Making Home Assistant’s Presence Detection not so Binary

In Home Assistant and many other home automation controllers, your home status is either Home or Away. There’s no in-between.

The Problem

So, you’ve got your home automation started, and it’s time to add some cool automations, like turning off everything when you leave, or playing some music when you get home. These can be pretty easy to do with presence detection, but sometimes you need more.

In my Home Assistant setup I’m using Bluetooth presence detection. Every ten seconds my Synology NAS running Home Assistant checks to see what Bluetooth devices it can ‘see’. If it detects my phone, then it knows I’m home.

When I get home, and it’s between a certain time, my house will start playing my Chillout playlist on Spotify through my Sonos speakers. It will only do that, if I arrive home alone, or my fiancée isn’t home. When everyone leaves, Home Assistant will shut everything down – including music, Philips Hue Lights, the TV, heating/cooling etc.

I’m in a two bedroom apartment, and the Bluetooth presence detection works across the entire apartment. There seems to be a blackspot when I’m at my desk with my phone. I’ll be working away, writing my next awesome automation or piece of code, only for Home Assistant to cut the power to my computer monitor and pause my music. A massive first world problem that needs to be solved.

I could increase the timeout which would reduce this from happening (which I’ve done) or even use multiple presence detection options like WiFi and Bluetooth. However this doesn’t solve the problem of my house doing things too quickly.

I’ll wake my phone, place it on the desk and wait for Home Assistant to detect it again. But here comes the problem. After waiting what seems like a lifetime for my phone to be detected again, everything starts as if I have been away for hours. My music is changed to my Chillout playlist again (or starts from the beginning), lights that I don’t need might come back on, I get messages that the dishwasher is done etc. At the moment, Home Assistant doesn’t know that I was home one minute ago, but maybe there’s a way we don’t need to start from scratch each time.

There’s also some times when we might be away from home. Maybe a weekend in the country, or away for work. The house should be able to tell that we’re more than just away for the day, so maybe it shouldn’t send us alerts that a battery needs to be replaced. Or, if I’m away for a long time, but my fiancée is home, maybe send those alerts to her instead.

Adding New States To Home Assistant

In my home, I want to track the following states that a person could be.

Just Arrived	when someone has just arrived home after being away
HOME	The classic Home state
Just Left	When someone has just left the house
AWAY	The classic Away or not_home state
Extended Away	If someone is away for more than 24 hours

I’m using the Home Assistant input select component to track the states of my dishwasher and washing machine. I can re-use the same logic for that here.


input_select:
  phil_status_dropdown:
    name: Phil
    options:
      - Home
      - Just Arrived
      - Just Left
      - Away
      - Extended Away
    initial: Home

input_select:

phil_status_dropdown:

name: Phil

options:

- Home

- Just Arrived

- Just Left

- Away

- Extended Away

initial: Home

Making Them Look Nice

Just like I did for my washing machine and dishwasher, I’m going to use a template sensor that will read the value of the drop-down. I can then make it look like a normal device tracker by adding our photos to the sensor.


sensor:
  - platform: template
    sensors:
      phil_status:
        value_template: '{{ states.input_select.phil_status_dropdown.state }}'
        friendly_name: 'Phil'
      helen_status:
        value_template: '{{ states.input_select.helen_status_dropdown.state }}'
        friendly_name: 'Helen'

sensor:

- platform: template

sensors:

phil_status:

value_template: '{{ states.input_select.phil_status_dropdown.state }}'

friendly_name: 'Phil'

helen_status:

value_template: '{{ states.input_select.helen_status_dropdown.state }}'

friendly_name: 'Helen'


people_status:
  name: People Status
  entities:
    - sensor.phil_status
    - sensor.helen_status

people_status:

name: People Status

entities:

- sensor.phil_status

- sensor.helen_status


sensor.phil_status:
  entity_picture: #URL to picture
sensor.helen_status:
  entity_picture: #URL to picture

sensor.phil_status:

entity_picture: #URL to picture

sensor.helen_status:

entity_picture: #URL to picture

Automating Transitions Between States

In Home Assistant we can see when someone is home or away only. But we now have some more complex states. Like I did for my washing machines, I’m going to use a for: condition. So as soon as someone is marked as away from their device tracker, they’ll be set to “Just Left”. If they are then in the “Just Left” status for five minutes, they’ll be marked as “Away”. The opposite is true when getting home.

However one problem I mentioned was music jumping back to my Chillout playlist. Let’s make sure that if someone is marked as “Just Left” and then their device tracker ‘sees’ them again, instead of marking them as Just Arrived, mark them as Home. This will stop any automations for when you get home for the first time firing off again.

Here’s some code which will do that.


