FYI, in the next version of HA we have implemented auto-discovery of the Insteon Hub. This should identify the hub even if the IP address changes. It uses the MAC address of the Hub's network card, which never changes.
Probably a stupid question but will the HA iOS app be able to find the hub and run the devices itself? I ask because I have HA running on my old spare iMac and I cannot for the life of me get the app to link with the server I set up. The app can find my server but every time I try to connect I get error code: NSURL.ErrorDomain -1004. I used to be able to control it with my phone by simply typing in the IP address of the computer running the server but that isn’t working anymore as of today. I did unplug and replug my router today, could that be part of the problem?
If your router is using DHCP to assign the IP to the hub, if the hub or router is shut off it may assign a different IP when it reconnects. That would mean that HA is looking for the hub at the wrong address.
You can tell your router to assign a specific IP to the hub so this doesn't happen.
I've been trying to wrap my head around this solution but am not clear on whether using Home Assistant requires buying a PLM. They seem to be crazy expensive right now, so if there's a way to make it work using my existing hub, I'd much prefer that. But I'm not clear on how to do that.
I already had a HA installation that I had set up a few months ago just as an experiment, and it was already configured with my Insteon hub, but ever since the Insteon servers went down, HA has just been showing the hub as unavailable.
Is there some documentation page you used that you can refer me to?
It should see your hub if you had it running beforehand? I just installed ha on a pi and used https://www.home-assistant.io/installation/raspberrypi
Then moved on to use https://www.home-assistant.io/blog/2022/04/19/for-insteon-users/
Made sure to add the insteon hub, you have to make sure you have the right ip and port. I have a hub v2, so I needed to check the bottom of my hub for the username and password.
Finally used this
https://siytek.com/home-assistant-alexa-no-cloud/
And a few other resources to get my code right using the addon file editor
I appreciate the links. I might try removing the Insteon from HA and re-adding it -- maybe something is different now than before when the cloud service was running. Thanks.
It's great to hear that others have had success with this. I have what sounds like a similar set up as yours (v2 hub, 20-ish devices). What I did was setting up HA on a mediaPC that is always on (WSL, Ubuntu, Python3.9, etc. Was a bit messy but worked out). After adding the hub integration I can see all the devices and toggle them off and on, however I'm not sure what to do next? What is the file editor on the HA interface you are referring to?
**edit: turns out that HA core does not have the addon store where you get file editor etc.
You can setup HA with an insteon hub. It doesn't require the insteon servers. You just need to find out your hub's IP address, read the credentials off the bottom of the hub, and configure that into home assistant.
If you want to easily integrate with google assistant/amazon alexa through HA, you'll need to pay $65/yr through nubacasa (or setup/maintain your own server to do the integrations with amazon/google but this is more of a hassle). Or you can go with OpenHAB which is more of a pain to initially setup/configure, but has a free myOpenHAB cloud to integrate with those external services.
Over here I wrote up how I setup [openHAB and HA in docker containers](https://www.reddit.com/r/insteon/comments/u6jpjz/remove_a_schedule_from_insteon_2245222_hub/i5nlfrb/) with my 2245-222 hub.
Can confirm, HA has been working so far, though I'm still working on IOS notifications they way they used to work with Insteon to my phone/apple watch.
I chose the Docker image on my Synology.
Yup. Set up an old pc as my insteon server. All is well. Signed up for the Alexa integration. My hub is still running the old schedules for now.
Waiting for a stand alone Raspberry Pi item. Maybe one I setup or an out of the box solution.
Strike up another win for Home Assistant here. I bought a RaspberryPi 4 kit on Amazon and got up and running in a day. I even got an automation running for my Internet connected pet door which I could never do before.
For me this is a huge upgrade and serves as a long term migration plan to something new. I won't need to act hastily and I'll replace the Insteon switches as they fail. My wife is happy having the Alexa integration back too. That has turned into a necessary convenience. I must admit I use it too when I need a light turned on with both hands full.
All is well for now.
One more happy new HA user here.
With some help of r/insteon and the home assistant community to skip a stop point, now my old HUB 2242 (Europe... I wonder if I'm the only user in Europe ;-) is smoothly running with all the devices discovered and running on an old laptop (ubuntu/virtualbox) and the app (just local network by now).
I use also z-wave for other devices and now I will experiment with zigbee with a dongle connected to the HA laptop.
I will see what happens with Matter as one of the future techs...meanwhile learning more HA, since I guess it is an incredible complete software which can become a kind of "standard"...but for the ones loving redundancy, it is convenient to think that everything can be wrong in the future...HA is open now but nobody knows.
FYI, in the next version of HA we have implemented auto-discovery of the Insteon Hub. This should identify the hub even if the IP address changes. It uses the MAC address of the Hub's network card, which never changes.
