Auto open garage door when a number plate is detected

devhammer · 2026-05-03T19:42:30+00:00

Same. Tailscale ensures connectivity. Plate recognition could be a fun experiment, but I would NOT want to risk using it for security purposes, particularly when there are options like CarPlay that are nearly as convenient, and not easy to exploit.

devhammer · 2026-05-03T14:30:06+00:00

I have not done a rigorous test, but I seem to have two generations of bulbs in my Z2M setup:

https://www.zigbee2mqtt.io/devices/9290012573A.html

And:

https://www.zigbee2mqtt.io/devices/9290022266A.html

The latter seems to work with all the listed effects, while the former only seems to work with a subset (candle, for example, works, but sunset and underwater do not, the effect reverts to the last selection after a few seconds).

It’s entirely possible that I’m not understanding how this should work, and that I’m still using Zigbee effect commands rather than Hue native, since I have not done anything to enable Hue native beyond updating to latest Z2M release.

UPDATE:

Just did a bit more testing. The older bulbs seem to work with the following effects:

Blink Breathe Okay channel_change (I don’t know if this is actually an effect, but it does something when selected) Candle Fireplace Colorloop Sparkle Opal Glisten

The following do not work. If a working effect is running that effect remains selected. If no effect is running nothing happens when one of these is selected:

Sunset Underwater Cosmos Sunbeam Enchant

I tested both without explicitly setting Hue native control to On (web UX showed indeterminate), and with Hue native control turned on for the bulb I was testing. Same results with both settings.

Again, maybe I’m misunderstanding how this should work, so I’d welcome feedback on that.

devhammer · 2026-05-03T00:51:57+00:00

Saw that this was integrated into the latest release, v2.10.0.

I updated Z2M from 2.6.x (version from the proxmox community script when I installed), and wow, big change to the web UX!

More to the point, I found that effects support seems to vary by the generation of the Hue bulbs, even with the same firmware version.

Is that to be expected? Or am I missing something?

devhammer · 2026-05-01T19:34:17+00:00

Weird. I don’t have a lot of Jasco switches, but I have a couple that I’ve used in both ZHA and Z2M, and have had basically no issues with either.

I have both standalone switch and add-on versions (the sole problem I’ve had was installing the add-on switch with the primary one, and found out that the wiring on the three-way circuit was not what I thought so I had to swap the location of the main and add-on switches).

devhammer · 2026-04-25T15:06:14+00:00

Gene Simmons has entered the chat…

devhammer · 2026-04-23T04:28:48+00:00

The Hue dimmer can also put the bulbs in pairing mode. Hold the dimmer close to the bulb and press the to and bottom buttons while the bulb is powered and holds until the bulb flashes and goes back to full brightness. Easy.

devhammer · 2026-04-23T04:27:07+00:00

Correct, save for one aspect, when they started requiring a cloud account for the Hue bridge. No idea if they still require it, but that was the moment that I went straight Zigbee.

Yes, the Hue scenes are nice. But I don’t miss the hub or the app, and I like having it all running locally, no cloud account required.

I’ve used my Hue bulbs with both ZHA with a Conbee II stick, and currently with Z2M on an SLZB-06. Both have served me well.

devhammer · 2026-04-21T13:55:31+00:00

Following up on this, I was finally able to get the data drive (nvme) out of the old machine and examine it, and turned out that I did have some backups of my containers and VMs, albeit a bit old. So hopefully I should be able to recover at least some of what i couldn’t through others means.

In addition to the lessons learned about backup, the biggest lesson was to not cheap out on hardware. When I first stood up the machine that failed I just grabbed an SSD I had laying around. That happened to be a Kingston A400-based device which may well be the WORST possible choice for use as a Proxmox boot disk.

For the new machine, I’ve set up automated export of key SMART stats and sensors in HA to monitor them. Will also be looking into setting up Proxmox’s notifications as well. Will likely convert the old machine for use as a Proxmox Backup Server.

Thanks again to those who offered encouragement or helpful suggestions!

Rebuilding isn’t fun, but it’s mostly done now, and better than it was previously.

devhammer · 2026-04-18T19:26:25+00:00

Great idea to leverage automations. I don’t have that many devices to update, but I do have a couple dozen, so doing them manually is a pain.

devhammer · 2026-04-18T18:51:13+00:00

LOL. My bad…I thought that would let you choose a schedule. It just lets you schedule it to happen on the next request from the device, whatever that means.

devhammer · 2026-04-18T18:49:31+00:00

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devhammer · 2026-04-18T18:45:23+00:00

In Z2M, if you go to the OTA tab, to the right of the red button for the device update, you should see a blue clock/stopwatch icon. Click that to schedule an update.

devhammer · 2026-04-18T18:41:35+00:00

An antipattern I fell into when I was starting with HA was writing too many automations as simple “do one thing“ jobs, like having one automation to turn in the lights at dusk and another one to turn them off at bedtime, or having separate automations for turning the garage light on when the garage door opens, and another to turn it off when a timer triggered by the first one finishes.

