Xap HS 2 plugin - a few questions...

[Bestgear]

HI Folks - I hope somone can help!

I have installed the Mi4 Xap plugin, and it is working....

I have some 24+ one wire devices, which are all seen by the hub.

My questions are:

1. Where do I get the graphics etc that the Mi4 plugin is looking for? I am looking specifically at the temperature ones and I am sure there will be others missing. I have downloaded the Mi4 app graphics set, but did not find the ones that "temperature" require.

2. I use the "green button" to add the discovered one wire device to HS. If I click on RAW, it gives me the option to slelect temperature only, which is not default, so needs checked. Is this the way to add devices???

3. The Mi4 plugin docs mention a wizzard - I have never seen the wizard appear... and as a result, am missing the option to confirure and even select things like celcius or farenhight. How do I "fix" this? The wizzard looks great!

4. Going further.... I would like to have the data graphed and presented in HS against time... is there an easy way for a non app develoepr to achieve this?

5. Backup - now I have all this in HS, what is my best way to backup the config. Is simply taking a copy of the HS subdir/tree enough, or are there bits in teh registry too? What do folks do to backup HS as we are all too aware of the time and effort to set the whole damn thing up!

6. One wire question - given that one wire is tempremental when deployed in anything other than a simple layout (I have a hobby boards 6 port hub), when devices get missed (dissapear for a short period of time) as they do with one wire (smile!) what happens in HS? I have two sensors that do this and the HS device seems to be removed... Mi4 plugin will redescover them easily, but its a pain loosing the device.

Anyway - enough questions....

Thanks in advance for any help!

David

[Michael McSharry]

1. If you are using xapmcs1Wire to read the 1-wire then copy the files & subfolders in xapmcs1Wire\HTML to Homeseer 2\HTML to get the graphics.

2. xapmcs1Wire uses xapbsc so these should now be selected as RAW, but as normal BSC devices. I'm not familiar with the setup procedure for xap Conduit. With the mcsXap Homeseer plugin then the xapmcs1Wire data is mapped directly into the Homeseer DeviceState, DeviceValue, and DeviceString properties of Homeseer devices.

3. Cannot help on this one.

4. mcsTemperature plugin for Homeseer was designed specifically for this purpose. It provides a way to generate charts with minimum user fuss. I also have an xAP node xapmcsChart that performs the same functions, but I do not have a distribution strategy for this node at this time.

5. I do folder backups daily and then archive to permanent media every month or two. There is generally no information in the registry, but in the past some authors have used it and it does create a backup pain.

6. Generally a non-reporting sensor will simply mean that the LastChange time will not be updated within HS. Other than the data being stale there are no harmfull effects or other implications.

[Bestgear]

Many thanks for the reply Michael...


I am really pulling my hair out now... and have started to question what I thought was the way it worked.

I "assumed" that this is the way it goes...

Dallas drivers> xapMCS1Wire>XAPHub (v1.2.1.6)>MI4XAP HS plugin.

Is this correct!?!?

Reasons..

Dallas drivers to present the one wire net...
xapMCS1Wire to present the discovered 1 wire devices as xap devices....
xap hub as a hub device to allow multiple clients to access the xap "network"
MI4 HS plugin to allow presentation of XAP devices in HS

I am a bit confused with all the options that are available, as there seem to be options from various authors along the way. I almost did a quick table in Word to kinda get an idea of a matrix of functionality to get things straight!

So, I guess in asking for confirmationa nd advice, I should state my end game intentions...

I have 26 one wire thermometers installed, and want to have them as devices in HS (v2) and trigger events based on crossing thresholds.

I would like to get nice graphs of temperature over time, so trends etc can be seen.

I have built up the Jon00 1wire counter and IR interface so i can get the electricity meter monitoring done sometime...

I may want to add Tivo as a client, mainly for caller display, but would be good to have it such that I can send text to Tivo from scripts etc. Just now, it is used with YAC only.. along with the recient (sorry cannot remember the author) yac/HS script.

Thats it then...

Problems?

MI4 plug in... no wizard has ever appeared. Devices cannot be properly configured. Menu options seem to dissapear preventing discovery and device config (in MI4)

I thought my missing graphics would be from MI4, and not MCS, but see that they are from MCS (Thanks Michael!)...but i still cant find the temperature gifs... looks like there is a heap of gifs missing... I have none of the gifs in the MCS1wire distro... referenced here... Am I right to look for them in this zip?!?

src='/images/temperatures/58.gif' height='16' width='16'><img alt=' ' src='/images/sensors/blank3.gif'></td><td

My previous MCStemp attempt gave me problems with HS integration, in that I could not get devices in HS from it...

