{"id":22,"date":"2017-11-26T21:55:57","date_gmt":"2017-11-26T21:55:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.diyfuturism.com\/?p=22"},"modified":"2018-01-31T13:46:33","modified_gmt":"2018-01-31T21:46:33","slug":"the-open-source-smart-home-getting-started-with-home-assistant-node-red","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/diyfuturism.com\/index.php\/2017\/11\/26\/the-open-source-smart-home-getting-started-with-home-assistant-node-red\/","title":{"rendered":"The Open Source Smart Home: Getting Started with Home Assistant & Node-Red"},"content":{"rendered":"

Home Assistant<\/a> is one of the most interesting open source projects I’ve ever come across. It interfaces with any device, platform, or service you can think of. It can connect all of your devices to make a truly smart home. With a little creativity almost anything is possible with Home Assistant, and best of all it’s private and totally under your control.<\/p>\n

After using Hass to control my smart home for the last year, I started to hit the limitations of its YAML-based configuration. Any automation that was even moderately complicated required a lot of pieces spread out through the configuration files (see the sprawling “Creating an Alarm Clock<\/a>” thread on the HA forums for an example). Doing simple things like if-then or a\u00a0 loop required awkward workarounds. As my automations (and ambitions) increased in complexity, so did the time I spent trying to figure out what was going on.<\/p>\n

That’s when I discovered Node-Red<\/a>, a visual programming tool developed by IBM. Node-Red is the perfect complement to Home Assistant, allowing for very complicated logic to be constructed visually through a simple “flow” interface. It integrates seamlessly with Home Assistant. Let’s set it up.<\/p>\n

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