Files
homeassistant_espscreen/screen_manager/DOCS.md
T
Max Gramser dfd1a26d69 Let Wake only light the screen, and open ESP Screens without a chosen screen (0.2.65)
Wake from Home Assistant counted as a tap: it reset last_touch_ms, the one
clock that standby and Back to page 1 both read. An automation pressing Wake
on every motion therefore held an open card or page 2 up for as long as
someone moved in the room. Back to page 1 now has its own clock, last_use_ms,
written only by the boot, the touchscreen triggers, open_settings from Home
Assistant and the UI self test. Wake, an alert ending and Auto standby on
still restart the standby time, and Wake still brings back the brightness and
the second hand.

The rule moved from the interval into the script back_to_page_1_when_due.
Wake runs it right after waking a dimmed screen, so a page whose time ran out
during standby lights up on page 1 instead of jumping there a second later.

ESP Screens no longer opens the first screen by itself. Until one is picked
the page says "Choose a screen", and with no screens it still offers the
install; both cards start hidden so neither flashes while the page loads.

Checked with 48 host API checks per board, both ESP32 builds, 314 Python and
16 C++ tests, and the editor on the demo home. Firmware 0.2.56.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
2026-09-17 12:41:19 +02:00

2.7 KiB

Installation and everyday use

See the full installation guide.

Open Settings → New screen to install a screen: connect it via USB to the Home Assistant machine, choose the board, name and USB port, then click Install. The profile with unique keys goes into the ESPHome folder of the HA configuration, any missing Wi-Fi goes into secrets.yaml (existing secrets are left untouched), and the build and flash run in the same window; it then shows the API key for pairing. Pairing itself happens in Home Assistant under Settings → Devices & services (a button in the window and on the not yet in Home Assistant card under My screens). Each screen has its own profile. Settings → Firmware & USB is for existing profiles: check, build or reinstall via USB or the IP address (OTA). Existing ESPHome profiles in the HA config folder are found automatically.

Settings (top right) also has the nightly firmware updates, the Alerts cheatsheet (an alert on one screen, or on every screen with the esp_screens_show_alert event) and Claude: install the ESP Screens skill for Claude Code in Home Assistant, or download it for claude.ai, and ask Claude for the alert automation.

At the top of the editor you set the Top bar for each screen: the name on the left, up to six items on the right (time, analog clock, date, or an entity with an icon, such as temperature, a door, the alarm, or "last changed"). Drag to reorder, tap to configure; firmware 0.2.32 or newer renders them.

After pairing via the HA ESPHome integration, choose the tiles in ESP Screens. Tile settings has click behavior, larger values and mini-sliders. Screen settings has brightness and standby. Inspector helps with missing attributes or an offline screen. New cards require firmware 0.2.0. Each screen also has Override YAML for a persistent, hardware-specific <screen>.local.yaml file. It is loaded after the shared package and does not replace the managed name, credentials, Wi-Fi, OTA or package connection.

The screen carries the same settings itself (firmware 0.2.44 or newer): hold the top bar for about a second and a half, or put the built-in Settings card on a page. What is changed there appears here within a second, and the other way around.

In Home Assistant every screen also has a Wake and a Sleep button (firmware 0.2.45 or newer). Press them from an automation with button.press: Wake lights the screen up and restarts the standby time, Sleep puts the screen in standby right away, also with Auto standby off. Wake is not a touch, so an open card or a later page still goes back to page 1 on time (firmware 0.2.56 or newer).