Raspberry Pi NUT Server for UPS Monitoring and Home Assistant
This project turns a Raspberry Pi into a small, always-on server that watches a UPS (uninterruptible power supply) over USB using Network UPS Tools (NUT), and shares what it sees with Home Assistant. Home Assistant then shows the battery charge, load and runtime, and can warn you the moment the power goes out. Written October 2026 for Raspberry Pi OS “Trixie” and NUT 2.8.1. It uses the same approach as my Raspberry Pi camera guide to keep the Pi running for months unattended: automatic restarts, a hardware watchdog, a Wi-Fi watchdog, fewer writes to the SD card, and a daily…
Revisiting the Raspberry Pi Camera
The camera has been more stable but needed restarting quite often then finally failed to restart. Using AI, the following steps were generated in an attempt to improve the stability/availability of the Raspberry Pi Camera over time. This project uses a Raspberry Pi Zero 2 W and a Raspberry Pi Camera Module 3 to build a Wi-Fi camera that works with Frigate, Blue Iris, or any other Network Video Recorder (NVR) that can read an RTSP stream. Updated September 2026 for Raspberry Pi OS “Trixie” and MediaMTX v1.21.1. This version also adds the pieces that keep the camera running for…
PiBox and KubeSail Are No More
Unfortunately PiBox and KubeSail ended operations in September 2025. I had not used my PiBox too much, just as a scratchpad for WordPress. I decided to reflash it with Raspbian. Below are the steps that I took to reuse my PiBox. Oddly, the only post that I could find about it was at https://lemmy.world/post/38039322. I did go to the PiBox and KubeSail websites and they appear to be gone. Flashing Raspbian I’m using a Windows PC to flash the PiBox. I followed the directions at https://docs.kubesail.com/guides/pibox/rpiboot/. One thing that was not clear is that rpiboot.exe should be run before plugging…
Home Assistant – Wi-Fi
It is recommended to use Home Assistant with a wired connection, however you may need or want to use a Wi-Fi connection. Follow these steps to setup a Wi-Fi connection within Home Assistant. Setup Wi-Fi You have successfully connected Home Assistant server to your Wi-Fi network.
Home Assistant on Raspberry Pi
I can’t believe I have not written up my Home Assistant setup. Perhaps that is a good thing as I needed to become comfortable with the setup and how to use it. I’ve been using it for nearly a year at this point. What prompted me to do a writeup now is I’m setting up another one for my mom so I can control some things remotely and to help her manage some things around the house. My current installation was on a Raspberry Pi 4 setup to boot from a USB drive. This has been working well, but I’m…
iPad as a second PC Monitor
When I travel, I need to have a second monitor. I have a small Wisecoco monitor that I purchased from Amazon. It works well, but it is one more thing that I take with me when I travel. I had thought about turning my iPad mini into a monitor as it is about the same size as the Wisecoco monitor. I started looking around and found some options, but not pleased as many seem to require an internet connection or at least a monthly subscription. I don’t mind paying a small fee for software so I can use it for…
Write the Raspbian OS to an SD Card
When working with a Raspberry Pi, you will need to format an SD Card to boot the Raspberry Pi the first time. The most straight forward way to get the Raspberry Pi Operating System (OS), Raspbian, onto an SD Card is to use the Raspberry Pi Imager software. It may be downloaded by visiting https://www.raspberrypi.com/software/. There are alternative methods for flashing the OS to an SD Card, such as balenaEtcher, but they will not be covered in this guide. Materials Needed Steps for Flashing the SD Card Once you have Raspberry Pi Imager installed, you may follow the steps below…
Disable On-Screen Keyboard
When using a touchscreen with your Raspberry Pi, depending on the screen size, you may soon be annoyed with the amount of screen real estate the on-screen keyboard utilizes. While it can be useful if you do not have a keyboard attached, it can make it difficult if not impossible to complete forms an know what you are entering. You may want to connect a physical keyboard via USB or Bluetooth but find that the on-screen keyboard pops up anyway. How do you disable it? Follow the steps below to disable the on-screen keyboard for touch screens. You will find…
Revisit Photobooth Project
I had built a Photobooth in 2019 based on Wyolum’s Raspberry Pi Photobooth project as posted in Make Magazine. Caroline Dunn made a YouTube video of her build, which explains different aspects of the project. I had two events where the photobooths could be used, so I pulled them off the self and tested them. The first one started just fine, but the SD Card soon became corrupted and would no longer boot. I flashed the SD Card with the latest Raspbian OS and installed the software, but it would not run. There have been changes to Raspbian and in…
Something went wrong. Please refresh the page and/or try again.