- alias: Mark Phil as just arrived
  trigger:
    - platform: state
      entity_id: device_tracker.phil
      from: 'not_home'
      to: 'home'
  action:
    - service: input_select.select_option
      data:
        entity_id: input_select.phil_status_dropdown
        option: Just Arrived

- alias: Mark Phil as home
  trigger:
    - platform: state
      entity_id: input_select.phil_status_dropdown
      to: 'Just Arrived'
      for:
        minutes: 10
    - platform: state
      entity_id: input_select.phil_status_dropdown
      from: 'Just Left'
      to: 'Just Arrived'
  condition:
  action:
    - service: input_select.select_option
      data:
        entity_id: input_select.phil_status_dropdown
        option: Home

- alias: Mark Phil as just left
  trigger:
    - platform: state
      entity_id: device_tracker.phil
      from: 'home'
      to: 'not_home'
  action:
    - service: input_select.select_option
      data:
        entity_id: input_select.phil_status_dropdown
        option: Just Left

- alias: Mark Phil as away
  trigger:
    - platform: state
      entity_id: input_select.phil_status_dropdown
      to: 'Just Left'
      for:
        minutes: 10
  action:
    - service: input_select.select_option
      data:
        entity_id: input_select.phil_status_dropdown
        option: Away

- alias: Mark Phil as just arrived

trigger:

- platform: state

entity_id: device_tracker.phil

from: 'not_home'

to: 'home'

action:

- service: input_select.select_option

data:

entity_id: input_select.phil_status_dropdown

option: Just Arrived

- alias: Mark Phil as home

trigger:

- platform: state

entity_id: input_select.phil_status_dropdown

to: 'Just Arrived'

for:

minutes: 10

- platform: state

entity_id: input_select.phil_status_dropdown

from: 'Just Left'

to: 'Just Arrived'

condition:

action:

- service: input_select.select_option

data:

entity_id: input_select.phil_status_dropdown

option: Home

- alias: Mark Phil as just left

trigger:

- platform: state

entity_id: device_tracker.phil

from: 'home'

to: 'not_home'

action:

- service: input_select.select_option

data:

entity_id: input_select.phil_status_dropdown

option: Just Left

- alias: Mark Phil as away

trigger:

- platform: state

entity_id: input_select.phil_status_dropdown

to: 'Just Left'

for:

minutes: 10

action:

- service: input_select.select_option

data:

entity_id: input_select.phil_status_dropdown

option: Away

We also want to add the special case “Extended Away”. This is useful if someone is away for the house for more than a whole day, like a vacation.


- alias: Mark Phil as extended away
  trigger:
    - platform: state
      entity_id: input_select.phil_status_dropdown
      to: 'Away'
      for:
        hours: 24
  action:
    - service: input_select.select_option
      data_template:
        entity_id: input_select.phil_status_dropdown
        option: Extended Away

- alias: Mark Phil as extended away

trigger:

- platform: state

entity_id: input_select.phil_status_dropdown

to: 'Away'

for:

hours: 24

action:

- service: input_select.select_option

data_template:

entity_id: input_select.phil_status_dropdown

option: Extended Away

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Using Templates for Multiple People

With the code blocks above, there’s five automations just to go through those states. What if you have two people in your house? That becomes ten automations you need to maintain.

Let’s use Home Assistant templates to make the automations more dynamic. We can use the trigger variable to see which device caused the state to change, and then update the drop-down for the right person. Using templates, our whole automation for today becomes the following.


- alias: Mark person as just arrived
  trigger:
    - platform: state
      entity_id: device_tracker.phil
      from: 'not_home'
      to: 'home'
    - platform: state
      entity_id: group.helen
      from: 'not_home'
      to: 'home'
  action:
    - service: input_select.select_option
      data_template:
        entity_id: >
          {% if trigger.entity_id == 'device_tracker.phil' %}
            input_select.phil_status_dropdown
          {% else %}
            input_select.helen_status_dropdown
          {% endif %}
        option: Just Arrived

- alias: Mark person as home
  trigger:
    - platform: state
      entity_id: input_select.phil_status_dropdown
      to: 'Just Arrived'
      for:
        minutes: 10
    - platform: state
      entity_id: input_select.helen_status_dropdown
      to: 'Just Arrived'
      for:
        minutes: 10
    - platform: state
      entity_id: input_select.phil_status_dropdown
      from: 'Just Left'
      to: 'Just Arrived'
    - platform: state
      entity_id: input_select.helen_status_dropdown
      from: 'Just Left'
      to: 'Just Arrived'
  action:
    - service: input_select.select_option
      data_template:
        entity_id: >
          {% if trigger.entity_id == 'input_select.phil_status_dropdown' %}
            input_select.phil_status_dropdown
          {% else %}
            input_select.helen_status_dropdown
          {% endif %}
        option: Home

