use iBeacons to track any object.

    +]]>     +     + +     diff --git a/blog/categories/ibeacons/index.html b/blog/categories/ibeacons/index.html new file mode 100644 index 0000000000..08754e7f7a --- /dev/null +++ b/blog/categories/ibeacons/index.html @@ -0,0 +1,278 @@ + + + + + + + + + + Category: iBeacons - Home Assistant + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + + + Home Assistant + +
    + +
    + +
    + +
    +
    +
    + + + +
    +
    + +
    + + + + + +
    + + + + +
    +
    + + + + + + + \ No newline at end of file diff --git a/blog/categories/internet-of-things/atom.xml b/blog/categories/internet-of-things/atom.xml index 293e386155..3bce380cea 100644 --- a/blog/categories/internet-of-things/atom.xml +++ b/blog/categories/internet-of-things/atom.xml @@ -4,7 +4,7 @@ <![CDATA[Category: Internet-of-Things | Home Assistant]]> - 2016-04-30T11:04:27+00:00 + 2016-04-30T11:26:57+00:00 https://home-assistant.io/ diff --git a/blog/categories/internet-of-things/index.html b/blog/categories/internet-of-things/index.html index cbff63b89a..4ebd7e166f 100644 --- a/blog/categories/internet-of-things/index.html +++ b/blog/categories/internet-of-things/index.html @@ -294,6 +294,12 @@ diff --git a/blog/categories/mqtt/atom.xml b/blog/categories/mqtt/atom.xml index 10c1949acb..c19d0b61dc 100644 --- a/blog/categories/mqtt/atom.xml +++ b/blog/categories/mqtt/atom.xml @@ -4,7 +4,7 @@ <![CDATA[Category: MQTT | Home Assistant]]> - 2016-04-30T11:04:27+00:00 + 2016-04-30T11:26:57+00:00 https://home-assistant.io/ diff --git a/blog/categories/mqtt/index.html b/blog/categories/mqtt/index.html index 1275c0c75c..6f3ad98115 100644 --- a/blog/categories/mqtt/index.html +++ b/blog/categories/mqtt/index.html @@ -270,6 +270,12 @@ diff --git a/blog/categories/organisation/atom.xml b/blog/categories/organisation/atom.xml index e15b71e240..1718fbf421 100644 --- a/blog/categories/organisation/atom.xml +++ b/blog/categories/organisation/atom.xml @@ -4,7 +4,7 @@ <![CDATA[Category: Organisation | Home Assistant]]> - 2016-04-30T11:04:27+00:00 + 2016-04-30T11:26:57+00:00 https://home-assistant.io/ diff --git a/blog/categories/organisation/index.html b/blog/categories/organisation/index.html index c9c290a115..4381cc85c8 100644 --- a/blog/categories/organisation/index.html +++ b/blog/categories/organisation/index.html @@ -230,6 +230,12 @@ diff --git a/blog/categories/owntracks/atom.xml b/blog/categories/owntracks/atom.xml new file mode 100644 index 0000000000..97486b7ed2 --- /dev/null +++ b/blog/categories/owntracks/atom.xml @@ -0,0 +1,155 @@ + + + + <![CDATA[Category: OwnTracks | Home Assistant]]> + + + 2016-04-30T11:26:57+00:00 + https://home-assistant.io/ + + + + + Octopress + + + + <![CDATA[iBeacons: Making presence detection work better (part I)]]> + + 2016-04-30T06:50:09+00:00 + https://home-assistant.io/blog/2016/04/30/ibeacons-part-1-making-presence-detection-work-better + This is a guest post by Home Assistant contributor Greg Dowling.

    + +

    In 2013 Apple introduced iBeacons: a class of Bluetooth low energy (LE) devices that broadcast their identifier to nearby devices, including most smartphones. At first glance it’s hard to imagine why they might be useful. In this two part blog I’ll try and explain why they are useful and how you can use them with Home Assistant.

    + +

    The reason I started using iBeacons was to improve presence detection (and I think that’s the case with most people) so that’s what I’ll discuss in part 1. In part 2 I’ll talk about using iBeacons to track devices that can’t track themselves.

