suggestions for improvements etc.
Quote from: Halfcrazy on May 03, 2013, 08:55:23 PM
suggestions for improvements etc.
I have a suggestion....
How about more improvements !
Good call!
Actually you guys may notice that the data looks pretty scarce -- I'm currently limiting to about 200 datapoints which makes for a pretty boring chart after 2 weeks. This was for performance reasons: my i5 4 core machine has no problems, but my atom netbook was clunking along with the full dataset. Once I get to performance improvements on my bug list that will get fixed up.
Also the slow page loading will be improved; at the moment there is no caching or compression of the immense amount of javascript libraries used. I'll turn this on once we feel good about the features.
Improvement : make each Classi?s call to MyMidnite a success with solar values registered.
Actually, I have more holes than datas in my graphs.
And, it seems that with the firmware needed for the MyMidnite Logs, I have now production resets during the day.
So, not all the datas on MyMidnite and Classics Logs that are affected, it´s a big problem.
Yann
Yes we are aware of the Random Resets and now know it is in the Classic and aggravated by certain Routers. We will be working to fix that.
Ryan
Is there going to be a screen available like the qnode/14 one?
Quite useful seeing list of about last days connections with those times,watts,v and I details
Dgd
Hi,
Dgd, +1 on your suggestion.
As we are in suggestion, I was hoping a simplest interface, with biggest graphs.
The website that I fall in love with is the following :
http://solarlog-home3.eu/projet.drome/ (http://solarlog-home3.eu/projet.drome/)
I translate the left menus :
Bilan quotidien : Daily production
Bilan mensuel : Monthly production
Bilan annuel : Yearly production.
Bilan total : Production since the installation
Each bar graph is clickable to access a deeper level of information, and it's fast and clear
Quote from: Lya72 on May 05, 2013, 07:09:01 AM
Hi,
Dgd, +1 on your suggestion.
As we are in suggestion, I was hoping a simplest interface, with biggest graphs.
The website that I fall in love with is the following :
http://solarlog-home3.eu/projet.drome/ (http://solarlog-home3.eu/projet.drome/)
I translate the left menus :
Bilan quotidien : Daily production
Bilan mensuel : Monthly production
Bilan annuel : Yearly production.
Bilan total : Production since the installation
Each bar graph is clickable to access a deeper level of information, and it's fast and clear
I kind of like that site.
Certainly like the numbers! :o
Tom
PS. I see Ryan got our Smileys back! 8)
Quote from: Lya72 on May 05, 2013, 07:09:01 AM
http://solarlog-home3.eu/projet.drome/ (http://solarlog-home3.eu/projet.drome/)
I translate the left menus :
Bilan quotidien : Daily production
Bilan mensuel : Monthly production
Bilan annuel : Yearly production.
Bilan total : Production since the installation
Each bar graph is clickable to access a deeper level of information, and it's fast and clear
yes now that is my kind of reporting, uses a lot more screen real estate for graph displays 8)
dgd
I am with dgd, I would like to be able to see the list of recent watts, volts, etc. within my midnite. Graphs are pretty but I love to see the raw data.
Good call, that is a nicely designed site.
I'll add current daily values to the badge on the left. Any requests?
I can also attempt to add a tabulated data option if you guys want.
There will be an export option as well once I figure out how to make Internet Exploder conform (the test is on the top left).
Quote from: Wxboy on May 06, 2013, 10:16:58 PM
I am with dgd, I would like to be able to see the list of recent watts, volts, etc. within my midnite. Graphs are pretty but I love to see the raw data.
+1
I assume it will auto refresh in the future?
Quote from: atop8918 on May 07, 2013, 03:07:51 AM
Good call, that is a nicely designed site.
I'll add current daily values to the badge on the left. Any requests?
I like amp hours produced and consumed. I know the consumed won't happen till the wizbang shunt monitor which I'm anxiously awaiting.
Quote from: unyalli on May 07, 2013, 10:04:52 AM
I assume it will auto refresh in the future?
unyall;
A very good idea I have on my wishlist, also.
Tom
First of thanks for restoring the classic's that vanished. I got to play with Mymidnite for the first time today. Overall I like it (Great being able to check my system on my I phone when I am out and about ;D) and I'm sure it will only get better with a few tweaks.
Improvements.
