Improve Thread meshing by merging multiple Thread networks into HomeAssistant OTBR through official Thread 1.4 support in the OTBR App

[mkerstner]

Problem statement

Further improving Thread mesh and credential sharing capabilities via Home Assistant's own OTBR App is a key quality criteria for user convenience and overall Thread / Matter network stability.

While most smart home hubs already natively support Thread 1.4 Home Assistant's own OTBR App offers Thread 1.4 support via a beta flag.

Based on positive feedback from the beta we should aim to make that available as a public release to further improve user convenience.

Community signals

wip

Scope & Boundaries

In scope

• Bump Thread 1.4 to public release and thus out of beta

Not in scope

• Further functional improvements

Foreseen solution

Close running beta loop and refine open feedback

Risks & open questions

No response

Appetite

Medium - 1-2 cylces mainly depending on feedback from Beta and further testing

Execution issues

No response

Decision log

Date	Decision	Outcome

[mkerstner]

@puddly @Apollon77 @TheJulianJES Idea to pursue to get Thread 1.4 out of Beta

[puddly]

Promoting beta to stable is currently blocked by:

• as_json() still emits PascalCase keys in PUT requests (counterpart of #227) home-assistant-libs/python-otbr-api#238

This would also be nice in the future to actually merge networks:

• [Request] Add support for EphemeralKey (ePSK) home-assistant-libs/python-otbr-api#211

[mkerstner]

@puddly Thanks for pointing that out so that we have scoping defined in case we pick it up in one of the next iterations