Node Red + Home Assistant - Master Class 2 Advanced Flows. Flow variables, switch, state and others!

[@MaunoKoivistoOfficial]

I'm blown away by what this software can do. Thanks for the clear explanations.

[@DaleThomasNYC]

Another great explanation! I am only slightly glazing over at the complexity of all this. I love how you call the Wife Satisfaction Rating! Very important! And it just made me giggle that clearly, that is a universal truism. Well done.

[@HomeSight]

Thanks Dale. You’re right, it’s very important for a happy and harmonious life!

[@bjarkesoegaard]

Your Basics is taking me to the next lvl. thx :-)

[@abbv2x]

The msg.reset command in particular was very helpful as was the rest of the vid!

[@HomeSight]

Glad I could help!

[@TheNCGardener]

This is exactly what I needed for my irrigation project! Thank you for this. This helped me figure out several missing pieces of my project.

[@HomeSight]

Glad to help

[@MrRfries]

I'm totally new to Home Assistant and I wanted to jump right in to Node Red. I watched some other videos, but I could not get anything to work. This series is a great pace and detailed enough for a new user. I got my first basic flow working while watching Part 1. Thanks!!

[@HomeSight]

Hi Roger! Thanks, that’s great to hear! Enjoy the other parts!

[@ml.2770]

The addition of the switch node between the "Sunrise to Sunset" node and the light state nodes is pretty key here. I think you forgot to edit it in. You left me very confused until I noticed it just appeared. Then I downloaded the flow and saw what you really did to tie the automation and the automation defeat together.

[@HomeSight]

Ah, apologies! Yes you are right that is key to the flow.

[@craigw4644]

Nice job, well explained, much easier than training the wife 😊

[@HomeSight]

thanks! If you figure out the latter we’d all be interested!

[@Farizno]

Great video. Thanks again for the lesson!

[@HomeSight]

No problem! Glad you found it useful.

[@jproveta]

Very good, again, thanks.

[@OthmanAlikhan]

Thanks for the video =)

[@johnm4962]

Very good video!

[@HomeSight]

Thanks John!

[@FlyPrelude]

Great guide! video at 17:30 - 17:39, you added a "Switch" node (after the "Time Range" nodes) but didn't explain, is that node also required for the automation disable/enable to work? What's the properties inside those "Switch" nodes? Thanks edit: found my answer from downloading and importing your nodes (the "switch" nodes are key to complete the automation)

[@HomeSight]

Hi Howard. Sorry for not making that part clear. Have you tried importing the flow from the description? homesight.tech/?portfolio=node-red-master-class-2-advanced-flow

[@FlyPrelude]

@@HomeSight yes, problem solved, having the ability to import your nodes really helps. Please keep those node-red videos coming!

[@HomeSight]

Glad it’s helped. I certainly well keep them coming, the next one is planned for presence detection.

[@AndyFreestone]

Hi Simon, enjoying the videos so far having just got into Node Red and HA. Enjoying your style andprsentations and finding them easy to follow. (with lots stops starts of course). Before I move on can I ask if you have covered how to stop the PIR reactivating then flow if triggered once again. Thanks just about to start no. 3.

[@DouglasFish]

The reset logic there might help me solve an auto-light on/off problem I have...

[@HomeSight]

The delay and reset is often used in my routines, it’s very useful used in the right way!

[@RicardoSantos-zh5uz]

Fantastic!

[@pfurrie]

Content is good. Suggestions: - Tighten up the video time-wise. A bit long, needs to move along. - Bring up your audio level. The sound effects are quite a bit louder than you (they should be a little softer than you). - Get your microphone closer, so you get a better signal-to-noise ratio. Currently, there is background hum, which would be less noticeable if the microphone picked you up stronger, and easiest way to do that is to move it closer. Don't just turn up the gain in editing, as that boosted both your voice *and* the hum, so there is no SNR difference. Thanks for the content!

