WLED/mcsMQTT - HSTouch integration

[Michael McSharry]

Started from scratch. Receipt of wled topic created the base devices. Local page to set weed max index to 3 and an IP. Additional devices were created for each segment with the HSB having sliders. The initial values were all zero so the slider was not obvious, but could be controlled with mouse to fill in the slider graphic.

[123qweasd]

Started again, obsoleted "wled", deleted the local/WLED fields, rebooted.
Even without segments the main HSB sliders are not created; see screenshots;
One weird thing is the long string of decimals in the various ranges, could this be related in any way ?

[Michael McSharry]

Looks to me as if you are running a version of mcsMQTT_2020.dll that was not updated for the HSB sliders for color. What is in the updater should have the update. There was also post of a later version (without wled changes since 5.21.4.1) at post #10 at Geofence with mcsMQTT - HomeSeer Message Board

[123qweasd]

Updated to 5.21.5.0 (copied the 2 usual files to the main folder (Exe) and bin (dll) ) started over, even changed topic. same result. odd.
Would a debug log help?

[Michael McSharry]

The .exe and .pdb of same name go into HS root. mcsMQTT_2020.dll and .pdb of same name go in /bin/mcsMQTT. There should be no mcs*.dll and corresponding .pdb in root folder.

[123qweasd]

stopped HS

Copied 5.21.5.0 files

HSPI_MCSMQTT.exe
HSPI_MCSMQTT.pdb

in root folder and

MCSMQTT_2020.dll
MCSMQTT_2020.pdb

in bin folder

restarted HS
unassociated all wled topics, obsoleted wled topic, stopped new topic discovery
stopped HS

opened database to ensure no traces left of wled (ok)

restarted HS
enabled new topic discovery
restarted wled

Sliders still doesn't work and it automatically re-creates the 2 test topics I've use prior (WLED1, WLED01) + the current one WLED1A ???
don't know where it takes the data to re-create deleted topics but it's probably related to the device issues I guess.

Let me know what you think.

Thx,

[Michael McSharry]

Did you delete mcsMQTT_2020.dll from HS root folder?

WLED sends its messages with retain bit set do broker resend to subscribed clients each time the client connects to broker.

You need to delete them from broker database. I delete the mosquito database to do it. There are other techniques.

[Michael McSharry]

I see that the HSB sliders are created, but they are the top and not after the color device. I will look again at these devices being updated as the color device is updated.

[Michael McSharry]

I confirmed that the H,S,B and Color devices update based upon received /c topic and commands from any of the four controls results in the proper /col command.

On the Asdociation tab for the /c:RRGGBB sub topic is there a text box pub topic? If it is not blank then a control should be generated for all four HS devices. Since the color picker is shown I believe the pub topic is not blank.

Look at /deviceutility for Hue device. It should have Control Status of both, range 0 to 360, control type of slider. Control use Dim.

[123qweasd]

Did you delete mcsMQTT_2020.dll from HS root folder?

It was not in the root folder to begin with.
what is your method to delete the Mosquitto database ? I still get the old topics after a restart.

On the Association tab for the /c:RRGGBB sub topic is there a text box pub topic? If it is not blank then a control should be generated for all four HS devices. Since the color picker is shown I believe the pub topic is not blank.

yes, textbox is there (wled/WLEDCONTROL1/col)
Edit tab shows "HSB" as UI
controls are created for all four HS devices

Look at /deviceutility for Hue device. It should have Control Status of both, range 0 to 360, control type of slider. Control use Dim.

Under "Status graphics" tab (Am using HS3), only "status graphics" is populated with the icons. "status text" is empty (see my screenshot in post #32.

[Michael McSharry]

Motion. Am not at a computer now, but a shot in the dark is if the MISC property for status only is set. It seems the controls are being removed after creation. I will load the plugin on a HS3 install to see if the behavior is any different.

[Michael McSharry]

Confirmed that running HS3 plugin under HS3 gives a different result than running HS3 pluign under HS4 and the slider controls are not present.

[123qweasd]

Thanks for double checking Michael.
glad you could reproduce and hopefully not too complicated to fix.
Cheers.

[Michael McSharry]

This turned out to be a hard one. Single step with the debugger works fine, but letting is free run then is usually, but not always, fails to generate the slider controls. Turns out it was related to the HS PluginExtraData object. Sometimes it would return a null object. Sometimes it would return an object with a null contents. In HS4 there is a conversion step needed by the plugin to convert HS3 PluginExtraData to HS4 PluginExtraData so mcsMQTT always returned a consistent null object when this object had no data. Apparently HST had covered the cross-version correctly, but the original HS3 native implementation seems to be flawed or I do not understand the limits of HS3.

It is fixed in 5.21.7.0

HS3: http://mcssprinklers.com/mcsMQTT_5_21_7_0.zip
HS4: http://mcssprinklers.com/HSPI_mcsMQTT_5_21_7_0.zip

This version also contains the ability to clear the retain messages is the MQTT Broker. It operates just like the Obsolete text box on the General Tab. It will remove the retain status for any message that fits the wildcard template entered and the topic has been previously recognized by mcsMQTT. The clients that have the annoying retain set in my environment are the homeassistant/../config messages that support HomeAssistant discovery, WLED, and espresence/ . For those that use the internal broker this is not an issue as the internal broker does not persist retained messages through a restart. HomeAssistants internal MQTT broker also does not persist messages on a HA restart.

[123qweasd]

Hi Michael, thanks for the new version;
just installed and all devices/sliders get created now;
however, only the main controls work. All sub-segments are not functionnal.
you can move the sliders and change colors but values stay at 0, nothing gets updated.
Would you mind having a quick look to see if you can replicate?
Thank you,