Tasmota VS esp-homekit-devices

BTW, there is one more way - if your devices are connecting to some kind of central hub, e.g. MQTT broker, they may send a "sticky" (retained) message with discovery info to some known topic - Tasmota is using this way, devices are publishing to tasmota/discovery/id and every time MQTT client connects it gets lastly updated autoconf info.

Just seeing your edit. WeightRaw is changing, so that is a good sign that everything might be hooked up right. I believe weight is in KG so it won't necessary change unless you put over a KG on the scale. I looked at the code for this and couldn't easily figure out what might be causing the calibration failure. I don't have time to figure out what all is going on there.

These are Tuya ones (unfortunately, the specific one on Amazon has been removed now, so can't share a link) reflashed with Tasmota so I can use them natively with Home Assistant rather than bouncing through a third-party cloud service. Bit of logic to manage the transitions from "not using power" to "using power" and convert that into notifications to the various Google Homes.

If it's a simple thing, the Tasmota firmware might do everything you need without a single line of code.

The lesson here is to never buy a smart home product which can only be controlled/montitored/upgraded via a cloud service provided by the hardware vendor. If the product cannot be controlled and monitored from your home network while unplugged from the internet, then there is some risk that this type of experience can happen again. Tasmota [0] allows a user to erase the vendor provided firmware, of ESP chipset devices, with well maintained open source firmware so that is never reliant on the vendor ever again. This is one example. Perhaps there are others.

[0] https://tasmota.github.io/docs/

You can use wifi devices, you just have to be careful about it. Anything that is supported by the Tasmota Project (https://tasmota.github.io/docs/) can be re-flashed with their firmware which doesn't make any calls to the internet and will directly talked to by anything that supports the MQTT protocol (Home Assistant, Hubitat, etc)

Here's the list https://github.com/arendst/Tasmota/blob/development/BUILDS.md

I use Meross switches and plugs. They seem to work just fine without internet access. I have a bunch of cameras through Homebridge and they work without a problem. Some fans controlled with Sonoff iFan flashed with Home Accessory Architect, again no need for an internet connection.

Solder your switches to IKEA Tradfri-Switches or use an ESP8266 with this https://github.com/RavenSystem/esp-homekit-devices/wiki/Home-Accessory-Architect

This is what I use to modify device and make them work with HomeKit. HAA

I am using an ESP-8266 and Home Accessory Architect https://github.com/RavenSystem/esp-homekit-devices to create virtual switches. It’s nice and small and doesn’t sit anywhere that is easily accessible. You can create a bunch of virtual switches. I have one for being awake or asleep. The other one for whether I am home or not and triggered by location to unlock the door and turn lights on when arriving home. When I leave it shuts everything off.

Try some keywords from https://github.com/RavenSystem/esp-homekit-devices

Personally I use Home Accessory Architect which also integrates directly with HomeKit without any other server or whatever inbetween https://github.com/RavenSystem/esp-homekit-devices/wiki

From an end device standpoint look into ESP devices, they use chipsets that can be overwritten with open source firmware and stay local. - If you want to stick with HomeKit look into HAA https://github.com/RavenSystem/esp-homekit-devices - If you’re using Home Assistant ESPHome is great, especially without MQTT - Tasmota supports the broadest number of ESP devices.

I actually use the RavenSystem repo with the ESP8266 to port it into HomeKit. These boards are cheap and you can create many devices with them. Then my automations are run with Shortcuts. Works great!

This is SUPER easy if you are comfortable flashing microcontrollers, can understand what a JSON configuration says (given ample documentation), and [optionally] aren't afraid of soldering: https://github.com/RavenSystem/esp-homekit-devices/ .