    + +

    Using beacons to improve OwnTracks location data

    + +

    When you use OwnTracks in standard major move mode (which is kind to your phone battery) it sometimes fails to update when you’d like it to. In my case I found that it would often send a location update as I was on my way home, but then not update when I got home. The result would be that Home Assistant would think I was 500M away from home, and take quite a while to notice I was home. It would also mean that the automation that should turn on my lights when I got home didn’t work very well! There were a few times when my phone location updated at 2am and turned the lights on for me. Fortunately my wife is very patient!

    + +

    Luckily, OwnTracks supports iBeacons so I could use them to make presence detection more reliable. When OwnTracks sees a beacon it recognises, it will send an update. This means that if you put a beacon at your front door - OwnTracks will see it within a few seconds of you arriving home - and send an update saying it has seen this iBeacon.

    + + + +

    Getting Started

    + +

    To do this you first need to set up MQTT and OwnTracks in Home assistant - and make sure that HA can track your phone.

    + +

    You then have to (A) tell Home Assistant where the beacon is located and (B) tell OwnTracks to recognise the beacon.

    + +

    A. Tell Home Assistant where your beacon is located

    + +

    You tell HomeAssistant about fixed locations by creating a Zone with the longitude and latitude of your beacon. You should also give the zone a name which you will also use when you set up OwnTracks. An an example this zone specifies the location of my where my drive way.

    + +

    Example configuration.yaml entry

    + +
    + 
    +zone:
+    - name: 'Drive'
+      latitude: XXX
+      longitude: YYY
+      radius: 100
+
    +
    +
    + +

    The radius isn’t used by the beacon code, but it is used by the GPS location sensing code. I’ll come back to this a little later. For now just use 50 or 100.

    + +

    Once you’ve created the zone - you need to restart HA. The next step is:-

    + +

    B. Tell OwnTracks to track your beacon

    + +
      +
    1. Go to the OwnTracks app on your phone
      2. +
    2. Touch the Regions menu at the bottom of the screen
      3. +
    3. Touch the + symbol at the top right of the screen
      4. +
    4. Give the beacon a name e.g. -drive ’(start the name with a - see below for the reason)
      5. +
    5. Turn Share to On
      6. +
    6. Skip the Circular Region section
      7. +
    7. Enter the UUID of your beacon - this may be written on your beacon - or you can copy it from the management app that came with your iBeacon device. It’s a long number – so it’s easier to copy if you can!
      8. +
    8. Enter the Minor and Major numbers for your iBeacon - or leave them at 0 which will match all beacons with that UUID
      9. +
    + +

    + +

    + +

    Once you’ve added the iBeacon - you should be able to see it on the OwnTracks region screen. If your phone can see the packets from that beacon, OwnTracks will turn the relevant Region red.

    + +

    + +

    + +

    When OwnTracks sees the beacon (and turns the region red), it also sends an MQTT packet to HA to say that you have entered that region.

    + +

    The result of the configuration above would be to set the location of device.phone to Drive , (and the GPS location to XXX,YYY) when your phone sees the beacon.

    + +

    So with the steps above you should be able to improve the reliability of tracking your phone - and send timely updates to HA. I did this for my home - and the lights now turn on before I reach the house on foot. If I arrive by car they turn on within a few seconds of arriving, before I can get to the front door.

    + +

    I’m also pleased to say I no longer get an arrive home event at 2am that turns the lights on. I hope I’ve convinced you that iBeacons are worth trying!

    + +

    Mixing Beacons and GPS locations

    + +

    You will probably use beacons to make entry into your existing GPS zones more reliable. By default either a beacon or a GPS location can cause you to enter a zone - and HA has some logic that should make them two work well together (it ignores GPS updates when you’re in an iBeacon Zone).

    + +

    However you can also use beacons for situations where GPS doesn’t work well.

    + +

    This might be because the zones are too close together - or even on top of each other!
    +For example, my wife works next door - and I couldn’t detect whether she’s at home or in the office via GPS because the accuracy wasn’t high enough. However I can do this by using two beacons.

    + +

    To make this type of presence detection work you need to turn GPS off for a zone in Home Assistant by making them passive. This is important because otherwise HA will try to decide between two close together zones without enough data. This doesn’t work well.

    + +

    A passive zone can only be entered via an iBeacon, so a GPS location update will always pick the other zone.

    + +

    I set up my Home zone to be a standard region, and my office zone to be passive, so the home zone can be entered in the normal way via either GPS or a Beacon.