[@synco1985]

Thank you so much, the clip is great, really needed this. can do something about the volume of your voice? is really low, and the music at the end scared me because I had to take the volume really high. Thank you again, and have a wonderful new year! bye

[@HomeSight]

Hi, glad you found the content useful, this is one of my earlier videos. The sound is much better on later ones! Happy new year to you too!

[@McAndriu]

Nice vid! Thank you very much. The "Beware of Wife" sign is something we should start to get rid of, I believe... A little bit disappointing.

[@HomeSight]

Hi Andreu, thanks for watching, although I’m not sure I fully understand your comment?

[@McAndriu]

@@HomeSight Thanks for answering! It's just that I understood -or maybe misunderstood- the "Beware of Wife" sign as something that poses "the wife" as somebody that does not enjoy domotics/tech -of course, maybe she does not- and somehow paternalizes her figure in a way that she is seen and somebody that is always having our wings clipped. I read it as these micro sexist expressions that could be avoided. By the way, I am learning a lot thanks to your videos. Thank you very much for your effort and time!

[@HomeSight]

Hi Andreu, I had not thought about it in that way. My partner certainly does not “clip wings”, she is incredible. She is not a big fan of technology in the same way I am. I meant no offence by it.

[@matthewswan1873]

Really would like a video on how to do things when all (several) people are away from home (with life 360 or other presence detectors)

[@ericxls93]

Very good indeed, -loving your videos! Would be great if you do a video about counters and timers - how these values then move to the front end dashboard. For instance, A counter for the nespresso pods, every time I use the machine it display the counter in the dashboard and I get alerted, how to increase 50 in one stab OR Every time a window sensor triggers remind me in 30 days - I would like to see the remaining days in the front end... Trouble is that I am limited to HA automation as I simply would not know where to start! -So much to explore around counters, but no one has done a decent video.

[@andrewclarke9533]

Great vid! Helped me a lot. How would I adapt your sequence so the lights don’t turn off if motion is still being detected. Currently the lights go out after the delay then when it’s triggered again it comes back on? Maybe restart the delay or something?

[@HomeSight]

Hi, I'm glad it helped. I tried a few different methods. I don't know if you've used a function node yet? I have created a little flow using a function node which sets the time and sends a reset. You'll also have to change the setting of the delay node to "override with msg.delay". Try importing this, and then adding it into the flow in the right place: [{"id":"c9a69455.ed82f","type":"delay","z":"cbc875ea.73196","name":"","pauseType":"delayv","timeout":"10","timeoutUnits":"seconds","rate":"1","nbRateUnits":"1","rateUnits":"second","randomFirst":"1","randomLast":"5","randomUnits":"seconds","drop":false,"x":410,"y":320,"wires":[["5a441953.636c08"]]},{"id":"ae3f5f0d.618a28","type":"inject","z":"cbc875ea.73196","name":"","props":[{"p":"payload"},{"p":"topic","vt":"str"}],"repeat":"","crontab":"","once":false,"onceDelay":0.1,"topic":"","payload":"","payloadType":"date","x":100,"y":320,"wires":[["bfe4eac2.5add5"]]},{"id":"5a441953.636c08","type":"debug","z":"cbc875ea.73196","name":"","active":true,"tosidebar":true,"console":false,"tostatus":false,"complete":"false","statusVal":"","statusType":"auto","x":570,"y":320,"wires":[]},{"id":"bfe4eac2.5add5","type":"function","z":"cbc875ea.73196","name":"","func":"msg.delay = 5000; var reset = {reset:true}; return [[reset,msg]];","outputs":1,"noerr":0,"initialize":"","finalize":"","x":260,"y":320,"wires":[["c9a69455.ed82f"]]}]

[@andrewclarke9533]

Legend!! Works a treat

[@HomeSight]

I’m glad it worked. no problem!

[@michelduprezcomposer]

That's great, thanks ! Maybe you could balance your voice track higher, because I need to turn the volume to its max, then I nearly got a stroke when came the jingle :)

[@richardburguillos3118]

Yes, I agree, all the jingle sounds are much louder than the voice track.

