NSPanel_HA_Blueprint/ReleaseNotes.md

(DRAFT) v4.1 - Easier TFT transfer

Support this project

As always, we would like to thank everyone who donated to this project and remind you that every donation helps to support this project - so if you haven't made a donation yet, now would be a good time ;)

 

General

The focus this time was on making easier to transfer the TFT files.

As this project grows with features, it becomes more hungry of resources from all sides (ESPHome, your Home Assistant server and even the Nextion display) and with that the chances of something going wrong when updating increased.

So at this release we concentrated on cleaning up de code everywhere and shave some unnecessary elements, making the system easier to install and opening some space for future features.

 

Updating

Since in this update lots of input to the blueprint changed, we highly recommend you review your settings and make sure all fields have the correct selection. We did our best to support your legacy settings and avoid breaking your system, but please double check your settings if you see something not working as expected.

Files that need to be reloaded:

1. nspanel_eu.tft, nspanel_us.tft or nspanel_us_land.tft - v4.1
2. nspanel_esphome.yaml - v4.1
3. nspanel_blueprint.yaml - v4.1

Instructions

You can find the update procedures following here:

• (EN) How To - All important thing you should know - Update
• (DE) How To - Alle wichtigen Dinge die man wissen sollte - Update

 

Breaking changes

1. The following components are now deprecated:

   • Buttons:
     • Exit reparse (button.xxxxx_exit_reparse) - It shouldn't be necessary with the new TFT upload engine
   • Services:
     • Play rtttl (esphome.xxxxx_play_rtttl)
   • Sensors:
     • API uptime
     • Device uptime
     • RSSI
     • ESPhome Version
     • IP
     • SSID
     • BSSID

   You can still add these components (except by "Exit reparse") by adding the file nspanel_esphome_advanced.yaml in your ESPHome settings as in the example bellow, but please have in mind that these are not used by the blueprint and will be using some memory of your ESPHome.

...
packages:
  remote_package:
    url: https://github.com/Blackymas/NSPanel_HA_Blueprint
    ref: main
    files:
      - nspanel_esphome.yaml # Core package
      - nspanel_esphome_advanced.yaml # activate advanced (legacy) elements - can be useful for troubleshooting
...

2. Very long press on hardware buttons If you have a custom automation using very long hold (more than 15s) of hardware buttons it may fail as now the panel will restart with button hold for 15s.

 

Overview of noteworthy changes

1. New Upload TFT engine
2. Hardware restarts with button hold for 15s

 

Details of noteworthy changes

1. New Upload TFT engine

We rebuilt the Upload TFT engine and now it will be using less resources from ESPHome during the transfer and, in addition, will provide more logs for troubleshooting.

The original engine from Nextion component still as a fallback in case the new engine fails, but it might be removed in a future version.

2. Hardware restarts with button hold for 15s

Now if you press the hardware buttons for more than 15s, the panel will act as the following:

Button	Action	Details
Left	Power cycle the screen	It can remove the need to power cycle the panel when the screen can't stablish connection to ESPHome (Nextion is not connected! on logs).
Right	Restarts the panel	It is equivalent to press the "Restart" button on the Settings page or from Home Assistant, but is available even when the Wi-Fi isn't connected or Home Assistant is out.

 

Next topics we are currently working on

See here: https://github.com/Blackymas/NSPanel_HA_Blueprint/labels/roadmap

Special thanks to:

• @misery - Fixing a typo in the docs (#1176)
• @Floppe - Adding space for value fields on Home page (#1180)

New Contributors

@misery @Floppe