I am going to be using a Hubitat C8 to manage some automation for an external building, and from reading their forums, many people recommend Node-RED as the backbone to their system for continuity and easily setting up with a different system.
So, if I'm going to invest in a new pi (I have one from... 2015 or something, I'm sure it has minimal use in these days, and almost everything needed a breakout board) I am going to get a Pi 5, which is unable to install Bullseye, which is the only supported version of PiOS by NR
I can see the few posts on here about Pi 5 have a lot of issues.
Will Node-RED get an update to use Bookworm (it's been out for 6+ months... is this also a sign of slow updates of NR?) I know Bookworm no longer uses DHCPCD, and I've read some issues about NR being able to control a Pi 5s GPIO pins because of a change in python... or something...
TLDR: Should I invest in a Pi 5 with hopes NR support will come, or should I buy an older Pi 4 even though I hate buying outdated tech (outdated as in there is something newer and better, when looking at the Pi 4 and 5 8gb boards from where I usually buy components, the difference is a whole $6)
Where did you get that idea?
I have Node-red running on Raspberry Pies with RPiOS Buster (Pi 4), Bullseye (Zero Two) and Bookworm (4 and Zero Two)
I have seen reports of problems with GPIOs in the Pi 5 and/or Bookworm, I have also seen work-arounds suggested. Personally I almost never connect to GPIO pins, preferring a cheap ESP board to connect to sensors and LEDs with MQTT comms to Node-red on the Pi.
You don't need the top spec Pi, Node-red runs perfectly well for me on a Pi Zero Two with 512MB memory.
If I was buying a higher power Pi now, even to use GPIO I'd definitely go for the Pi 5 with 4GB.
Not an issue for Node-red, or as far as I know, for anything else either.
If you are using Raspberry Pi OS, Bullseye is the currently supported version.
Installing and Upgrading Node-RED
We provide a script to install Node.js, npm and Node-RED onto a Raspberry Pi. The script can also be used to upgrade an existing install when a new release is available.
Running the following command will download and run the script. If you want to review the contents of the script first, you can view it on Github.
Ah yes, there it is in black and white.
Imho it's the documentation that's out of date, but I can understand you might want more official confirmation.
If it's working for you, thats good enough for me. I don't want to invest money or energy in to something that is uncertain, as this working correctly will be fairly critical for a small business.
I think I'll get a Pi5 and if the workaround posted here doesn't work, I'll also get a Pi4, and whichever doesn't work for NR the way I need, will be used to either automate my home or as a media server, as mine is pretty dated hardware.
But you are right, it's not worth the risk... it just feels dirty paying $6 less for something that was released 5 years ago. I'm going to do some comparison shopping too, maybe check eBay
Guess I'll try that... I don't use the GPIO for input/output per say... but the pins for i2c... I have a Raspberry Pi 5, so I'll need to give those instructions a shot. I have ALLOT of i2c devices attached to my RPi4Bs running NodeRed 3.1.
I'm hoping to do the Rpi5B, BookWarm, NodeJS v20 and NodeRed 4.0, Dashboard 2 jump together and not break all of my projects completely (obviously I'm expecting re-work with the new Dashboard2)..
As has already been suggested, it is generally MUCH better to use a low cost ESP or Arduino for I/O. Non-Python access to Pi GPIO has always had some issues and that aside, it is far too easy to release the magic blue smoke from the Pi.
A Microprocessor board will give you better performance and physical resilience and they are cheap enough that you can keep spares in stock should something go wrong.
Of course, it does add a bit of complexity for wiring and has an overhead of creating some simple code in the MPS. But overall, it is a much better approach.
I didn’t realize ESP32 used arduino code until I was trying to figure out where it was previously mentioned using arduino… is there any benefit to using an actual arduino board over ESP32 for a GPIO instead of the Pi and use MQTT for Pi and Arduino to connect
Or am I looking at using Node Red directly with the ESP32/Arduino and eliminating Pi altogether, and if that’s the case can everything still be local or would I have to use arduino cloud to interface between the board and hubitat.
This just added another level that I wasn’t expecting.
I don't believe you can dispense with a Node-red server and imho a Pi is the best option for that.
You can use an Arduino, in which case you need a WiFi board, which will be an ESP.
Or you can use an ESP without an Arduino.
Occam's razor says the second option is the one.
Not really, I was just trying to be inclusive in case you had one lying around!
Well you might be able to since there is a version that will run on some ESP32 boards but probably depends on what your needs are. Obviously, the ESP32 with its very limited OS and resources isn't going to replace all uses of a Pi.
Just use it for the I/O and pass the data to Node-RED. As serial if you are using a wired connection or using MQTT if using WiFi.
I never recommend using a 3rd-party cloud service unless you really need it.
It's a bit more work, but not that much. And once done, a configuration for the MCU is not likely to change very often. By the way, depending on what I/O you need, you may well find that one of the pre-defined firmwares such as ESPHome, ESPEasy, etc. could be used and these may then only need a configuration and not any code.
