1. You have been scanning the home assistant forms, trying to find out how you can run home assistant supervised on Windows and have been presented with, is some very unhelpful and abrupt “NO” responses without actually giving you some helpful information.
2. You just can’t get your hands on a Raspberry Pi 4 to run your Home Assistant supervised installation, but you’ve got some old PC hardware that is gathering dust and now you want to utilise it to run Home Assistant Supervised and are looking for some support.
3. You have found my YouTube Video.

Well if you haven’t found my YouTube Video you can find it here:

The video is a companion to this Step by Step guide and visually covers every step of this process and is designed to run side by side with this so please open it up in a new window and use it the follow along.

Few things before we get into it.  You’re going to need to PC running windows, in my example I’m using windows 10 but windows 11 is also fine.

That PC need to be online and connected to your home network.  

You also need to make sure that virtualisation has been turned on in your computer’s BIOS setting.

There is a detailed Articale over on https://www.simplilearn.com/ that shows you how to do this on Windows 10.

Step 1: Get Your Tools

First, we need to get the tools that we are going to need to get Debian Linux Installed in a VM on Windows.

For these make sure you download the correct version for your computer system.  There is an ARM and AMD/Intel (x64) version of each app.

1.01 Debian: https://www.debian.org

1.02 VirtualBox: https://www.virtualbox.org

1.03 Visual C++: https://learn.microsoft.com/ (Look for the “Visual Studio 2015, 2017, 2019 and 2022 section).

1.04 Once downloaded install “Visual C++” and then “VirtualBox”.  The Debian ISO file is for the next step.

Step 2: Install Debian

2.01 Open “VirtualBox” and select New.

2.02 Give your VM a name: “homeassistant”.

2.03 Select the pulldown on ISO image and select “Other”.

2.04 Select the download Debian ISO – This will be in your download folder.

2.05 Click on “Skip Unattended Installation” this will stop the installation from setting up a desktop environment that we will not be using.

2.06 Set the base memory.  This will work with 2GB however my advice would be to set it to 4GB or more.

2.07 Processors ideally set this to 2 as a minimum.  If you’re not going to use the PC for anything other than Home Assistant I would set this to 75% of what’s available to you.

2.08 The Virtual Hard Disk is where Home Assistant Supervised will keep all files and history.  I Have Rana system for 6 months with only 64GB however I would recommend that you set it to 120GB as a minimum this way you don’t have to change anything later if you run the system for a long time.

2.09 Click “Finish”

2.10 Click “Setting”, and “Network” and change the Network Adaptor from “NAT” to “Bridged Adaptor”

2.11 Click “OK”

2.12 Now Start the VM

Follow the install process inside of the VM window.  

2.13 Hostname is the name of your computer and could be anything: homeassistant

2.14 For Domain Name if you are already using this in your home set this as you normally would, if not then you can make one or just press return to skip: ha.home

2.15 Your root password and user password should be different.   

2.16 The user name I’m using here is “smlp” you will need to change this where needed.

2.17 For the Partitioning method use: “Guided – use entire disk”.

2.18 Select the disk to partition, you should only see one option

2.19 For the Partitioning scheme you can use any option here but I used: “Separate /home partition”.

2.20 Select “Finish partitioning and write changes to disk”.

2.21 Write the changes to disk?: “Yes”

2.22 For Scan extra installation media? Select: “No”.

2.23 For the Debian archive mirror select your country and then the preselected option that shows. In my example: the United Kingdom, deb.debian.org.

2.24 If you are using an HTTP proxy you will already have the information for “HTTP proxy information” if not just press: “Continue”

2.25 Participate in the package usage survey? This is up to you: “Yes” or “No”

2.26 Under software to install:

Deselect “Debian desktop environment”

Deselect “GNOME”

Select “SSH server”

Select “standard system utilities”

2.27 Install the GRUB boot loader to your primary drive?: “Yes”

2.28 Device for boot loader installation: Select the “VBOX” device listed

2.29 Installation complete: Continue

2.30 The VM will now reboot.

Step 3: Get Ready to Install Home Assistant

First, get the IP address for the system.

3.01 Login user your username and password setup in the installation process.

3.02 Get the system IP address:

ip a

Your address will be shown under the “BROADCAST” section, not the “LOOPBACK” section.

My ip shows as: 192.168.1.186/24

Discard the “/24” so my IP is 192.168.1.186

3.03 Now switch to root and install Sudo.  Having this will help with being able to follow along more easily with guides and tutorials from other websites in case you want to do more with the system at a later date. Enter the commands:

su

(Enter your root password setup in the installation process)

3.04 Install sudo

apt install sudo

3.05 Next, we need to add your user “smlp” to be able to use “sudo”.

nano /etc/sudoers

Under the line:

root ALL=(ALL:ALL) ALL

Add the line

smlp ALL=(ALL:ALL) ALL

Remember you will need to change “smlp” to your user name.

