twischi/ibutton_watcher_owserver repository overview

⁠iButton Watcher — Docker Container

⁠What is this container for?

This container watches a 1-Wire bus (via owserver) for Dallas/Maxim iButton devices (family code 01).

When an iButton is placed on the reader, the container:

1. Detects the iButton ID via owdir (uncached, low latency)
2. Strips the family-code prefix → e.g. 8B92BA150000
3. Posts the ID to a Home Assistant Webhook via HTTP POST

It polls in a tight loop (configurable interval) and only fires the webhook when a 'new' iButton is detected (not on every poll while it remains on the reader). New is every iButton after at least one cycle no iButton is detected.

⁠Source of Image at GitHub (with Dockerfile):

https://github.com/twischi/iButton_watcher_owserver⁠

⁠Ready to use Image at Docker-Hub:

https://hub.docker.com/r/twischi/ibutton_watcher_owserver⁠

⁠Configuration Variables

All variables can be overridden at container start — the values below are the defaults.

⁠Override variables with docker run

Pass a variable with -e (to override a default):

Option 1: Start with docker run

docker run \
  -e OWSERVER_HOST=owserver \
  -e OWSERVER_PORT=4304 \
  -e HA_HOST=homeassistant \
  -e HA_PORT=8123 \
  -e WEBHOOK_ID=my_ibutton_hook \
  -e SLEEP_TIME_MS=200 \
  -e ALIVE_SIGNAL=true \
  -e SIGNAL_EVERY_X_SEC=30 \
  ...

Or handover an env-file:

# ibutton.env
OWSERVER_HOST=owserver
HA_HOST=homeassistant
WEBHOOK_ID=my_ibutton_hook

docker run --env-file ibutton.env ibutton-watcher

Option 2: docker-compose.yml

services:
  ibutton-watcher:
    image: ibutton-watcher
    environment:
      OWSERVER_HOST: owserver
      OWSERVER_PORT: 4304
      HA_HOST: homeassistant
      HA_PORT: 8123
      WEBHOOK_ID: my_ibutton_hook
      SLEEP_TIME_MS: 200
      ALIVE_SIGNAL: "true"
      SIGNAL_EVERY_X_SEC: 30
    restart: unless-stopped

Or reference an env-file in Compose:

services:
  ibutton-watcher:
    image: ibutton-watcher
    env_file:
      - ibutton.env
    restart: unless-stopped

⁠Build for...

It is only built for this architectures linux/arm64 (e.g. Raspberry Pi 5) and for linux/amd64.

If you need the Image/Container for other platforms you can just build it on your machine with docker installed. See the GitHub-Repository the dockerfile and other files to do so. See link to GitHub above.

⁠Use the provided Image

Option 1: Start with docker run

docker run -d \
--restart unless-stopped \
--network host \
--name=twischi/ibutton_watcher_owserver:latest  

Option 2: docker-compose.yml

services:
# iButton Watcher service using the OWSERVER 
  ibutton_watcher:
    image: twischi/ibutton_watcher_owserver:latest  
    container_name: ibutton_watcher  
    restart: unless-stopped
    network_mode: host