Some Insteon Minibroker questions

[georgejm]

You can PM me the stuff as well...

Just curious, when you right-click on custom devices and see the InsteonDevices item, do you also see OnOffSwitch>MotionSensor when you follow the menu all the way out? It's nothing to worry about (it's happening on my system as well). However, if you are not seeing "MotionSensor" at the end, the right XDO isn't loading. To get rid of it, go to the InsteonMiniBrokerDriver|Classes|InsteonMotionSensor class. Go to the properties panel and make sure thee "Virtual" property is checked. The setting is a hold-over from testing that I didn't catch.

Once I get your stuff, I'll send you a version of the driver that sends extra debugging info to the event log. That should help us figure out where the thing is dying.

 

[georgejm]

One more thing to check.

Do you have a file in Program Files\GeorgeCo Professional Services\Premise Insteon Driver called DeviceMapFile.xml?

 

[chucklyons]

I sent the files to your email -

Yes, I did have the .xml file. I just checked, but this time I dont have it, using the 2.0.11...

I do get the Insteon Motion Detector Device....

And this morning, I did get a 'failed to connect event'. I did a number of installsm including the 2.07 xdo, so given the time of the error, it was prob around that time....

 

[chucklyons]

Well, I finally admit defeat....I have NOT been able to get this driver to work. I even did the most radical thing, whihc was to move my data files off (approx 500GB), nuked the WHS/2003 and rebuilt it. Started with only the SDM, the Insteon Driver and SYS. NADA.
Turned DEP to 'AlwaysOff'. The weird thing about this whole effort is that the 2.0.7 driver I had working w/ the SDM 2.7.8.

So, I think I'll try the UPB stuff. Anybody want to buy my Insteon stuff before I eBay it?

p.s. John - thanks for your behind the scenes work - in NO way do I imply it's the driver!

 

[chucklyons]

YES! YES! YES! Hallelujah! Hallelujah! Hallelujah!

As of 15 May 2009, at 535pm, I have John's Insteon Driver working...I've been successfully adding devices and its still working fine.

I took the occaision of a crashed HDD to totally nuke the system. Clean install of Windows Home Server, Premise, and a bunch of other garbage.
It took a couple of times, but the dreaded CLR203 error went away after I identified which port the Insteon controller was on. Resinstalled the Service, fired it up and BAM! Off to the races. Very exciting.....although my wife failed to see the magic of it.

 

[kzboray]

Congrats!

If you happen to have an KeyPadLinc 8 and use groups successfully let me know. For the life of me I have not been able to get group devices to work reliably.
Home.House.First_Floor.Entry.RelayLight.PowerState=TRUE works 100% of the time.
I have also created a group that contains the same device (group 2).
Devices.CustomDevices.Insteon_Root.InsteonGroup_2.PowerState=TRUE works about 10% of the time. The exception to this is if I flood the network with commands. One way I have found to do this is...
If times.systime.......
Devices.CustomDevices.Insteon_Root.InsteonGroup_2.PowerState=TRUE
Devices.CustomDevices.Insteon_Root.InsteonGroup_2.PowerState=FALSE
Devices.CustomDevices.Insteon_Root.InsteonGroup_2.PowerState=TRUE
Devices.CustomDevices.Insteon_Root.InsteonGroup_2.PowerState=FALSE
Devices.CustomDevices.Insteon_Root.InsteonGroup_2.PowerState=TRUE
end if

The above mess will turn on group 2 100% of the time. If I use the same technique with a group that contains multiple devices I have about a 95% success rate.

So far this is the only way I have found to actually use groups with any success. If you have different results I would be VERY interested in knowing how you do it.

If you don't have a KeyPadLinc 6 or 8 then you would not be using groups. It is currently the only way to activate the individual indicator lights on the KeyPadLincs when activating a linked SwitchLinc/RelayLinc programmatically.

Again glad to hear you have the Insteon driver working.