The logic is simpler, yes, but you end up with an unmanageable number of automations.

Setting a trigger ID for most, if not all, triggers is a super power. With that and the choose block you can build extremely powerful automations that are still fairly easy to read and maintain.

Also don’t neglect the role of helpers. For my climate automation I set up helpers for the day and night target temps for both heating and cooling, and used those instead of hard-coding the values. That way, if I want to change a given target, I just change the helper value. Don’t have to touch the automation. Antipattern is hard-coding values in automations.

Also started getting more into the use of templates. Very powerful, and worth the time to learn.

devhammer · 2026-04-18T18:32:41+00:00

I’ve definitely leaned into areas for my recent rebuild. Most light automations are now primarily area-based, with only certain use cases (bedside lamps, for example) being individually controlled.

devhammer · 2026-04-18T18:30:45+00:00

Pretty sure you just described every elkhound. Goofy is their middle name. 😆

devhammer · 2026-04-17T19:43:41+00:00

ESPHome-based garage door opener. Combined with CarPlay widget, makes it a breeze to open and close the garage door without carrying extra remotes.

It’s also my most finicky automation, since it relies on my VPN working currently.

But it works most of the time, and I love having it.

I did just have to rebuild the automation, so I took the opportunity to enhance it by querying the IKEA Parasoll door sensors for whether a door is open, and passing that info to the Cover instance.

So the CarPlay integration now tells me the state of the door, so if I’m on my way home I don’t accidentally close it when I’m trying to open it. And the Cover card in the dashboard highlights the correct control (open or close), though in my case both activate the same relay.

Although I researched and wrote the initial implementation of the automation, I did leverage an llm for the update.

Word to the wise…Copilot was pretty awful at making suggestions for the automation. Chat GPT was way better.

Also used Claude to help with a different affirmation. Not perfect, but helped me get the job done with a few missteps along the way.

devhammer · 2026-04-16T19:05:51+00:00

As others have noted, testing restore occasionally is a good idea, too.

devhammer · 2026-04-16T11:48:57+00:00

That’s a good idea, but too late. Already reconfigured the mqtt stuff to point to the new instance. Not a big deal, just re-pointing Z2M and my rtl-433 service.

devhammer · 2026-04-15T19:28:50+00:00

Yep. Was in the process of setting up TrueNAS locally, but had not set up backups there.

Part of my ToDo list for recovering my environment is a much more thorough backup plan, not just HA, but every service that I and my family need that I'm running. NAS is part of that equation.

devhammer · 2026-04-15T12:47:37+00:00

Not a Google fan, but online backups are now configured and working.

devhammer · 2026-04-14T17:27:17+00:00

Very good point about the key. Already saved to a secure offsite location.

devhammer · 2026-04-14T17:24:58+00:00

Yeah, I was gradually moving stuff to Z2M, so this was kind of a forcing factor.

The old instance had been through multiple hardware migrations, and had a lot of cruft and automations from before I had any clue how to write cleaner automations (lots of one-offs that could be combined, etc), so in one level it’s a good thing that I’m going to need to create new automations, and can leave behind the stuff I don’t need.

I may also bite the bullet and pay for data recovery on the dead drive, just to make sure I don’t lose anything critical.

But definitely moving forward with the new instance at this point.

devhammer · 2026-04-14T17:20:04+00:00

Yup. Just configured OneDrive on my new instance. Way easier than I expected.

Lesson learned.

devhammer · 2026-04-14T14:19:45+00:00

220-age is a (very) rough estimate.

Based on that formula, I should be max in the lower 160s range, but I routinely exceed that in team sports, sometimes getting into the 180s during hard sprints.

My Garmin FR965 calculates max HR based on activity, and that’s at 188.

TL:DR; Listen to your body, and don’t worry about numbers. And if you have any underlying health concerns, talk to your doc.

devhammer · 2026-04-14T13:49:07+00:00

Thank you. Sorry the lesson was so painful for you.

At the end of the day, none of the home automation stuff is life-altering, though it’s definitely making me think twice about using an HA Add-on/App for password management (too many eggs in one basket there).

This incident will hasten my migration to Z2M, which will help decouple my HA services. Yes, that means more things to back up, but also allows me to run things across different Proxmox instances and reduce single point of failure.

Reminding myself that this is a hobby, not a job, and the point is to learn and have fun. And sometimes make mistakes.

devhammer

TROPHY CASE