So, are my "stack" assumptions correct, and am I using a sensible ensemble or should I be doing something completely different?

Thanks yet again for any help....

David

[Bestgear]

sorry about that last post formatting... heaven knows howI did that!

DJ

[Michael McSharry]

I see that I did not include the graphics with xapmcs1Wire. I'm traveling this week, but you can get the graphics by downloading mcsTemperature trial from the updater and then copy the image folder under \HTML to \HTML under xapmcs1Wire. If you want data collection, threshold triggering, and charting then you likely will want mcsTemperature anyway.

I cannot help with xAP Conduit plugin, but you can achieve the desired xAP interface to HS using the mcsXap plugin which is at http://board.homeseer.com/showthread.php?t=106451. If you want to use the xAP Conduit then you will have a better chance of getting support by joining the Yahoo xAP group. The link was posted by CouchePotatoe and you should be able to find it with a little searching.

Your understanding of the relationship of the components involved is correct

[Bestgear]

Many thanks Michael for your continued help.

I am glad my understanding of the components was correct.. at least Im not totally stupid!

I will go and use your software... and leave the conduit for now... The homeseer world can be a dangerous place for those who are not software developers!!!

DJ

[Bestgear]

Well... I have moved over to mcsXAP....

But.... in the mcsxap.asp page. (nor anywhere else..) I dont get any 1 one wire devices!

What am I doing wrong!?!?

I still have the xap hub I used with the conduit, and mcsxap can be seen there connected ok.

If I enable debug... I get messages indicating that devices are being discovered... but it looks like (uneducated guess...) the exists=true is set, so I assume it ignores it because the flag is set?

4/15/2006 8:12:31 PM - mcsXap Debug - xapbsc.event Source=mcs.onewire.speedy:xapmcs1wire_.e2000000aa74db28.temp erature,Exists=True


What am I doing wrong!?!?!?

I am assuming that the mcsonewire supports hobby boards hubs - am I right?

Last question... going back to the original thread... I want to get graphs of temp over time... what is the component that will give me that?

Thanks again for the help...

David

[Michael McSharry]

On the browser for xapmcs1Wire you need to give names to any sensors that you want delivered as xAP messages. On the browser for mcsXap you need to check the "A" column for any xAP message that you want to have represented as Homeseer Devices. mcsXap will assign a default location, name and DC or you can specify specific values of these properties for HS devices.

The mcsTemperature pluign to Homeseer is the published means to collect and chart sensor data. I'm not posting my xAP database node or xAP charting node because they are a major component of mcsTemperature plugin. If you have a license for mcsTemperature then send me a PM and I will make available to you what I'm using.

[Bestgear]

Hi Michael...

Does MCS temperature work through xap?

If not, does it support the hobby boards hub? from memory, it does not...

Given I want to retain xap... am I best to buy MCS temp and come and speak to you re the charter!?!?

DJ

[Michael McSharry]

There are a varitey of approaches you can take with the software I developed. If you want a pure xAP solution then the following is an architecture that will give you data collection and charting that can be viewed with a browser or generate jpg that can be inserted whereever you want. xapmcs1Wire does support the hobby-boards.com hub.

xapmcs1Wire -> xapmcsDatabase -> xapmcsChart

If you want a pure Homeseer solution then the following is a single package solution. It does not support the hub and it does not support the control graph format and generation of jpg to insert in other places is somewhat awkward. What it does give you is emulated closed loop control such as a thermostat as well as a varitey of event trigger capabilities

mcsTemperature

There are two hybrid solutions. The first uses xapmcs1Wire to transform 1-wire into xAP LAN and mcsXap to transform xAP LAN into Homeseer Devices. mcsTemperature will then provide the data storage and charting as well as other mcsTemperature features

xapmcs1Wire -> mcsXap -> mcsTemperature

The other is to use the Homeseer as an additional source of data that is combined with the xAP nodes. This is the way I run my environment

Homeseer -> mcsXap ---> |
|
xapmcs1Wire -------------> | ----> xapmcsDatabase -> xapmcsChart
|
xapmcsTemp0X ----------> |

If you have xAP already implemented on your system then this last architecture is what I would recommend for flexibility. You can also run mcsTemperature with Homeseer if you want to use its triggering, closed loop control, or input of data from files.

You should also be able to use the xAP Conduit rather than mcsXap since the xapmcs1Wire does use the xapBSC schema, but I have never tried to perform the integration.

