Home Gadget Geeks

Phil Hawthorne joins Jim to explore Home Assistant Blueprints, area-based automations, ESPHome Bluetooth proxies, e-ink dashboards, AI integration and the Open Home Foundation.

T.J. Huddleston joins me to talk pollinator gardens, smart irrigation, a solar-powered shed, and using Hermes to build safer Home Assistant tools.

Christian Johnson joins Jim Collison for Home Gadget Geeks 684 to talk about passkeys, Bitwarden, Vaultwarden, managed container hosting through Maple Grove Partners and the guardrails needed when AI agents begin doing real operational work.

Jim revisits the LEPRO permanent outdoor lights after six months, then walks through two OpenClaw projects in depth: a DIY Home Assistant Storm Guard for EcoFlow and BLUETTI batteries — tested during a real severe-weather event — and an Amazon Affiliate Manager for TheAverageGuy.tv. He shares what he has learned about AI agent authority, batch size, observable state, gold-standard workflows and conversational memory, along with notes on AI costs, hardware and adapting the OpenClaw series for Medium.

Erin Lawrence joins HGG682 to compare Ring 4K cameras, robot mowers, coffee gear, travel cameras, smart lighting and review workflows.