💡 v4.0.0 Preview — Config Flow Redesign & HomeKit Integration

[hiall-fyi]

Tado CE has grown a lot since v3.0.0 — we now have 79 configurable options across 5 collapsed sections. That's powerful, but it's also getting hard to navigate. For v4.0.0, I'm redesigning the entire configuration experience and adding HomeKit local control.

What's Changing

New Top-Level Menu

Instead of one long settings page, you'll see a clean menu:

┌───────────────────────────────────┐
│  Configure Tado CE                │
│                                   │
│  ▸ General Settings               │
│  ▸ Advanced Settings              │
│  ▸ Zone Configuration             │
│  ▸ Reset to Defaults              │
└───────────────────────────────────┘

General Settings — All Your Toggles in One Place

This is where you enable or disable features. Everything defaults to off — turn on what you need.

┌─ General Settings ─────────────────────────────────────────┐
│                                                            │
│  Toggle features on or off. All settings use recommended   │
│  defaults. Use Advanced Settings to fine-tune.             │
│                                                            │
│  ── Smart Features ────────────────────────────────────    │
│                                                            │
│  ☐ Smart Comfort                                           │
│    Comfort scoring, mold risk, condensation, dew point     │
│                                                            │
│  ☐ Thermal Analytics                                       │
│    Heating rate, approach factor, thermal inertia          │
│                                                            │
│  ☐ Adaptive Preheat                                        │
│    Smart pre-heating to reach target temp on time          │
│                                                            │
│  ☐ Schedule Calendar                                       │
│    View Tado schedules as HA calendar entities             │
│                                                            │
│  ── Connections ───────────────────────────────────────    │
│                                                            │
│  ☐ Internet Bridge                                         │
│    Connect to your Tado Bridge for flow temperature data   │
│                                                            │
│  ☐ Weather Compensation                                    │
│    Auto-adjust boiler flow temp based on outdoor weather   │
│                                                            │
│  ☐ Local Control (HomeKit)                                 │
│    Control Tado locally via HomeKit — no cloud needed      │
│                                                            │
│  ── Data Sources ──────────────────────────────────────    │
│                                                            │
│  ☐ Weather Data                                            │
│    Fetch outdoor weather from Tado                         │
│                                                            │
│  ☐ Home State Sync                                         │
│    Sync home/away presence state                           │
│                                                            │
│  ☐ Mobile Device Tracking                                  │
│    Track mobile devices for presence detection             │
│                                                            │
│  ☐ Temperature Offsets                                     │
│    Fetch per-zone temperature offset data                  │
│                                                            │
│  ── Per-Zone ──────────────────────────────────────────    │
│                                                            │
│  ☐ Per-Zone Configuration                                  │
│    Customise sensors, overlays, and heating per zone       │
│                                                            │
│                                                   [Submit] │
└────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘

Advanced Settings — Fine-Tune What You've Enabled

Only shows tuning parameters for features you've already turned on. If nothing is enabled, it tells you to visit General Settings first.

For example, if you've enabled Weather Compensation:

┌─ Advanced Settings ────────────────────────────────────────┐
│                                                            │
│  Fine-tune your enabled features. To enable or disable     │
│  features, go to General Settings.                         │
│                                                            │
│  ▼ Weather Compensation                                    │
│  ┌──────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐  │
│  │  Heating System        [Radiators (Standard) ▾]      │  │
│  │  Curve Slope           [auto / 1.4]                  │  │
│  │  Design Outdoor Temp   [-10] °C                      │  │
│  │  Max Flow Temp         [55] °C                       │  │
│  │  Min Flow Temp         [25] °C                       │  │
│  │  Shutoff Temp          [18] °C                       │  │
│  │  Smoothing Method      [EMA ▾]                       │  │
│  │  Smoothing Window      [60] min                      │  │
│  │  ☐ Room Compensation                                 │  │
│  │  Room Comp Factor      [3.0] °C/°C                   │  │
│  │  Step Size             [1.0] °C                      │  │
│  │  Hysteresis            [1.0] °C                      │  │
│  └──────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘  │
│                                                            │
│  ▼ Polling & API                        (always visible)   │
│  ┌──────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐  │
│  │  Day Start Hour        [7]                           │  │
│  │  Night Start Hour      [23]                          │  │
│  │  Custom Day Interval   [___] min  (empty = auto)     │  │
│  │  Custom Night Interval [___] min  (empty = auto)     │  │
│  │  Refresh Debounce      [15] s                        │  │
│  │  API History Retention [14] d                        │  │
│  │  ── Write Optimization ──                            │  │
│  │  Debounce Window       [3] s                         │  │
│  │  ☐ Action Guard                                      │  │
│  │  Device Sync Delay     [1.0] s                       │  │
│  └──────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘  │
│                                                            │
│                                                   [Submit] │
└────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘

