Two years ago, I built a wooden notepad box with a 2.9-inch E-Ink display and wrote about it . Until recently, it was still sitting on my desk and it’s still working. It was even shared on Hacker News back then. But there were two things that kept bothering me a bit. Not a huge deal, but still. That’s why I’ve been toying with the idea of an upgrade for a few months now. The display was too small…
Updated May 2026 : Added full coverage of Hourly Weather Card and Weather Forecast Card plus more alternative options like Atmospheric Weather Card, Weather Radar Card, Lovelace Windrose Card, and Meteoalarm Card. Whether you want to see if you need an umbrella, trigger garden automation, or just want a nice weather forecast, it’s easy to integrate weather data into your Home Assistant . I don’t…
At Adobe Summit 2026 in Las Vegas, Chris Millar and I ran a 90-minute hands-on lab Vibe Code an Author Experience for Edge Delivery Services , session L613. We had developers, marketers, and authors in the room, gave everyone an AI coding agent and a live EDS project, and asked them to build a real authoring tool before the session ended. No prior technical skills needed. What vibe coding means…
Over the past few months, AI assistants have gone from useful chat tools to something more interesting: agents that can actually do things. They can read files, call APIs, and interact with external systems. Model Context Protocol (MCP) is an open standard that enables AI tools to connect to services in a structured way. I’ve been working deeply with Document Authoring (DA) — Adobe’s content…
If you want to know if it makes financial sense to install a home solar system in Germany, or if you’re curious about how long these systems last, we have the answers for you. Here is five years of real data from our own rooftop PV system in Germany. In 2025, our 9.45 kWp system produced 8,624 kWh , covering 54% of our household electricity needs and saving us around €2,200 in grid costs. The full…
I’ve been a happy Plausible Analytics user for a long time. The UI is clean and the solution is privacy-focused and does exactly what it’s supposed to do. Honestly, there was no technical reason to switch until we exceeded our current subscription plan. Lately, my websites - this one and the dinosaur website of my daughter have seen a nice increase in traffic, consistently exceeding the 10k…
Another year has passed and 2025 is coming to an end. Since my 2024 update , our Home Assistant setup has continued to mature and there have been some notable additions and refinements worth sharing. This post outlines the changes, new devices and valuable insights gained over the past year. Architecture # As always, here’s the updated architecture diagram to help visualize the entire setup: The…
This year, I once again had the honour of speaking at the adaptTo() 2025 conference in Berlin. Together with my colleague Max Voos, I introduced a new authoring paradigm for AuthorBus (formerly Dark Alley aka. DA) in a session. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i6dJVELaB_o&t=1s We demonstrate how AuthorBus integrates with Universal Editor and Edge Delivery Services, providing attendees with insight…
In my previous post about evcc , I introduced you to this powerful open-source energy management system and explained why it’s essential for anyone with solar panels and an electric vehicle. Now it’s time to get our hands dirty with the actual setup and configuration process. This guide will walk you through exactly how I configured evcc with our specific hardware setup: a SolarEdge inverter with…
Two weeks ago, I took the next step in optimizing our smart home energy setup by implementing evcc (Electric Vehicle Charging Controller). This post describes my journey and gives you a complete introduction to what evcc can do for your EV charging setup. Are you the proud owner of an electric car? Do you charge it at home? Have you installed a photovoltaic system on your roof? If so, then this…
Are you familiar with the following situation? You’ve just returned from shopping or work and the battery in your electric car is running low, so you need to charge it. You just need to plug the charging cable into the EV charger and switch charging on. But at the same time, you’ve still got groceries and other stuff in the trunk, and your hands are full. Ever found yourself fumbling for the RFID…
Ever wish your security camera could actually speak? Let’s talk about camera alerts and how we can make them even smarter. You’ve got your smart home cameras connected to the Home Assistant, and you get notifications whenever there’s motion. In my article Automate Reolink camera notifications , I explained how you can automate the camera notifications. That’s useful, sure. But a generic…
