Integrating Immergas Victrix Boiler Display with Home Assistant via ESP32 and MQTT

I have an Immergas Victrix boiler and would like to read its parameters and transmit them to Home Assistant.
Unfortunately, according to Google, the boiler cannot be integrated in any meaningful way because it uses a closed protocol.
I would like to read the parameters from the boiler display: .
I need to read:
* display on (backlight on) / off (no backlight).
With the display on:
* flame level (number of dashes).
* whether the radiator icon (visible in the picture) or the tap icon (not currently visible in the picture) is visible
* current temperature

Other requirements:
* data transfer to Home Assistant via MQTT.
* resistance to slight repositioning of the camera. The camera will have to be dismantled for boiler inspection and I do not want to configure anything from scratch after reassembly.

I don't know how to go about this.
I have read about using ESP32 with ESPCam to read the water meter using OCR. I thought this might be the right direction to go, but I would like some expert advice .

ljoncz wrote:

the boiler cannot be integrated in any meaningful way because it uses a closed protocol

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Nobody has recognised it yet ?
You can actually do some reverse engineering.

ljoncz wrote:

I have read about using ESP32 with ESPCam to read a water meter using OCR.

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Theoretically, it would be possible to use such an eqilibrium, but not likely with OCR. You would need an image recognition program. Maybe even something based on machine learning? A very ambitious project .

Maybe we could build a matrix of SMD photoresistors superimposed on this display + ADC + processor + program. Theoretically quite simple to software, as you only need to set thresholds when a given field is dark when it is light and then just simple zero-one logic.

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What do you mean "uses a closed protocol"? Are you sure this boiler doesn't work with Opentherm?
I would try connecting an opentherm gateway, and see what you see in the communication.
I use this one: https://otgw.tclcode.com/ with DeDietrich MCR3, and it works very well. It can be in passive mode (it just reads what flies between the wall controller and the boiler). I can see exactly all temperatures, modulations, mode, flame status and even error messages. I put it into active mode, which means I can also control the boiler precisely - impose any parameters other than those set by the controller, because the gateway works in between.
There is also ready integration with Home Assistant https://www.home-assistant.io/integrations/opentherm_gw/.
Even if your boiler is not 100% supported, it's open source, or you can toss the logs to the author and he'll complete.