    + +

    Example configuration.yaml entry

    + +
    + 
    +zone:
+    - name: 'Office'
+      latitude: XXX
+      longitude: YYY
+      radius: 3
+      passive: true
+
    +
    +
    + +

    You could use this technique to try to detect which room someone is in. This might allow you to notice whether someone is in the living room or the bedroom - even though one is above the other (although beacon packets do pass through walls and floors).

    + +

    To get this to work you’ll probably need to experiment with the beacon signal strength to try to match the beacon reception area to the location you want to track. Let me know if you get this to work (it doesn’t make sense in my open plan house)

    + +

    Conclusion

    + +

    Presence tracking sounds easy - and it’s an important part of Home Automation. Trying it shows how difficult it is to get presence detection right. I’ve found that iBeacons have improved the reliability and timeliness of knowing where I am, and I hope I encouraged you to try them too.

    + +

    Tips

    + +

    You can find out more about configuring the OwnTracks application and beacons here

    + +

    There is information about configuring Homeassistant to use beacons here

    + +

    Connections and disconnecting

    + +

    Owntracks treats a region name with a leading - as a hint that it shouldn’t disconnect after a single missed packet. This improves the ability to keep a connection to a beacon.

    + +

    However, even when using this feature I’ve noticed that you can still lose connections (although it seems to vary by beacon manufacturer and type - I’ll talk more about this in part 2). This means that it’s best to take into account that you may see false enter/leave events in HA. You may be able to improve this by changing how often the beacons send packets - and by increasing the signal strength (both will drain your beacon batteries more quickly). You can usually change these parameters in the app supplied by the iBeacon maker. You can also find some high power beacons (which have worked well for me).

    + +

    In automations you can use a for: to avoid triggering during a brief disconnect, or use a script with a delay. Stay tuned for part 2 for an example of this.

    + +

    Using Multiple beacons for the same Zone

    +

    iBeacons have a UUID (usually set to the same value for beacons from the same manufacturer), as well as a minor and major number. If you set two beacons to have exactly same details then OwnTracks will think multiple beacons are at the same location.

    + +

    This means you can have more than one beacon around your home - and a connection to any of them will count as home to OwnTracks and HA. This reduces disconnections.

    + +

    You can achieve the same effect by using the same the same UUID but different major / minor numbers - and tell OwnTracks not to worry about the minor / major numbers for a particular region by setting them to 0).

    + +

    Stay tuned for part II where I’ll talk about how to use iBeacons to track any object.

    +]]>     +     + +     diff --git a/blog/categories/owntracks/index.html b/blog/categories/owntracks/index.html new file mode 100644 index 0000000000..89d1aa57bf --- /dev/null +++ b/blog/categories/owntracks/index.html @@ -0,0 +1,278 @@ + + + + + + + + + + Category: OwnTracks - Home Assistant + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + + + Home Assistant + +
    + +
    + +
    + +
    +
    +
    + + + +
    +
    + +
    + + + + + +
    + + + + +
    +
    + + + + + + + \ No newline at end of file diff --git a/blog/categories/presence-detection/atom.xml b/blog/categories/presence-detection/atom.xml new file mode 100644 index 0000000000..4d942f0a4b --- /dev/null +++ b/blog/categories/presence-detection/atom.xml @@ -0,0 +1,155 @@ + + + + <![CDATA[Category: Presence-Detection | Home Assistant]]> + + + 2016-04-30T11:26:57+00:00 + https://home-assistant.io/ + + + + + Octopress + + + + <![CDATA[iBeacons: Making presence detection work better (part I)]]> + + 2016-04-30T06:50:09+00:00 + https://home-assistant.io/blog/2016/04/30/ibeacons-part-1-making-presence-detection-work-better + This is a guest post by Home Assistant contributor Greg Dowling.

    + +

    In 2013 Apple introduced iBeacons: a class of Bluetooth low energy (LE) devices that broadcast their identifier to nearby devices, including most smartphones. At first glance it’s hard to imagine why they might be useful. In this two part blog I’ll try and explain why they are useful and how you can use them with Home Assistant.

    + +

    The reason I started using iBeacons was to improve presence detection (and I think that’s the case with most people) so that’s what I’ll discuss in part 1. In part 2 I’ll talk about using iBeacons to track devices that can’t track themselves.

