I recently bought a new AppleTV, which I tried to integrate with HomeAssistant today.

Since the AppleTV is on a different VLAN than my HomeAssistant, I created an appropriate firewall rule, but HomeAssistant still could not find the AppleTV.

After a long search I found out that I also need to enable mDNS and create an additional firewall rule.

So all in all I did the following to make it work:

1. Install and configure Multicast DNS Proxy
2. Create first firewall rule:
   • Action: Pass
   • Interface: DMZ
   • Direction: in
   • TCP/IP Version: IPv4+IPv6
   • Protocol: any
   • Source: HomeAssistant (this is an alias for my Homeassistant ip)
   • Destination: AppleTV (alias)
   • Description: Allow HomeAssistant access to AppleTV
3. Create second firewall rule:
   • Action: Pass
   • Interface: DMZ
   • Direction: in
   • TCP/IP Version: IPv4
   • Protocal: any
   • Source: HomeAssistant (alias)
   • Destination: Single host or Network: 224.0.0.251/32
   • Description: Allow HomeAssistant access to Bonjour (for AppleTV)
4. Restart HomeAssistant.

A few days ago, a good friend asked me: "How do you restore your encrypted offsite backup when you've lost all your other machines".

If all my devices are down at the same time, I might actually have a problem, as I would need at least a PGP key to decrypt my password manager.

So after some research I decided to copy my private ssh and gpg keys to an encrypted veracrypt volume. This is basically a small encrypted folder (~10MB) you can borrow to some of your friends.

# Create a new volume through a text user interface
veracrypt --text --create

# Volume type
1  # normal, default

# Enter volume path:
/private/unencrypted/nextcloud/keys

# Enter volume size:
10M  #  du -sh ~/.gnupg/ ~/.ssh/ # will give you a good idea

# Encryption Algorithm:
1  # For AES, default

# Hash algorithm:
1  # For SHA-512, default

# Filesystem
2  # For FAT, default

# Enter passphrase
MAGA2020!:D

# Enter PIM
# For more information: https://documentation.help/VeraCrypt/Personal%20Iterations%20Multiplier%20(PIM).html
# I leave this empty because I think my passphrase is strong enough

# Enter keyfile
none # default

mkdir /tmp/keys
veracrypt --text /private/unencrypted/nextcloud/keys /tmp/keys

scp -rp ~/.ssh/ /tmp/keys/
scp -rp ~/.gnupg /tmp/keys/
# ...
touch /tmp/keys/FILES_ARE_HIDDEN  # just a hint for the future 

veracrypt --text --dismount /tmp/keys/
# make sure you are not in /tmp/keys, otherwise you will see:
# Error: umount: /tmp/keys: target is busy.
rm -rf /tmp/keys

From time to time I have to setup a Raspberry Pi including ssh and wlan. But it's always super annoying to connect keyboard and screen to setup ssh and wifi. And there are other ways:

1. Use dd or etcher to flash your (raspbian) image to the Pi
2. Enable SSH
   • Mount sd card on your Computer (not on your raspberry pi)
   • Create an empty file named ssh and store it on the sd card on /boot

3. Enable Wifi

   • create /boot/wpa_supplicant.conf

   ctrl_interface=DIR=/var/run/wpa_supplicant GROUP=netdev
   network={
       ssid="YOUR_SSID"
       psk="YOUR_WIFI_PASSWORD"
       key_mgmt=WPA-PSK
   }
   

   • Pi will get an IP adress from your DHCP-Server
   • unmount
4. Start Rarspberry Pi
   • put in sd card
   • power on

5. Get IP Adress

   On your computer:

   nmap -sP 192.168.XXX.1/24  # replace XXX
   

   • most likely the hostname you are locking for is rasberrypi ;)

6. Connect to Raspberry Pi:

   ssh pi@IpFromPrevCommand
   # pw: raspberry
   

7. Configure system

   sudo raspi-config
   # Change default password!
   # Update System
   # Change settings
   

Update [2021-01-24 Sun]

• Fixed command to restore corrupt backup. It should be sqlite3 for both dump and restore! Thank you Philip for the hint!

Assuming you're using hass.io on a raspberry pi:

- alias: Create hourly backup
  trigger:
    - platform: time_pattern
      minutes: '/60'
  action:
    - service: notify.mobile_app_iphone_your_name
      data:
        message: Hourly Backup 💾 is created!
        title: Backup
    - service: hassio.snapshot_full
      data_template:
        name: >
          Backup_{{ now().strftime('%d-%m-%YT%H-%M-%S') }}

{
  "ssh_enabled": true,
  "ssh_host": "192.168.178.27",
  "ssh_port": 22,
  "ssh_user": "ms-backup",
  "ssh_key": [
    "-----BEGIN OPENSSH PRIVATE KEY-----",
    "AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA",
    cat ~/.ssh/hassio-key
    "ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ",
    "-----END OPENSSH PRIVATE KEY-----"
  ],
  "remote_directory": "/hpdata/homes/ms-backup/backup_hassio",
  "zip_password": "",
  "keep_local_backup": "48",
  "rsync_enabled": false,
  "rsync_host": "",
  "rsync_rootfolder": "hassio-sync",
  "rsync_user": "",
  "rsync_password": ""
}

- alias: Offside backup
  trigger:
    platform: time_pattern
    minutes: '/60'
  action:
  - service: notify.mobile_app_iphone_your_name
    data:
      message: Offside backup 💾 is created!
      title: Backup
  - service: hassio.addon_start
    data:
      addon: 36883ed7_remote_backup
      #      ^- to get the propper ID go to hass.io -> Addons -> Remote Backup 
      #         I couldn't figure out where this ID comes from

sqlite3 home-assistant_v2.db ".dump" | sqlite3 home-assistant_v2.db_fixed

1.) Access the remote server via ssh

2.) Start jupyter server on the remote machine

jupyter notebook --no-browser --port=8889

3.) Forward port 8889 from your remote machine to port 8888 of your local machine

ssh -N -f -L localhost:8888:localhost:8889 remote_user@remote_host

4.) Access the remote notebook from your local browser visiting localhost:8888

I find this very usefull, especially when working with plots and audio.

Make sure X forwarding is enabled on your remote machine

cat /etc/ssh/sshd_config | grep X11Forwarding

If the result it not X11Forwarding yes adjust the file.

Access remote machine with X forwarding from your local machine.

ssh -X user@remote-host

On the remote machine: Activate X-compatible backend

import matplotlib
matplotlib.use('tkagg')

On the remote machine: Plot as normal

import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
plt.plot([1,2,3])
plt.show()

See plot on your local machine.