Reset to Defaults — Granular Control

You can reset everything at once, or just one feature category. Per-category reset only resets tuning parameters — the feature stays enabled.

┌─ Reset to Defaults ────────────────────────────────────────┐
│                                                            │
│  What do you want to reset?                                │
│                                                            │
│  ── Scope ─────────────────────────────────────────────    │
│                                                            │
│  ◉ Reset Everything                                        │
│  ○ Smart Comfort                                           │
│  ○ Thermal Analytics                                       │
│  ○ Weather Compensation                                    │
│  ○ Internet Bridge                                         │
│  ○ Local Control (HomeKit)                                 │
│  ○ Mobile Device Tracking                                  │
│  ○ Polling & API                                           │
│                                                            │
│                                    [Cancel]  [Next]        │
└────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘

🏠 Local Control via HomeKit (New)

The big new feature in v4.0.0. Control your Tado devices locally through HomeKit — no cloud needed for basic operations like setting temperature and switching modes.

• Toggle on in General Settings → triggers a one-time pairing step
• Tuning and unpairing available in Advanced Settings
• Works alongside cloud control — local commands are faster, cloud is the fallback

Why These Changes

1. 79 options is too many for one page — the current layout works for power users, but newcomers get lost
2. Most users only need toggles — General Settings gives you that with zero complexity
3. Power users lose nothing — Advanced Settings has every parameter, just better organised
4. Sensible defaults — everything starts off, you opt in to what you need
5. Reset without fear — granular reset means you can experiment without losing everything

For Existing Users

If you're upgrading from v3.x:

• All your current settings are preserved — nothing changes automatically
• You just see the new menu layout
• No reconfiguration needed

Timeline

• Now → 27 March: Collecting feedback on this proposal. Any suggestions you raise before then, I'll do my best to address before 5 April.
• April → mid May (~5-6 weeks, best effort): Focused development on v4.0.0 — HomeKit integration and config flow redesign. No bug fixes during this period unless critical.
• Target release: Q2 2026

Your input shapes this. If something doesn't make sense, if you'd organise things differently, or if there's a feature toggle missing — let me know here. 🙏

[hiall-fyi]

Quick progress update on v4.0.0.

What's Done

The internal groundwork for v4.0.0 is underway. The main focus has been cleaning up the codebase so the Config Flow Redesign and HomeKit integration don't turn into a mess — the options flow is now in its own module, and the insights engine has been broken out into smaller, focused pieces. Net result: ~3,600 fewer lines of code with the same functionality.

The crash-on-clean-install bug (#204 — thanks @Saughassy) was already fixed in v3.4.1. There's also a minor cosmetic issue where the quota pause message showed "0h 0m" instead of the actual reset time — not a blocking issue, so no hotfix for that. It'll ship with v4.0.0.

Insights Redesign

The Home Insights sensor got a facelift — it now only shows sections that actually have data, so you won't see empty "actions needed" or "cross-zone insights" cluttering up the attributes. The weekly digest is also easier to read. I'll drop a few screenshots below so you can see the difference.

HomeKit — Architecture Decision

We've locked in the approach: bundle aiohomekit directly into Tado CE rather than relying on HA's built-in HomeKit Device integration. The main reasons:

1. One integration — no need to install two integrations and manually match entities
2. Automatic fallback — local and cloud work together seamlessly; if one goes down, the other takes over
3. Zero API quota for local writes — setting temperature locally doesn't count against your daily limit

We'll pin the same aiohomekit version that HA uses, so compatibility is handled.

What's Next

Config Flow Redesign first (the new menu structure from the original post), then HomeKit. Still tracking the original timeline. Beta testers welcome when it's ready.