Voltage needs to be more defined. At the moment its scaled to round out in 1.0v increments. It really needs to be in 0.1v scale. For example my system voltage settles down to around 51.0V in the evening and by 11pm or so I like to see 50.7V or so to know things are in check. So that range from 50 - 51V can tell me a lot about what my system is doing.
On a 12v battery the difference between 12.8v and 12.00v is just 0.8v but the to voltages would signify roughly 100% SOC and 50% SOC condition. Seeing your system at 13v one moment and 12v the next could be alarming :o
2nd issue more of a bug I think.
Even though I can see that every day my battery has spent several hr's in float by checking the local app and the classic its self. When I get mymidnite to display.( time in float) and looking at the little window on the left and in the graphs it always shows zero hrs float time. So something is wrong there.
3rd perhaps a bug as well.
The data shown on the log looks to be a day behind.
Keep up the good work
Kurt.
Thanks, Kurt,
These are al great catches and exactly what I need to help get the site locked up.
I think I've got my offline version handling the decimals properly now -- your point is well taken about battery SOC.
The float time is a known bug: it's on my list though and I should be able to get that working when I get back into the database module.
As for the data being a day behind -- I made some poor timezone correction decisions that I'll be working on once the bigger bugs have been squashed.
Again, thanks for your help on these bugs,
-Andrew
I just released the latest changes to the website. Please let me know what you think.
Major features include:
- sticky settings for chart values and widget states
- improved charting performance
- full resolution on larger chart
- "improved" device badge incorporating instantaneous values from the most recent data read and re-arranged icons
There are still a lot of bugs, but I'm trekking through them now. Please let us know when you find any issues.
Thanks!
-Andrew
Andrew, excellent improvements, the graphs look much more refined and useful. I like the classic status info too, much neater. Good work, thanks...
Dgd
A couple of suggestions.
On the actual graph window is included upper left the colour boxes and what they represent, watts, PV volts etc..
These appear to be in a sub-window that encroaches half way over the main graph window and will obscure any data below.
I would suggest removing these from the main graph window as it is fairly evident what the different colours represent from their scales and the text displayed in the Classic ID window at left.
The graph does not auto refresh so what about a refresh button, perhaps up where the daily, weekly etc buttons are.
The ? button removes the description text. Whatabout a similar button above each Classic so thatit can be made visible/invisible in its system display.
Nice to see ongoing fixes, my main graph display now updates when the slider moves to a different time period.
Still wishing for a button associated with each Classic display that just displays the qnode/14 screen for that Classic. Graphs are nice but its still nice to see a good text list of connections and data.
dgd
+1 on the idea of just raw text data option . In the end its the text numbers that are more handy - to me anyhow.
Kurt
OR, maybe, be able to export a CSV file for the tabular text data ?
boB
More suggestions.
I see about 4 connections per hour so graphic resolution is about 15 minutes, I would find a higher time resolution more useful, 5 minutes would be good.
Month and year graphs, are these not wishful thinking? I cannot see how realistic or useful these would be, week maybe but barely, daily or a few days certainly. I would forget the long term storage and increase the number of data points to 5 minute intervals. If anyone wants to get long(er) term reports then that CSV file dump that boB suggests would allow users to collect and save short term data.
Can we get the Classic's ID back into the Clasic panel on LHS?
Dgd
Good ideas all, thanks for the feedback.
I am working on a download option so that csv data will be available. There will also be a firmware update which will increase the datapoint resolution somewhat.
suggestion.
Where multiple Classics are displayed it would be nice to have the time horizontal scale of each Classic graph box line up so that time events are in the same vertical axis.
Difficult since each Classic seems to make its data calls to MyMidnite at different times.
So could there be a FOLLOWME setting that aligns all Classics to make these MyMidnite connections at the same time?
dgd
Just curious if it might be more sensible to get the basics rock solid and then do the tweaking to "features"?
I guess My simplistic view is the car needs to drive properly before you add the air conditioning, heated seats, blue tooth and GPS?
Just from the peanut gallery.
Tom
Quote from: TomW on June 12, 2013, 09:58:25 PM
Just curious if it might be more sensible to get the basics rock solid and then do the tweaking to "features"?
I guess My simplistic view is the car needs to drive properly before you add the air conditioning, heated seats, blue tooth and GPS?
Just from the peanut gallery.