- alias: Mark person as just left
  trigger:
    - platform: state
      entity_id: device_tracker.phil
      from: 'home'
      to: 'not_home'
    - platform: state
      entity_id: group.helen
      from: 'home'
      to: 'not_home'
  action:
    - service: input_select.select_option
      data_template:
        entity_id: >
          {% if trigger.entity_id == 'device_tracker.phil' %}
            input_select.phil_status_dropdown
          {% else %}
            input_select.helen_status_dropdown
          {% endif %}
        option: Just Left

- alias: Mark person as away
  trigger:
    - platform: state
      entity_id: input_select.phil_status_dropdown
      to: 'Just Left'
      for:
        minutes: 10
    - platform: state
      entity_id: input_select.helen_status_dropdown
      to: 'Just Left'
      for:
        minutes: 10
  action:
    - service: input_select.select_option
      data_template:
        entity_id: >
          {% if trigger.entity_id == 'input_select.phil_status_dropdown' %}
            input_select.phil_status_dropdown
          {% else %}
            input_select.helen_status_dropdown
          {% endif %}
        option: Away

- alias: Mark person as extended away
  trigger:
    - platform: state
      entity_id: input_select.phil_status_dropdown
      to: 'Away'
      for:
        hours: 24
    - platform: state
      entity_id: input_select.helen_status_dropdown
      to: 'Away'
      for:
        hours: 24
  action:
    - service: input_select.select_option
      data_template:
        entity_id: >
          {% if trigger.entity_id == 'input_select.phil_status_dropdown' %}
            input_select.phil_status_dropdown
          {% else %}
            input_select.helen_status_dropdown
          {% endif %}
        option: Extended Away

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- alias: Mark person as just arrived

trigger:

- platform: state

entity_id: device_tracker.phil

from: 'not_home'

to: 'home'

- platform: state

entity_id: group.helen

from: 'not_home'

to: 'home'

action:

- service: input_select.select_option

data_template:

entity_id: >

{% if trigger.entity_id == 'device_tracker.phil' %}

input_select.phil_status_dropdown

{% else %}

input_select.helen_status_dropdown

{% endif %}

option: Just Arrived

- alias: Mark person as home

trigger:

- platform: state

entity_id: input_select.phil_status_dropdown

to: 'Just Arrived'

for:

minutes: 10

- platform: state

entity_id: input_select.helen_status_dropdown

to: 'Just Arrived'

for:

minutes: 10

- platform: state

entity_id: input_select.phil_status_dropdown

from: 'Just Left'

to: 'Just Arrived'

- platform: state

entity_id: input_select.helen_status_dropdown

from: 'Just Left'

to: 'Just Arrived'

action:

- service: input_select.select_option

data_template:

entity_id: >

{% if trigger.entity_id == 'input_select.phil_status_dropdown' %}

input_select.phil_status_dropdown

{% else %}

input_select.helen_status_dropdown

{% endif %}

option: Home

- alias: Mark person as just left

trigger:

- platform: state

entity_id: device_tracker.phil

from: 'home'

to: 'not_home'

- platform: state

entity_id: group.helen

from: 'home'

to: 'not_home'

action:

- service: input_select.select_option

data_template:

entity_id: >

{% if trigger.entity_id == 'device_tracker.phil' %}

input_select.phil_status_dropdown

{% else %}

input_select.helen_status_dropdown

{% endif %}

option: Just Left

- alias: Mark person as away

trigger:

- platform: state

entity_id: input_select.phil_status_dropdown

to: 'Just Left'

for:

minutes: 10

- platform: state

entity_id: input_select.helen_status_dropdown

to: 'Just Left'

for:

minutes: 10

action:

- service: input_select.select_option

data_template:

entity_id: >

{% if trigger.entity_id == 'input_select.phil_status_dropdown' %}

input_select.phil_status_dropdown

{% else %}

input_select.helen_status_dropdown

{% endif %}

option: Away

- alias: Mark person as extended away

trigger:

- platform: state

entity_id: input_select.phil_status_dropdown

to: 'Away'

for:

hours: 24

- platform: state

entity_id: input_select.helen_status_dropdown

to: 'Away'

for:

hours: 24

action:

- service: input_select.select_option

data_template:

entity_id: >

{% if trigger.entity_id == 'input_select.phil_status_dropdown' %}

input_select.phil_status_dropdown

{% else %}

input_select.helen_status_dropdown

{% endif %}

option: Extended Away

Note: I’m using bluetooth and WiFi presence detection for my fiancée’s iPhone, which I have in a Home Assistant group. When her iPhone is detected on Bluetooth or WiFi the group Helen will be marked as home.

