Simple Chores

A Home Assistant custom integration for managing household chores.

Why? Because the Grocy integration isn't working and KidsChores is buggy. I'll add features as needed to motivate the kiddos, but this is for adults, too.

A Note About This Code

This entire codebase was vibe coded with Claude Sonnet 4.5. This is as much an experiment in AI use and its limitations as it is a real HASS integration that provides real value.

Basics

• All configuration is file-based, in a single yaml file. State is maintained within Home Assistant.
• Chores consist of a name, description, frequency (daily, manual), list of assignees, and slug (used to identify the chore in code).
• Assignees are Home Assistant users and are identified by name, not ID, in the config file.
• Each chore is represented in Home Assistant as a sensor following the format sensor.simple_chore_{assignee}_{slug}.
  • Attributes: the sensor includes all configured chore information (full name, description, frequency, points) as sensor attributes.
  • State: chore state is one of: Pending, Complete, Not Requested
  • Note: A daily chore must be requested at least once (marked as Pending or Complete) before it becomes a daily chore. Until then, it behaves like a manual chore.
• Each assignee has a summary sensor at sensor.simple_chore_summary_{assignee} that tracks:
  • Count of pending/complete/not requested chores
  • Lists of chores in each state
  • Points tracking:
    • total_points: Lifetime earned points (cumulative)
    • points_missed: Cumulative total of all missed opportunities (updated by start_new_day)
    • points_possible: Current sum of points from pending + complete chores (calculated in real-time)
• Points System: Each chore can have a point value (default: 1). When a chore is marked complete, the assignee earns those points. Points can be set when creating/updating chores. The start_new_day service adds pending chore points to the cumulative points_missed total before resetting states. The summary sensor calculates points_possible in real-time based on current chore states.
• The following actions are defined for interacting with chores:
  • simple_chores.mark_complete - Marks a chore as complete and awards points to the assignee. Takes a chore slug and optional user as parameters. If user is not specified, marks complete for all assignees.
  • simple_chores.mark_pending - Marks a chore as pending. Takes a chore slug and optional user as parameters. If user is not specified, marks pending for all assignees.
  • simple_chores.mark_not_requested - Marks a chore as not requested. Takes a chore slug and optional user as parameters. If user is not specified, marks not requested for all assignees.
  • simple_chores.reset_completed - Resets all completed chores to not requested. Takes an optional user parameter to reset only that user's chores.
  • simple_chores.start_new_day - Resets completed chores based on frequency. Manual chores reset to not requested, daily chores reset to pending. Calculates daily points statistics before resetting. Takes an optional user parameter.
  • simple_chores.create_chore - Dynamically create a new chore at runtime with specified properties including points.
  • simple_chores.update_chore - Update an existing chore's properties including name, description, frequency, assignees, points, and icon.
  • simple_chores.delete_chore - Remove a chore from the system.
  • simple_chores.refresh_summary - Force refresh of summary sensor attributes for one or all assignees.
  • simple_chores.adjust_points - Manually adjusts an assignee's earned points by a specified amount (positive or negative). Useful for bonuses, penalties, or corrections.
  • simple_chores.reset_points - Reset points tracking for one or all assignees. Always resets daily stats (points_missed, points_possible). Optionally resets total_points with reset_total: true.

Installation

HACS (Recommended)

1. Make sure HACS is installed
2. Add this repository as a custom repository in HACS
3. Search for "Simple Chores" in HACS and install it
4. Restart Home Assistant

Manual Installation

1. Copy the custom_components/simple_chores folder to your Home Assistant's custom_components directory 2s. Restart Home Assistant

Configuration

Configuration is file-based using a YAML file in your Home Assistant config directory.

1. Copy simple_chores.yaml.example to your Home Assistant config directory as simple_chores.yaml
2. Edit the file to define your chores
3. Add the following to your configuration.yaml:

simple_chores:

4. Restart Home Assistant

Configuration File Format

The configuration file (simple_chores.yaml) should be placed in your Home Assistant config directory (the same directory as configuration.yaml).

Example configuration:

chores:
  - name: "Take Out Trash"
    slug: "take_out_trash"
    description: "Take the trash and recycling bins to the curb"
    frequency: "manual"
    assignees:
      - "john"
      - "jane"

  - name: "Wash Dishes"
    slug: "wash_dishes"
    description: "Wash and put away dishes from dinner"
    frequency: "daily"
    assignees:
      - "john"
      - "jane"

Configuration Fields:

• name: Display name of the chore (required)
• slug: Unique identifier for the chore, used in entity IDs (required, lowercase alphanumeric with hyphens/underscores)
• description: Description of what the chore involves (optional)
• frequency: How often the chore should be done - daily or manual (required)
  • daily: Chore will be reset to Pending each day after being completed (must be requested at least once first)
  • manual: Chore will be reset to Not Requested each day after being completed
• assignees: List of Home Assistant usernames who can be assigned this chore (required, at least one)
• points: Number of points awarded when the chore is completed (optional, default: 1, must be >= 0)
• icon: Material Design Icon for the chore (optional, default: mdi:clipboard-list-outline)

The configuration file is automatically reloaded when changes are detected (checked every 5 seconds).

Automation Examples

An example automation for daily chore reset is provided in automations/start_new_day.yaml. This automation calls the start_new_day service at 2:00 AM each day to:

• Reset manual chores from Complete to Not Requested
• Reset daily chores from Complete to Pending (only if they were previously requested)

You can copy this to your Home Assistant automations directory or use it as a reference for creating your own automations.

Development

This integration is based on the integration_blueprint template.

Setup Development Environment

1. Clone this repository
2. Open in Visual Studio Code with devcontainer support
3. The devcontainer will automatically set up the development environment
4. Run scripts/develop to start Home Assistant with the integration loaded

Contributing

See CONTRIBUTING.md for guidelines on how to contribute to this project.

License

This project is licensed under the MIT License - see the LICENSE file for details.

Disclaimer

This entire integration was written by Claude Sonnet 4.5. I had no hand in it other than writing prompts. I write enough code in my day job that I'm happy supervising an agent in my downtime.