    + +

    Using beacons to improve OwnTracks location data

    + +

    When you use OwnTracks in standard major move mode (which is kind to your phone battery) it sometimes fails to update when you’d like it to. In my case I found that it would often send a location update as I was on my way home, but then not update when I got home. The result would be that Home Assistant would think I was 500M away from home, and take quite a while to notice I was home. It would also mean that the automation that should turn on my lights when I got home didn’t work very well! There were a few times when my phone location updated at 2am and turned the lights on for me. Fortunately my wife is very patient!

    + +

    Luckily, OwnTracks supports iBeacons so I could use them to make presence detection more reliable. When OwnTracks sees a beacon it recognises, it will send an update. This means that if you put a beacon at your front door - OwnTracks will see it within a few seconds of you arriving home - and send an update saying it has seen this iBeacon.

    + + + +

    Getting Started

    + +

    To do this you first need to set up MQTT and OwnTracks in Home assistant - and make sure that HA can track your phone.

    + +

    You then have to (A) tell Home Assistant where the beacon is located and (B) tell OwnTracks to recognise the beacon.

    + +

    A. Tell Home Assistant where your beacon is located

    + +

    You tell HomeAssistant about fixed locations by creating a Zone with the longitude and latitude of your beacon. You should also give the zone a name which you will also use when you set up OwnTracks. An an example this zone specifies the location of my where my drive way.

    + +

    Example configuration.yaml entry

    + +
    + 
    +zone:
+    - name: 'Drive'
+      latitude: XXX
+      longitude: YYY
+      radius: 100
+
    +
    +
    + +

    The radius isn’t used by the beacon code, but it is used by the GPS location sensing code. I’ll come back to this a little later. For now just use 50 or 100.

    + +

    Once you’ve created the zone - you need to restart HA. The next step is:-

    + +

    B. Tell OwnTracks to track your beacon

    + +
      +
    1. Go to the OwnTracks app on your phone
      2. +
    2. Touch the Regions menu at the bottom of the screen
      3. +
    3. Touch the + symbol at the top right of the screen
      4. +
    4. Give the beacon a name e.g. -drive ’(start the name with a - see below for the reason)
      5. +
    5. Turn Share to On
      6. +
    6. Skip the Circular Region section
      7. +
    7. Enter the UUID of your beacon - this may be written on your beacon - or you can copy it from the management app that came with your iBeacon device. It’s a long number – so it’s easier to copy if you can!
      8. +
    8. Enter the Minor and Major numbers for your iBeacon - or leave them at 0 which will match all beacons with that UUID
      9. +
    + +

    + +

    + +

    Once you’ve added the iBeacon - you should be able to see it on the OwnTracks region screen. If your phone can see the packets from that beacon, OwnTracks will turn the relevant Region red.

    + +

    + +

    + +

    When OwnTracks sees the beacon (and turns the region red), it also sends an MQTT packet to HA to say that you have entered that region.

    + +

    The result of the configuration above would be to set the location of device.phone to Drive , (and the GPS location to XXX,YYY) when your phone sees the beacon.

    + +

    So with the steps above you should be able to improve the reliability of tracking your phone - and send timely updates to HA. I did this for my home - and the lights now turn on before I reach the house on foot. If I arrive by car they turn on within a few seconds of arriving, before I can get to the front door.

    + +

    I’m also pleased to say I no longer get an arrive home event at 2am that turns the lights on. I hope I’ve convinced you that iBeacons are worth trying!

    + +

    Mixing Beacons and GPS locations

    + +

    You will probably use beacons to make entry into your existing GPS zones more reliable. By default either a beacon or a GPS location can cause you to enter a zone - and HA has some logic that should make them two work well together (it ignores GPS updates when you’re in an iBeacon Zone).

    + +

    However you can also use beacons for situations where GPS doesn’t work well.

    + +

    This might be because the zones are too close together - or even on top of each other!
    +For example, my wife works next door - and I couldn’t detect whether she’s at home or in the office via GPS because the accuracy wasn’t high enough. However I can do this by using two beacons.

    + +

    To make this type of presence detection work you need to turn GPS off for a zone in Home Assistant by making them passive. This is important because otherwise HA will try to decide between two close together zones without enough data. This doesn’t work well.

    + +

    A passive zone can only be entered via an iBeacon, so a GPS location update will always pick the other zone.