Stopping the Just Arrived State

Update January 2018: Thanks to u/barqers on Reddit for pointing this out. With the code block above, it is possible for you to be marked as Just Left -> Just Arrived -> Home in the matter of a second if your phone disconnects and reconnects quickly. This means any automations you have setup that you want triggered when you enter the Just Arrived state could be triggered when you don’t want them.

You could use a for in your automation to account for this, however this may increase the time for Home Assistant to detect you as Home, which we don’t want.

To cover this edge-case, I’ve made the following changes to my automation, using templates to first check what my previous state was. If my previous state was Just Left, then instead of marking me as Just Arrived it will instead mark me as Home, skipping the Just Arrived state altogether.


- alias: Mark person as just arrived
  trigger:
    - platform: state
      entity_id: device_tracker.qopyeeku_phil
      from: 'not_home'
      to: 'home'
    - platform: state
      entity_id: group.helen
      from: 'not_home'
      to: 'home'
  action:
    - service: input_select.select_option
      data_template:
        entity_id: >
          {% if trigger.entity_id == 'device_tracker.qopyeeku_phil' %}
            input_select.phil_status_dropdown
          {% else %}
            input_select.helen_status_dropdown
          {% endif %}
        option: >
          {% if trigger.entity_id == 'device_tracker.qopyeeku_phil' %}
            {% if states.input_select.phil_status_dropdown.state == 'Just Left' %}
              Home
            {% else %}
              Just Arrived
            {% endif %}
          {% else %}
            {% if states.input_select.helen_status_dropdown.state == 'Just Left' %}
              Home
            {% else %}
              Just Arrived
            {% endif %}
          {% endif %}

- alias: Mark person as just arrived

trigger:

- platform: state

entity_id: device_tracker.qopyeeku_phil

from: 'not_home'

to: 'home'

- platform: state

entity_id: group.helen

from: 'not_home'

to: 'home'

action:

- service: input_select.select_option

data_template:

entity_id: >

{% if trigger.entity_id == 'device_tracker.qopyeeku_phil' %}

input_select.phil_status_dropdown

{% else %}

input_select.helen_status_dropdown

{% endif %}

option: >

{% if trigger.entity_id == 'device_tracker.qopyeeku_phil' %}

{% if states.input_select.phil_status_dropdown.state == 'Just Left' %}

Home

{% else %}

Just Arrived

{% endif %}

{% else %}

{% if states.input_select.helen_status_dropdown.state == 'Just Left' %}

Home

{% else %}

Just Arrived

{% endif %}

Some Automations We Can Now Do

Now that we’ve got our new states setup, here’s some examples of automations we can do:

Play music when someone is marked as Just Arrived
Send dishwasher/washing machine alerts to someone when they are marked as Just Arrived, so the notification doesn’t get sent every time their device is marked as home
If everyone is marked as Extended Away, activate vacation mode to automatically turn off/on lights to make it look like someone is home
Don’t send alerts/messages to anyone marked as Extended Away for day-to-day operations of the house, like the washing being done or a battery needing to be replaced.
If you are marked as Home after being marked as Extended Away, send an email to you with the status of your smart home. What sensors need their battery replaced etc.
When someone is marked as Just Arrived and there are people marked as Home, announce who just got home over Text-to-Speech. Great for an announcement to let kids know when a parent is home from work for the day.

Additional States

At the moment, these five states work well for me, but i may want to change them in the future. Remember, they may not be the best fit for you but you can tailor them to suit your own home.

I don’t use this feature, but Home Assistant can be used with GPS to identify ‘zones’, such as work or school. These zones are used by Home Assistant instead of “home” or “not home”.

You could also do something similar with the drop-downs. One example would be to add a work option to the drop-down. If you have Home Assistant exposed to the world, you could use Tasker on Android to change the state of the drop-down to work when you connect to your work’s WiFi. If you have something like an Eight Sleep tracker, you could also mark someone as “asleep” when they’re laying in bed.

Wrapping Up

By adding additional states for presence, your home gets more information about what is happening. This means your smart home can tell the difference between when you’ve arrived home from a vacation and when you’ve just picked up milk from the shops.

Hopefully this inspires you to think outside the binary constraints of your controller software, to help you build some really smart automations.

Recommended Posts

pattyland

Hi, just a quick question: Why are you using Bluetooth detection instead of WiFi? I thought WiFi would me much more wide range than Bluetooth, speaking of repeaters or multiple access points…
- Phil Hawthorne
  
  WiFi would absolutely cover more range. I’ve found that in our house, we tend to turn our WiFi on our phones off quite a bit. Generally 4G is faster than our WiFi here, so if we need to download something quickly we turn WiFi off. My work WiFi sucks, so I generally have to turn WiFi off, and then forget to turn it back on before I’m home.
  