Hold “Ctrl X”, and then “Y” to save and return to confirm the file.

Step 4: Install Dependencies and Home Assistant

4.01 In the Windows search bar type CMD and “RETURN” to open the command prompt.

4.02 Now connect via SSH but remember to use your user name and IP address.

ssh smlp@192.168.1.186

Type “yes” to confirm “Fingerprint”

Enter you user password.

4.03 You are now connected to the system via SSH and we are going to use this to install Docker that runs Home Assistant the dependencies that make everything work as well as Home Assistant Supervised.  Simply copy and paste the command into the command prompt in the order listed:

4.04

sudo su -

4.05

apt-get update
apt-get upgrade -y
apt-get dist-upgrade -y

4.06

apt-get install \
apparmor \
jq \
wget \
curl \
udisks2 \
libglib2.0-bin \
network-manager \
dbus \
lsb-release \
systemd-journal-remote -y

4.07

curl -fsSL get.docker.com | sh

4.08 For the following commands, you first need to make sure that version “1.4.1” is the correct and latest version of Home Assistant before entering the command.  You do this by heading over to the Home Assistant Github first to check the listed version number then edit the “1.4.1” to the latest version for the next two commands.

Home Assistant Github: https://github.com/home-assistant/os-agent/releases/

4.09

wget https://github.com/home-assistant/os-agent/releases/latest/download/os-agent_1.4.1_linux_x86_64.deb

4.10

dpkg -i os-agent_1.4.1_linux_x86_64.deb

4.11

wget https://github.com/home-assistant/supervised-installer/releases/latest/download/homeassistant-supervised.deb

4.12

dpkg -i homeassistant-supervised.deb

4.13 Home Assistant Supervised is now installed close down the Virtual Machine Window and select “send the shutdown signal”.

Step 5: Additional Setup

5.01 In the left-hand panel on VirtualBox right click on your VM and select “Create Shortcut on Desktop”

5.02 Now hold down the Windows Key and “R” on the keyboard.

5.03 Enter the command “shell:start” this will open a folder.

5.04 Copy the new VM shortcut on the desktop into the “Start-up” folder, next time Windows starts it will auto-open your new Home Assistant VM.

5.05 If you have a Zigbee USB Dongle like the two listed below you can set these up by plugging them into your Windows PC then in Setting, USB on VirtualBox you can link them to your Home Assistant VM.

Debug Point has an article showing you how to do this: https://www.debugpoint.com/enable-usb-virtualbox/

5.06 Windows Remote Desktop allow you to connect to your Window PC from any other computer or iOS or Android mobile phone via the Remote Desktop App when you are on your home network.  This is not available on Windows Home 10/11.

To set up Remote Desktop click on Windows/Start, Setting and search for Remote Desktop and Enable.

5.07 Also, you can set Windows up so that if it has been restarted or accidentally turned off it will Auto start without the need for entering your Windows username and password when it first boots up.  You can enter your Windows username and password to get VirtualBox going again after a shutdown via Remote Desktop from another computer but if you want to set it without doing this:

Click on Windows/Start, Setting and search “Sign-in option” and change Requires sign-in to “never”

This will not always work but there is a more detailed article on Help Desk Geek on how to do this: https://helpdeskgeek.com

5.08 If you want to keep a copy of your new Home Assistant VM before you fully set it up so that you have a fallback in case something goes wrong you can do this from VirtualBox by right-clicking on your VM and selecting “Clone”.  Remember if you switch to using this Clone you will also need to add a shortcut for it to the windows “Start-up” folder and remove the old one if it’s no longer needed.

Step 6: Home Assistant Supervised

If Everything has gone to plan you are now done.  Start your new Home Assistant VM and wait for it to boot.

6.01 You can now access Home Assistant using your VM’s IP address followed by the Home Assistant Port.  For me this would be:

http://192.168.1.186:8123 

Thank you for taking the time to follow along with my guide.  If you have any feedback or additional pointers please let me know in the comments here or on my YouTube Channel.

If you found it helpful and want to support me you can buy me a coffee on Ko-Fi or just help promote the guides that I am making by sharing this post, liking or subscribing to my video on my Youtube Channel.

Other Links:

Setting up Home Assistant Supervised on Debian: https://mathesonsteplock.ca

Setting up HACS on Home Assistant:  Smart Home Junkie

Grey, horrible but still beautiful.

Week 9: It’s a dull day

Have fun and post your Photo on Mastodon with the hashtag #P52.