    + +

    I set up my Home zone to be a standard region, and my office zone to be passive, so the home zone can be entered in the normal way via either GPS or a Beacon.

    + +

    Example configuration.yaml entry

    + +
    + 
    +zone:
+    - name: 'Office'
+      latitude: XXX
+      longitude: YYY
+      radius: 3
+      passive: true
+
    +
    +
    + +

    You could use this technique to try to detect which room someone is in. This might allow you to notice whether someone is in the living room or the bedroom - even though one is above the other (although beacon packets do pass through walls and floors).

    + +

    To get this to work you’ll probably need to experiment with the beacon signal strength to try to match the beacon reception area to the location you want to track. Let me know if you get this to work (it doesn’t make sense in my open plan house)

    + +

    Conclusion

    + +

    Presence tracking sounds easy - and it’s an important part of Home Automation. Trying it shows how difficult it is to get presence detection right. I’ve found that iBeacons have improved the reliability and timeliness of knowing where I am, and I hope I encouraged you to try them too.

    + +

    Tips

    + +

    You can find out more about configuring the OwnTracks application and beacons here

    + +

    There is information about configuring Homeassistant to use beacons here

    + +

    Connections and disconnecting

    + +

    Owntracks treats a region name with a leading - as a hint that it shouldn’t disconnect after a single missed packet. This improves the ability to keep a connection to a beacon.

    + +

    However, even when using this feature I’ve noticed that you can still lose connections (although it seems to vary by beacon manufacturer and type - I’ll talk more about this in part 2). This means that it’s best to take into account that you may see false enter/leave events in HA. You may be able to improve this by changing how often the beacons send packets - and by increasing the signal strength (both will drain your beacon batteries more quickly). You can usually change these parameters in the app supplied by the iBeacon maker. You can also find some high power beacons (which have worked well for me).

    + +

    In automations you can use a for: to avoid triggering during a brief disconnect, or use a script with a delay. Stay tuned for part 2 for an example of this.

    + +

    Using Multiple beacons for the same Zone

    +

    iBeacons have a UUID (usually set to the same value for beacons from the same manufacturer), as well as a minor and major number. If you set two beacons to have exactly same details then OwnTracks will think multiple beacons are at the same location.

    + +

    This means you can have more than one beacon around your home - and a connection to any of them will count as home to OwnTracks and HA. This reduces disconnections.

    + +

    You can achieve the same effect by using the same the same UUID but different major / minor numbers - and tell OwnTracks not to worry about the minor / major numbers for a particular region by setting them to 0).

    + +

    Stay tuned for part II where I’ll talk about how to use iBeacons to track any object.