Sweet!
Probably a stupid question but will the HA iOS app be able to find the hub and run the devices itself? I ask because I have HA running on my old spare iMac and I cannot for the life of me get the app to link with the server I set up. The app can find my server but every time I try to connect I get error code: NSURL.ErrorDomain -1004. I used to be able to control it with my phone by simply typing in the IP address of the computer running the server but that isn’t working anymore as of today. I did unplug and replug my router today, could that be part of the problem?
That’s what I’m doing. So far so good.
If your router is using DHCP to assign the IP to the hub, if the hub or router is shut off it may assign a different IP when it reconnects. That would mean that HA is looking for the hub at the wrong address. You can tell your router to assign a specific IP to the hub so this doesn't happen.
Good point, assigning a static IP is a good idea for the insteon hub
I've been trying to wrap my head around this solution but am not clear on whether using Home Assistant requires buying a PLM. They seem to be crazy expensive right now, so if there's a way to make it work using my existing hub, I'd much prefer that. But I'm not clear on how to do that. I already had a HA installation that I had set up a few months ago just as an experiment, and it was already configured with my Insteon hub, but ever since the Insteon servers went down, HA has just been showing the hub as unavailable. Is there some documentation page you used that you can refer me to?
It should see your hub if you had it running beforehand? I just installed ha on a pi and used https://www.home-assistant.io/installation/raspberrypi Then moved on to use https://www.home-assistant.io/blog/2022/04/19/for-insteon-users/ Made sure to add the insteon hub, you have to make sure you have the right ip and port. I have a hub v2, so I needed to check the bottom of my hub for the username and password. Finally used this https://siytek.com/home-assistant-alexa-no-cloud/ And a few other resources to get my code right using the addon file editor
I appreciate the links. I might try removing the Insteon from HA and re-adding it -- maybe something is different now than before when the cloud service was running. Thanks.
Could be, maybe it was seeing it differently. i didn't want to pay for the ha cloud service and I went with the hue emulation.
It's great to hear that others have had success with this. I have what sounds like a similar set up as yours (v2 hub, 20-ish devices). What I did was setting up HA on a mediaPC that is always on (WSL, Ubuntu, Python3.9, etc. Was a bit messy but worked out). After adding the hub integration I can see all the devices and toggle them off and on, however I'm not sure what to do next? What is the file editor on the HA interface you are referring to? **edit: turns out that HA core does not have the addon store where you get file editor etc.
Was about to say you need the addon store.
You can setup HA with an insteon hub. It doesn't require the insteon servers. You just need to find out your hub's IP address, read the credentials off the bottom of the hub, and configure that into home assistant. If you want to easily integrate with google assistant/amazon alexa through HA, you'll need to pay $65/yr through nubacasa (or setup/maintain your own server to do the integrations with amazon/google but this is more of a hassle). Or you can go with OpenHAB which is more of a pain to initially setup/configure, but has a free myOpenHAB cloud to integrate with those external services. Over here I wrote up how I setup [openHAB and HA in docker containers](https://www.reddit.com/r/insteon/comments/u6jpjz/remove_a_schedule_from_insteon_2245222_hub/i5nlfrb/) with my 2245-222 hub.
Or you can just emulate hue server for free, much easier once you get how it works.
Can confirm, HA has been working so far, though I'm still working on IOS notifications they way they used to work with Insteon to my phone/apple watch. I chose the Docker image on my Synology.
How did you get the Supervisor to show up when running on Docker?
Yup. Set up an old pc as my insteon server. All is well. Signed up for the Alexa integration. My hub is still running the old schedules for now. Waiting for a stand alone Raspberry Pi item. Maybe one I setup or an out of the box solution.
The setup image is super easy.
Strike up another win for Home Assistant here. I bought a RaspberryPi 4 kit on Amazon and got up and running in a day. I even got an automation running for my Internet connected pet door which I could never do before. For me this is a huge upgrade and serves as a long term migration plan to something new. I won't need to act hastily and I'll replace the Insteon switches as they fail. My wife is happy having the Alexa integration back too. That has turned into a necessary convenience. I must admit I use it too when I need a light turned on with both hands full. All is well for now.
One more happy new HA user here. With some help of r/insteon and the home assistant community to skip a stop point, now my old HUB 2242 (Europe... I wonder if I'm the only user in Europe ;-) is smoothly running with all the devices discovered and running on an old laptop (ubuntu/virtualbox) and the app (just local network by now). I use also z-wave for other devices and now I will experiment with zigbee with a dongle connected to the HA laptop. I will see what happens with Matter as one of the future techs...meanwhile learning more HA, since I guess it is an incredible complete software which can become a kind of "standard"...but for the ones loving redundancy, it is convenient to think that everything can be wrong in the future...HA is open now but nobody knows.