Tom
Ok, not sure if you mean rock solid MyMidnite or rock solid Classic.
If its MyMidnite then the advances made in the last week or so have transformed this reporting system.
The 1401 release fixing the sparse data issue and the graph improvements, not least the width size change, have moved MyMidnite into being a very useful graphic reporting system. All of the background fixes Andrew has acheived have also made it closer to rock solid reliability. I really feel we are at the stage of having a worthwhile MyMidnite and cosmetic changes as well
as aditional features are really useful fine tuning and greatly enhance the user experience.
I, probably like you and others, gave up with the local app, the only part of it that interested me was the meter dashboard,
the reporting was too little, gappy and needed the app to be running reliably for extended periods to gather data, even now I get 'Connection Closed error box after I leave it for a while - hence gaps in data. The config stuff was only necessary for the LITE classics and even then one of the most important config setting DATE and TIME was not there.
This is where MyMidnite is proving an excellent reporting system, albeit only graphical at the moment, but I am hoping Andrew will get the node14 text/numerical list into it then we can get a complete data report.
I, for one, am definitely encouraged by this progress, and it must be a significant addition to the Midnite Classic system, hopefully encouraging others to become Classic users... 8)
dgd
An app for Android, Ubuntu/Debian, Raspbian, etc... that would run via cron job polling all information into a text file then let me design the display would be beyond awesome.
- Jeff
dgd;
I guess my view is "overall" and not any specific piece of the puzzle. I agree there is a LOT of improvement lately and I meant nothing negative by my comments.
Bottom line for me is the ability to grab data and process it locally. The local app is cute and all but I still have issues with the live data and disconnects. Probably related to the severe lack of support for Linux by Adobe and the ancient version I have to use.
I am also likely one of very few users more interested in the raw data to process locally than the online buzzers and bells.
To be brutally honest we have our system in place for if / when power is unavailable via the grid and if / when the grid fails the internet will be one of the dependent systems that will fail. When / if that day comes I want to be able to monitor my system here without the need for outside systems. No, I am not paranoid, just practical and I know I can only truly rely on myself.
Just my situation.
Just sayin..
Tom
Quote from: unyalli on June 12, 2013, 10:40:27 PM
An app for Android, Ubuntu/Debian, Raspbian, etc... that would run via cron job polling all information into a text file then let me design the display would be beyond awesome.
- Jeff
Jeff;
Some users are already doing this, thanks to RossW. Check out the "Black Box" thread for binaries to do just that for Raspbian on a Pi, Ubuntu 11.10 on a PC and OSX on a Macinsquash:
http://midniteforum.com/index.php?topic=1094.msg9695#msg9695 (http://midniteforum.com/index.php?topic=1094.msg9695#msg9695)
Tom
Quote from: TomW on June 12, 2013, 10:55:11 PM
Bottom line for me is the ability to grab data and process it locally.
Tom, just posted new source that's added a couple of additional modes just for you ;)
-ixxx Interval (how many seconds between logging events)
-l Log-to-local. Will create (if required) and append to a text file, a bunch of registers.
Call from cron if you like, or use the -c (continuous) and -i (interval) flags to just read and log.
Quote from: TomW on June 12, 2013, 10:55:11 PM
To be brutally honest we have our system in place for if / when power is unavailable via the grid and if / when the grid fails the internet will be one of the dependent systems that will fail. When / if that day comes I want to be able to monitor my system here without the need for outside systems. No, I am not paranoid, just practical and I know I can only truly rely on myself
This would make a good general category discussion topic. I sort of agree with your view especially the last sentence.
Thats why I am off grid. I suppose its a case of being prepared for the worst scenario while hoping it never occurs.
dgd
Quote from: dgd on June 13, 2013, 05:12:37 AM
Quote from: TomW on June 12, 2013, 10:55:11 PM
To be brutally honest we have our system in place for if / when power is unavailable via the grid and if / when the grid fails the internet will be one of the dependent systems that will fail. When / if that day comes I want to be able to monitor my system here without the need for outside systems. No, I am not paranoid, just practical and I know I can only truly rely on myself
This would make a good general category discussion topic. I sort of agree with your view especially the last sentence.
Thats why I am off grid. I suppose its a case of being prepared for the worst scenario while hoping it never occurs.
dgd
We are all in agreement here!