    +]]>     +     + +     diff --git a/blog/categories/presence-detection/index.html b/blog/categories/presence-detection/index.html new file mode 100644 index 0000000000..58d8fa4120 --- /dev/null +++ b/blog/categories/presence-detection/index.html @@ -0,0 +1,278 @@ + + + + + + + + + + Category: Presence-Detection - Home Assistant + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + + + Home Assistant + +
    + +
    + +
    + +
    +
    +
    + + + +
    +
    + +
    + + + + + +
    + + + + +
    +
    + + + + + + + \ No newline at end of file diff --git a/blog/categories/public-service-announcement/atom.xml b/blog/categories/public-service-announcement/atom.xml index d4c7689148..ac2dea92b2 100644 --- a/blog/categories/public-service-announcement/atom.xml +++ b/blog/categories/public-service-announcement/atom.xml @@ -4,7 +4,7 @@ <![CDATA[Category: Public-Service-Announcement | Home Assistant]]> - 2016-04-30T11:04:27+00:00 + 2016-04-30T11:26:57+00:00 https://home-assistant.io/ diff --git a/blog/categories/public-service-announcement/index.html b/blog/categories/public-service-announcement/index.html index 6f83ae53f5..becfd6ba3f 100644 --- a/blog/categories/public-service-announcement/index.html +++ b/blog/categories/public-service-announcement/index.html @@ -195,6 +195,12 @@ diff --git a/blog/categories/release-notes/atom.xml b/blog/categories/release-notes/atom.xml index c9fee9ac46..d36ccc3d5e 100644 --- a/blog/categories/release-notes/atom.xml +++ b/blog/categories/release-notes/atom.xml @@ -4,7 +4,7 @@ <![CDATA[Category: Release-Notes | Home Assistant]]> - 2016-04-30T11:04:27+00:00 + 2016-04-30T11:26:57+00:00 https://home-assistant.io/ diff --git a/blog/categories/release-notes/index.html b/blog/categories/release-notes/index.html index 5e17a7b840..a7c5f9694b 100644 --- a/blog/categories/release-notes/index.html +++ b/blog/categories/release-notes/index.html @@ -1224,6 +1224,12 @@ diff --git a/blog/categories/survey/atom.xml b/blog/categories/survey/atom.xml index 57f0840903..2da97388df 100644 --- a/blog/categories/survey/atom.xml +++ b/blog/categories/survey/atom.xml @@ -4,7 +4,7 @@ <![CDATA[Category: Survey | Home Assistant]]> - 2016-04-30T11:04:27+00:00 + 2016-04-30T11:26:57+00:00 https://home-assistant.io/ diff --git a/blog/categories/survey/index.html b/blog/categories/survey/index.html index 62f1901e37..5d48e54fe1 100644 --- a/blog/categories/survey/index.html +++ b/blog/categories/survey/index.html @@ -195,6 +195,12 @@ diff --git a/blog/categories/user-stories/atom.xml b/blog/categories/user-stories/atom.xml index 385fa3a4b9..7b34926123 100644 --- a/blog/categories/user-stories/atom.xml +++ b/blog/categories/user-stories/atom.xml @@ -4,7 +4,7 @@ <![CDATA[Category: User-Stories | Home Assistant]]> - 2016-04-30T11:04:27+00:00 + 2016-04-30T11:26:57+00:00 https://home-assistant.io/ diff --git a/blog/categories/user-stories/index.html b/blog/categories/user-stories/index.html index 10163ba357..cbb317791e 100644 --- a/blog/categories/user-stories/index.html +++ b/blog/categories/user-stories/index.html @@ -195,6 +195,12 @@ diff --git a/blog/categories/website/atom.xml b/blog/categories/website/atom.xml index aef7408bae..9d6a833879 100644 --- a/blog/categories/website/atom.xml +++ b/blog/categories/website/atom.xml @@ -4,7 +4,7 @@ <![CDATA[Category: Website | Home Assistant]]> - 2016-04-30T11:04:27+00:00 + 2016-04-30T11:26:57+00:00 https://home-assistant.io/ diff --git a/blog/categories/website/index.html b/blog/categories/website/index.html index b249a332d5..229366fad4 100644 --- a/blog/categories/website/index.html +++ b/blog/categories/website/index.html @@ -230,6 +230,12 @@ diff --git a/blog/index.html b/blog/index.html index 47f3cba2c8..1403b32bab 100644 --- a/blog/index.html +++ b/blog/index.html @@ -78,6 +78,64 @@ +
    +
    + +

    + iBeacons: Making presence detection work better (part I) +

    + + + +
    + + Greg Dowling + nine minutes reading time + + + + + + Comments + +
    + +
    + + +
    +

    This is a guest post by Home Assistant contributor Greg Dowling.

    + +

    In 2013 Apple introduced iBeacons: a class of Bluetooth low energy (LE) devices that broadcast their identifier to nearby devices, including most smartphones. At first glance it’s hard to imagine why they might be useful. In this two part blog I’ll try and explain why they are useful and how you can use them with Home Assistant.

    + +

    The reason I started using iBeacons was to improve presence detection (and I think that’s the case with most people) so that’s what I’ll discuss in part 1. In part 2 I’ll talk about using iBeacons to track devices that can’t track themselves.

    + +

    Using beacons to improve OwnTracks location data

    + +

    When you use OwnTracks in standard major move mode (which is kind to your phone battery) it sometimes fails to update when you’d like it to. In my case I found that it would often send a location update as I was on my way home, but then not update when I got home. The result would be that Home Assistant would think I was 500M away from home, and take quite a while to notice I was home. It would also mean that the automation that should turn on my lights when I got home didn’t work very well! There were a few times when my phone location updated at 2am and turned the lights on for me. Fortunately my wife is very patient!

    + +

    Luckily, OwnTracks supports iBeacons so I could use them to make presence detection more reliable. When OwnTracks sees a beacon it recognises, it will send an update. This means that if you put a beacon at your front door - OwnTracks will see it within a few seconds of you arriving home - and send an update saying it has seen this iBeacon.