  WiFi can also be a bit slower. Because phones go to sleep, you have to increase the timeout or “consider home” time to allow for this. So, Home Assistant may not see that we’ve left the house until 10 minutes after we’ve actually left.
  
  Bluetooth we keep on, as it drains little battery in the background, and doesn’t have the sleep issues that WiFi does.
Stephen Arbon

I believe you should be able to shorten this up significantly if you were to bundle some of the actions together. For instance Mark Person as home could be
– alias: Mark person as home
trigger:
– platform: state
entity_id: input_select.phil_status_dropdown,input_select.helen_status_dropdown
to: ‘Just Arrived’
for:
minutes: 10
– platform: state
entity_id: input_select.phil_status_dropdown,input_select.helen_status_dropdown
from: ‘Just Left’
to: ‘Just Arrived’
action:
– service: input_select.select_option
data_template:
entity_id: >
{% if trigger.entity_id == ‘input_select.phil_status_dropdown’ %}
input_select.phil_status_dropdown
{% else %}
input_select.helen_status_dropdown
{% endif %}
option: Home
Kyle Gordon

This is great, thank you 🙂

As an aside, do you know if it’s possible to overlay the status onto the image, like the regular sensor presence would do?
- Phil Hawthorne
  
  Thanks!
  
  I think it might be possible. Think you would have to create your own custom UI component for it though, which I am not sure exactly where to point you for that.
- teachingbirds
  
  See my comment to see how to get a “real” device_tracker!
  - Kyle Gordon
    
    eh?
  - Kyle Gordon
    
    eh?
David Pickel

hey, thank you for sharing your solution!
you did great job 🙂 and the guide was very helpful
i have problem,
why my People Status wont show the status? and how can i hide the input_select box?

thanks phil

https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/5f930372073e89963034a0a8a286fff5424ed8e8c3261bf6fd5c71eccccdcf31.png
- David Pickel
  
  hey, somehow i managed to show the state , but didnt manage to hide the input select. can you help?
  thanks
  - Phil Hawthorne
    
    Hey David,
    
    I’m guessing this is showing on your default view?
    
    You might be able to do this in your customize.yaml file to hide those
    
    input_select.dani: hidden: true input_select.david hidden: true
    
    1
    2
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    4
    5
    6
    7
    8
    9
    
    input_select.dani:
    hidden: true
    
    input_select.david
    hidden: true
    
    That should hide the dropdowns on the home assistant UI for you.
    
    You may also be able to do this from the interface. Configuration -> Customize -> (Select Dropdown) -> Pick An Attribute to Override -> Hidden
    - David Pickel
      
      phil you are the man!
      thanks for the quick response
      thank you 🙂

doune

Hi,

How do you handle the state “all people are away” OR “all people are home” ?
Because, being home is (or can be) the following 3 states :
– “home”
– “just arrived”
– “just left”

and being away can be the 3 following states :
– “away”
– “extended away”
– “just left”

Thanks for your help 🙂

Phil Hawthorne

For that, I use the regular Home Assistant group functionality of device trackers.

So, in my groups YAML file I have



people:
  - device_tracker.phil
  - device_tracker.helen

people:

- device_tracker.phil

- device_tracker.helen

Then let’s say I want an automation for when everyone has left the house to turn off my study lamp, the automation could be done in two ways. First using my dropdowns



- alias: Turn off study lamp when everyone leaves
   trigger:
  - platform: state
     entity_id: sensor.phil_status
     to: 'Away'
  - platform: state
    entity_id: sensor.helen_status
    to: 'Away'
   condition:
  condition: and
  conditions:
  - condition: state
    entity_id: group.people
    state: 'not_home'
action:
  - service: light.turn_off
    entity_id: light.study_lamp

- alias: Turn off study lamp when everyone leaves

trigger:

- platform: state

entity_id: sensor.phil_status

to: 'Away'

- platform: state

entity_id: sensor.helen_status

to: 'Away'

condition:

condition: and

conditions:

- condition: state

entity_id: group.people

state: 'not_home'

action:

- service: light.turn_off

entity_id: light.study_lamp

With the above, as soon as a dropdown changes to Away, the conditon against


group.people

group.people

will ensure everyone is away.

Another option could be to use a

for

for

in the trigger against the all people group, like so



trigger:
       - platform: state
  entity_id: group.people
  to: 'not_home'
  for:
    minutes: 10

trigger:

- platform: state

entity_id: group.people

to: 'not_home'

for:

minutes: 10

Where the number of minutes is equal to the same

for

for

you use in your automations between states.

Glenn Delmotte

Hey Phill,

When one of us is still at home nothing happens and that is is fine. When someone is already away and the other one leaves also everything works as it should. But when Both of us leave at the same time or within 10 minutes of each other the automation triggers twice. Do you know a way to prevent this from happening?

