Install Raspberry OS with Home Assistant Supervisor

The Raspberry Pi has long been a favorite among DIY enthusiasts and tech hobbyists for its affordability, versatility, and compact design, making it an ideal platform for home automation projects. Pairing it with Home Assistant—a powerful, open-source home automation platform—unlocks a world of possibilities, from automating window blinds based on solar irradiation to controlling smart lights and thermostats. However, to fully leverage Home Assistant’s capabilities, including its add-ons and seamless updates, installing it with the Home Assistant Supervisor is the way to go. In this article, we’ll guide you through the process of installing Raspberry Pi OS and setting up Home Assistant Supervisor, empowering you to build a robust, DIY smart home system tailored to your needs. Whether you’re a beginner or a seasoned tinkerer, this step-by-step guide will help you get started on your home automation journey.
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    Hardware recommendation

    1. Raspberry Pi 4 8GB: Powerhouse for Home Assistant and Server Tasks

    2. DeskPi Pro Case: Enhanced Cooling, Storage, and Accessibility

    This description contains affiliate links. As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases. 

    DeskPI Pro

    Conclusion

    Raspberry OS installation onto Raspberry PI 4

    microsd card preparation

    By default, the unit can boot from MicroSD card only.  So, this step should be repeated for USB device (flash card, HDD, or SDD) when bootload from USB would be enabled.

    The best tool is the native Raspberry Pi Imager which is available for the following OSes:

    So, please download, install, and launch the Imager.

    First of all, choose Raspberry OS 64-bit for flashing. 

    I use the light version without GUI because it isn’t needed for my headless home server.

    So, I should find the required version in the menu. 

    By default Rasberry OS started with disabled SSH.

    So, you need a monitor and keyboard for the first logging despite to configured DHCP client on ethernet port.

    But, the Imager provides the possibility to enable SSH, set up a user name and password. 

    Also, WiFi can be configured as well. But I didn’t try this option because I use a wired connection for my home server.

    Hence, let’s add the necessary configurations.

    Please set “Image customization option” as “to always use”. I recommend keeping your configuration for further flashings. For example, you will need to flash your USB device in the second step because SD card is limited in the quantity of recording cycles and speed. 

    Home Assistant writes logs to storage continuously and SD card can be depreciated pretty soon. 

    The hostname configuration will help you to find your headless device in your network.

    Also, don’t forget to set up your username and password.

    Save your settings, choose your SD card for flashing and start writing process.

    launch your raspberry pi

    Insert your SD card to your Raspberry PI and start it. The best way to control the starting process is by connecting a monitor or TV to HDMI port of your device. But you can also find it in your home network with the following tools:
    • MacOS & Linux: arp -a | grep raspberry raspberrypi.home (192.168.1.xx) at xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx [ether]
    • Windows: You will need Advanced IP Scanner
    Please connect your device with SSH client and start your Raspberry Jorney!

    Raspberry OS Configuration

    Unfortunately, you must spend time on this step despite whether you will stay with SD card or will switch to USB storage because of the necessity to check updates for the Raspberry configuration tool and bootloader. 

    So, start update process with following command and order a pizza because of long time process due to pretty slow speed of SD card.

    pi@raspberrypi:~ $ sudo -s
root@raspberrypi:/home/pi# 
/home/pi# apt update && apt upgrade -y

    When the update process is completed, you can configure the necessary options with following command:

    root@raspberrypi:/home/pi# raspi-config

    You need “Advanced Options” for switching to LAST bootloader version and getting additional features as a result.

    You will need to reboot after this switching to the last version.

    So, let’s do it.

    After reboot please login into our device, start raspi-config, and go to advanced options again.

    Now you need “Boot Order” menu:

    Please use “USB boot” to switch to USB storage.

    I’d like to draw your attention to the possibility of booting from SD card as a backup if you will have any issues with your USB storage!

    You must reboot your device again to apply a new options. 

    Let’s do it.

    Now you must repeat all steps above but with USB storage instead of SD card if you want to use it.

    Please don’t forget to remove SD card from your device to be sure that you can boot from USB storage!

    home assistant installation with supervisor

    why supervised version is needed?

    Home Assistant supervised is an all-in one-solution and has a management user interface that can be used from the Home Assistant frontend. This interface is not present in a Home Assistant Core setup.

    This interface allows using additional addons and configurations!

    Install the necessary dependencies

    Use the following commands to install the necessary packages from Rasberry os repository:

    pi@raspberrypi:~ $ sudo -s
root@raspberrypi:/home/pi# 
/home/pi# apt update && apt upgrade -y


    apt-get install \
apparmor \
jq \
wget \
curl \
udisks2 \
libglib2.0-bin \
network-manager \
dbus \
systemd-journal-remote -y

    Install docker-ce because HA uses it.

    curl -fsSL get.docker.com | sh

    HA depends on OS-Agent.

    As can you remember you installed 64-bit OS onto your Rasperry. So, you need OS-Agent for aarch64 platform.