Two years ago, I wrote about backing up Home Assistant to a Synology NAS using NFS shares. While that method still works, the Home Assistant team has gone all-in on backups and massively improved Home Assistant’s native backup capabilities with the 2025.1 and 2025.2 releases. I have already adjusted my backup configuration. Let’s explore what’s new and why you should update your approach. The Home…
Our home’s solar energy system continued its upward trajectory in 2024. In fact, compared to previous years, it provided a slight increase in energy production. This post looks at our solar performance in 2024, highlighting key trends and comparing them with the results from 2021, 2022 and 2023. 2024: A Bountiful Harvest of Solar Energy # In 2024, our solar panels generated a total of 8571 kWh, an…
We recently had the opportunity to present at adaptTo() in Berlin, one of the most anticipated tech conferences in the Adobe Experience Manager community. Together with my colleague Anian Weber we delivered an in-depth session on AEM Edge Delivery Services, focusing on how its capabilities have evolved well beyond small blog websites and basic corporate pages. Our talk aimed to answer a critical…
As I wrote in my previous post , I recently switched from Arlo cameras to Reolink cameras. The Reolink cameras have excellent hardware quality, an aluminium housing and no cloud subscription obligation. However, there are some gaps in the software and functions that have been standard with Arlo and other providers for years are missing here. The camera alarms cannot be automated and there is also…
I recently replaced all our security cameras around the house with new Reolink network cameras with either Wifi or PoE (Power of Ethernet). In this post, we will walk through the process of integrating Reolink Network Cameras into Home Assistant. With this integration, you can stream live footage, set up motion detection automations, and even record clips based on events. Here is why, and more…
Smart homes are becoming increasingly popular, and temperature and humidity sensors play a crucial role in automating home environments. Over the last years I have added > 10 in and around the house. Every room got one, the attic as well and one was added into the fridge. Of course there is a sensor outside in the garden and a second for to measure the pool water temp. ZigBee sensors are great for…
E-Ink displays are known for their low power consumption and crisp visibility. They have gained popularity in various DIY projects. After seeing the first threads on the Home Assistant community forum, I got interested in building an e-paper project with ESPHome. I wanted to build a project where I always have the display in view and it shows me all kinds of useful information. I also wanted it to…
In this annual update I give an update on the 2023 performance of our photovoltaic system and comparing it with previous years’ data. This is a follow up to last years post series about the installation and first energy yield numbers ( 1 , 2 , 3 ). 2023 Solar Energy Production Overview # Total solar energy produced in 2023: 8.292 kWh Average monthly solar energy production: 691 kWh Month with…
Since sharing our initial insights into the Home Assistant setup at my first post about our Home Assistant setup , a lot has transformed. It’s time for an update. This article will walk you through the changes, replacements of devices and integrations, additions of new elements, and the tried-and-true components that have proven to be reliable. Architecture # Since I’m an IT guy I have to draw an…
For zero to go-live of your first website in 30 min. Is that possible? In this developer step-by-step walkthrough I show you how to build and launch your first size using Adobe’s new Edge Delivery Service. Here’s what you will learn: Setting up the GitHub Repo from our boilerplate project Setting up a document library and connecting it to the project Publish the first content changes Run a local…
This year’s AdaptTo 2023 conference in Berlin brought an exciting twist to my speaking journey. Unlike previous years, where AdaptTo conference was only virtually, I had the incredible opportunity to hold a keynote presentation in person. During this keynote , I gave an introduction into the innovation of Adobe AEM Sites – Document-based Authoring combined with Edge Delivery Services, also known…
Update : With the first two 2025 releases, there were some new features for Home Assistant backups. I have summarised these in a new article . However, the NAS backup steps in this article are of course still valid. Okay, I don’t think I need to go into detail about why having a solid backup strategy for your Home Assistant solution is important. So I’ll write about how to set it up. I’ve wanted…
In May Adobe hosted the Adobe Developers Live virtual conference for Adobe Experience Manager. The conference focused on building next generation composable services, universal editor, edge delivery and generative AI. I gave a presentation about the new AEM document-based authoring and how to build an effective editor experience with Microsoft 365/Google Workspace. Abstract: A crucial aspect of…
