Next month the kitchen is getting remodeled and I volunteered to provide outlets and light switches for the contractors. I need like 13 of each.

My house is one foot in home assistant and one foot in google and I’m looking for both specific and general advice. I’ve done mostly Kasa HS200 switches so far in my house but I just installed my first [Enbrighten switch](Enbrighten 43080 Zigbee in-Wall… https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08428GDS8) and it seems good, but it’s underutilized because either I use the switch or I have to go dig in the HA app, and it isn’t convenient yet.

Here’s the deal:

I’ve got some door sensors, I’ve got HVAC, I’ve got doorbell and deadbolt (kind of), I’ve got zigbee smart blinds, and then a butt load of kasa switches and zigbee third reality wall warts and stuff. All the automations I’ve made are hands off. I don’t have any crossover between Google and home assistant (I understand there IS an integration) but I want to do this right.

  • Should I be doing probably one zigbee switch per room in the remodel (pantry, kitchen, laundry, mudroom) and then kasa? Then eventually move over to full HA?

  • I am struggling to figure out how to help the family switch away from Google to HA, but maybe I want to mask HA with Google? We are using the hub max displays around the house and I’m not sure how to pass control without posting dashboards (which I haven’t made) to the Google displays.

Sorry this is rambling, but what should I be thinking about here and how do I take next steps to ungoogle the house? I feel like instead of gobbling random stuff together like I have been doong I have an opportunity to make a commitment, but if I choose wrong it’s like a $1k+ mistake at $50 per switch/outlet.

  • CompactFlaxEnglish
    3·
    2 days ago

    Run everything through HA as the first step, and the frontend that your family uses is somewhat secondary.

    I use HomePods and the home app as a front end. I assume you can do the same idea with Google.

    There’s nothing wrong with setting up smart switches and using the physical buttons. If you don’t have an automation set up for the activity of the moment, just hit the button. That’s how it should work.

    • dream_weasel@sh.itjust.worksOPEnglish
      2·
      2 days ago

      Idk the front end is a sort of tough question it feels like because I think she would like to be able to say “hey Google open the blinds” but those are on timer automation and obfuscated by home assistant. I assume the integration fixes that problem, but eventually if like to set the Google displays to show home assistant dashboards when there is movement and expose those devices to Google? I’d like to keep things coherent and eventually move away from Google, but I’ll need to get to parity with HA first.

      • CompactFlaxEnglish
        1·
        2 days ago

        The way I have it set up, HomeKit (hey siri) has full control over the stuff people want to control. So hey Google open the blinds/turn on the lights always works. But the blinds might still close 30 seconds later if that’s when the trigger occurs. Homeassistant is my coordinator.

        Generally there’s limited use of HomeKit in my house because there’s a lot of automations. HomeKit only is a bunch of switches. I would set up Google the same way.

        I don’t have smart switches if I can’t easily come up with a good automation - either motion based (which doesn’t work if the sensor doesn’t face enough of the room or if there isn’t enough motion to trigger it eg sitting in office chair) or time based (you positively know that between x and y hrs you need the lights on). And the automation needs to be pretty reliable; if I’m overriding constantly I’ve done it wrong. The convenience factor of being able to turn it off from my bedroom doesn’t add up in my case.

        I also expose some switches to HomeKit that toggle things eg a water recirculating pump to toggle before starting the shower for instant hot water. But I’m a nerd.

        • dream_weasel@sh.itjust.worksOPEnglish
          1·
          24 hours ago

          What kind of logic are you using behind motion based detection?

          If you get motion between hours of x and y turn on and if no motion for x minutes turn off?

          • CompactFlaxEnglish
            1·
            22 hours ago

            Yeah it’s just time and motion. I don’t like it to be honest, but my sensors are either not great or in a bad spot. I am interested in the mmWave sensors but not rushing.

    • Avid Amoeba@lemmy.caEnglish
      1·
      2 days ago

      I concur. Use HA with Zigbee and/or Z-Wave. Expose to Google Home as needed. You can expose idividual devices. That said switching to HA as main iterface is pretty painless and HA Voice is better than Google’s.*

      * With local 4B LLM, so get a small mini PC or maybe Pi 5. I run the LLM on my workstation.

      • dream_weasel@sh.itjust.worksOPEnglish
        2·
        2 days ago

        I need different devices for that though right? Like at the point I’m using HA for voice the Google hubs should be gone.

          • chaospatterns@lemmy.worldEnglish
            2·
            1 day ago

            I’d love for my HA Voice Preview to be sufficient to replace my Alexa/Google devices. I even unplugged my Alexa devices. However, it’s been rough going for me. It never responds to my girlfriend speaking the wake word and doesn’t set timers. There’s a number of knobs that define how well it works including the physical hardware (there’s obviously the Voice Preview, but also some community made versions with better mics,) wake word model, conservation LLM model and the speech to text model (whisper vs speech to phrase). If it works well for you, can you share your configuration you’re using?

            • Avid Amoeba@lemmy.caEnglish
              2·
              1 day ago

              I’m using the HA PE hardware. The wake word sensitivity is set to max. I’m currently using the default Home Assistant (Nabu Casa) cloud STT and TTS. I’m using Qwen 8b running on Ollama via the Ollama HA integration. It runs on my main computer on the same network. I’ve tested local STT and TTS and it works great. The only reason I’m currently using the cloud one is that there’s a specific voice that sounded good for a Santa Claus assistant for the holidays. We haven’t encountered significant issues with the wakeword. Gotta yell louder sometimes. It activates from the TV sometimes. Speech recognition is pretty flawless. Neither me or my wife is a native English speaker but we don’t have super heavy accents.

              The one thing that made it great was the addition of the LLM. With it I don’t have to remember the exact names of devices or the correct phrasing to get HA to do what I want. It also allows for multiple actions in a single instruction. Since it’s an LLM you could also ask it to do LLM things. Like give you a semi-accurate fact or do basic math wrong:

              If you’d like to know specifics, ask.

          • dream_weasel@sh.itjust.worksOPEnglish
            2·
            2 days ago

            I’m interested to try. Does it matter which of the options I pick for purchase? It seems to be fulfilled by 4 different sources.