this post was submitted on 18 Nov 2023
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homeassistant

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Home Assistant is open source home automation that puts local control and privacy first. Powered by a worldwide community of tinkerers and DIY enthusiasts. Perfect to run on a Raspberry Pi or a local server. Available for free at home-assistant.io

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[–] [email protected] 54 points 9 months ago (2 children)

This is sooooo cool. You could conceptualize and sell this. I would buy this.

[–] [email protected] 19 points 9 months ago (1 children)

Thank you for the nice message! I don't have any plans to sell these though. Have enough on my hands with 2 kids ;)

You can buy pre-made readers from Adenno: https://adonno.com/tagreader/ He uses the smaller NFC reader that I want to use in the future.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 9 months ago

Thanks a lot for the link, I'll check it out.

[–] [email protected] 13 points 9 months ago

I love it! There are so many users who could benefit from this: children, elderly, people with disabilities, prison/hospital/hotel settings.

[–] [email protected] 31 points 9 months ago (2 children)

That's such a cool idea! I don't have kids but if I someday do I'll probably steel your idea. I feel like the digital era makes it "to much" for kids, and having a limited, physical library was a better experience overall.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 9 months ago

Exactly this!

[–] [email protected] 5 points 9 months ago (2 children)

For audio books this has already be done: https://us.tonies.com/

It is a walled garden ecosystem, though.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 9 months ago

Walled gardens suck, so I built this for audiobooks and kid-story podcasts for my kids. No tonies for us, and my kids have way more control over what they listen to. Same base setup with the reader, just different media sources and player targets.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 9 months ago

My first thought when seeing this post was "oh like Tonies but for movies, awesome"

[–] [email protected] 24 points 9 months ago (1 children)

I did this at my house too. I've also got a card for turning off the the TV and the lights when the kids are done in that room.

[–] [email protected] 16 points 9 months ago

Hadn't considered using NFC tags to have my kids control other things in the house. Interesting idea!

[–] [email protected] 11 points 9 months ago

That's really cool - plus it gives them a chance to learn how NFC spoofing works when they get older.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 9 months ago (1 children)

That's a great idea. I hope they also use the opportunity to educate the kids on what NFCs are and, at least in simple terms, how the setup all works.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 9 months ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 4 points 9 months ago (1 children)

I'm not saying show them the code. But there are simple ways you can explain to kids what a NFC chip is and how that NFC chip lets them play the movies they want.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 9 months ago (2 children)

Of course. But when a kid has important Good Dinosaur things to do, they’re not going to care

[–] [email protected] 3 points 9 months ago (1 children)

I loved learning about how computers worked when I was a little kid. My (much) older brother taught me all about how the Apple II worked when I was 6, and within a few months, I knew enough to use it myself. I had important games to play, but I still wanted to know how it all worked.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 9 months ago (3 children)

And your sample sized is a biased 1.

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[–] [email protected] 2 points 9 months ago

It depends. Children are naturally curious. I think it comes down to how you deal with that as a parent. Our son is interested in pretty much everything we do. As much as possible, we take the time to involve him. Tell him what's happening, why we're doing things a certain way, etc...

I assembled the NFC reader together with him, and he did question what it was for. Obviously he doesn't understand the technical details behind it, but he understand that the box recognizes the cards he put on top of it. That's enough for now. Maybe in the future I can dive a little bit deeper into it.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 9 months ago

This is amazing! If I had kids, I'd now set this up too.
... Maybe for my gf 🤔😂

[–] [email protected] 8 points 9 months ago (1 children)

Was there supposed to be more to this post?

[–] [email protected] 11 points 9 months ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 3 points 9 months ago
[–] [email protected] 8 points 9 months ago (2 children)

Does it resume from the last time they watched? Does it work with TV shows too and track which episode they are on?

[–] [email protected] 12 points 9 months ago (1 children)

The Plex deep links will automatically resume. TV shows are tricky. For that, I use the Plex integration of Home Assistant to play a random episode. It's supposed to be super powerful, but I haven't got it to work reliably yet (which is why I didn't focus on TV Shows in the blog post).

service: media_player.play_media
data:
  media_content_type: EPISODE
  media_content_id: |-
    { 
      "library_name" : "TV shows",
      "show_name": "SHOW NAME HERE",
      "shuffle": 1,
      "maxresults": 1
    }
  enqueue: replace
target:
  entity_id: media_player.plex_plex_for_apple_tv_apple_tv

[–] [email protected] 3 points 9 months ago

Thank you, this gives me enough to start and play with.

My kiddo doesn't really care too much about movies but loves TV shows. Maybe I solve it with a script if I can't get the native plex link to work

This is going to be a good winter project for me

[–] [email protected] 6 points 9 months ago (2 children)

And I'm wondering if these could be adjusted to have the card be "inserted" and turn off when the card is removed?

I have some nfc tags sitting around but they are much thicker. Maybe I can 3d print something those tags can click into and make like a mini vhs player for them

[–] [email protected] 5 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago) (1 children)

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[–] [email protected] 7 points 9 months ago

Love these ideas! Might make a V2!

[–] [email protected] 4 points 9 months ago

For audiobook that has been done: https://us.tonies.com/ The moment you lift the figure it stops playing and will resume, when you put it back. Nice concept for little kids and it went really well here in Germany. You will find a Toni box in most middle/upper class households. They are magnetic.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 9 months ago (1 children)

Awesome! Btw your TV is not leveled 😂

[–] [email protected] 9 points 9 months ago

It's definitely level. Guess it's the perspective + the fact that it's a curved TV.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 9 months ago (1 children)

Haha I still have my stack of nfc cards nearby from when I was inspired by that music player project as well.

Maybe you’ll inspire me to actually try it now.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 9 months ago

Go for it! If you have some experience with Home Assistant and ESPHome, then this is a simple project. I might do in the future for music as well. I love the physical aspect of browsing the cards and deciding what to watch/listen.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 9 months ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 4 points 9 months ago (1 children)

Did the blog say they have two chunks of thirty minutes for TV viewing?

[–] [email protected] 5 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago)

Yes, 30min in the mornings, 30min in the evening.

[–] netchami 3 points 9 months ago

Wow, this is really cool!

[–] [email protected] 3 points 9 months ago

I have a similar setup for my MiSTer.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago)

Great post, thanks for sharing! I'm hoping to dive into the world of hardware projects and 3D printing and this article is quite inspiring :)

[–] [email protected] 2 points 9 months ago

Great work. Thanks for sharing!

[–] dream_weasel 2 points 9 months ago

I guess this means I need to set up home assistant instead of lazily relying on Google... This is totally beyond my expertise and I've got a 42U server rack in my basement.

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