It’s all too easy to fall into the trap of using smart home automation tools like Home a**istant to only manage those devices that already have some level of “smarts.” All too easy indeed, and this was me when I first started getting to grips with how the operating system works. Yes, I said operating system, because the full installation of Home a**istant (HAOS) is no less complex than OPNsense or the OS running your laptop. But we might also want to monitor the other devices in our homes, the “dumb” ones that might not even be connected to Wi-Fi, let alone have any sort of algorithms onboard to control them.