As I have run this website for a few years now and have been doing some re-designs and new stack changes , I have always thought about how the website performs. Over time, I became more and more interested in topics related to performance optimization. Core Web Vitals and that website performance are important for site users, especially people who come here via mobile. Incidentally, this is also a…
I’m a big fan of Nintendo and Super Mario since I was a teenager. One of my most played games in my life was probably Super Mario Land on the Gameboy. I still own it and an original Gameboy as well. I recently found a cool DIY project - Clockwise Mario Bros. Clock by Jonathas Barbosa. I absolutely had to rebuild it. With this project you can create your own animated Mario clock. With a nice frame…
Home Assistant is an open-source home automation platform that allows you to connect and control all the devices in your home. It supports a wide range of solar inverters like Fronius, SMA Solar, Solar-Log, GoodWe or SolarEdge. And while SolarEdge already provides an extensive monitoring portal for end users, there are still some reasons to integrate with Home Assistant. Home Assistant lets you…
In relation to my ESPHome water tank project I got a lot of inquiries about how to use an ultrasonic distance sensor with ESPHome. That’s why I created this short guide. ESPHome is an open-source framework for building Internet of Things (IoT) devices using the ESP8266 and ESP32 microcontrollers. ESPHome provides an YAML-based configuration language for creating custom firmware that runs on these…
In part 2 of my “Our Own Electricity” series I give an insight into our electricity production and consumption. After I explained our setup I will share details on the installation costs, our break even calculation. Disclaimer: the numbers below are actual numbers from our installation. There will be differences in numbers based on the place where you live, the local regulations and the hours of…
This one has been in my draft folder for a few weeks. Our photovoltaic system was installed in spring 2020 and I wanted to report on it earlier. I finally had some time to finish the article over the holidays. Small side effect of the fact that it took a bit longer: by the end of 2022 I will have two full years of electricity yield data to show and compare. This article will consist of 3 blog…
Last November, Adobe hosted the Adobe Developers Live Headless. The event focused on building modern experiences with AEM Sites headless. Together with my colleagues Mark & James I gave a presentation about how to build a Content and Commerce Experiences with AEM Sites & Adobe Commerce. The talk discussed the use of the App Builder and API Mesh to create content and commerce experiences. We guided…
Little spiders on your shoulder # For this year’s Halloween project I built something without pumpkins. The small moving spiders are to scare our guests. During the party, we placed it over the buffet table. A second one was placed in such a way that it reached down to the kids’ shoulders when they were standing at the buffet and didn’t suspect anything. Using small motors, the spiders moved up…
Some readers recently asked me about the Wemos D1 mini usage in my projects and how this board can be used with ESPHome. For most of my Arduino & ESPHome projects I use a Wemos D1 mini (v3.1.0) or Wemos D1 mini Pro (v1.1.0) and recently the Wemos D1 mini v4.0 . The fourth board of the family is the is the D1 mini light . I never used one of the light versions, most of the time you can get the D1…
Home Assistant controlled garden watering part 2 - are you ready? In my previous post , I explained how I measured the level of water in our garden cistern using ESPHome. In this post, I will describe how the garden watering system works. I will explain how we get our water from the tank, distribute it in our garden, and control the main pump. In addition, I will give an example of how I use the…
Watering your lawn and plants around the house wasn’t one of my favourite things to do. Especially when we bought a robot lawnmower, watering the lawn became quite a hassle since we had to always put away the sprinklers and hoses after each irrigation. An automatic irrigation system was needed. Inspired by this thread on the HA Community I started looking into building a DIY solution. Which…
Home Assistant & Arlo cameras go better together than I initially expected. I’m using it since our entire setup got migrated from OpenHab to Home Assistant and I’m happy with the setup. But let’s start from the beginning … How it started # In 2016 I tough about the topic of home surveillance for the first time. I was looking for a camera system that could operate on batteries. I have identified…