 

[123]

Instead of repeatedly toggling the PowerState property of InsteonGroup_2, could you try using the SetValueForced method like this:
Devices.CustomDevices.Insteon_Root.InsteonGroup_2.SetValueForced "PowerState", TRUE

Maybe it will be as effective?

 

[kzboray]

123,

Thanks for the suggestion. I went ahead and tried using..


Devices.CustomDevices.Insteon_Root.InstonGroup_2.SetValueForced "PowerState", TRUE

And none of the devices in Group_2 powered on. I then tried manually checking the PowerState box for each of the devices in Group_2 and they all came on. I then added the same devices to a scene and toggled the play property. They all turned on. It is only when I try to use the group function that I have these problems. If you have any other suggestions let me know. Thank you again.

Kaz

 

[chucklyons]

I have been using John's driver for some time, consistently for Insteon and X10. Now that I have added multiple devices, and all are Outletlincs, I am totally lost. Now that I have added additional outlets (I had one before), Insteon Root detects everything, but puts them into Groups. If I choose to bind the Lion Fountain to Group_1, and delete any other members, everything works fine. The Appliancelinc works fine and reports status...when in Groups, status seems to be disabled - Is there a way to separate a device from a group (everything defaults to 'is group device)

I'm not exactly clear as to the benefits of groups, or how they would be used in a Premise system. Does anyone know whether the driver supports OutletLinc? Can anyone give me a brief 'Insteon for Dummies' braindump?

 

[georgejm]

Chuck,

Let me see if I can help.

Insteon groups are a way to (simply) manage a collection of devices as a single entity. In my setup, I have groups for things like exterior lights, Christmas lights, All first floor lighting, family room lights, etc that I bind to scenes that execute on a schedule. I bind the appropriate Insteon group to a Home level object to control all of those devices together. The alternative approach (binding insteon devices to home level devices separately and then attaching them to a scene) would have lights come on one at a time versus all at the same time.

Under the covers, Insteon sends a broadcast message to a group to perform an action (on, off, dim, etc.). If all goes well, the members of the group will take the action simultaneously. Unfortunately, there is not response to a group broadcast to see if the action was successfully taken like there is in a "direct" message. To get around this, the protocol supports the concept of a "cleanup" to make sure that the broadcast actually worked. If there was a problem with the broadcast, the cleanup messages will individually set the devices to the desired state.

To get all this to work, a device needs to be "linked" to a controller. Linking adds the device's address and requested group to the controllers database. It also (and this is important) adds the controllers address and group information to the device's local database. A controller can do group broadcast, but if the device doesn't have the group in it's database, it won't respond. Judging from what you describe in your post, I'd say the remote device wasn't linked properly. The controller knew about the remote device, but the remote device doesn't know about the controller. Try re-linking with the SetGroup property set to the group you want.

I don't recall if outletlinc is explicitly supported. Check the release notes, I made sure I documented what devices were being added as I did revisions to the driver. If it's not supported, you can set up a "Generic Dimmer" device as documented in the release notes.

 

[chucklyons]

Documentation? Release Notes? Readme?

So THAT's what they are for!



Thanks, John! OutletLincs now working like a charm.....

 

[chucklyons]

John, et al -

John's awesome module still working like a charm. WAF is over the top! Question: Is there support for the EZRain? Or would I need to extend one of the existing? or...?

 

[chucklyons]

Any tricks to get the Insteon motion detector to work? Not sure if its the user, the configuration, or if I need to update .xdo? Looking at some other forums, seems it may be a pain?
I have device type 0109? Or 1001?

 

[georgejm]

Have you been able to successfully link the motion detector to the PLC? The motion detector needs to be the "Master" in this case. Put the motion detector in "Link-mode" according to the directions, and then press and hold the button on the PLC. Another trick that I've used is to initiate a ping to the motion sensor from the PLC. You need to press the button inside the motion detector, and quickly (within a few seconds) initiate a ping from the builder to the motion detector's address. You need to move fast because the RF receiver in the motion detector is only on for a few seconds after it transmits (saves battery life).

-John