Let’s not through the word "false"around too much. I haven’t watched the videos, so I need to leave open the possibility that you misinterpreted BK Hobby due to not yet having a solid grasp on openHAB. That happens a lot around here, so I’m not pinning blame on you or him.
I’m unclear on why you deleted addons.cfg. I’m fairly certain OH needs that file to exist.
I think the real question is, why do you want to do both? I would personally recommend to use PaperUI for any official bindings that are available in 2.5.3., and only resort to manual install if you’re using a beta or a test binding. In those cases, you would need to remove the official binding in PaperUI and then just drop the binding file into the addons folder.
I feel like this has somehow gotten way more complicated than it needs to be for you.
I was hoping to just use paperui keep things simple but then I ran into the above binding which it what I need to install and it can not be installed via paperui because its not listed. You have to manually install it which i did. I guess as much as you try to make openhab newbie proof which I love its always going to not be completely noob proof.
Also from my understanding unless you comment out addon.cfg its not used. So deleting it should be fine. Ive already proven that but rebooting without the file. However I also read that it would be recreated and it is not showing in the samba share which makes me wonder.
In that case, there’s no official binding. So, I’m guessing that’s why it doesn’t show up in PaperUI. Without looking closely, I assume it has to be configured via text files.
To be honest, this is exactly why I encouraged you to just get your system running and get comfortable before tackling complex stuff. The IP camera is definitely in the realm of complex stuff.
I know it sounds like we’re trying to parent you, but we’re really not. The reason we give this advice is so that people don’t get discouraged and frustrated while trying to learn openHAB, because this system is not easy to learn. (We see a lot of people coming from systems like Samsung SmartThings and wondering why it’s not all drag and drop. You can either have simplicity with limited options or complexity with unlimited options. It’s nearly impossible to have both.)
You’ll also find that longtime users are less inclined to help when they feel that new users have skipped the basics. I don’t mind having conversations like this, because I think it helps new folks like you to adjust to the expectations. It’s worse, in my opinion, when things quickly turn negative due to mutual frustration. In a little over a year, I’ve seen too much of that.
I can’t remember ever needing to touch addons.cfg, so I can’t comment other to say that I don’t think it should have been necessary to delete it.
OpenHAB makes its own addons.config file down in userdata. addons,cfg was for users in openHAB 1.x to delpoy addons, if I recall correctly
They may show up under the Configuration menu. If you need to automatically discover a Thing sometimes you go to the Inbox and select SEARCH FOR THINGS. If needed you will be presented with a menu of bindings.
Russ I really appreciate how you handle things on this forum. I only got into openhab for that camera binding actually. So it has to be the fist thing I setup. I kinda wanna do lighting but it would all be tied to that camera binding. See the video below for what I wanna do after I get the ipcamera binding working. The idea is to have my cameras say something when they see something basicly. We have a lot of opportunist thief’s around Albuquerque. I want them to know there being watched by my cameras.
This is exactly what I wanted to know. I found the IPcamera binding listed and I’m ready to see how this goes in discovery. I know im going in the backdoor to get openhab going but i’ll circle around and learn the basics through BKhoby and lookup whats old and missed in those videos.
That depends on the binding rather than how it is installed. The zwave binding you need to search & choose no matter how the binding is installed. My point is that the binding actively appears in the UI but does not show in the installed list.
Well, it doesn’t have to be, but I appreciate your perspective. It would cost all of $20 to buy a wifi smart plug.
That’s fine so long as you know that some of your problems in setting up the IP camera might be self-inflicted. So long as you try to figure it out for yourself before asking questions, you should be able to avoid snarky responses. People here just want to see that a good effort was made (showing your work helps).
You guys have been so helpful. I looked into doing lighting second and you wont believe this. My lighting will also be complicated. I have leviton decora smart switches. SO I have to use another oddball python script install for that. At least I have some python knowledge.
Yeah I picked the wifi ones because I did not want to hub, i wanted to use alexa and google home directly and now that I am getting into openhab it will be my hub.
I think @madhits is saying that he’s already installed a bunch of switches, so there’s no going back without spending a bunch of money.
@madhits, that is unfortunate that you didn’t come across OH until now. Hopefully that Python script works, as it doesn’t look like the guy who provided it has been on the forum in awhile.
yeah i did not want a second wireless signal running in my house and choose wifi as it made things simple. I figure later if I want some battery powered stuff I would go with zigby. I know in the coming years these standards will start to disappear and I figured wifi is not going anywhere.
Don’t get @Bruce_Osborne started on WiFi devices. He has legitimate reasons to hate them.
If I started over again I’d go straight to ZWave whenever possible. Devices tend to be more expensive and it can be finicky at times, but there’s a lot of support for it in the community (Bruce being one of the go-to members). I don’t see ZWave disappearing any time soon.
For MQTT, you just need to install the Mosquitto broker (via openHABian config tool) and then install the MQTT binding. After that, you can configure the binding to talk to Mosquitto using PaperUI or text files.
Are you actually installing Tuya-based devices, or just wanting MQTT? If the latter, I don’t think you need that tutorial.
Yes after looking at the ipcamera binding and complexity I decided to try to do my lights as you guys suggested. I have the following in my house that Id like to automate.
Tuya lights/switches
leviton switches
panasonic tv
ONVIF and Dahua cameras.
Tuya seemed the easiest after reviewing everything. Actually the TV is prob the easiest but cant think id wanna do that before lights.
Why do I not need the guide though? It has no binding, just a script so I need to try to add all the tuya things.
DARN getting an error trying to install the tuya api…
npm install codetheweb/tuyapi
npm WARN saveError ENOENT: no such file or directory, open ‘/home/openhabian/package.json’
npm WARN enoent ENOENT: no such file or directory, open ‘/home/openhabian/package.json’
npm WARN openhabian No description
npm WARN openhabian No repository field.
npm WARN openhabian No README data
npm WARN openhabian No license field.
tuyapi@5.2.1
updated 1 package and audited 19 packages in 18.81s
found 0 vulnerabilities
Thought it was missing sudo but it was not that. Same error even with sudo
I can’t help you with this, as I went in another direction by flashing my Tuya devices with Tasmota firmware. You’ll be better off posting in that ongoing thread than continuing this one (which has now strayed far from its original topic).
Flashing Tasmota sounds hard, but it turned out to be pretty simple once I did it. This tutorial is about smart plugs, but it applies to any device in the Tasmota Template list. It states that you need a spare RPi, but you don’t. You just need a separate SD card with a fresh Raspbian installation.
Once you’ve done this, your Tuya-based devices will be discoverable by MQTT and you can control them easily with openHAB. Also, there’s no cloud requirement, so they’ll work without Internet access and won’t tell Chinese spies when you’re turning your lights on and off (if you care about that sort of thing).
If this sounds like a lot, then I would start with your TV (though I don’t know what the state of the Panasonic binding is). Just to have the satisfaction of something working the way it’s supposed to work.
As noted at the start of this post, I feel like we probably need to tie up this thread now that you’re on your way. Good luck!
Interesting idea to reflash everything but are all mine really supported by this new firmware? This is a big question ill have to find out first.
As for the TV i know it will work cuz its a VT60 model with WOL support. So I know I can turn it on with WOL and off with the panasonic binding. As for the other stuff Im not so sure.
Anyway Ill mark your reply as the solution as this has been really enlightening.
