Home Assistant Voice

[akbooer]

I didn’t go the HA route, but have voice control through Apple HomeKit and Siri. Works OK, but don’t use it much.

[toggledbits]

I'm in. Let's see what we can get done with this, shall we?

I'm also looking at some other open source solutions that aren't HA-specific.

[CatmanV2]

@akbooer I have Alexa that works really well for most voice control, but doesn't interact with HA. I have virtual switches in OpenLuup that are exposed HA bridge, so effectively I simply ask to flip a switch and the automation follows.

The exception is my Logitech Elite hubs which integrate with Alexa directly (and also work really well)

@toggledbits that would be awesome. I'm keen on the more interactive stuff (i.e. where the VA prompts for activity)

Certainly I can make Alexa speak, but a simple 'yes' or 'no' response isn't going to get anything from her.

C

[Venom]

I set one of these up a few months ago. I got it working pretty easily. It controls everything My Amazon Echo Alexa could do. My Logitech Harmony Hubs work better with the Home Assistant Voice. Alexa seems to have a problem here and there telling me the device is not responding. Then I give the same command to HAV and it works. I did activate Alexa in Home assistant and it works pretty well. As mentioned the lag with the HAV was pretty long. As a test I tried the Home Assistant cloud service. That cut down the lag a lot. Now it is only slightly slower than Alexa. I am going to try building a dedicated AI PC. That should cut the lag to zero and I can get rid of the cloud service. Once I get the HAV to react quickly and do everything as I would like I will move on to improving sound quality.

[CatmanV2]

Given I'm starting from zero on this particular path it would be interestting to see how you set it up. Took me about 90 minutes to get a light to turn on! The documentation I've found so far is, well, poor

TIA

C

[Venom]

This morning I noticed an update was available for Home Assistant Voice. I did the update and it broke the HAV. I had to re-enable it along with the Cloud Service to get it working again.
I got mine working by watching a lot of Youtube Videos. I would start by watching the newest videos you find. That is important. The one thing I noticed with Home Assistant in general, Updates come very often and instructions you find today may be different after an update. I also read lots in the Home Assistant Forum. Same goes there, read the latest posts first. What I did 6 months ago, if I could remember what I did, probably would not be the way to do it today. I keep planning on really learning the most I can about Home Assistant but life keeps getting in the way. So I continue to stumble my way through it..

[CatmanV2]

Cheers! I shall try and make some time
(Is it just me that hates having to watch videos? Can't we just have instructions written down? )

C

[Venom]

@CatmanV2

You can find lots of written instructions in the Home Assistant forums. The problem I found was that when I went into the HA Settings I could not find many of the items the instructions mentioned. They had already been changed by updates to HA. That is why I mentioned looking at the newest posts and videos. I found that the Youtube videos seem to have the latest tips and instructions. While I love all the frequent advancements and updates being made in HA, it can be rather difficult for someone new to HA to jump in and get everything working.

[CatmanV2]

Thanks (again) I have found this

C

[CatmanV2]

OK, so digging through stuff. Definite progress. I've got an OpenAI integration running, but just been told that 'Max output tokens reached' which seems a little odd as I've used precisely $0.01

Must go out now!

C

[akbooer]

@CatmanV2 said in Home Assistant Voice:

Cheers! I shall try and make some time
(Is it just me that hates having to watch videos? Can't we just have instructions written down? )

Not just you! Such a lot of very poor narration and not so easy to refer back to! A modern disease.

[CatmanV2]

@akbooer I just don't get it. I guess it's less effort to make a video than actually write down the instructions. Sure, for somethings they can be useful but a 15 minute video for a 5 minute config. Grrr!

C