Dianemo: missing vital screens in newer skins - UI1 Audio doesn't work anymore

[bulek]

Hello,

quite some time Audio media playing feature has not been working for us. When we tried to start Audio, got errors about non-existing Entertainment Area. Radu gave me advice to try new skin and it seems that Audio is not working anymore under UI1 skin. I know this skin is old, but we've been using it all the time on our main touchscreen.

Now to retain Audio features, we have to move to newer skins, but we got quite dissapointed, cause newer skins don't support some vital screens - at least for us. Our house is fully automated one and we have practically everything automated (also fully integrated Ventilation system, Heat Pump and whole house audio system with two channels and 5 audio zones).

To be able to control such a beast, we had created a lot of scenarios, that are showed in separate buttons on UI1 main screen (see attachment). We have at least 12 such scenarios for each main category (listed in left column). Also we liked quad view camera screens - we have two such screens, one for internal and one for external cams.
But we're a bit said, cause newer skins seem to be not supporting mentioned features anymore. Only Lighting button brings you to Lighting scenarios, but in our system this is only smaller part of all scenarios.

I think that those screens are really important for a system that appears to be full automation solution for residential use. My family members got used to those buttons (scenarios), even our grandma stayed with us for a few days and she used some additional scenarios created especially for her quite extensively.

Currently, we will probably keep UI1 and sacrifice Audio, but we would like to start discussion about this matter. We feel that perhaps we're not the only missing those features. We would also like to hear opinion from Dianemo - is it changing its focus to more media oriented system ?

Thanks in advance for discussion,

regards,

Bulek.

[Marie.O]

I am not familiar with Dianemo, but can't you just select one of the LinuxMCE skins? I mean, we have quite a few different skins, that all offer the same original abilities.

[bulek]

Hi,

thanks for a tip.

I will try, but I suspect that audio part from Dianemo is not compatible with those skins (quite similar as I have problems with UI1 now).

Will report on progress...

I'm attaching skins that I can choose in Dianemo. Can you please take a look and point the most probable one...


Thanks,
Regards,
Bulek.

[totallymaxed]

Hello,

quite some time Audio media playing feature has not been working for us. When we tried to start Audio, got errors about non-existing Entertainment Area. Radu gave me advice to try new skin and it seems that Audio is not working anymore under UI1 skin. I know this skin is old, but we've been using it all the time on our main touchscreen.

Now to retain Audio features, we have to move to newer skins, but we got quite dissapointed, cause newer skins don't support some vital screens - at least for us. Our house is fully automated one and we have practically everything automated (also fully integrated Ventilation system, Heat Pump and whole house audio system with two channels and 5 audio zones).

To be able to control such a beast, we had created a lot of scenarios, that are showed in separate buttons on UI1 main screen (see attachment). We have at least 12 such scenarios for each main category (listed in left column). Also we liked quad view camera screens - we have two such screens, one for internal and one for external cams.
But we're a bit said, cause newer skins seem to be not supporting mentioned features anymore. Only Lighting button brings you to Lighting scenarios, but in our system this is only smaller part of all scenarios.

I think that those screens are really important for a system that appears to be full automation solution for residential use. My family members got used to those buttons (scenarios), even our grandma stayed with us for a few days and she used some additional scenarios created especially for her quite extensively.

Currently, we will probably keep UI1 and sacrifice Audio, but we would like to start discussion about this matter. We feel that perhaps we're not the only missing those features. We would also like to hear opinion from Dianemo - is it changing its focus to more media oriented system ?

Thanks in advance for discussion,

regards,

Bulek.

Hi Bulek,

We're sorry but there are some breakages in the old UI1 skins due to changes we have been making over the last several months to the underlying system as we moved the audio side of the system to be fully integrated with LMS. However we are working on our Athena Orbiter which is written in HTML5 and it may well be that you can re-create your UI1 skin functionality in a customised Athena skin and at the same time get all the new advanced audio features too.

All the best

Andy

[bulek]

Hi Bulek,

We're sorry but there are some breakages in the old UI1 skins due to changes we have been making over the last several months to the underlying system as we moved the audio side of the system to be fully integrated with LMS. However we are working on our Athena Orbiter which is written in HTML5 and it may well be that you can re-create your UI1 skin functionality in a customised Athena skin and at the same time get all the new advanced audio features too.