My daughter Mia is a huge dinosaur fan, almost a little dinosaur nerd. We are overwhelmed with information about dinosaurs every day. It starts during breakfast and doesn’t stop before she falls asleep 😉. She is super happy when she can share her dinosaur knowledge with someone. Then, between the Christmas holidays last year, we had the idea: how about sharing the Dino knowledge not only with…
In this post I will briefly describe my personal website’s history. It started in 1998. At this point, I have already gone through six iterations. I had already completely forgotten two of them. My personal blog is built around simple HTML and CSS. There’s no need for much javascript on the site - something I got sorted out over time. The site also become a bit of a playground. Described here is a…
In the last few weeks and months, my colleagues and I have written several articles for the Adobe Tech Blog . Since I am also presenting some of my professional projects here, I wanted to take the opportunity and briefly introduce them. Taking a Deep Dive into Adobe Experience Manager’s Commerce Integration Framework This is the first article in a series that we wrote about the Commerce…
At the last Adobe Developers Live conference I gave a talk about how to extend AEM Content & Commerce with new Adobe Developer App Builder. In this talk I discuss AEM Commerce integration & extensibility patterns using App Builder. I explain how you can integrate your eCommerce solution, either in house home grown services or an off the shelf commercial solution, with Adobe Experience Manager. The…
I would like to show you my new half 30 minutes no coding holiday Home Assistant project. My daughter’s Mimosa plants need some water while we were on vacation, so I built this super simple automated watering system. The project goal is to keep the plants alive for two weeks while we are away. Nothing permanently only a temporary project. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0LImGXfNvG4 It was built…
Together with my colleague Mark J. Becker I wrote an introduction and instructions on how to use AEM Content Fragments together with the Adobe Commerce (aka. Magento) PWA. We provide step-by-step instructions that explain the individual tasks in detail, using a blog example - starting with setting up the PWA with the help of PWA Studio, via setting up the GraphQL endpoint in Adobe Experience…
I held a session on “Content and Commerce with Adobe Experience Manager” at the recent Adobe Developers Live | Content conference. The recording for my talk is now up. If you couldn’t join the session, please watch and learn about how to get started with Commerce on Adobe Experience Manager as a Cloud Service. Your browser does not support the iframe element. The slide deck is available as well.…
A mini TV for my daughter’s dollhouse # This project and the blog post about it were originally created in February 2019. A few weeks ago I updated the Mini TV software so it was time to update the blog post as well. The dollhouse Mini TV is a small Arduino project using an ESP8266 chip on a Wemos D1 board and an SSD1306 OLED display to build a small working TV for my daughter’s birthday. She…
Today I want to share a little holiday project I build this week: a mailbox sensor to make a dumb mailbox smart and notifying us if we got new mail. I’m talking about real physical mail here - letters, postcards, newspapers etc. dropped into our mailbox. How does it work? # The project is build using two Xiaomi ZigBee contact sensors I had leftover. You can get these from Gearbest, AliExpress, or…
I want to share some professional projects I’m working on: Commerce Integration Framework and the AEM CIF Core Components are built by the team I’m working for at Adobe. On July 28th I was a guest on Mark Szulc’s Building Experiences using Adobe Experience Cloud show . We discussed how Adobe Experience Manager works together with Magento, using the latest release of the Commerce Integration…
I try to gather and describe our Home Assistant setup here, along with the configuration in GitHub. Maybe there is something useful to copy and adapt 😃 I already documented our migration journey from OpenHab to Home Assistant and some details about how to better integrate Homematic devices into HA. Overview # Our Home Assistant setup is simple - everything currently runs on a single board Odroid…
Home Assistant # I recently switched from OpenHab to Home Assistant . While this transition was smooth for most of the devices and integrations the Homematic part was a little more challenging. Homematic is a proprietary Smart Home solution mainly marketed in Germany. It is actually an entire Smart Home ecosystem similar to SmartThings. It can be used as a standalone solution and has a wide…
From OpenHab to Home Assistant # This “project” is about the change I did from OpenHab to Home Assistant for our smart home automation system. Ok maybe the headline sounds a bit too sensational but change our entire home automation setup from one system we used for 2+ years now to a completely new one requires quite some heavy lifting. Let’s start from the beginning. I’m running a smart home…