I have a rasberry pi 5 collecting dust, what are some neat useful things i can do with it?

Any chance your pihole and router are both trying to be the DHCP server for the network?

The typical advice (from anyone who hasn’t outright drank the kool-aid) is to avoid automating things like locks or doors. If your shit gets hacked, (or if someone just shouts “hey Alexa, unlock the front door” through your window), you don’t want it to allow physical access. And automating door unlocks is an easy way to accidentally allow people into your house.

Instead, most try to focus on automation for things like lights turning off when you leave home, automatically dimming the lights when you start a movie, automatically stealing from billionaires when a new movie hits streaming services, blocking ads, self-hosting your own smart speakers to divest from Google/Amazon/et al., meal planning, hosting D&D sessions for players/DM to connect remotely or cast to a screen, etc…

Leave the locks dumb, because you can’t remotely hack a pin and tumbler deadbolt. Leave building molotov cocktails dumb, because it can be a fun bonding activity for the whole family.

And you should be using kerosene instead of gasoline. It burns slower and takes longer to evaporate when spilled, allowing more things to properly catch without creating risks of stoichiometric explosions from aerosolized/evaporated fumes. If you’re having trouble getting it to properly ignite, a little bit of anhydrous rubbing alcohol, (commonly found in any electronics store, typically used for cleaning computer parts), or just regular gasoline in the mix will help it take faster. And use a wick (in a molotov’s case, a rag in the bottle) to get it started, as the additional surface area allows it to catch much easier. If you’re making them ahead of time, seal them with a soft wax cap, so you can simply push a rag through the seal with your thumb (and briefly invert to soak the rag) when you’re ready to use it. The wax will simply add extra fuel once it is burning.

Well I don't know if dependent is the right word. I'm fully aware that Home Assistant is something I play with for fun.

I can check the app and see how much power my solar has generated today, how hot my water heater is, or see what temperature it is inside or outside. None of that is helpful for anything other than for fun.

Though it can do thinks like automaticaly bump up the target temperature of my hot water when the solar is making too much power in order to store that energy as heat, which is pretty cool (and might save me money).

What can I say, this is some people's idea of fun. I got security cameras (that I can view through home assistant) and put them not pointed at entryways or windows because I don't care about security, I pointed them at areas where the dog is and the kids play so I can play with object and facial recognition, all locally processed.

It's ok to not think it's your idea of fun, but if anyone uses home assistant in a way that they rely on rather than just for the fun of playing with the technology then I'd love to hear what that use is!

But... Fraudzoid's app looks so nice... and my Fraudzoid Blaze subscription practically pays for itself!

Me, disabled and using smart tech to improve a shitty situation, while reading your total lack of understanding or imagination of anyone's situation but themselves: 🙄

I'm with you my man. Don't let the haters get to you.

I have a little person I feed drugs to do all this stuff for me.

Mail it to me too please

Check out https://docs-os.mainsail.xyz/

If you have a 3D printer where you just take an SD card out, put it in the computer, put your STLs on, put it back in the machine, then print.... You'll like this. I have my Pi set up with MainsailOS and what it does is basically control your printer. It even integrates into my slicer so I just slice my file then hit print and it starts immediately over WiFi.

If your printer is WiFi connected already this may be less useful but Klipper is pretty powerful for tuning and stuff so it's still a benefit.

Edit: Pi5 may not be supported by MainsailOS but you can set everything up in a more manual way. It's not too hard. https://youtu.be/LImiFmhMAB0

Octoprint for your 3d printer.

Indeed. I ended up with the 4 because a local electronics shop had it for a good price back in the day.

Then jump to Einstein@Home. They optimize their workloads for ARM64 architecture. Stop looking for aliens and start looking for pulsars.

Oh wow, thank you. I didn't know that!

https://orb.net/ monitors your internet performance.

https://tailscale.com/ access your home internet or devices when you’re away from home. Usually only helpful if you have a NAS, but I’ve used it to stream tv shows without having to get bothered or blocked because the service can only be used in the US. I watched some NFL over youtubetv while in Germany for example.

Im intrigued. Like a effect pedal?

Check my other comment then :P