    + + + + Read on → + +
    +
    +
    +
    @@ -712,97 +770,6 @@ player state attributes. This change affects automations, scripts and scenes. -
    -
    - -
    -
    - -

    - Community Highlights -

    - - - -
    - - Paulus Schoutsen - two minutes reading time - - - - - - Comments - -
    - -
    - - -
    -

    Home Assistant land has been busy and a lot of people have been creating awesome stuff. We’ve added a cookbook section to the website full of examples how you can automate different things. Make sure you take a look and share your own recipes too!

    - -

    Home automation demo by Part of the Thing

    - -
    - -
    - -

    Haaska - Alexa Skill Adapter for Home Assistant

    - -

    Haaska allows you to control lights, switches, and scenes exposed by your Home Assistant instance using an Amazon Echo. This is different from our own Alexa component because it will teach the Amazon Echo directly about the devices instead of teaching it to talk to Home Assistant. It will not allow you to use custom sentences but it will allow you to skip the ‘Ask Home Assistant’ part when giving commands:

    - -
      -
    • “Alexa, set kitchen to twenty percent”
      • -
    • “Alexa, turn on evening scene”
      • -
    • “Alexa, turn off bedroom light”
      • -
    - -

    Haaska on GitHub

    - -

    Integrating Home Assistant with HomeKit

    - -

    Contributor Maddox has created a plugin for HomeBridge, an open-source HomeKit bridge. This will allow you to control your home using Siri on your Apple devices. HomeBridge has recently restructured so you’ll have to install the plugin separately with the homebridge-homeassistant npm package.

    - -

    Example config.json entry to load Home Assistant:

    - -
    - 
    "platforms": [
-    {
-        "platform": "HomeAssistant",
-        "name": "HomeAssistant",
-        "host": "http://192.168.1.50:8123",
-        "password": "xxx",
-        "supported_types": ["light", "switch", "media_player", "scene"]
-    }
-]
-
    -
    -
    - -

    HomeBridge on GitHub
    -HomeBridge Home Assistant Plugin

    - -

    Custom alarm system with Home Assistant

    - -

    User thaijames describes in the Home Assistant forums how he has created his own NFC-based alarm system using Home Assistant, DIY components and Garfield dolls.

    - -

    - -Hold your NFC tag against the belly of Garfield to unlock the alarm. -

    - -
    @@ -855,6 +822,10 @@ Hold your NFC tag against the belly of Garfield to unlock the alarm.
  • Organisation
    • +
  • OwnTracks
    • + +
  • Presence Detection
    • +
  • Public Service Announcement
  • Release Notes
    • @@ -865,6 +836,8 @@ Hold your NFC tag against the belly of Garfield to unlock the alarm.
  • Website
    • +
  • iBeacons
    • + diff --git a/blog/posts/2/index.html b/blog/posts/2/index.html index f09c9aa5d0..2ce5cc6512 100644 --- a/blog/posts/2/index.html +++ b/blog/posts/2/index.html @@ -78,6 +78,97 @@ +
    +
    + +

    + Community Highlights +

    + + + +
    + + Paulus Schoutsen + two minutes reading time + + + + + + Comments + +
    + +
    + + +
    +

    Home Assistant land has been busy and a lot of people have been creating awesome stuff. We’ve added a cookbook section to the website full of examples how you can automate different things. Make sure you take a look and share your own recipes too!

    + +

    Home automation demo by Part of the Thing

    + +
    + +
    + +

    Haaska - Alexa Skill Adapter for Home Assistant

    + +

    Haaska allows you to control lights, switches, and scenes exposed by your Home Assistant instance using an Amazon Echo. This is different from our own Alexa component because it will teach the Amazon Echo directly about the devices instead of teaching it to talk to Home Assistant. It will not allow you to use custom sentences but it will allow you to skip the ‘Ask Home Assistant’ part when giving commands:

    + +
      +
    • “Alexa, set kitchen to twenty percent”
      • +
    • “Alexa, turn on evening scene”
      • +
    • “Alexa, turn off bedroom light”
      • +
    + +

    Haaska on GitHub

    + +

    Integrating Home Assistant with HomeKit

    + +

    Contributor Maddox has created a plugin for HomeBridge, an open-source HomeKit bridge. This will allow you to control your home using Siri on your Apple devices. HomeBridge has recently restructured so you’ll have to install the plugin separately with the homebridge-homeassistant npm package.