There’s loads of them about… get you camera out point it in the correct direction and Bam!

Have fun and post your Photo on Mastodon with the hashtag #P52.

Week 8: That’s a canny building

Have fun and post your Photo on Mastodon with the hashtag #P52.

Well with all the new crazy AI stuff kicking about I thought that I would have a look at the one area that I have not looked into yet.  AI text-to-speech (AI-TTS) and see if it can do my voice-over for me.

If you don’t already know most modern operating systems already have TTS built into the OS and considering they process on the fly they are not too bad.

I often use the iPhone accessibility “two finger swipe down” on my phone to read the current web page I am on when I’m busy.  When you use it at often as I do the quality of the voice generation feels more than sufficient to get through a two-thousand-word News article without any issues.

So how has AI and machine learning, large language models improved TTS?

Well here is a voice-over created in almost real-time speed of my last blog post about Bing AI search:

This was made using eleven labs’ Prime Voice AI.  

It’s fair to say there are quite a lot of usecases where a voice of this high-quality could be used.

Sign up for a free account to try it out the service at: elevenlabs.io

Bing’s new AI search is so good, it hurts my head and yes it will take some time for people to get used to it, but when they do…. Internet search will be changed forever.

Anyone that has tried ChatGPT will have had that moment of amazement. The way that it will not only answer your questions in detail ,but will also let you step it up to “write me an example essay about it” and down to “can you explain it to me like I’m five”.

These amazing responses have been done while still running a old version of the AI and with no recent information or access to the internet.

Well now OpenAI and Microsoft have opened the Flood gates and given it access to the whole internet. They have also customised how it works to be focused on supporting internet searches.

You could ask how many cans of beer will fit in the boot of your Vauxhall. It will search the internet for the owners manual, find the dimensions of your boot, then calculate the answer using the average size of a can of beer.

It will give you the right answer, but it won’t JUST give you the right answer; it will give you detailed context on why it’s given you that answer. It will let you know that the capacity of the boot and shape of it will not allow you to perfectly fill it as not all the sides are straight, instead it will give you its best guess… and it will give you the links to all the places it searched to get that answer.

You could search for a new dress and once you have found one you can ask it to see if it can find you a bag that would match that dress. It will search fashion sites to find out what colours work best together, check that against your dress then search for bag’s that match.

It’s hard to fully get your head around how unreal this new AI search is.

Linus Sebastian of Linus Tech Tips did a live demo on “The WAN Show” recently where he put it through it’s paces and at some points he was totally gob-smacked and speechless on how good it performed.

Watch the clip HERE

If you have the time I would recommend you check out the full demo on the show they did (from around 43mins in)

Linus Tech Tips: WAN Show February 10th

To use the service you need to join a waiting list or you can “jump the queue” by going all in on Microsoft Edge Browser, Default search to Bing and downloading the Bing search App.

Google have some work to do to play catch up and for Microsoft they have nothing to loose. Microsoft are the underdog of search when (not if) this works out for them they are going to sky rocket, search was worth $257 Billion in 2021. Something tells me google are not going to be leader for much longer.

Anyone else wish they had stock in Microsoft right now.

Phil GB

Microsoft announcing the new AI powered Bing: https://blogs.microsoft.com/

Google’s new AI: $120bn wiped off Google after Bard AI chatbot gives wrong answer

It’s Valentines week and it’s that time you show love by submitting to the corporate juggernaut of the greetings cards and flower industries.

Get your wallet out and show the love or book that table for one at your local restaurant and ruin somebody’s evening.

Week 6: Love or hate

Have fun and post your Photo on Mastodon with the hashtag #P52.

Could “A Welsh Rapper” be the the new “A Florida Man”?

When I spotted this one I thought it was a news story from The Onion when in fact it’s from the BBC.

Basically this guy invited his “fan base” to turn up at a field with their dirt bikes (presumable because he’s only has an Electric push bike) for a music video he was going to make for his 341 Facebook followers.

The field was then trashed and now local volunteers have set up a £3,500 fundraiser for Betterment Park in Cwm, to try and fix the damage.

Hard boy Welsh Rapper Dight says… It’s nothing to do with me mate.

i have no clue if he was involved or not but I can however, officially confirm that he looks like a dick.

Full Article: bbc.co.uk

Mastodon has grown into a beautiful community of 7,519,214 users across 18,458 instances.  Every one of them instances is a floating boat in a worldwide ocean that’s interconnecting people in the best way.  