Phil Hawthorne

Hey Glenn,

Sure, you’ve got two options. I’m guessing you have an automation setup something like this?



- alias: Turn off the lights
  trigger:
    - platform: state
      entity_id: input_select.person_one
      to: Away
    - platform: state
      entity_id: input_select.person_two
      to: Away
  action:
    #Do something

- alias: Turn off the lights

trigger:

- platform: state

entity_id: input_select.person_one

to: Away

- platform: state

entity_id: input_select.person_two

to: Away

action:

#Do something

You can either add a condition, so that the automation only fires once within x minutes, using a template condition. So, the example above would be:



- alias: Turn off the lights
  trigger:
    - platform: state
      entity_id: input_select.person_one
      to: Away
    - platform: state
      entity_id: input_select.person_two
      to: Away
  condition:
    condition: and
    conditions:
       # Only trigger this automation once every 30 minutes
      - condition: template
         value_template: >
          {% if states.automation.turn_off_the_lights.last_triggered is not none %}
            {% if as_timestamp(now()) | int   -  as_timestamp(states.automation.turn_off_the_lights.attributes.last_triggered) | int > 900 %} true {% else %} false
            {% endif %}
          {% else %}
          false
          {% endif %}
  action:
    #Do something

- alias: Turn off the lights

trigger:

- platform: state

entity_id: input_select.person_one

to: Away

- platform: state

entity_id: input_select.person_two

to: Away

condition:

condition: and

conditions:

# Only trigger this automation once every 30 minutes

- condition: template

value_template: >

{% if states.automation.turn_off_the_lights.last_triggered is not none %}

{% if as_timestamp(now()) | int - as_timestamp(states.automation.turn_off_the_lights.attributes.last_triggered) | int > 900 %} true {% else %} false

{% endif %}

{% else %}

false

{% endif %}

action:

#Do something

Another option is to instead use the default Home Assistant group behaviour of device trackers. So, once everyone is marked as not home, like this:



- alias: Turn off the lights
  trigger:
    - platform: state
      entity_id: group.people
      to: not_home
  action:
    #Do something

- alias: Turn off the lights

trigger:

- platform: state

entity_id: group.people

to: not_home

action:

#Do something

That requires you have a group with all of your device trackers (not the input_select’s) in a Home Assistant group.

Hope that helps!

Glenn Delmotte

Thanks!

Jorge Assunção

Hi Phil, great job you’ve done! I’m having a small problem on the automation because i need to track three persons. I’ve changed:

entity_id: >
{% if trigger.entity_id == ‘input_select.jorge_status_dropdown’ %}
input_select.jorge_status_dropdown
{% else %}
input_select.lara_status_dropdown
{% endif %}

into this:

entity_id: >
{% if trigger.entity_id == “input_select.jorge_status_dropdown” %}
input_select.jorge_status_dropdown
{% elif trigger.entity_id == “input_select.lara_status_dropdown” %}
input_select.lara_status_dropdown
{% else %}
input_select.bia_status_dropdown
{% endif %}

But i get this automation error in Home Assistant log:

ERROR (MainThread) [homeassistant.config] Invalid config for [automation]: invalid template (TemplateSyntaxError: Expected an expression, got ‘end of statement block’) for dictionary value @ data[‘action’][0][‘data_template’][‘entity_id’]. Got None.

What am i doing wrong?

Phil Hawthorne

Hey Jorge,

That’s so strange. So I copied your template into my Home Assistant to check that the syntax was correct, and it seems fine to me.

In your config.yaml is your spacing correct?

Jorge Assunção

yes it is. It stopped giving error when i wrapped it inside comas.

entity_id: >
“{% if trigger.entity_id == ‘input_select.jorge_status_dropdown’ %}
input_select.jorge_status_dropdown
{% elif trigger.entity_id == ‘input_select.lara_status_dropdown’ %}
input_select.lara_status_dropdown
{% else %}
input_select.bia_status_dropdown
{% endif %}”

but i don’t know if it is working because state doesn’t change…

If i check the syntax inside Developer Tools – Templates gives me the error (Error rendering template: UndefinedError: ‘trigger’ is undefined).

Phil Hawthorne

So in the developer tools, it will error because trigger is only available inside automations, so that makes sense. I replaced trigger with state, just to check the syntax.

I have a feeling that using the double quote ” might have been the issue here. In your first example you had


{% if trigger.entity_id == "input_select.jorge_status_dropdown" %}

{% if trigger.entity_id == "input_select.jorge_status_dropdown" %}

In your second example, using


{% if trigger.entity_id == 'input_select.jorge_status_dropdown' %}

{% if trigger.entity_id == 'input_select.jorge_status_dropdown' %}

seemed to do the trick.