The other thing with xapmcsChart is that it is not as far along on the maturity curve. I had originally developed mcsEnvironment that was essentially an xAP solution to mcsTemperature, but it never did do what I expected it to achieve. I still have some of my charting done with it. xapmcsChart came into existance as a better companion to my xap plugin to Main Lobby since I was not satisfied with how mcsEnvironment was evolving.

[Pete]

xAP - anyone using for &quot;other&quot; stuff

I installed the xAP plugin to send messages out to my Zoneminder. I am using Michaels Xap for Temp05 stuff. When I installed it I noticed it was sending out messages regarding all of my X10 devices. Anyone else notice this?

[Bestgear]

..yip - seemed to send out heaps of stuff!


DJ

[CouchPotatoe]

1. Where do I get the graphics etc that the Mi4 plugin is looking for? I am looking specifically at the temperature ones and I am sure there will be others missing. I have downloaded the Mi4 app graphics set, but did not find the ones that "temperature" require.

2. I use the "green button" to add the discovered one wire device to HS. If I click on RAW, it gives me the option to slelect temperature only, which is not default, so needs checked. Is this the way to add devices???

3. The Mi4 plugin docs mention a wizzard - I have never seen the wizard appear... and as a result, am missing the option to confirure and even select things like celcius or farenhight. How do I "fix" this? The wizzard looks great!

4. Going further.... I would like to have the data graphed and presented in HS against time... is there an easy way for a non app develoepr to achieve this?

5. Backup - now I have all this in HS, what is my best way to backup the confir. Is simply taking a copy of the HS subdir/tree enough, or are there bits in teh registry too? What do folks do to backup HS as we are all too aware of the time and effort to set the whole damn thing up!

6. One wire question - given that one wire is tempremental when deployed in anything other than a simple layout (I have a hobby boards 6 port hub), when devices get missed (dissapear for a short period of time) as they do with one wire (smile!) what happens in HS? I have two sensors that do this and the HS device seems to be removed... Mi4 plugin will redescover them easily, but its a pain loosing the device.

Just to clarify these questions..

1) They are graphics from the mcs 1-wire app I believe.

2) You use 'RAW' to allow you to individually select any name/parameter pair in a xAP message. It allows any/all of the key values in a xAP message to be linked into a HomeSeer device. However if the xAP message is a 'standard' one using a schema already known to HomeSeer then you are better to use this as it has more meaning and structure. A xAP BSC message should usually be introduced to HomeSeer using BSC and not 'raw' unless perhpas you wanted to display two of the embedded values eg 'State' and 'DisplayText' - as two HomeSeer devices.

3) The documentation for the HomeSeer plugin on www.mi4.biz still has some carryovers from the plugin for HomeSeer V1. In fact there are two plugins, one for V2 and the now frozen one for V1, but only one set of examples. The 'wizard' was done away with in V2 in favour of the web page configuration pages which is no the recommended approach. You can achieve everything (and more) via these pages cf the older wizard. You access them via the config option in the plugin (Setup>Interfaces>xAP and click the yellow Config button) - you will then get an 8 tabbed interface.
There is no option within either xAP plugin to translate for example temperature values from C to F. You can only use whatever information is provided in a xAP message. Normally the sending app would have an option to either report in C or F. You could however convert the value within HomeSeer.

4) This is not the intent of the plugin but there are graphing apps available for HS I believe.

5) The xAP configuration info for the mi4 plugin are added both to the HomeSeer device DB and into a folder called xAP which you should backup too (particularly settings.txt)

6) Devices created in the xAP plugin are persistent, they remain within HomeSeer unless deleted , when your device comes back online it will update the HS device again.

I check this forum as often as poss but if you need a faster response the xAP group on Yahoo is recommended as it has email notifications.
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/xap_automation/
I see that you've now swapped to Michaels HS xAP plugin but if you do need any help on the xAP mi4 one then ask away ...

Kevin

[CouchPotatoe]

I installed the xAP plugin to send messages out to my Zoneminder. I am using Michaels Xap for Temp05 stuff. When I installed it I noticed it was sending out messages regarding all of my X10 devices. Anyone else notice this?

If it's the mi4 plugin you can enable and disable xAP messages and control on a per device basis through the configuration interface. Basically if you enable a device it will send a message everytime it changes state and also a periodic status message about every 5 to 10 minutes. If it is setup to use both the HomeSeer schema and the xAP BSC one it will obvioulsy do both. Things that are constantly changing - eg a seconds time counter or movement sensors send a lot of messages, (although in the nature of Ethernet traffic it's insignificant really).

Kevin

[Pete]

Thank you Kevin.