It’s a breeding ground for great ideas, conversations, learning, information and Dogs on skateboards.  The best thing, it is not controlled by one individual or company with views and opinions of how everyone should behave.  Every boat has a captain, and that captain can set down the law for the people on their boat… not rules, but more guidance and a moral code, what they consider right or wrong and what they consider cool.  The captain can also invite like-minded people to get on board and share a viewpoint around a common goal.  

Love Dogs on skateboards? Captain Daryl is your man.  Passionate about Badgers? Not as much as Captain Angie, get on her boat!  Like living in a cold place… Captain Pingu, we are on the way.

All these boats can listen to, and broadcast to, every boat in this wonderful Ocean.

But What about Captain Dennis… His boat smells a bit funny and he likes to pull the wings off flys!

Well here is the genius of Mastodon.  Captain Barbara’s bug boat doesn’t want to hear about that kind of messing about so her boat can just cut ties, so nobody on her boat has to put up with Dennis’s horrible behaviour.  Daryl however likes Dennis’s jokes so no drama as long as his boat doesn’t start to smell even worse.

Caption Bruno’s Boat?  We don’t talk about Bruno’s boat, no no no, he doesn’t broadcast to us and we don’t listen. I think that’s best for everybody.

Some of these boats only have a Captain and some are big superliners with multiple Captain’s and Catering staff, they have swimming pools, tennis courts, helicopter pads and a shit load of passengers, the biggest, Mastodon.social 929,480 Passengers.

The boat I am on Mastodonapp.uk currently has 69,738 people.  Actual not all are people some are random computerised weather Station that blast out interesting information from a place I have never been but I still look at the info every time I see it – check it out: newquayweather

Our boat’s common connection is simply the little island we all live on and I think that’s kind of cool because I’m awake when they are awake.

So, Ocean, Boats, Captains, Passengers and Bruno.  Beautiful, Beautiful Ocean

What do you do when the Passengers are dicks? Kick them off the Boat, simple.  What if you get rats on your boat?  What if your passengers start kicking off with the Captain?  If it was somebody else’s boat you could just stop listening but this is happening in the dining room, around the pool and the Captain is starting to get pissed off with it.  Have you ever seen one of those videos of a retail worker finally deciding they have put up with enough of Karen’s shit!!

In the Twitter Ocean, there was only one big boat, and they spent a long time kicking the rats off the boat, after a while, you get too many rats and you just don’t have the time to get them off the ship… you end up with rat shit… everywhere.  The Captain’s paid good money for his boat and is too busy trying to charge people entry into the pool to spend any more time dealing with the rats.  When the whole place starts to smell like that toilet from Trainspotting the passengers just swim off to the next Ocean.

Now in the Ocean of Mastodon, the Ships and Boats are free, yes you have to pay to keep the lights on and the shifts are long but the Captain’s focus is on that cool connection to their like-minded passengers, that common connection.  That makes it all worth the effort, right?

Well… one of the biggist ships mastodon.lol with 76,281 passengers just got rats and as far as I’m aware this is the first big ship in our Ocean to get rats, some have been kicked overboard by the Captain, passengers are starting to rebel and now there is shit… everywhere!  The passengers have been blaming the Captain, but they don’t want to leave the ship; they have asked to speak to the MANAGER! but we only have Captains here.

I’m my opinion the Captain has done the only thing a Captain can do, and should do, in this situation.  

Sink the fucking boat and teach them horrible rats a valuable lesson.  Don’t shit where you eat!

I feel bad for the passengers that were just chilling by the pool sharing the love with other like-minded passengers, I really do, I would be more than happy for you to hang out with me on my boat.  But I also hope that the rats realise that in this new world, people won’t put up with your shit and are more than happy to let the air out of your dinghy of yours if you don’t play nice.

Just play nice people.

Phil GB

(Source of Mastodon Stats: https://observablehq.com/@simonw/mastodon-users-and-statuses-over-time

“The Shopping Trolly Theory”

To return the shopping trolly is an easy, convenient task and one which we all recognize as the correct, appropriate thing to do. To return the shopping trolly is objectively right. There are no situations other than dire emergencies in which a person is not able to return their trolly. Simultaneously, it is not illegal to abandon your shopping Trolly. Therefore the shopping Trolly presents itself as the apex example of whether a person will do what is right without being forced to do it.

No one will punish you for not returning the shopping trolly, no one will fine you or kill you for not returning the shopping trolly, you gain nothing by returning the shopping trolly. You must return the shopping trolly out of the goodness of your own heart. You must return the shopping trolly because it is the right thing to do; Because it is correct. A person who is unable to do this is no better than an animal, an absolute savage who can only be made to do what is right by threatening them with a law and the force that stands behind it.

Don’t be a dick, return that trolly.

Phil GB

Stolen from: thecolumbiastar.com/

They also stole it from somewhere else.