Brainstorm: how should blind/shutter be shown on floorplan

[bulek]

Hi,

I'd kindly ask for your guidance and opinions in what direction will support for blind/shutter devices go under LMCE and Orbiter floorplans...

My home automation wrapper I'm writting in Perl is communicating with automation level with 3 variables for each devices that can be set to integer state (usually 0-100%):
1. velux_shutter_set - used for setting device to new state
2. velux_shutter       - shows current activity of device (1 means device is in traveling phase, 0 means inactive, this one is useless for dimmable lights, cause they go instantly to new state)
3. velux_shutter_state - shows current state of device (when device is idel this equals to _set variable)

Now I'm trying to figure out, how such device will be shown on floorplan, when it will be supported. At least two ways comes to mind :
1. to show current state in number beside icon, and yellow colour of icon expresses traveling phase, maybe different icon to visually show different state (open,close,half open...)

2. to be like lights are currently made - so any state above 0 gives yellow icon and state of 0 gives neutral icon. For lights this is usable, cause you can see right away if light is switched on...

I'm leaning toward 1. also for lights (so show current state beside icon, state above 0 gives another color) and for shutters/blinds (state beside icon, different color of icon or different icon for each opened state and certain color for device traveling phase)...

I'd kindly hear your opinions... If I may express a little dream - if device appearance on floorplans and its controls and support could be somehow easily changed via few lines of Ruby code - with some embedded engine like currently GSD is, then we will gain enormous advantage in various possibility how to present things on floorplans and other visual interfaces.....


Thanks in advance,

regards,

Bulek.

[jondecker76]

I have not messed with blinds/shutter at all yet. I did notice, however, that the Icon for these appears to have 2 states. Rather than just being purple and black, it has a 3rd color (I think it was a shade of gray). I never got around to testing it, but it appears that it should show a separate picture for the opened and closed state (using either gray or black as a mask for the fill color) - I've never tested this however, and for all I know was never fully implemented. I'll have to assign a light as a blinds floorplan type and have a look. Do you know if this 2-state icon feature is currently working?

[bulek]

I have not messed with blinds/shutter at all yet. I did notice, however, that the Icon for these appears to have 2 states. Rather than just being purple and black, it has a 3rd color (I think it was a shade of gray). I never got around to testing it, but it appears that it should show a separate picture for the opened and closed state (using either gray or black as a mask for the fill color) - I've never tested this however, and for all I know was never fully implemented. I'll have to assign a light as a blinds floorplan type and have a look. Do you know if this 2-state icon feature is currently working?

Hi,

sorry can't confirm anything, cause my setup is currently quite a mess. I send events for on/off when travelling, but blinds are currently actually dimmable light switches so they go to yellow state also on any click by themselves... I'm also not sure if device state is properly changed (I'm getting what I want on automation side)... But I've seen yellow, normal (black or gray) and pink color - but this one is used when there is no state info present (for instance on startup)...

HTH,

regards,

Bulek.

[MarcoZan]

Hi Bulek

I'm facing exactly the same issue. I'm writing a GSD driver for my lighting system, and I'm trying to figure out as well how could the blinds icons be better displayed on floorplans.

I'm currently using light switch (ON/OFF) for blinds, so there are only 2 states to show and I'm trying to play a bit to find out a reasonable compromise.
At this stage I'm trying to get a yellow icon when blind is not totally closed, and a black icon when blind is totally closed. Unfortunately my lighting system seems not to return any state about blinds position, so it's a bit hard ...

I think that showing opening percentage figures besides icons could be nice, but only for not-so-complex floorplans otherwise the overall look is likely to be a mess.
Unless a new scenario category is added specifically for blinds, we will still have lights and blinds shown on the same floorplan and I'm afraid that having a lot of info on that could be confusing.

I think that simply showing different icons for different opening percentage (maybe at 25%-30% steps) could be more effective and useful from user perspective.
Actually I don't care to know whether blinds of living room are 10% open or 20 %open .... I care to know that they are partially opened but not open wide (but of course this it's me ..).

I totally agree when you say that travelling state should be shown on floorplans. Maybe a blinking icon could be more effective, but a yellow one could be good as well.

The point now is: how to do it? Is there anyone already working on this, or anyone that could give some pointers to start digging from?

Regards
Marco

[bulek]

I have not messed with blinds/shutter at all yet. I did notice, however, that the Icon for these appears to have 2 states. Rather than just being purple and black, it has a 3rd color (I think it was a shade of gray). I never got around to testing it, but it appears that it should show a separate picture for the opened and closed state (using either gray or black as a mask for the fill color) - I've never tested this however, and for all I know was never fully implemented. I'll have to assign a light as a blinds floorplan type and have a look. Do you know if this 2-state icon feature is currently working?

Hi,

Jondecker are you around ? Of course anyone else with such knowledge is welcomed too. I think that it would be nice to support blind type of devices in climate floorplan (now that I'm enhancing climate plugin).

What I'm after is whether we have ability to display different icons on floorplan and control that from Climate plugin ? This would be nice feature, since we could show current state by icon already (opened, closed and other possible states)...

Currently, the only device that resembles blinds is Drapes switch, but it is in Lighting category so I guess this was not meant for blind type of devices (BTW, they would require same floorplan controls as dimmable light switch)....

Thanks in advance,

regards,

Bulek.

[hari]

aeh bulek, i am not aware of a drape switch with feedback. All I've ever seen just do dumb motor control (up/down), some with end position switch.

br, Hari

[bulek]

aeh bulek, i am not aware of a drape switch with feedback. All I've ever seen just do dumb motor control (up/down), some with end position switch.

br, Hari

I've written all needed support on automation level of my system (I get full blown IDE for IEC logic programming with it). Algorithm works quite descent, although it determines current position based only on active time going in either directions.... When you do full open or full close, then it adds a bit to traveling time so it surely gets to end position.

It works ok for about a year now. so yes, I have feedback and I think that more and more systems will have that. But anyway, with my recent additions to Climate plugin you can control what is shown on floorplan, so you can hide if that feedback info has no meaning....

We can surely make separate templates for switch only devices and proper devices with feedback state info....

Regards,

Bulek.

[tschak909]

Yes, basically we would just do a similar template to a dimmable light switch.

Thank you so much for your work on these types of devices. I will be looking into these when I do my house... as well as electrically dimmable glass. ;-)

-Thom

[bulek]

Yes, basically we would just do a similar template to a dimmable light switch.

Thank you so much for your work on these types of devices. I will be looking into these when I do my house... as well as electrically dimmable glass. ;-)

-Thom
[/quote
Hi,

I'm glad my work is usefull. But I'll ask for some of your help on Designer's side of things.... I'll start another thread in Developers forum. I'm curious why nothing is displayed on floorplans for lighting devices, although it seems everything is the same as for Climate devices, which states are shown on floorplan. Without showing anything on floorplan, whole work in plugin is useless...

Thanks in advance for your help,

regards,

Bulek.