That seems like a perfect use of node-red. Your setup sounds pragmatic and effective; I’m sure there would be an audience for some kind of write up with diagrams, especially if it also functions as a node-red tutorial (of sorts). I know that I am regularly designing control systems for hobbyist ag setups, and I pretty quickly hit a wall due to having minimal coding background. Something like node-red seems really useful for someone in my situation. Thanks for the ideas!
It really makes the most out of the flow-programming paradigm and the integrated UI bits are really convenient.
The architecture is pretty straightforward. MQTT over wifi acts as a message bus between node-red and your 'legos'. (You don't really even need a raspberry pi, you just need to be able to run node-red, an mqtt broker and have wifi. I ran everything from containers on raspberry pi and ran the pi in AP mode which kept everything self-contained and tidy.)
For the i/o 'legos', i had more luck with the esp8266 than esp32's on Tasmota, but things have probably improved since then. You could also look at espurna, esphome, home assistant, etc. Main thing to look for is a firmware that supports some kind of async messaging protocol that nodered supports and has the i/o you need. You can buy a six pack of nodemcu esp8266's for $20 off amazon.
