Please help with multi sensor

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  • Last Post 05 March 2014
Axial-User posted this 08 January 2014

I did have a lot of trouble getting them set up as well. What ended up working for me was to use the Z-Stick directly:

- Remove the multi-sensor via InControl in Devices (click once and hit the red "Delete").
- Remove the Z-Stick from your PC.
- Press and hold the button on the Z-Stick to put it in "remove/exclude" mode with the light blinking fast (about 3-4 seconds).
- Press the button on the Multi-sensor to exclude it.
- Press the button on the Z-Stick after the light goes back to fast blink to take it out of exclude mode.
- Press the button on the Z-Stick to put it into "add/include" mode (slow blink).
- Press the button on the Multi-sensor to include it.
- Press the button on the Z-Stick after the light goes back to slow blink to take it out of include mode.
- Plug the Z-Stick back in.
- Wait for InControl to update and show the multi-sensor. Took about 20-30 seconds for me I think. (You might have to do network heal via the "Tools...ZWave Commands...Heal Network" 3-4 times to get it to show up once it's back in place and not near your PC.)
- Right click on the multi-sensor and select "Auto configure".

It does show as a Binary Sensor in my PC and I didn't need to change it. Once I had all the above done, it took a few minutes for all the sensors to show up in the box.

------------------

As far as the script stuff goes, just copy all the lines of the script and paste them into Notepad. For that script, be sure it's named "BatteryMonitor.cs" (not .txt or .cs.txt) and save it to your script folder.

You can find your script folder by clicking on the Browse button next to the pre- or post-script boxes. The script folder has several others that come by default with ICHA.

Hope this helps!

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Axial-User posted this 08 January 2014

Check out these instructions (to associate the device) and see if it helps.

http://incontrolzwave.com/page/Device-Associations.aspx

Axial-User posted this 09 January 2014

The device is associated with the controller. It displays "tripped" for 4 min after it detects motion (just like it should per the instructions) but I don’t know how to view or use any other information it collects.

SickPup404 posted this 09 January 2014

If you select the motion sensor, you should have a scrollable box in the right margin of InControl. It lists (for me):
- Battery
- Luminance
- Relative Humidity
- Temperature

It also lists some others at times - I just ignore them. They usually come up as "5", "7", "131", etc. and have duplicate readings of the above sensors.

Anyway, if you click the blue link button next to the sensor reading, it will create a separate device to track the sensor reading. I did this with all of the sensors on my two 4-in-1's, but I only check the temperature via the iPhone app and check battery status nightly.

To check the battery status, I created the devices for the sensors, created a "Maintenance" scene, added the two battery sensors to the device list, set the trigger to repeat every day at 05:00, and built my own script to poll the battery level in the "Pre-script" box.

The script:
[i][b][code]using System;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using System.Linq;
using System.Text;
using MLS.ZWave.Service.Rules;
using MLS.ZWave.BusinessObjects;
using MLS.HA.DeviceController.Common.Device.ZWave;

///


/// This script will send an email when battery powered devices in the scene device list report battery level <=>
///


public class BatteryMonitor : ScriptBase, ScriptInterface {

public void runScript() {
try {
bool sendMailNeeded = false;
var subject = "Battery level alert";
var bodyLine = "Device '{0}' reports battery level of {1}%.
";
var body = "";

// Before the for-each loop, make sure sceneDevices is not null
if (base.sceneDevices == null) {
return;
}

foreach (var sd in base.sceneDevices) {
var device = getNode((Guid)sd.deviceId);
if (device != null && device.level <= 10)="" {=""><===battery reporting="" percent="" here.="" 100="" for="">
sendMailNeeded = true;
body = body + string.Format(bodyLine, device.deviceName, device.level);
}
}

if (sendMailNeeded) {
sendEmail(string.Format(subject), string.Format(body));
}

} catch (Exception ex) {
// Log the exception here
var message = ex.Message;
writeLog(message);
}
}
}
[/code][/b][/i]

SickPup404 posted this 09 January 2014

Oh, and you have to have your email set up correctly for the above script to work. Set the level to 100 where I note it in the script to test your email setup, then just execute the scene.

Axial-User posted this 09 January 2014

That is great information. Thank you.
A new problem has come up not related to the software. I have bats living in the over hang of my roof and when the sun go’s down they trip the motion sensor every 2 mins. A new challenge.

SickPup404 posted this 09 January 2014

Well, that will present some issues! Good luck with them!

Axial-User posted this 09 January 2014

If you select the motion sensor, you should have a scrollable box in the right margin of InControl. It lists (for me):
- Battery
- Luminance
- Relative Humidity
- Temperature

It also lists some others at times - I just ignore them. They usually come up as "5", "7", "131", etc. and have duplicate readings of the above sensors.

Anyway, if you click the blue link button next to the sensor reading, it will create a separate device to track the sensor reading. I did this with all of the sensors on my two 4-in-1's, but I only check the temperature via the iPhone app and check battery status nightly.

[/code][/b][/i]

Sick Pup,
What you have explained here is exactly what I expect from my device. However I have no scroll box or any indication of any other values being tracked or recorded by the device. I did an auto configure to see if maybe that would set up something I had not yet but I had no luck with that either. I also tried to change the type of sensor to a multi level, motion sensor, and a binary sensor (what IC called the sensor after the auto configuration). I am stumped on this. I have little to no skill with programming so my lack of knowledge frustrates me even further.

