Home Assistant integration for Intellicenter

[Jean-Luc]

I believe I'm seen some interest for a Home Assistant Intellicenter integration on other topics therefore this post.

I just released a Home Assistant integration for Intellicenter and, though I've been testing thoroughly on my own pool, there are many features that I haven't been able to test against.
In no particular order:
- different types of lights (I have Intellibrite for which I was able to support light effects). I can tell from the GetCircuitType response some of them support dimming and I have no idea how the intensity is encoded ('USE' parameter hopefully).
- chemistry system
- different heater configuration (I have a gas heater shared between pool and spa)
- and I'm sure a few more that I am not even aware of
Would love to have additional testers and/or internal configurations of more "extreme" setups that I have.
Integration code can be found on GitHub.

Thanks for the help/interest.

 

[scchan1w]

Thanks for sharing this. Does this integration allow you to bypass the Pentair software completely? I haven't installed IntelliCenter yet, but will when I have time and will look into this down the road.

 

[Jean-Luc]

Thanks for sharing this. Does this integration allow you to bypass the Pentair software completely? I haven't installed IntelliCenter yet, but will when I have time and will look into this down the road.

Not sure what you mean by 'bypassing' the Pentair software completely... when you say "I haven't installed IntelliCenter yet" do you mean the iOS or Android app?

I definitely no longer use the mobile app (or the Pentair website) to interact with the pool, except for changing rare settings (like changing the presets for pump speed).

Once in home assistant, it's trivial to replace the schedules, integrate Siri or Alexa ('Hey Siri, turn on the spa") or do some other nifty automations ('turn the light spa to pink when it reaches desired temperature"). It's also a little geeky but cool to observe the graph of the water temperature or pump RPM on my wall tablet ;-)

While the internal library provides full low level access to the system I chose to only expose in HA the "user" features as opposed to the more "installer" features.
Something like the nodes-PoolController project is definitely closer to the hardware but it felt too intrusive for my taste (additional Raspberry PI, serial cable, possible warranty issues with Pentair...) and since the Intellicenter unit already provides a very decent local network access, I preferred to go the "easy way".

I'm totally open to adding more "control" but I see a point of diminishing return in trying to recreate code in HA for things that already exist on the Pentair website and are only used once or twice a year (if ever).

Hope this help.

 

[scchan1w]

Not sure what you mean by 'bypassing' the Pentair software completely... when you say "I haven't installed IntelliCenter yet" do you mean the iOS or Android app?

I definitely no longer use the mobile app (or the Pentair website) to interact with the pool, except for changing rare settings (like changing the presets for pump speed).

Yes, I was asking if you no longer use the Pentair mobile app/website. Sounds like your software is an alternative, that's great. I meant that I have not installed the whole system yet - haven't wired up the load center/equipment and sensors yet - I just purchased the system and it's sitting in my garage. Once I have it installed, I'll take a look at using your software.

I looked through your code. I'm not familiar with HACS or Home Assistasnt, but like to code. How were you able to figure out the API to interact with the Intellicenter? Thanks

 

[Jean-Luc]

The “philosophy” I used was to only expose a subset of all the functions you get thru the portal (or app) to Home Assistant. There are a few elements that I am still debating (like changing speed pump presets or chlorination levels) but I don’t think it makes sense to fully reproduce the UI from Pentair. Where Home Assistant shines IMHO is in bringing all the others elements of the house in the picture. I can synchronize the pool light color with the other decorative lights I have in the yard. One can imagine only heating the pool when the temperature outside is over a certain threshold.
To “reverse engineer” the protocol I used the Pentair web portal in my browser “developer mode”. The portal uses a web socket that is easy to monitor and the command/response sequences are almost identical to the ones you can send directly to the local port (6681) of the Intellicenter unit. From there it has been a game of figuring out what all the object types and attributes mean (and how to fetch the data efficiently). It even works if you connect to the “demo” pools which is why I should be able to support IntelliChem and IntelliChlor though I don’t have these systems in my own pool. I’m currently adding a detailed description of all the Pentair parameters in my code, I’m hoping to finish this week and will push an update if you’re interested in the very low level.
I’m not sure what system you are replacing but I’m pretty happy with the Intellicenter architecture

 

[Jean-Luc]

Happy new year!

Glad to annouce a new (extended) version of the integration with:

• added proper handling for English vs Metric setting
• added support for multiple heaters per body of water
• added support of the IntelliChem chemistry unit
• added support for light effects for light groups (if applicable)
• added a binary sensor for each schedule
• added Vacation Mode switch
• added binary sensor for tracking usage of individual heaters
• significant optimizations at the protocol level

If already installed with HACS you should be offered to upgrade. Otherwise URL is the same Intellicenter Custom Component

For those curious to see the underbelly, see attributes.py for a detailed and exhaustive description of all the objects/attributes a Intellicenter can throw at you....

 

[silfa718]

Happy new year!

