Active Mode Text Not Displaying

[Sinandgrin]

I am currently in the trial period and testing of this plugin to see if it will allow me to finally cut the cord from HS2. For the most part I have been able to get everything I need working except 1 key piece for me.

I use a custom HSTouch project with a Climate Control section. In HS2 I was able to reliably pull in the current running state of the HVAC system (ie. heating, cooling, off, ect...) using the Sage Insteon plugin with my Venstar T1800 thermostat with the 2441V RF adapter but with this plugin I am having some issues. As you can see below the Device page of HS3 show the "HVAC Mode" correctly but within HSTouch the 'text' value is not populating. I can see the 'Image' and 'value' data points but not the 'text' which is what I need for my custom HSTouch project.

Any thoughts on what to check for to get this working?

[nfrobertson]

I ran a test myself using my test system HVAC. I used a textbox and under Status/Device associations -> Status TrackingNormal I associated to the HVAC MODE and saw the same behavior you did. Status value and graphic worked but Status text was blank. I then associated to my HVAC Fan device. It's basically the same concept, a device that has only status values/graphics/text. When I used the HVAC fan I was able to see all three - including the text. I did run the client and exercised the attached thermostat Fan (on vs. auto) and saw the text change in HSTouch.

The only meaningful difference between the HVAC Mode and HVAC Fan HS3 devices is that the Mode is the parent device for the HVAC. The timers and fan are all children devices. Why that would have any bearing on whether status text could be seen I have no idea.

Are you using one thermostat or many thermostats? Even if you have many, does only one actually connect to the HVAC? Meaning, is only one the driver of whether the HVAC Mode would change? If that's the case, can you associate your HSTouch element to the Thermostat Mode device instead of the HVAC Mode device? I tested and the Thermostat Mode device status text does seem work work correctly.

I tried one last test. I associated my text box to the parent device of my thermostat. Sure enough, status value worked. Even a "status graphic" worked, which was the graphic assigned to the entire parent device, as there are no specific parent device status graphics. However, the status text option was blank. The thermostat does have status text entries (a numeric value an a text value to go with it).

At this point I can only assume this is either a bug in HSTouch or it's designed to work that way with parent devices but that doesn't seem right? I'm hoping the thermostat mode option might work for you?

Nathan

[Sinandgrin]

I ran a test myself using my test system HVAC. I used a textbox and under Status/Device associations -> Status TrackingNormal I associated to the HVAC MODE and saw the same behavior you did. Status value and graphic worked but Status text was blank. I then associated to my HVAC Fan device. It's basically the same concept, a device that has only status values/graphics/text. When I used the HVAC fan I was able to see all three - including the text. I did run the client and exercised the attached thermostat Fan (on vs. auto) and saw the text change in HSTouch.

The only meaningful difference between the HVAC Mode and HVAC Fan HS3 devices is that the Mode is the parent device for the HVAC. The timers and fan are all children devices. Why that would have any bearing on whether status text could be seen I have no idea.

Are you using one thermostat or many thermostats? Even if you have many, does only one actually connect to the HVAC? Meaning, is only one the driver of whether the HVAC Mode would change? If that's the case, can you associate your HSTouch element to the Thermostat Mode device instead of the HVAC Mode device? I tested and the Thermostat Mode device status text does seem work work correctly.

I tried one last test. I associated my text box to the parent device of my thermostat. Sure enough, status value worked. Even a "status graphic" worked, which was the graphic assigned to the entire parent device, as there are no specific parent device status graphics. However, the status text option was blank. The thermostat does have status text entries (a numeric value an a text value to go with it).

At this point I can only assume this is either a bug in HSTouch or it's designed to work that way with parent devices but that doesn't seem right? I'm hoping the thermostat mode option might work for you?

Nathan

Hey Nathan,

Thanks for your suggestions here. To answer your questions, I am using a single thermostat only in this setup. I do have an element currently associated with an HST element's status set to the Thermostat Mode device instead of the HVAC Mode Device. This gives me the "selected thermostat mode", but I also want the "currently working mode", meaning is the system cooling the home, heating the home or at rest. In the past (HS2) I would use the Status text of the HVAC Mode to accomplish this, which I suppose is a bug in the new HS3 plugin.

Moving forward I actually have switched over the using the Status Image (the wavy lines) in place of the Status Text on the HVAC Mode device and this updates and functions correctly. I actually kind of like the image a bit more, since the Status Text of "Cool" was not very different than the Status Text of the Selected Mode "Cool", for example. This is a little more descriptive to me what the difference between these 2 values on my project page are, so I'm happy with this work-around.



Thank you for your help here though!

[nfrobertson]

Oh, good. I'm glad you were able to come up with a workable solution. Your comments make good sense as the thermostat mode doesn't necessarily show the "current operation" like the HVAC mode does. Glad this is working with the image after all.

Nathan