In my opinion this is not Xiaomi <i>into</i> Home Assistant (HA). To me, an integration would mean that I need nothing from Xiaomi, all activities are within HA.<p>from the Github page[0]:<p>> Xiaomi Home Integration and the affiliated cloud interface is provided by Xiaomi officially. You need to use your Xiaomi account to login to get your device list. Xiaomi Home Integration implements OAuth 2.0 login process, which does not keep your account password in the Home Assistant application. However, due to the limitation of the Home Assistant platform, the user information (including device information, certificates, tokens, etc.) of your Xiaomi account will be saved in the Home Assistant configuration file in clear text after successful login. You need to ensure that your Home Assistant configuration file is properly stored. The exposure of your configuration file may result in others logging in with your identity.<p>[0] <a href="https://github.com/XiaoMi/ha_xiaomi_home?tab=readme-ov-file#security">https://github.com/XiaoMi/ha_xiaomi_home?tab=readme-ov-file#...</a>
Home Assistant is one of the best open source projects I've come across. I've been using it for 5+ years on an older RPi and it's been pretty rock solid. Countless updates and everything just keeps on chugging.<p>I've landed on a mixture of MQTT and Zigbee communicating devices, the latter being much easier to set up and maintain. There's an integration for just about everything I've wanted, some better than others, but all in all just a great project.
HA is awesome but I have found that over time entropy kicks in if you don't maintain it properly (which I haven't done for a year) connections fail, switches stop doing what they are supposed to...it's on my Xmas list to spend some time sorting it out!
I include this when considering buying something integrated.<p>For example Philips Hue is overpriced, but their Home Assistant integration is top tier and ultra-reliable. Contrast that with myQ garage door openers (LiftMaster, Chamberlain and Craftsman) recently breaking Home Assistant support on purpose, to essentially replace it with nothing, and they're dead to me.<p>So Xiaomi adding support, assuming it is reliable, definitely moves them into a better category.
Meanwhile MyQ “closed” their API and broke all HA integration because it “cost” the company too much. Where in reality, they just wanted people to use their app since they started serving ads. Say what you want about China and the security implications but a lot of their IoT companies are way more opened than our US counterparts.
low-end Chinese phones, including Xiaomi and Huawei, show ads on system apps like Settings and Contacts. soon, smart home appliances might also display or speak ads. there's nothing stopping these Chinese companies from doing so - both technologically and ethically.<p>Xiaomi definitely should not lead the way in smart home automation.
I love Home Assistant but I now have a pretty strict minimum effort rule after years of configuring integrations and building dashboards that I would forget about after 2 months:<p>I only do automations (no dashboards at all), and try to keep them as simple as possible. Once I feel I’m reaching diminishing returns territory, I stop.<p>Only use HA if I need to mix different vendors (e.g. turn on the hue lights if the tuya sensor switches to on) or if the vendor app/service has a limitation that doesn’t allow me to do what I want. For instance, I have some automations for my Mitsubishi airco units cause their app sucks. Otherwise I’ll just use the default app or service.<p>Only configure an integration if I’m going to use it in an automation; I have a bunch of integrations detected that I don’t configure.<p>I decided to follow these rules a couple of years back, and since then I could address all my needs with almost 0 maintenance.
Better late than never, I have 3 of their bulbs in the house, and not being able to integrate with HA prevented me from buying more (at least before Matter was announced).<p>I've been using them with Google Home, so the lights weren't automated with HA. I'll try the integration out.
I've had a reasonable run with athom pre-flashed tasmota kit and HA.<p><a href="https://www.aliexpress.com/store/5790427" rel="nofollow">https://www.aliexpress.com/store/5790427</a><p>Low effort, low maintenance, works good. mqtt & wifi, tasmota has everything you could want in a timer interface while still exposing switching etc to override it HA.
All I know about Xiaomi is that I bought a phone from them because the hardware specs were pretty good and the bootloader was unlockable. Upon trying to unlock the bootloader, I was told my account must be 30 days old (effectively, that I must have owned the phone for 30 days). Annoying, but not that unreasonable if it's some kind of anti-theft protection or something. After 30 days, every time I press the button for the first step of unlocking, I am told that I should try again on tomorrow's date. Apparently every 6 months they change the roadblocks to bootloader unlocking, and as of this moment there is no simple way to do it (their server no longer processes the requests), with rumours they plan to permanently disable it. This is pretty bad for my trust in their brand.
I have some xiaomi bulbs that used to work until I needed to re-pair them to a new wifi and (unofficial) integration kept asking me for pairing code - which is nowhere to be found. I probably got rid of the boxes where it's supposed to be located. Wonder if there's a workaround for that.
Is anyone else trying to run HA with deCONZ & Conbee II ? AFAICT the documentation is scattershot and the software is ugly and fickle. OTOH maybe I'm just stupid.
Interesting but this one doesn't work with my containerised Home Assistant.
Xiaomi Miot Auto works on the other hand.<p>There's also another, a built-in one.
I mean....I guess this is better than <i>not</i> having it, but I'm not personally interested in cloud-only smart integrations. Cloud option? Fantastic! Cloud-only? No thank you.
If you are thinking of deploying Home Assistant (HA), let me give you a few tips that <i>I</i> should have known when started. HA environment is vast. There are myriads of options, features, and functions. There are some gotchas that can be costly down the road.<p>All of the following are "for now, as you start out":<p>Do not gyrate over which version of HA to run. Run the HAOS loaded on RasPi, or a dedicated machine. You can migrate to other solution if that does not end up to be the best choice.<p>Make sure you get the latest Zigbee radio dongle the HA Forum recommends. I use in all my HA installs a combination dongle for Zigbee & Z-Wave and it works flawlessly (NORTEK Quickstick Combo).<p>Start with a few <i>cheap</i> Zigbee devices. Stay away from WiFi, LoRaWAN and other solutions. Z-Wave devices are great, but more expensive. You know you do not know if you even want to do this.<p>Initially, just use the built-in Zigbee (ZHA) integrations. Once you are comfortable deploying other ways, like MQTT can be established easily.<p>Do not spend too much on the devices now. I suggest you pick up a PIR motion sensors, door & window opening sensors, temperature & humidity sensors, smart plugs, and light bulbs. Anything else is overkill to try out. Sub-tip: all of these are battery operated, so try to consolidate on a standard battery. The ones I listed can all run off of 2032 cell batteries. Ikea sells most of these, Aqara is well known, and so on. If it is Zigbee (not Matter) you will have 96% chance it will work with HA.<p>Have fun!
I'll be the one to plug Valetudo in this thread I guess. Primitively, it replaces the cloud functionality on-device for robot vacuums (see supported models) and replaces it with local services that run offline and can connect to Home Assistant easily.<p>I will never buy another robot vacuum without Valetudo support as long as that project lives. It's great.<p><a href="https://valetudo.cloud/" rel="nofollow">https://valetudo.cloud/</a>