Insteon SDK/ Developers?

[Snuffles]

Hello all,

I'm interested in doing some .net programming for Insteon but do not have the experience to hack my way into the control boc and build my own libraries.

I noticed that Insteon has a developers kit for $99, does anyone know if that kit includes the libraries/tutorials on how to access Insteon functionality from a .Net application.

Note: I have sent two emails and even called Insteon and left a message but alas have received no response.

 

[tech-home]

The Zwave SDK is easier... :angry:

I promise you will recieve a quick response

 

[BraveSirRobbin]

Hi Snuffles and welcome to Cocoontech.

I'm surprised at the lack of response to your Emails from Insteon. Curious, were they sent to Smarthome then? We have Smarthome reps that visit our forums so hopefully you will find some good answers here!

Regards,

BSR

 

[PeterW]

My experiences with the SDK.. It is really more of a tool suite and some really hard core documentation.

There is a 'Device Manager' that runs as a sort of proxy server. You talk to it over a tcp/ip socket and it controls the PLCv2. They provide various example code to talk to it, even as extreme as flash.

The documentation tells you how to talk to it at a very low level.. directly at the RS232 or USB layer. This is seriously hard going if you haven't worked at this level before.

There are various other things provided, including ActiveX or COM interfaces if my memory serves me correctly. I normally ignore that stuff because I don't do Windows, so I really can't tell you if it is any good or not.

By the sounds of things, you'll be wanting to talk to the Device Manager. It speaks a HTTP-like ascii protocol. If you work at that level, you can skip a lot of the hard stuff.

-Peter

 

[jlokanis]

They really don't have the .NET/ActiveX/COM stuff figured out yet. They have a very basic COM interface, but they implemented the callback event in a non standard way. I have heard that some VB and C++ guys have figured out how to work around it, but if your programming environment relies on them properly following ActiveX/COM conventions, then forget it for now. They have been promising a working COM interface for many months now (4+) with nothing out there yet.
I have resorted to working with another developer to write a COM wrapper around their COM interface to properly expose the event.

If all you care about is sending commands (turn light on, off) and not getting any responses, then the current Device Manager COM interface will work.

If you are an experienced COM programmer and are using VB or C++ (or I think C#) you can get it to work with some effort.

Good luck...

 

[Snuffles]

I appreciate all the responses. At this point it sounds like ability to control Insteon through .NET apps is still in its infancy.

As such I'll just become more familar will all the home automation technologies and see which one is the best fit for my needs/experience.

Thanks again

 

[Steve]

There's really only 2 others worth looking at - UPB and Zwave. If you tell us what your needs are maybe we can help steer you.