Glad to annouce a new (extended) version of the integration with:

• added proper handling for English vs Metric setting
• added support for multiple heaters per body of water
• added support of the IntelliChem chemistry unit
• added support for light effects for light groups (if applicable)
• added a binary sensor for each schedule
• added Vacation Mode switch
• added binary sensor for tracking usage of individual heaters
• significant optimizations at the protocol level

If already installed with HACS you should be offered to upgrade. Otherwise URL is the same Intellicenter Custom Component

For those curious to see the underbelly, see attributes.py for a detailed and exhaustive description of all the objects/attributes a Intellicenter can throw at you....

As a Home Assistant user and with a pool under construction I'm excited to see this.

 

[Revlus]

Oh heck yea... Love Home Assistant.

 

[Mycall9550]

I'm just getting started with HA, but I installed this last week.

Pentair ScreenLogic

Instructions on how to integrate a ScreenLogic gateway within Home Assistant.

www.home-assistant.io

@MyAZPool Here you go!

 

[SlipperyPete]

I believe I'm seen some interest for a Home Assistant Intellicenter integration on other topics therefore this post.

I just released a Home Assistant integration for Intellicenter and, though I've been testing thoroughly on my own pool, there are many features that I haven't been able to test against.
In no particular order:
- different types of lights (I have Intellibrite for which I was able to support light effects). I can tell from the GetCircuitType response some of them support dimming and I have no idea how the intensity is encoded ('USE' parameter hopefully).
- chemistry system
- different heater configuration (I have a gas heater shared between pool and spa)
- and I'm sure a few more that I am not even aware of
Would love to have additional testers and/or internal configurations of more "extreme" setups that I have.
Integration code can be found on GitHub.

Thanks for the help/interest.

Just setup my Home Assistant today and this was one of the first things I installed. So far it is great. Once I figure out the layout I use, I'll post some screenshots. Thanks for sharing

 

[SlipperyPete]

I find I use this MUCH more often than the pentair app. It's quicker and more responsive. Of course I need to pull up the intellicenter app or website to edit schedules. I also haven't figured out how to change the light color yet, but I also haven't put any effort to see if it's possible.

This first pic is the pic I keep on my main dashboard.




This second pic is all of the sensors I'm showing. It's a great card to have. I'm setting up a backyard page and this is where this will be so I can see everything at once.

 

[SlipperyPete]

Another update in case @Jean-Luc returns at some point. I have globrite led lights. I can turn them on/off with my Home Assistant. However I can’t seem to change the color. All in all, I’m still very happy. I’ve now created an Backyard dashboard. For the time being it’s only my pool. I’ll add more later.

 

[frankos]

I'm really liking this integration. Here is my current pool dashboard.



I'd rather just show the temperature of the pool on a graph like the air temp, but I'm affraid I cannot figure out how to get the data. It's listed in the data attributes of climate.pentair. I can access it in Node red, but I cannot figrue it out in straight Home assistant. I think I need a template sensor. So I'm trying the template sensor, but I get an error.

Here is the sensor yaml:

#- platform: template
# sensors:
# pool_temp_sensor:
# value_template: {{states.climate.pentair_xx_xx_xx_pool_heat.current_temperature}}
# unit_of_measurement: F

And the error I'm getting is:

Error loading /config/configuration.yaml: invalid key: "OrderedDict([('states.climate.pentair_xx_xx_xx_pool_heat.current_temperature', None)])" in "/config/sensors.yaml", line 160, column 0

Any tips or suggestions would be greatly appreciated. The whole temple thing is still a mystery to me compared to the rest of Home Assistant. I just cannot wrap my head around it.

Thanks!

 

[silfa718]

I'm really liking this integration. Here is my current pool dashboard.

View attachment 348584

I'd rather just show the temperature of the pool on a graph like the air temp, but I'm affraid I cannot figure out how to get the data. It's listed in the data attributes of climate.pentair. I can access it in Node red, but I cannot figrue it out in straight Home assistant. I think I need a template sensor. So I'm trying the template sensor, but I get an error.

Here is the sensor yaml:


And the error I'm getting is:


Any tips or suggestions would be greatly appreciated. The whole temple thing is still a mystery to me compared to the rest of Home Assistant. I just cannot wrap my head around it.

Thanks!

Check your spacing in your yaml.

 

[silfa718]

Finally got my equipment and water in the pool...loaded this integration up and I don't think I will use the Pentair app unless I have too. Awesome work @Jean-Luc

 

[splat10]

I believe I'm seen some interest for a Home Assistant Intellicenter integration on other topics therefore this post.

I just released a Home Assistant integration for Intellicenter and, though I've been testing thoroughly on my own pool, there are many features that I haven't been able to test against.

I know this is somewhat aged, but do you know if the Intelliconnect uses the same web sockets as the intellicenter? I'm pretty new to HA and have wanted to get my pool on it but no one has done the intelliconnect yet. I tried your app but it doesn't recognize the connect so i'm guessing they may be different. I'll keep working on it though.

 

[hawkmoon7]

Is this still being worked on? Does it work with the new Intellicenter2 update?