All the best

Andy

Hi,

it seems that someone thought on access to those scenarios. In newest skin (St.George or something), lighting button brings you to those scenarios - but only those from Lighting group. Then Climate button brings you to Floorplan instead of Climate scenarios. I assume that cause there is separate Floorplans button probably for the purpose of seeing all possible floorplans... Only button for Media Scenarios is not there...

Anyway, we will probably stay with UI1 - my family just got too familiar with that screen. It's a pity we cannot use Audio...

Regards,
Bulek.

[totallymaxed]

Hi,

it seems that someone thought on access to those scenarios. In newest skin (St.George or something), lighting button brings you to those scenarios - but only those from Lighting group. Then Climate button brings you to Floorplan instead of Climate scenarios. I assume that cause there is separate Floorplans button probably for the purpose of seeing all possible floorplans... Only button for Media Scenarios is not there...

Anyway, we will probably stay with UI1 - my family just got too familiar with that screen. It's a pity we cannot use Audio...

Regards,
Bulek.

Well with Athena there is no reason why you could not design a new Athena UI skin that looks and behaves exactly like the old UI1 skin you love ;-). All you'd need to do is design a layout in HTML5 to emulate the old skin and your done.

Thats the power of Athena's HTML5 based skins & Orbiter!

All the best

Andy

[Marie.O]

Andrew,

I think, you simplify the generation of a new skin dramatically. There is a reason, why people get paid for being web screen developers. It is not easy task, and frankly, I would be pissed if all of a sudden something I am using in a system I've paid for is no longer working like it used to. Just ask Tschak how often I've beaten him with a baseball bat because some change caused havoc on existing stuff.

[totallymaxed]

Andrew,

I think, you simplify the generation of a new skin dramatically. There is a reason, why people get paid for being web screen developers. It is not easy task, and frankly, I would be pissed if all of a sudden something I am using in a system I've paid for is no longer working like it used to. Just ask Tschak how often I've beaten him with a baseball bat because some change caused havoc on existing stuff.

Well anyone that has a Dianemo system will have known that these changes were coming well in advance and were given plenty of time to change to another Skin. We very rarely end support for a feature and in this case it only effects some of the original LMCE skins - we have only had a single user be affected in fact. So we assessed the impact as about as close to zero as it could be.

Our move to HTML5 for our Athena Orbiter UI is all about making adapting, changing and designing UI's more accessible. Yes you do need some basic design sensibilities aligned with some basic HTML skills. But taking an existing UI eg the Basic skin from UI1 and implementing it in HTML5 is not at all difficult and there are plenty of graphical editors available if you prefer to work that way and plenty of information available for you to educate yourself via too. We feel that opening our UI up via HTML5 offers an incredibly accessible entry point for anyone to get into customising their system - yes as with anything we will see some badly designed screens & UI's but thats not a reason to not give people the opportunity to experiment. We will also see many graphically talented people do some great new designs because for the first time they can use their existing skills to implement a Dianemo UI. Something no designer would ever be able to do with a tool like HADesigner.

All the best

Andy

[Marie.O]

Andrew,

I agree 100% that adding HTML5 as an Orbiter option is a GREAT thing. I've been playing with that for years, as you know with my iOrbiter. And with Radu's JSON plugin the two missing things I was unable to achieve are now doable.

The main point I tried to make is: Yes, HTML5 design is much easier done than the original Orbiter work. But it still is not something that one can easily do on a single weekend, if one doesn't have any background in HTML "coding".

On the other hand, if anyone wants to get HTML code for an existing Orbiter UI1 screen, feel free to utilize my little script that was build to do just that. It is part of my iOrbiter adventure, and can be accessed after svn checking out iOrbiter (see wiki for details) with http://dcerouter/iOrbiter/structure.php?screen=1

And with that, I shall stop interfering with the goal of this thread.

rgds
posde

[totallymaxed]

The main point I tried to make is: Yes, HTML5 design is much easier done than the original Orbiter work. But it still is not something that one can easily do on a single weekend, if one doesn't have any background in HTML "coding"

I didn't quantify how long it would take to learn HTML5 - but knowing Bulek I think he already has skill in this area. But I think the broader point is that many people here already have enough knowledge of HTML to easily cope with building a skin especially if they use an existing Dianemo Athena skin as their starting point. We will add plenty of notes and remarks to our standard Athena skins so that understanding the structure of the skins makeup will not be difficult.

Personally I cannot wait to see what users come up with, both in terms of improvements and adaptations to our standard skins, and to brand new designs they've invented too.

Andy