    + +

    Example config.json entry to load Home Assistant:

    + +
    + 
    "platforms": [
+    {
+        "platform": "HomeAssistant",
+        "name": "HomeAssistant",
+        "host": "http://192.168.1.50:8123",
+        "password": "xxx",
+        "supported_types": ["light", "switch", "media_player", "scene"]
+    }
+]
+
    +
    +
    + +

    HomeBridge on GitHub
    +HomeBridge Home Assistant Plugin

    + +

    Custom alarm system with Home Assistant

    + +

    User thaijames describes in the Home Assistant forums how he has created his own NFC-based alarm system using Home Assistant, DIY components and Garfield dolls.

    + +

    + +Hold your NFC tag against the belly of Garfield to unlock the alarm. +

    + + +
    +
    +
    +
    @@ -699,57 +790,6 @@ Example of the new views in the frontend. Learn mor
    -     -
    - -
    -
    - -
    -
    - -

    - Home Assistant goes geo with OwnTracks -

    - - - -
    - - Paulus Schoutsen - 1 minute reading time - - - - - - Comments - -
    - -
    - - -
    -

    A few weeks have past and it is time again for another release: version 0.7.4. This time we’re very glad to be able to introduce brand new integration with OwnTracks to allow tracking of people on a map. The geo support consists of three different parts:

    - - - -

    We have added a new getting started section to get up and running.

    - -

    - -Map in Home Assistant showing two people and three zones (home, school, work) -

    - -

    Ofcourse more things happened in the last three weeks. I’m moving away from my usual long post to a short summary of highlights:

    - -

    - -

    - - - -
    @@ -718,6 +698,10 @@ Map in Home Assistant showing two people and three zones (home, school, work)
  • Organisation
    • +
  • OwnTracks
    • + +
  • Presence Detection
    • +
  • Public Service Announcement
  • Release Notes
    • @@ -728,6 +712,8 @@ Map in Home Assistant showing two people and three zones (home, school, work)
  • Website
    • +
  • iBeacons
    • + diff --git a/blog/posts/4/index.html b/blog/posts/4/index.html index 40d380c1f5..00f2b20d12 100644 --- a/blog/posts/4/index.html +++ b/blog/posts/4/index.html @@ -78,6 +78,77 @@ +
    +
    + +

    + Home Assistant goes geo with OwnTracks +

    + + + +
    + + Paulus Schoutsen + 1 minute reading time + + + + + + Comments + +
    + +
    + + +
    +

    A few weeks have past and it is time again for another release: version 0.7.4. This time we’re very glad to be able to introduce brand new integration with OwnTracks to allow tracking of people on a map. The geo support consists of three different parts:

    + + + +

    We have added a new getting started section to get up and running.

    + +

    + +Map in Home Assistant showing two people and three zones (home, school, work) +

    + +

    Ofcourse more things happened in the last three weeks. I’m moving away from my usual long post to a short summary of highlights:

    + +

    + +

    + + + + +
    +
    +
    +
    @@ -607,62 +678,6 @@ To update to the latest version, run scripts/update. Please report
    -
    -
    - -

    - Release notes for June 10, 2015 -

    - - - -
    - - Paulus Schoutsen - five minutes reading time - - - - - - Comments - -
    - -
    - - -
    -

    Wow, almost a month has gone by since the last release and this release is packed. The biggest part of this release is probably one that you won’t notice: the frontend has been upgraded from Polymer 0.5 to the brand new released Polymer 1.0. Polymer has been declared stable by the Google overlords which will allow us to expand functionality that was waiting for this moment to arrive.

    - -

    This release sets a record for the amount of people involved: 8! Andythigpen, Jamespcole, Azelphur, Fabaff, Dutchy-, Fbradyirl, wind-rider and ettisan, thanks a lot for your contributions!

    - -

    A big improvement has been brought this release by wind-rider. He took the time to revive the Chromecast support and started improving the media player integration. This triggered other people to join in resulting in a revamped media player experience and support for the Music Player Daemon.

    - -

    - Example of the new media player cards -

    - -

    -To update to the latest version, run scripts/update. Please report any issues on GitHub. -

    - - - - Read on → - -
    -
    -
    -