[@HomeSight]

Ah - sorry about that, I will sort that for my next video. I’ve found that the mic I’m using gets a lot of noise when I have the gain any higher, but don’t worry; I’ll sort. Thanks for the feedback.

[@derekcfoley]

Great video! Looking for help with accessing "current_power_w" on a smartthings outlet. Its an attribute, and I just can't ever get node red to see it in any of the debug outputs. My energy monitors by Aeotec are really simple to read and act on with Node Red, but it seems really hard to do the same with a basic socket outlet that has an energy monitor feature. I remember I had to do a lot of messing about with a different sql structure to access it in Grafana to visualise it compared to the energy monitors. I'm trying to monitor power levels - I'd prefer to use a function. I just don't get why I can't access it via a path - like power=switch.outlet.attribute.current_power_w in code! Node red seems to be very odd how it relies on "payloads" to pass in data. I've tried combinations of switch.outlet.attribute.current_power_w in various nodes - and nothing comes out of the debug showing its reading the wattage.

[@HomeSight]

Thank you, I’m afraid I don’t have any smart things outlets. Can you get the data in it’s raw format in MQTT?

[@derekcfoley]

@@HomeSight Thanks... erm... I have the MQQT broker installed on my Pi. Which I assume was a requirement for setting up homeassistant - but I haven't a clue how to access the raw data as I've only seen it on the add-ons section - I'll see if I can find how!

[@HomeSight]

How is your device added? Integration?

[@derekcfoley]

@@HomeSight Its added via a Smarthings app and are paired with their v2 hub - I use the "service" call nodes to activate them in Node Red.

[@derekcfoley]

I did manage to get to the data in Grafana using this database query: "SELECT mean("current_power_w") FROM "autogen"."state" WHERE ("entity_id" = 'car') AND $timeFilter GROUP BY time($__interval) fill(linear)"

[@feo786]

Excellent vid! Can you do one where you explain how to toggle a light on for, say 1 min when a PIR is triggered and then extend that by 1 min every time it gets triggered again?

[@HomeSight]

I could make and send you a flow to do that, but what what would you want the limit to be? What would you want to reset it back to 1 min?

[@feo786]

@@HomeSight the idea would be that someone walks into a dark room, PIR triggers and then the light turns on. As long as they're in the room and keep triggering the PIR, the light needs to stay on for longer. Anything that achieves that would be great. Not too fussed about the actual numbers but more about which nodes to use and how to tie it together.

[@MarkWascherJr]

I like the idea of using the light switch as a quick toggle to turn off/on the automation. I'm having an issue where I'm flipping the switch to quickly for NodeRed to see that the shelly state has changed. Any suggestions?

[@HomeSight]

Are you sure it's not the switch not actually switching? I only ask since the MQTT messages should be queued and replayed in order.

[@ninnaogtommyfrederiksen2266]

But if you turn on the light manuel and then activate the sensor won't the timer turn off the light?

[@groentoft]

So what happens if wifey turns bootroom light on by switching the light on at the wall switch? And do you have to reset the automation with the double switching within the 500 milliseconds?

[@HomeSight]

Hello, thanks for watching. That’s the joy of this, when turning either light on/off at the wall, it operates normally. Yes, you have to turn on/off or off/on within the 500ms to tell node red to toggle the state of the automation.

[@groentoft]

@@HomeSight Does that mean that if wifey leaves the room a few minutes later and turns off the light, you’ll have to activate the automation manually? Would it be possible to make a “fallback option”: Light is shut off so NodeRed re-enters automation mode again automatically (perhaps after a certain amount of time)?

[@HomeSight]

No that’s not needed, thats the joy of this automation, the state would be checked regardless of the state of the light switch, if the light is off, the automation will run. If the light is off (regardless of switch position) the automation will run.

[@BiagioDeGiovanni]

Sorry, You set up a variable automation. But shouldn't you set the flow about the automation to work or not to work in base at the value of the varialble? it only reset the timer for switching th elight back off but if the automation is set to false that should not start at all. is it correct?