    Check the latest version with the link.

    wget https://github.com/home-assistant/os-agent/releases/download/1.3.0/os-agent_1.3.0_linux_aarch64.deb
dpkg -i os-agent_1.3.0_linux_aarch64.deb

    Let’s check the installation with the following command:

    gdbus introspect --system --dest io.hass.os --object-path /io/hass/os

    Your output should look like following:

    node /io/hass/os {
  interface org.freedesktop.DBus.Introspectable {
    methods:
      Introspect(out s out);
    signals:
    properties:
  };
  interface org.freedesktop.DBus.Properties {
    methods:
      Get(in  s interface,
          in  s property,
          out v value);
      GetAll(in  s interface,
             out a{sv} props);
      Set(in  s interface,
          in  s property,
          in  v value);
    signals:
      PropertiesChanged(s interface,
                        a{sv} changed_properties,
                        as invalidates_properties);
    properties:
  };
  interface io.hass.os {
    methods:
    signals:
    properties:
      @org.freedesktop.DBus.Property.EmitsChangedSignal("true")
      readwrite b Diagnostics = false;
      @org.freedesktop.DBus.Property.EmitsChangedSignal("invalidates")
      readonly s Version = '1.3.0';
  };
};
    Now you have to allow apparmor running in your system. Please use your preferred text editor to  edit cmdline.txt file: 
    vi cat /boot/cmdline.txt

    Add the following parameter to the first line of your file: lsm=apparmor

    Also, following parameters must be added to first line to enable cgroud for docker compatibility:

    cgroup_enable=memory cgroup_memory=1

    And reboot.

    Install Home Assistant

    So, finally, your Raspberry is ready for Home Assistant supervised.

    Let’s intall it!

    wget https://github.com/home-assistant/supervised-installer/releases/latest/download/homeassistant-supervised.deb
dpkg -i homeassistant-supervised.deb

    During the installation process, you will be asked about your platform. So, make a right choise. 

    As a result you should see following output:

    [info] Install supervisor startup scripts
[info] Install AppArmor scripts
[info] Start Home Assistant Supervised
[info] Installing the 'ha' cli
[info] Switching to cgroup v1
[info] Within a few minutes you will be able to reach Home Assistant at:
[info] http://homeassistant.local:8123 or using the IP address of your
[info] machine: http://YourIP:8123
[warn] A reboot is required to apply changes to grub.

    Please reboot your device and be patient because HA can’t be launched immediately! 

    Firstly, it must download all necessary docker images. 

    You can check if HA is launched with following command:

    netstat -nlp | grep 8123
tcp6       0      0 :::8123                 :::*                    LISTEN      3249/landingpage

    If you don’t see HA port available you can check the status with following command

    cat /var/log/syslog | grep supervisor

    HA still downloading images if you see something like this:

     hassio-supervisor[1298]: [WARNING] Supervisor image missing, downloading a fresh one: latest
 hassio-supervisor[1337]: latest: Pulling from home-assistant/aarch64-hassio-supervisor
 hassio-supervisor[1337]: 9b18e9b68314: Pulling fs layer
 hassio-supervisor[1337]: e35399852765: Pulling fs layer
 hassio-supervisor[1337]: 0d8adb443fc3: Pulling fs layer
 hassio-supervisor[1337]: 92f670f83005: Pulling fs layer
 hassio-supervisor[1337]: 8666f1e9abfa: Pulling fs layer
 hassio-supervisor[1337]: aaf46da0b598: Pulling fs layer
 hassio-supervisor[1337]: 751fd79842b9: Pulling fs layer

    Please be aware that even port is active the installation can be continued with following screen in a web-browser:

    You still can check the process in the log until you see: 

     (SyncWorker_0) [supervisor.docker.interface] Stopping homeassistant application#033[0m
 (SyncWorker_0) [supervisor.docker.interface] Cleaning homeassistant application#033[0m
 (MainThread) [supervisor.homeassistant.core] Home Assistant docker now installed#033[0m
 (MainThread) [supervisor.homeassistant.core] Starting Home Assistant

    After all you should see screen with prompting to setup you Home Assistant local account:

    Now, your HA is ready to start your journey in Smart Home world! 

    Please feel free to ask any questions in the comments!

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    Also, please the article on how to configure Home Assistant telegram integration from bot creation to configure simple automation (send/receive messages) with UI or YAML editor.

    Problems and solutions

    I was faced with an inability to update HA once during half of year due to an error:

    Error updating Home Assistant Core ‘HomeAssistantCore.update’ blocked from execution

     I fixed the issue by reinstalling the HA package with following commands:

     

    dpkg --remove homeassistant-supervised
 wget https://github.com/home-assistant/supervised-installer/releases/latest/download/homeassistant-supervised.deb
 dpkg -i homeassistant-supervised.deb

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    3 thoughts on “Install Raspberry OS with Home Assistant Supervisor”

    1. Hi great tutorial, i follow all the steps and succeded. my question is how you connect samba or ftp with windows 11??

    Comments are closed.