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Version: 4.2

Local Home Assistant for Development

Use this setup to test the Home Assistant plugin locally without a real Home Assistant server. The FiestaBoard dev container connects to a Home Assistant container on the same Docker network.

This is for local development only. Only the FiestaBoard dev container is intended to talk to this Home Assistant instance.

Prerequisites​

Start the dev stack with Home Assistant​

Run both the FiestaBoard dev stack and the optional Home Assistant service:

docker-compose -f docker-compose.dev.yml -f docker-compose.ha.yml up -d

From inside the FiestaBoard container, Home Assistant is reachable at http://homeassistant:8123.

First-time login (no default password)​

Home Assistant does not ship with a default username or password. The first time you open http://localhost:8123 you will see Create account: choose a name, username, and password.

Suggested for local dev only: when creating the account, use something easy to remember, e.g. username dev and password dev. (Do not use these on a real or exposed instance.)

If you already completed setup and forgot the password, you can reset and create a new account by removing the config volume (see Data persistence) and opening http://localhost:8123 again.

Configure FiestaBoard to use local Home Assistant​

  1. Create a long-lived access token in Home Assistant

    • Open http://localhost:8123 and sign in (using the account you created above).
    • Go to Profile (your user, bottom left) → Long-Lived Access Tokens.
    • Create a token and copy it.

  2. Point FiestaBoard at the local HA container

    • In your project .env, set:
      • HOME_ASSISTANT_BASE_URL=http://homeassistant:8123
        (Use the hostname homeassistant so the container can resolve it; do not use localhost.)
      • HOME_ASSISTANT_ACCESS_TOKEN=<your_long_lived_token>
    • Or configure the same URL and token in the FiestaBoard UI: Integrations → Home Assistant → enable and enter URL and token.

  3. Restart the FiestaBoard container if you changed .env:

    docker-compose -f docker-compose.dev.yml -f docker-compose.ha.yml restart fiestaboard

You can now use the Home Assistant plugin and entity picker in the UI; the dev container will talk to the local Home Assistant container.

Optional: MQTT so HA discovers FiestaBoard as a device​

To have FiestaBoard appear as a controllable device in Home Assistant (switches, sensors, buttons), enable MQTT in your .env:

  • MQTT_ENABLED=true
  • MQTT_BROKER_HOST=mosquitto (use hostname mosquitto when using docker-compose.ha.yml)

Then restart the FiestaBoard container. After configuring the MQTT integration in HA to use the Mosquitto broker (Settings → Add integration → MQTT → broker mosquitto, port 1883), the FiestaBoard device and all its entities will appear automatically.

Stopping Home Assistant​

To stop only Home Assistant and keep the dev stack running:

docker-compose -f docker-compose.dev.yml -f docker-compose.ha.yml stop homeassistant

To bring it back:

docker-compose -f docker-compose.dev.yml -f docker-compose.ha.yml start homeassistant

Data persistence​

Home Assistant data (config, entities, token usage) is stored in a Docker volume homeassistant-config. It persists across container restarts. To reset:

docker-compose -f docker-compose.dev.yml -f docker-compose.ha.yml down
docker volume rm fiestaboard_homeassistant-config  # exact name may vary by project name

Then start again; Home Assistant will go through first-time setup again.