manual event questions

[broyuken]

Hello,

I am trying to use the manual event creation service in HA to trigger some doorbell events in the logs. That is easy enough to do, but I had a couple questions about what the service does.

1. I noticed that the event type is "update" instead of "new" for these events. Is there a reason for this?
2. If I set the label to "visitor" for example, and then I stand in front of the door, will the event sublabel update with new info from facial recognition?
3. On that same note, if I then walk away, will the event automatically end or will I need to manually call the end service? If I need to manually end it, is there a way to corelate a motion event id from the same camera to the event id of the manually trigged event?

also just FYI, you cannot set things like the score, source_type or draw from the HA service.

[inkeep-ai-assistant[bot]]

Based on the available documentation, I can provide some information about manual event creation in Frigate:

Manual Event Creation:
You can create manual events using the HTTP API endpoint POST /events/{camera_name}/{label}/create (1). The request body can include parameters like duration, include_recording, score, source_type, and sub_label (1).

Event Duration Control:
For manual events, you have control over the duration. If you want an event to be indefinite duration (that you can manually end later), you need to send null as the duration (2). However, if you set a specific duration, the event cannot be ended manually - attempting to do so will result in an error message: "Event with ID [event_id] has a set duration and can not be ended manually" (2).

MQTT Event Messages:
Frigate publishes MQTT messages for tracked object changes with different types including "new", "update", and "end" (3). The first message is published when a tracked object is no longer marked as false_positive, subsequent messages with the same ID are published when better snapshots are found or zone changes occur, and a final message is published with end_time set when the tracked object ends (3).

However, I don't have specific information in the available sources about:

1. Why manual events might show as "update" type instead of "new"
2. Whether manual events automatically integrate with facial recognition to update sub_labels
3. Whether manual events automatically end based on motion detection
4. How to correlate motion event IDs with manual event IDs

For these specific technical details about manual event behavior, you might want to check the GitHub repository for more detailed discussions or create an issue for clarification.

📚 Sources:

1. POST /events/{camera_name}/{label}/create
2. [Config Support]: Reccording triggered by external trigger.
3. MQTT

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[NickM-27]

1. Which topic are you referring to?
2. No, it's not a tracked person, face rec won't be supported for this event. It is still there for person object that would be detected.
3. You either set a duration or have to end it yourself. The service provided the event id in the response

[broyuken]

1. Sorry, I was referring to the frigate/reviews topic. The type is set to update on these events instead of new.
2. Are you saying that even though it was manually started, if it detects a tracked object, that object will be tracked in this event? So if a car goes by or a person is detected while this event is running it will be listed?
3. If Motion detection #2 is true and a tracked person is gone, the event will not end? That could be fine, I may be able to use the tracked person leaving as a trigger for firing a manual event end.

The end goal I’m trying for here is to add doorbell support to the frigate notification blueprint.

[NickM-27]

1. There is no specific type. If activity is already happening on the camera then it will be an update. If you create a manual event when nothing is happening then the type will be new.
2. You are mixing concepts. You are basically creating a fake object, or in other words, inserting manual activity. If real activity happens alongside that, it will still behave normally.
3. If you're just trying to make a doorbell event then you should just make the event last a defined time of like 2 seconds, instead of needing to call end.

[broyuken]

So to make sure I'm understanding this correctly, creating a manual event is really just creating a new event only if one isn't already going on? If there is an event happening already, it will just tack the object label that you specify in the call into the existing event?

So if I walk up to my front door, a person detected event occurs, facial recognition knows who I am, and then I press the doorbell, all of those objects would be listed under the same event? If that is the case, then that could make things a whole lot easier for this automation. I could in theory just have a separate automation from the blueprint that only looks for the "doorbell press" object and sends a notification that way. Then I could have a separate automation from the same blueprint that does normal person detection, etc.

[hawkeye217]

They could potentially all be under the same review item, which is different than an event/tracked object. The glossary in the official documentation helps with terminology: https://docs.frigate.video/frigate/glossary/

[NickM-27]

I could in theory just have a separate automation from the blueprint that only looks for the "doorbell press" object and sends a notification that way.

yes, that is definitely what I would do