Running Home Assistant on Windows in Docker

I wanted to move HA to my home server, I can run Hyper-V images as needed but most service I run these days are in Docker, so looked up how to do this for Home Assistant.

Introduction

This was originally taken from [Guide] Hass.IO on Windows 10 WSL2 (No more VMs!) and updated as needed for how I run it on Windows.

Basically this is HASS.IO running on Docker in Windows 10 WSL2

New PowerShell module for Home Assistant

So after making the PowerShell script for Home Assistant I decided to spend a hour and pull it together to be a full module and push it up to GitHub. This is now in place and support just turning a switch entity on and off.

Installation

Install-Module -Name PoshHomeAssistant -Scope CurrentUser

Usage

Before you can use it set the configuration, this can be done with the following command, set the key and url to match your environment.

Developing Home Assistant on Windows using the Subsystem for Linux

I love Home Assistant and use it to control my house. I run it on a Pine64 board and it handles everything. However for developing and modifying it I want to have a slightly better environment than nano and a console screen :) So using the Subsystem for Linux I have a Linux based setup to run the hass instance in and can use Visual Studio code to develop the modules as I go, best of both worlds.

Using Microsoft Flow with Home Assistant

Now that Microsoft Flow is out of Beta I thought I would play with it and integrate it with Home Assistant running my house. The Microsoft Flow is fairly flexible and has more flow options than IFTTT to make choices. To use this with Home Assistant I am going to use the REST API to make and set a sensor value, you can then take this and make it as complicated as you want. :) Settings You need to ensure you have this information at hand. Home Assistant Endpoint - https://homeassistant.yourdomain.com/api Your password for the http component. If you public expose HA without a password, stop and fix it now! * The name of the sensor you want to update. sensor.kitchen_temperature in this case.

Enabling MQTT abilities in OpenHab

Using your favorite editor in Linux or something like WinSCP we need to edit some OpenHAB configuration files. If you followed the guides on this site the configuration is located in /etc/openhab. Open up /etc/openhab/configurations/openhab.cfg to edit. If it does not exist you need to copy openhab_defaults.cfg in the same directory to openhab.cfg

sudo nano /etc/openhab/configurations/openhab.cfg

You need to navigate to the MQTT Transport section for transport settings. Ignore the MQTT Persistence section. The following three bolded configuration items need to be modified, I am using pimosquitto as the broker name, you can use whatever you want. Just be consistent.

Installing OpenHAB

To install and run OpenHab on your Pi I am recommending you use the apt-get approach, these instructions are taken from the OpenHAB Wiki, so it may be more up to date and have additional options. I also contribute to changes in the wiki every now and then so this may get out of date but in general be correct. This page does highlight the addons needed for the guides on my site. Shopping List - things you need to do this.

Rooting the WINK Hub with Windows

I do have a Linux machine in the house but that is on a Pi running as a squeezelite client for my house music collection. So looking at the instructions on the web I have translated them for use in Windows. Of course I have use PowerShell! The only addition I have is I use Kitty as a SSH client. This uses the approach @ http://www.dinnovative.com/?p=348

1. Open up the box and plug in the WINK unit. Do not download any app or hook it up to the internet. If you do this the latest firmware will overwrite the ability to do the hack below without popping open the case and hitting the chip directly.

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Integrating ISY into OpenHAB

I am in the process of setting up OpenHAB for the extra functionality in my house. I have the ISY unit setup as the core brains for switches and scenes. All the other magic is in OpenHAB so if OpenHAB goes down the main functions of the house work. I wanted to get the OpenHAB system to be able to get the status from the ISY unit and also changes states. This was as not straight forward as I wanted. I still have a issue that the process is polling and not a subscriber model but I do not have time to create a ISY binding. Anyway, here’s the basic instructions.

Home automation with ISY and PowerShell

I am playing with ISY and automation in my home, looking at the universal devices page today I found the API for working with the unit. Turning to trusty PowerShell I came up with the following code to enable you to start interacting with the unit remotely. Ill look at a proper module at some point in the future but this increases the possibilities of the unit! [code] function Invoke-IsyRestMethod { param ( $RestPath ) $isyEndPoint = “http://192.168.0.123” $user = “user” $pass = “pass” $url = “{0}{1}” -f $isyEndPoint, $RestPath $headers = @{ Authorization = ‘Basic ’ + [Convert]::ToBase64String([Text.Encoding]::ASCII.GetBytes($("{0}:{1}" -f $user, $pass))) } invoke-restmethod -Uri $url -Method Get -Headers $headers } # Get all the nodes and addresses you have in the system. (Invoke-IsyRestMethod “/rest/nodes”).nodes.node | select name, address # get information about a specific node. Invoke-IsyRestMethod -RestPath “/rest/nodes/28 2F 24 1” #Turn the node on, in this case my desk lamp! Invoke-IsyRestMethod -RestPath “/rest/nodes/28 2F 24 1/cmd/DON/” #Turn the node off, in case my desk lamp. Invoke-IsyRestMethod -RestPath “/rest/nodes/28 2F 24 1/cmd/DOF/” [/code] Next to make my desk lamp flash when I should go to bed ;)