So, now I’m looking at the code you’ve supplied and I’m not sure what it is trying to do. I think it should be


"{% if trigger.entity_id == 'device_tracker.jorge' %}
            input_select.jorge_status_dropdown
          {% elif trigger.entity_id == 'device_tracker.lara' %}
            input_select.lara_status_dropdown
          {% else %}
            input_select.bia_status_dropdown
          {% endif %}"

"{% if trigger.entity_id == 'device_tracker.jorge' %}

input_select.jorge_status_dropdown

{% elif trigger.entity_id == 'device_tracker.lara' %}

input_select.lara_status_dropdown

{% else %}

input_select.bia_status_dropdown

{% endif %}"

You want to change the input_select based on what device_tracker entity gets updated. In your code. Try that out, and if it still doesn’t work can you post your automation?

Jorge Assunção

Hi Phill. Thank you for your answer. It’s all working now!

Andrey Laptev

Hello Phil.

How do you keep persistence of template sensor during reboot?

Phil Hawthorne

So that’s a tricky one actually. For some reason Home Assistant is meant to remember the state of the dropdowns on reboot, but for some reason it doesn’t quite work for these.

Yesterday I was doing some config changes remotely and restarting Home Assistant when I noticed we were being marked as Home, even though we were both away at work. I ended up adding an automation for each person to cover it. For example I added this automation so when HA boots, I am marked as away if my device tracker is “not_home”.



- alias: Mark Phil as away when home assistant starts
  trigger:
    - platform: homeassistant
      event: start
  condition:
    condition: and
    conditions:
      - condition: state
        entity_id: device_tracker.phil
        state: 'not_home'
  action:
    - service: input_select.select_option
      data:
        entity_id: input_select.phil_status_dropdown
        option: Away

- alias: Mark Phil as away when home assistant starts

trigger:

- platform: homeassistant

event: start

condition:

condition: and

conditions:

- condition: state

entity_id: device_tracker.phil

state: 'not_home'

action:

- service: input_select.select_option

data:

entity_id: input_select.phil_status_dropdown

option: Away

You could also add another one to mark you as Home when it reboots.

Andrey Laptev

Do you use initial attribute in your input_select config?
I think it overrides remembered state.
I have it in config and every time Hass reboots input_select goes to initial value.
- Phil Hawthorne
  
  So, I have one setup for me, but not one setup for my SO. So it seems it doesn’t matter if I use initial_state of not against the input_select it always seems to default people to Home for some reason.

– wιlғred

Hi Phil,

Nice approach! Question: why do you use entity_id: group.helen instead of something like entity_id: device_tracker.helen on row 61 of automation.yaml?
- Phil Hawthorne
  
  That’s an easy one 🙂
  
  I use multiple device trackers for my SO’s phone. She has an iPhone, which goes to sleep frequently so her Bluetooth and Wifi aren’t reliable.
  
  I track her iPhone with both WiFi and Bluetooth. So, if her bluetooth chip goes to sleep, the WiFi tracker will still “see” her as home, because her phone would still be connected to the WiFi.
  
  So, I have her group setup as
  
  helen: name: Helen entities: - device_tracker.helen_bt - device_tracker.helen_wifi
  
  1
  2
  3
  4
  5
  6
  7
  8
  9
  
  helen:
    name: Helen
    entities:
      - device_tracker.helen_bt
      - device_tracker.helen_wifi
Mark Rennie

I just wanted to say thanks Phil, this is genius and is working a treat on my system. I was always wanting to use something like this, now I can 🙂
I also have grafana working following your guide, after failing a few months ago. I love stats!!
sangve

Awesome work Phil!

Mark Reyes

This is Awesome Phil! I’m adding to my HA config and looking forward to adding notifications based on state.
I noticed some depreciation messages when testing in my dev instance:
2018-01-24 01:04:15 WARNING (MainThread) [homeassistant.components.sensor.template] The 'entity_id' option (with value 'input_select.mark_status_dropdown') is deprecated, please remove it from your configuration.
To clear this message, comment out the entity_id in the sensor template:
mark_status: value_template: '{{ states.input_select.mark_status_dropdown.state }}' friendly_name: 'Mark' # entity_id: input_select.mark_status_dropdown
Thanks again for the detailed walk through!

Phil Hawthorne

Hey Mark!

Thanks so much for pointing that out. It seems as though that has been deprecated in the latest release. So I’ll update the code above for future readers!

Mark Reyes

Hey Phil,
I noticed another ‘edge case’ scenario: If the device tracker used to trigger the input_select.status_dropdown is out of range and HASS is restarted. Since the input_select is set with initial state of ‘home’ and there is no state change to trigger, then sensor.mark_status never transitions from ‘home’ even when device is not home.