That is why we have made the Classic's MODBUS spec available and provided the Local App. Ross and others are making very good progress with their local logging applications, there are modscan, modpoll, javamod, and a handful of other 3rd party monitoring tools available which can all be used on-site if there is no Internet connection available. If there is no Internet available, then there is also no remote monitoring. you have a lot of options for local monitoring, though!
Remote monitoring may be be available with a cell modem if you are lucky enough to have cell service at your site and don't mind the feds tapping your info: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jun/06/nsa-phone-records-verizon-court-order (http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jun/06/nsa-phone-records-verizon-court-order)
Quote from: atop8918 on June 13, 2013, 05:58:00 AM
That is why we have made the Classic's MODBUS spec available and provided the Local App. Ross and others are making very good progress with their local logging applications
Indeed. I just sent Tom new code today to address his current issue. Added "local logging". Will write to a local, flat text file, the same (identical) data that it would have sent to my server, except it adds a local timestamp. Also added the option to specify how frequently it logs. From 1 to (2^16) seconds. In reality, anything less (frequent) than 10 minutes is in my opinion a waste of effort.
I've got bogged down with over-subscribed time (committed to 4 big jobs, each has blown out (change in scope) and I've ended up with about 5 months work to do in 6 weeks, when I expected 4 jobs of about a week to 10 days each). Anyhow, "feature requests" on the pile include sql, local graphing, task-bar icon and a few other things. One is a "daemon mode" where my app will talk to the classic and accept multiple, simultaneous modbus-over-ethernet requests (local app, other modbus logging, etc) requests. We'll get to them, in time. The main push behind this is for *LOCAL* everything. That it ever sent data to my servers was only ever a stopgap because it was the path of least resistance to me at the time, to get graphing going. (That was about an hours work, not goodness knows how long writing something that was portable across different platforms!)
Suggestions..
I have had a week of decent data to really see how MyMidnite works, looks and feels.. Overall mpression is that this is the best recent history graphing package I have seen for any solar controller.
When the display loads or is reloaded using the browser refresh the dates in Classic panel at at 1 Jan 1970.
The line at top right showing dates 'from and to ' is pointless, its obviously apparent what date range is covered fromthe main display.
The four range buttons DAY WEEK MONTH YEAR are also meaningless. There are the last 14 days of data made available and the white sliding indicator can be widened to cover from several hours out to the full 2 weeks. The data is compressed or spread out as needed tofit the main display window. All that WEEK achieves is to widen this slider over 7 days, you could do this easily for all ranges up to 14 days when in the DAY display.
The MONTH and YEAR are identical with MONTH allowing 6months for the slider to move on and the YEAR allowing 12 months
Everything you can do in expanding/compressing data canbe achieved in both.
Currently if you press MONTH while in DAY then all Classic graphs change to the MONTH view, Nicer if this was individually controller for each Classic
Therefore I would suggest removing these buttons.
Instead in the Chart Controls window for each Classic have a DAY/MONTH toggle, where DAY shows the current 14 days and MONTH shows the 12 month range. Also since the MONTH shows different data stats then these need to auto change in the chart controls as DAY or MONTH is selected.
This would allow each Classic graph to be individually controlled. The data slider would then have to be specific for its own Classic.
Again back to the date slider. The more I look at it the more unnecessary it seems to be ie to have a miniature graph representation of the 14 days that is one quarter the height of the main graph window. I find this miniature graph distracts from
the main graph, its visual 'noise' that is not necessary to convey real information.
As suggested before, I would have the white slider window just slide over the dates for the two weeks of available data. Since its so easy to see all 14 days in the main graph by simply widening the white slider I don't see any point in having a mini graph under the slider, it does not serve any real purpose. Same for MONTH display.
I can understand there is perhaps some reluctance to remove this mini graph as its clear a lot of though and effort has went into it and no doubt much programming effort but for MyMidnite this really is a case of LESS is better... with the advantage that the main graph could be made taller :D
dgd
..another small suggestion
When two Classics' graphs are displayed it would nice to have an option to match up the graph scales between the two.
It looks slightly off with power, for example, when one scale goes to 1Kw and the other to 3kw. If there is average 800w and 1.5kw
then the power blue bars make it visually look like the lower power Classic is producing more power.
If there was a chart control to rescale both to the larger of the two then it would be more visually accurate.
Just an idea but not very important in the the big scheme... :)
dgd