As others have commented, the open source home assistant project can take voice commands and perform smart home functions like turning lights on and off, reading off the forecast, taking down notes, etc etc. But it does have limits, you will have to script any kind of complex commands, like pulling headlines from an RSS feed, or playing spotify playlists, or really anything that requires fetching info from an API, it won’t do those kinds of things out of the box.

The other factor which others have called out is that it doesn’t currently handle wake word functionality, though that’s been on their road map this year and the Oct update might fix that. That being said, running a dedicated wake word app to fill in that gap is very much possible. See my thread here for more info: https://community.home-assistant.io/t/setting-up-a-100-local-smart-speaker-on-an-android-tablet-using-tasker-and-snowboy-to-handle-wake-word-detection/611435

Same, including an IR led is such a simple thing, why did this ever go away. Though I’m pretty sure most Chinese phones still have them, Xiaomi phones do for sure

Hell yes, just jumped on the ulefone train myself!

I actually meant to reply to your comment but replied to the main thread by mistake, I had the same frustrations with modern phones losing features, and even fairphone dropping the 3.5mm jack was a wtf decision to me. See my comment on the ulephone 18t, it had virutally everything I wanted in a phone.

I’m going to chime in here to plug the ulefone power armor 18t I just got. I was pretty nervous to get a chinese phone as I’ve only had samsung and lg phones before, but this thing legit blows me away. Not only does it fully support every band that my carrier uses (rare even for phones made for the US market), but it has:

• Replaceable battery that lasts 3+ days between recharges

• Extremely rugged, IP69 waterproof and designed for underwater photography (physical shutter button and diving camera app)

• 3.5mm jack, sd card slot, FM radio (with built in antenna - no headphones need to be plugged in), and an RGB notification led

• Dimensity 900 chipset that beats a lot of the snapdragon chips on the market.

• 12 fucking GB of RAM… yes, 12…

• Wifi 6(ax)

• Wireless charging and reverse charging

• A fucking 60x magnification microscope? (Why???)

• A FLIR thermal camera (Just because, why the fuck not)

• Runs mostly bloat free stock android

All that for under $600 (on aliexpress)

The only thing it’s missing is an IR blaster, otherwise this is the best phone I’ve ever had, bar none. It is a chonky beast though, be warned.

This has really changed my view on Chinese electronics, especially at a time when phones for the western world are losing features and functionality all the time (including stuff from South Korean). Turns out capitalism isn’t that great for innovation!

Interesting, can I ask a couple questions about that setup? How did you go about connecting all the pieces? Is it all handled locally? What hardware are you running it on? Do you have any good resources/tutorials you followed?

I have foscam cameras and have been pretty happy with them. Regardless of the brand, make sure you firewall them from the internet or they will phone home.

Reason I went with foscam was because at the time they were the only brand with an outdoor PoE camera that had a spotlight, 2-way audio, PIR, and ONVIF support. Which was what I wanted for an entryway camera. They’ve since discontinued that “SPC” model, so if I had to do it over again I would be just as likely to pick reolink (had shitty luck with amcrest).

I have been very happy with my venstar colortouch. It has a well documented local API, with a cloud option and mobile app if you’re comfortable with that. The HA integration is great as well.

I’m an electrical engineer who designs commercial and Utility Scale PV systems (i.e. Multi acre solar power plants), though I’ve done a couple dozen residential systems as well.

@evranch@lemmy.ca chimed in with some really good advice, but I wanted to add a few things.

If I were to do my own system I’d go with micro inverters, enphase IQ8 most likely, as they can be setup to operate during a grid outage, either with a battery backup, or with a load balancing panel.

Careful of the downfalls of going the DIY route, not sure how it is in your state, but in some states I’ve worked in you will forfeit incentives if you don’t use a qualified installer.

Get familiar with your utilities net metering policies, if they don’t net meter power at or near retail rates then you’ll end up giving them your power for free/cheap whenever you overgenerate. Some utilities will also make it difficult if you’re not going through a qualified installer.

Lastly, and this is coming from someone who understands the industry intimately, really take a look at the numbers and decide if this makes sense for you. Most residential solar will take 5-10 years to pay for itself (after incentives) and start to generate a profit. Compare that with the same sum invested in a general s&p500 index fund which would likely have doubled in value during that time.

Ultimately I decided not to install solar on my home, despite the ability to 100% DIY the whole thing and get parts at steep discounts, and instead installed a backup generator and signed up with a local community solar array (which is not something that all states/utilities allow).

Happy to answer any questions you may have!