[@photelegy]

Is there a way to kill a flow when a new flow starts?

[@HomeSight]

You can often do a reset dependant on the node?

[@photelegy]

@@HomeSight I'm pretty new on NodeRed. How can I do such a reset dependant? Is this a basic node or with a plugIn (if so, what's the plugIn called?

[@HomeSight]

It depends on the nodes that you have in the flow you are trying to stop. An example of a reset is on a delay node, if you have a flow with a delay, you can use a change node to send msg.reset and it will stop the delay node. Does that make sense?

[@steveklein9335]

I'm not sure I fully understand the 500 ms wait timer. So if you just instantly flip the switch from Off to On and back to Off within 500ms... or vice versa from On to off and back to on, then you essentially toggle whether the automation is on or off? But any reasonable person is going to need the light on for more than a half second, so they would never accidentally toggle off the automation. Only the programmer (you) would know to do that. Is this the jist of it? And to expand further... you could set switches all over your house to do this to enable/disable your most common automations that you'd like to turn on or off easily, even if they are completely unrelated to the light switch... ie, flipping the switch on and back off within half a second makes a video camera stop recording or something, right? Thank you for your Node Red videos. They are helping me a good bit set up automations, but I still haven't figured out how to change the attributes of things I want to change (for instance, turning a light on or off is easy because there is a specific call to make. But I haven't figured out how to make the light turn on to blue, or turn on at 50% brightness, etc. There are attributes in Hue lights for this type of stuff, but I can't figure out where to put that code within Node-Red. Hoping I find that in one of your videos 3-5, as you've touched on it here that it is possible (of course) but haven't actually seen an example of it.

[@HomeSight]

Hi Steve, yes the idea with the toggle of the switch with 500ms is to be able to turn the automation on or off but ultimately leave the light in the same state as it started. Yes, no one reasonably would enable or disable the automation since flipping the switch twice is not a natural function. You absolutely could use any switch to do certain things in the house.

[@HomeSight]

Oh, and yes, push on with the node red videos; we do cover brightness. I haven’t covered colour changing yet, but plan to soon with a “light sabre” I made with an RGB strip and a Shelly RGB!

[@HomeSight]

Oh, and yes, push on with the node red videos; we do cover brightness. I haven’t covered colour changing yet, but plan to soon with a “light sabre” I made with an RGB strip and a Shelly RGB!

[@HomeSight]

Oh, and yes, push on with the node red videos; we do cover brightness. I haven’t covered colour changing yet, but plan to soon with a “light sabre” I made with an RGB strip and a Shelly RGB!

[@jimbray7259]

Love your videos - but please turn the music down. Every time the music comes on I have to turn the speakers down and then back up to hear you talk.

[@HomeSight]

Sorry Jim, it’s better in my later videos!

[@Zippoz]

Hi everybody! A simple flow but I can't do it! I need to turn on an aspirator when light is turned on. Simple! But I want turn it off immediately aspirator if light is turned off before 5 min, after 5 min of running time, If I turn off light switch aspirator need to run another 5 min. Simple but I don't understand how do it. Could anybody help me? Ragardrs

[@richardburguillos3118]

