Arduino sketch for a garage-monitoring system which supports a garage door, light level sensing, and BLE beacon for the vehicle.
Compatible with Home Assistant, and inspired by GarHAge.
Open Source software: Apache License 2.0
Garaduino is an Arduino sketch designed to connect Home Assistant (or any other MQTT-enabled automation platform) to a garage, including the door, light level, and vehicle presence. It supports Over the Air (OTA) updates as well.
Garaduino provides control of a garage door (via connection to its opener) and status of the door; measurement of the outdoor light level; and presence detection of a vehicle in the garage (using a BLE beacon in the vehicle).
All of these features are supported via MQTT, and can be used with the Home Assistant MQTT Cover and MQTT Sensor device configurations.
In addition there is a simple read-only web interface which can be used to troubleshoot Garaduino's connections and get raw light sensor readings.
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Any ARM-based (SAM core) Arduino should be sufficient for this sketch; as of the current release the code requires less than 90KB of Flash and less than 10KB of RAM. The sketch was developed using an Arduino MKR WiFi 1010.
Note: ARM-based boards are required because this sketch is written using 'modern C++' features, and the AVR toolchains for Arduino boards do not support those features.
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An Ethernet interface supported by the standard Arduino Ethernet library. The sketch was developed using an Arduino MKR Ethernet Shield.
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Connections to two analog pins, and a door control relay on a digital pin. The sketch was developed using an Arduino MKR Relay Proto Shield.
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For vehicle presence detection, a Bluetooth interface supported by the standard ArduinoBLE library, and a beacon (tested with a BlueCharm BC037). Note that the code only uses the beacon's name; if the beacon also broadcasts data it is unused, and so it does not matter which format the beacon uses for this data. The sketch was developed using the Bluetooth support included in the MKR WiFi 1010.
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Arduino IDE. Required to obtain the toolchain (compiler/linker/etc.) and libraries. It is also used to bootstrap the board so that Garaduino can be installed (see Installation section below). The IDE can be installed using any available method; this sketch was developed using version 1.8.13 but any recent version should work.
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Board package for your selected board. The simplest way to install it is to open the Arduino IDE and then plug your board into the computer via USB. The IDE will detect it and prompt you to allow the installation of the necessary package. This sketch was developed using version 1.8.9 of the SAM board package.
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Standard Arduino libraries:
The simplest way to install them is to open the Arduino IDE and select Tools->Manage Libraries from the menu, then find each one and click the 'Install' button.
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arduino-timer-cpp17 library. Since this is not a standard library, it can't be installed using the Manage Libraries tool. The simplest way to install it is to go to the Tags page of the repository on GitHub, and click the 'zip' link for the latest version. Once the file has been downloaded, open the Arduino IDE and click Sketch->Include Library->Add .ZIP Library, then navigate to the downloaded file and install it. Note that you may have to update the
ARDUINO_LIBSvariable inMakefileto include the version number of the library that you downloaded. -
Arduino-Makefile. Rather than use the Arduino IDE for development, build, and upload, this project uses the Arduino-Makefile kit to allow all of these operations to be done from the command line. Use of this kit also eliminates the need to modify the Arduino IDE toolchain configuration to support C++17 mode in the compiler. GNU Make will also be required, and can be installed using your operating system's normal software installation tools. For monitoring the output of the Arduino (when a DEBUG build is in place), see the Debugging section below. Clone this repository into a suitable location.
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MQTT broker. An MQTT broker will be required to communicate with Garaduino. The sketch was developed using the Mosquitto broker (which is also the broker most commonly used with Home Assistant).
See HARDWARE for connection details.
A normally-open switch must be connected to an analog pin and to a voltage source compatible with the analog input of the chosen board. In addition a pull-down resistor must be used to hold the input 'low' when the switch is open.
The sketch was developed using a LittelFuse reed switch and magnet, and a 1/8W 3.3KOhm resistor installed into the provided pads on the MKR Relay Proto Shield.
To activate a door opener, a normally-open relay must be connected to a digital pin. The relay's load pins must be connected to the pins on the opener's control panel.
The sketch was developed using one of the relays on the MKR Relay Proto Shield, wired to the control panel of a LiftMaster 8500W opener.
A light-dependent resistor (LDR) must be connected to an analog pin and to a voltage source compatible with the analog input of the chosen board. In addition a pull-down resistor must be used to hold the input 'low' when the LDR in its 'open' (dark) state.
The sketch was developed using an NTE 02-LDR2 and a 1/8W 100KOhm resistor installed into the provided pads on the MKR Relay Proto Shield. The high resistor value was chosen in order to provide sufficiently wide range between 'light' and 'dark' states of the LDR.
As noted above, a BLE beacon must be configured to broadcast a consistent name.
The sketch was developed using a BlueCharm BC037, which was configured using the Eddystone Android app.
See BUILD.
See DEBUG.
Once Garaduino is up and running, use a browser to navigate to its IP address (or hostname, if one has been assigned). Garaduino will display something like this:
See HOMEASSISTANT.