Steps to recreate: turn off your device’s wifi, restart HASS.
IE: if you’re out for a week vacation, and your power resets, HASS will act as if devices are present.
Possible solution: automation for a ‘backup-timmer’: if device_tracker is away for longer than +1hour, place into Away status…?
(i’m checking into it too)

Phil Hawthorne

Oooh. That’s a good point. I’m usually restarting Home Assistant when everyone is home, so haven’t seen it. However your case of there being an unscheduled restart of HASS makes sense.

I like your solution. I actually overcame this by adding another automation into the mix, which might be overkill. However adding another “for” trigger as you suggested might be cleaner.


- alias: Mark Helen as away when home assistant starts
  initial_state: 'on'
  trigger:
    - platform: homeassistant
      event: start
  condition:
    condition: and
    conditions:
      - condition: state
        entity_id: group.helen
        state: 'not_home'
  action:
    - service: input_select.select_option
      data:
        entity_id: input_select.helen_status_dropdown
        option: Away

- alias: Mark Phil as away when home assistant starts
  initial_state: 'on'
  trigger:
    - platform: homeassistant
      event: start
  condition:
    condition: and
    conditions:
      - condition: state
        entity_id: device_tracker.phil
        state: 'not_home'
  action:
    - service: input_select.select_option
      data:
        entity_id: input_select.phil_status_dropdown
        option: Away

- alias: Mark Helen as away when home assistant starts

initial_state: 'on'

trigger:

- platform: homeassistant

event: start

condition:

condition: and

conditions:

- condition: state

entity_id: group.helen

state: 'not_home'

action:

- service: input_select.select_option

data:

entity_id: input_select.helen_status_dropdown

option: Away

- alias: Mark Phil as away when home assistant starts

initial_state: 'on'

trigger:

- platform: homeassistant

event: start

condition:

condition: and

conditions:

- condition: state

entity_id: device_tracker.phil

state: 'not_home'

action:

- service: input_select.select_option

data:

entity_id: input_select.phil_status_dropdown

option: Away

Mark Reyes

Awesome Phil! I think i’m going to merge that start trigger in, it’s cleaner than a running backoff timer. Thanks again!
Mark Rennie

I was just back here to say exactly the same thing as I am going away shortly and, was wondering of there was anyway to retain the “extended away” status after a reboot. This would work fine, but it would need to wait another 24 hours for it to be extended away again, therefore run my away on holiday scripts..
Phil Hawthorne

Ah that’s a conundrum.

When you restart home assistant, its internal timers for how long each device has been in a state will be reset.

You could have it so when people are marked as Extended Away, an input Boolean is turned on. When home assistant restarts, it will check if that is turned on. If it is, then everyone is marked as Extended Away instead of away.

Eduard Antonyan

Thanks, this is great! FYI I used https://github.com/rogro82/hass-variables instead for a cleaner implementation that also retains status across restarts.
- Phil Hawthorne
  
  That looks like a handy component! Thanks for sharing
  - Vince M
    
    would something like this work using one of your automations above? https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/e55c4f355443fee9b016eff558c5afdac740521b8bc8ac32a8edf41ceb253339.png
- Vince M
  
  could you show how you interpreted Phil’s presence detection using the above variable component?
  - Eduard Antonyan
    
    After creating the variable phil_status, basically just search replace input_select.phil_status_dropdown with variable.phil_status, input_select.phil_status_dropdown with phil_status, and input_select.select_option with variable.set_variable.
    
    Because the variable state is preserved correctly across restarts you won’t need the restore automation (which only works partially anyway with the dropdown).
    - Vince M
      
      does my example automation below work based on your component? https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/16e931369229049aa9cee41e536b6a14ec8a689064d1b5905cfcfd8e8aa5df3c.png
Phil Hawthorne

That’s awesome!
Phil Hawthorne

That’s awesome!
- Vince M
  
  what exactly does this do?
  - teachingbirds
    
    Makes a device_tracker entity for the combined trackers.
Mauricio Bonani

I “translated” these automations to Node-RED. I hope it is of some help.

https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/ca338e8376b35f2cd922c5bcc91c341100369fcc97b933229f183c14f9cd11c4.png

The code: https://pastebin.com/GWhmCeRg
- Phil Hawthorne
  
  This is awesome! Thanks for sharing
  - Mauricio Bonani
    
    Please let me know if there is anything wrong with this flow or if there is anything I can do to improve it.
    - Mauricio Bonani
      
      Based in doune’s question ( https://philhawthorne.com/making-home-assistants-presence-detection-not-so-binary/#comment-3599099764 ), I made a small improvement in the flow. This way we can have flows for “first person arriving” and “last person leaving”.
      
      https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/4722fd0a748e0f45ccfae6bbf73db4e58618ba2ee6d3b081526b2fb4d49f87ec.png
      
      The code: https://pastebin.com/kxkGdssx