Hello, hello! The Home Assistant 2023.8 version is here, and I am thrilled to share what’s new and hot in this latest release. In this comprehensive blog post, we’ll take a closer look at the exciting updates that await you in Home Assistant 2023.8. So, without further ado, let’s dive right in!
Table of Contents
Simplified Onboarding – Home Assistant 2023.8 & onwards
Gone are the days of manually dragging maps to find your exact location while setting up Home Assistant. With version 2023.8 or higher, you can now easily search for your precise address using the OpenStreetMap service. This makes the initial setup process a breeze, ensuring a seamless experience for first-time users.
AI Home Assistant Image Generation – OpenAI’s DALL-E
Home Assistant introduces a cutting-edge AI-powered service, powered by OpenAI’s DALL-E, capable of generating images. While I haven’t used this service to create the content for this blog post or my video, it offers tremendous potential for automation enthusiasts.
Subscribers to OpenAI can now describe the image they desire, receive a URL as a response, and view the generated image in their browser or more importantly to use that URL in Home Assistant dashboard, script, automation etc. Although the practical applications may still be unfolding, it opens up exciting possibilities for creative automations and scripting.
Translatable Services
Home Assistant 2023.8 brings inclusivity to the forefront by allowing services to be translated into languages other than English. This means that if your Home Assistant is set to a different language, you will now see the services in that language, provided they have been translated.
Moreover, Home Assistant crew made a step-by-step tutorial and invites users to contribute to translations if they are missing. This tutorial is allowing for everyone to participate in the community’s growth and the link is – https://developers.home-assistant.io/docs/translations
Introducing Event Entity
The most exhilarating addition to Home Assistant is undoubtedly the introduction of the “event entity.” This remarkable feature allows you to capture and manage real-world events as entities within Home Assistant. Gone are the days of dealing with complicated and time-consuming event triggers! The event entity simplifies the process, unleashing endless possibilities for creative automations.
Events catching before
When you press a button on a device added to Home Assistant, an event will be emitted. This event can then be captured in an automation or script, allowing you to create useful home automations. However, the problem so far was catching the event.
- You had to go to the Developer tools,
- to listen and subscribe to an event
- to figure out its exact name and data.
- Then, you had to go to the event trigger, for example, to configure everything based on the data gathered from the Developer tools, hoping you didn’t miss anything for your creation to work.
All of this could be a tricky and time-consuming activity. But not anymore!
Events catching now
The event entity is here to save the day or, at least, save some time. The event entity captures events from the physical world and makes them available in Home Assistant as entities.
For example, when a button, like a doorbell, is pressed, it will trigger an event entity. You can see that event in the logbook, as the event entity keeps a history. You can even inquire about the last time a certain event was triggered, and that is opening a lot more possibilities don’t you think?
So, instead of dealing with complicated event triggers, you can now simply start using state triggers with the event entity selected in your automations.
And if that’s not enough, starting from Home Assistant 2023.8, this new event entity is now supported by Matter, HomeKit, MQTT, and Philips Hue integrations.
Smart Home Glossary
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Condition Selector for Blueprints
Blueprint creators now have access to the “Condition Selector” feature in Home Assistant 2023.8. This powerful tool empowers you to incorporate custom user-provided conditions into your Blueprints designs, taking your blueprints to new heights of flexibility and creativity.
Home Assistant Assist Shopping List
Managing your shopping list becomes a breeze with the Home Assistant Assist feature. In this release, you can ask Home Assistant Assist to add items to your shopping list, streamlining the process of managing your shopping essentials.
Once an item is added, there is currently no option to remove or rename it using Assist. For now, you can only check off items using your phone or other means, going to your shopping list integration.
It’s not yet possible to add multiple items with one sentence. For example, if you say, “add bread & butter to the shopping list,” you will get one line saying “bread & butter.”
While there are current limitations regarding list modifications using Assist, the groundwork has been laid, and future enhancements are anticipated in upcoming updates.
Wildcard Support in Sentence Triggers
Version 2023.8 introduces wildcard support in sentence triggers, adding a whole new dimension to automation capabilities. Now, you can create dynamic sentence-based automations by using sentences like “play {album} by {artist}” to trigger specific actions related to your media player.
You can also use the TTS service to confirm the action through your media player. For example, you can use the following Template:
Playing {{ trigger.entities.album.text }} by {{ trigger.entities.artist.text }}.
Python 3.10 Support Removal
For users running Home Assistant Core in a Python environment, it’s essential to note that Python 3.10 support has been removed in this release. However, this change does not impact other installation types (Home Assistant OS, Supervised, and Container), as they are already on Python 3.11.
This upgrade not only ensures better performance, but also provides improved support at the time of writing this article.
Conclusion + Webinar
Home Assistant 2023.8 arrives with a flourish, introducing an array of new features and enhancements that elevate your Smart Home experience. Whether it’s the simplified location setup, AI-powered image generation, or the revolutionary event entity, Home Assistant continues to be at the forefront of innovation.
I hope this extensive blog post has shed light on the remarkable features awaiting you in Home Assistant 2023.8. If you want more Home Assistant article from – check this category
If you want to level up your smart home knowledge and explore more about Home Assistant, don’t miss my FREE Home Assistant webinar, available at https://automatelike.pro/webinar
Thank you for reading, and until next time, happy automating!
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