Enjoying your lessons... This one I am going to have to watch a few more times... Do I understand it correctly: PHYSICAL FAST TOGGLE (PS) FINAL SHELLY 1 Shelly 1 SWITCH (PS) FINAL POSSITION STATUS COMMENTS ============================================================================================ ON OFF OFF OFF Light turns OFF and stays OFF, Automation Override and will NOT turn ON Again ON ON ON ON Light Stays ON, Automation Override and will NOT turn OFF OFF OFF ON ON Light Turns ON, Automation Override and will NOT turn OFF Is my understanding correct? The act of quick toggling overrides the automation and leaves the light in the last state the physical switch was left in? I am new to Shelly and have a number of units to "play" with... If the Shelly 1 was OFF and the Physical Switch is turned ON, does the Shelly status change to ON? If the above is true, how do we tell the automation it's ok to run again? I have to watch this again... OK, I watched it a second time. The resetting of the 5 min delay node effectively stops the timer and thus the light will stay ON and never turn OFF, right? You ended the video without showing us the picture of your house and that the outside light was still ON. Now to watch it again... a little more sinks in each time and the "dim" setting on my understanding gets closer to 100% ;-) Updated table above... Noted that you did not finish the override link for the boot room toggling. I'm definitely going to need this one as I replace my Insteon motion switched outdoor flood lights with standard floods and place Shelly 1's in their respective switches. Then I will be using the Hue Outdoor Motion Sensors to trigger the Shelly 1's to turn on ALL the backyard lights. The trick here will be that as long as the sensors sense motion, the lights should stay ON and not time out. But as soon as motion is no longer sensed, then turn the lights off after say 3 - 5 minutes. All the physical switches would be in the OFF position. But if I turn a physical switch ON, then the light should stay ON and the automation of motion ignored. Also, motion would only trigger ALL lights ON if Event sun.sun is below_horizon. The kicker would be that there will be more than one motion sensor involved as there will be one on the back of home as well on the back left and back right of home and as long as any oone of these is sensing motion, the group.backyard_lights should remain on. On to lesson 3

[@HomeSight]

Hi Richard, thanks for watching. Firstly, I'll try and answer the toggling of the switch to enable/disable the automation. I made it 2 operations of the switch so it would go to the other state and then back, leaving the light in the same state. i.e. (Light starts on) -> Turn switch off -> Turn switch on = enable or disable of the automation (Light starts off) -> Turn switch on -> Turn switch off = enable or disable of the automation I run those Shelly 1s in "Edge" mode, so that every hit of the switch, changes the state of the light. From what you have said, you would need to tweak the sequence slightly to allow that. You will probably best having the shelly in "Toggle" mode so its acts as a flip switch with one state for "ON" and one state for "OFF", that way you will know the state of the switch. With multiple PIRs, you may have to have a a timer reset when the light is triggered too, to stop it going off from the previous timer? Does that make sense? Let me know on here, if you get stuck! Thanks again

[@richardburguillos3118]

@@HomeSight So If I use your description above: (Light starts on) -> Turn switch off -> Turn switch on = enable or disable of the automation This will end up with the Light ON and either enable or disable the automation based on what state it was before. (Light starts off) -> Turn switch on -> Turn switch off = enable or disable of the automation This will end up with the Light OFF and again, either enable or disable the automation based on what state it was before. Is the above correct? If so, then the trick might be to some how be able to show the status of the automation on Home Assistant. Possibly setting a global variable that tracks current status and changes the state of an indicator on a panle. Hmmmm, if that could be a virtual switch for the automation, then one could reactivate or deactivate the automation via that switch as well vs. having to go to the physical switch.... This Node-Red stuff can be fun and frustrating all at the same time... One of my frustrations is that I want to understand Logic and how I can do some something if say the state of one device AND the state of another is as I wish, THEN do what I want. The other would be if an OR, etc... I know there is a logic set, but I need to figure out how it works... Possibly a video for your future? Thanks!

[@HomeSight]

Hi Richard, you are exactly right. You are also mostly right about showing the status of the automation, rather than a global variable which would exist within Node Red (between multiple flows), you would use a "input_boolean" which you could setup in your config.yaml. You can set it using a call service node, as well as seeing and changing the state on a dashboard. I do this with my "alarm". I'll definitely be doing that in a future video. I know what you mean, getting ANDs and ORs can be a little complicated, sometimes you can do inline state checks for AND, although this relies on things happening in a certain order sometimes. ORs can be done by having parallel parts of the sequence, i.e. 2x PIRs wired to the same node, that way if 1 or 2 trigger, they both activate the flow. Definitely a video coming up for that soon.

[@wtfyooutube]

Letters are barely recognisable which is...