About the "code" I have seen multiple threads describing "I wrote this code and now it works great". I don’t know where to enter any code to make things happen. I did read a thread that explained a little about using post scripts and prescripts. in this thread they were using note pad to write the scripts and saving them with a .cs file extension. I experimented with this method and was successful in modifying some of the prewritten scripts and saving them with new file names. But because of my lack of knowledge in programming I was only able to make simple changes. I do understand how the cut and paste thing works and I have been able to steal scripts from other things and bring them together with limited success.

Thank you for your help so far. I am sure there is a way to get these thing to display for me it will just take a few more questions from me and a bunch more help from you and others with more knowledge than I.

Craig

SickPup404 posted this 09 January 2014

I did have a lot of trouble getting them set up as well. What ended up working for me was to use the Z-Stick directly:

- Remove the multi-sensor via InControl in Devices (click once and hit the red "Delete").
- Remove the Z-Stick from your PC.
- Press and hold the button on the Z-Stick to put it in "remove/exclude" mode with the light blinking fast (about 3-4 seconds).
- Press the button on the Multi-sensor to exclude it.
- Press the button on the Z-Stick after the light goes back to fast blink to take it out of exclude mode.
- Press the button on the Z-Stick to put it into "add/include" mode (slow blink).
- Press the button on the Multi-sensor to include it.
- Press the button on the Z-Stick after the light goes back to slow blink to take it out of include mode.
- Plug the Z-Stick back in.
- Wait for InControl to update and show the multi-sensor. Took about 20-30 seconds for me I think. (You might have to do network heal via the "Tools...ZWave Commands...Heal Network" 3-4 times to get it to show up once it's back in place and not near your PC.)
- Right click on the multi-sensor and select "Auto configure".

It does show as a Binary Sensor in my PC and I didn't need to change it. Once I had all the above done, it took a few minutes for all the sensors to show up in the box.

------------------

As far as the script stuff goes, just copy all the lines of the script and paste them into Notepad. For that script, be sure it's named "BatteryMonitor.cs" (not .txt or .cs.txt) and save it to your script folder.

You can find your script folder by clicking on the Browse button next to the pre- or post-script boxes. The script folder has several others that come by default with ICHA.

Hope this helps!

SickPup404 posted this 09 January 2014

Also, what version does ICHA report in the title bar? I have 3.54.5090.10353.

Axial-User posted this 10 January 2014

Boom like magic it is working. It is possible that it was sent out with dead batteries. I replaced the batteries and removed it from the network then added it back in. When it added back in it was not showing anything different so I left my office to make dinner and when I came back boom it was working just fine.

Thanks for the help and ideas
Craig

SickPup404 posted this 10 January 2014

Great news! Just post back if you run into anything you need help with! The people here are quite knowledgeable and Ryan is quick to answer as well!

tnamey posted this 26 February 2014

Maybe it's because I'm running the 3.92 RC server but I can't for the life of me get one of these sensors to auto config. I've gone through the steps listed here (http://incontrolzwave.com/page/Device-Associations.aspx) dozens of times but it never stays associated. I've excluded it and included it five times. Batteries are fine as it will stay on for ten minutes after you hit the sensor button three times. Is this a bug in the latest server version or am I doing something wrong. I have 4 of these and they all worked without issue, but that was a while ago. Any ideas?

Ryan-Scott posted this 26 February 2014

Maybe it's because I'm running the 3.92 RC server but I can't for the life of me get one of these sensors to auto config. I've gone through the steps listed here (http://incontrolzwave.com/page/Device-Associations.aspx) dozens of times but it never stays associated. I've excluded it and included it five times. Batteries are fine as it will stay on for ten minutes after you hit the sensor button three times. Is this a bug in the latest server version or am I doing something wrong. I have 4 of these and they all worked without issue, but that was a while ago. Any ideas?


Sometimes if you re-load associations and there's nothing there, it's because the device isn't awake. Can you plug it in using USB next to your InControl computer and tell me if what you see is any different? If it is, the device either isn't waking up to receive commands from InControl or it's too far away from your USB stick to send/receive commands.

tnamey posted this 26 February 2014

I will try plugging it in when I get home tonight and let you know. I'm seeing the little light stay on for ten minutes so I thought it was staying on. I also moved it to about a foot away from the control stick when it didn't work the first couple times. I'l give it another try tonight.

tnamey posted this 27 February 2014

So it worked when powered via USB but stopped when I switched back to batteries. Must be a bum unit.

Ryan-Scott posted this 27 February 2014

So it worked when powered via USB but stopped when I switched back to batteries. Must be a bum unit.


Which part didn't work when you switched to batteries? Was it the association part or did it stop sending motion events when on battery?

For what it's worth, I had one that was odd - it seems like when I had it awake it wouldn't send motion events at all and I'd have to wait for 10-15 minutes for it to time out and really start working normally again.

If you are expecting to see associations still being set, you'll need to make sure the sensor is in range and awake.

tnamey posted this 03 March 2014

So I tried it again and waited for the sensor to back on stand by, under battery power. All the sensor data started coming through like normal. Very weird. Guess I'll have to plug the sensor in if I want to change the params and such.

Ryan-Scott posted this 05 March 2014

So I tried it again and waited for the sensor to back on stand by, under battery power. All the sensor data started coming through like normal. Very weird. Guess I'll have to plug the sensor in if I want to change the params and such.


Yes... strange indeed. Normally if you wake the sensor up you can send configuration commands to it. Perhaps the wakeup procedure in the manual isn't correct for their latest firmware?

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