I have my HA Server running in the basement of my House. I now want to setup Matter over Thread for my NUKI Doorlock and devices i will purchase in the future. What would be the best Practice here to set this up? Do i need Matter Controller/Hubs/ oder other devices?
#Best practice setting up Matter over Thread
shut sparrow
hollow copper
i highly recommend you get either a Nest Hub or an Apple TV 4K and then stick to that ecosystem of devices. Especially if you intend to have multiple Border Routers in your Thread network
My more complicated answer is this:
Multiple Border Routers can work together to expand the reach of the overall network and right now that doesn't work very great either on the ZBT-1 or across different device ecosystems.
If you don't own a single home automation "hub" and have no interest in getting Nest Hubs/Google TV Streamers/Apple TVs/Homepod Minis then get a ZBT-1, you get a little more control over how it operates in Home Assistant, it's a little more janky but so long as you're smart about your network topology it'll work great.
If you have ANYTHING already from the Google/Nest or Apple Homekit ecosystems I highly suggest you just stick with them. They will operate well within Home Assistant and since they own the entire Thread network stack they work great with each other (at the expense of very little diagnostic information given to you the user)
trail lava
Note that you don't need a separate matter "controller" - home assistant will fill that role. That said, most of the devices mentioned from google and apple combine the functionality. they work as both thread border routers and act as matter controllers for their respective ecosystems. this isn't a problem - you can choose to use only home assistant, or you can share devices to use from multiple ecosystems.
low scaffold
Is a "Thread Border Router" actually needed, if you use a ZBT-1 directly connected to the machine that runs HA, and assuming you don't want to expose your Thread devices to anything outside the Thread mesh network?
trail lava
when you use a ZBT-1, what happens is that you run a thread border router (as an HAOS add-on, normally) on the same machine as home assistant.
it acts as a router between networks, same as a separate thread border router, and the matter integration/add-on talks to thread devices using normal network methods which just happen to go through the thread border router running on the same machine.
the matter controller doesn't actually need to know whether a device is on wifi, thread, or even wired - it talks to them using plain ipv6 either way.
You can also share thread devices from home assistant to another matter controller, and they will access them using home assistant as the thread border router. Routing between networks is also needed for when we finally get Matter binding support, to e.g. have a wifi matter device be able to bind to a thread matter device.
low scaffold
But is a Thread border router needed if you don't want to "route between networks"? If you only want a Thread mesh network and that's it?
hollow copper
You don't get to have a Thread mesh network without a Thread border router
without a border router all you have is a bunch of radios screaming into the spectrum void
as i said in another thread started by you:
A radio does not just do the networking on its own, this is akin to saying that all you need for a functioning WiFi network is an 802.11 radio. The ZBT-1 radio would be controlled by a Thread Border Router which is what actually functions as a network router and control unit, just like a WiFi router is a box with a CPU that controls the 802.11 radio and manages the local network
trail lava
you need a router for the home assistant matter add-on to be able to talk to thread devices. matter just goes over normal ipv6 networking, and the thread border router is responsible for routing that traffic to and from the thread network.