kewashi

Hey @kck thanks for this post and this observation. As I was writing HousePanel I came to this same realization. This is why 90% of the code is generic and it supports three types of smart home hubs - SmartThings, Hubitat, and ISY. The ISY port was drop-dead easy because of the points you are making. With this system you can also mix and match items from multiple hubs onto a single tile, and so on and so forth. The key is the visual is abstracted from the server back end, so what the user sees is hub independent. There are some caveats because some hubs just act differently - for example, ISY hubs have no concept of thing type while SmartThings does. Anyway, your point is well taken and has been a guiding design principle behind HousePanel from its very early days.

Hey @madcodger I am fully in line with you and working on a proposal to do just that. I have been in discussions with @Michel Kohanim about this and I owe him that proposal. I'm working on it as we speak. One thing you and others can do to help is to provide feedback on alternative user interfaces. I am mocking up a few screens that I would like to use this community to iterate with me to get them just right. Once the mocked up screens are good, I can then fill in the code behind them. Another thing you and others can do to help is provide me with quotes like the ones in your prior post that I have permission to use in my proposal. This will serve as the "voice of the customer" if you will. Finally, if you know anyone who is a really good "node.js" developer looking for remote work, and who wouldn't be too expensive (I'm thinking of gifted young people looking for some exposure) please send them my way. I'm not interested in high priced SW consultants. I will come back in this thread soon with the first mockup. Until then let me just share that my initial thinking is to completely ditch the ISY Finder java launcher and the Java admin console. In it's place would be a Node-driven HTML5 interface, assisted with VUE or jQuery (or both), launched from any browser. This interface would display to a user all available nodes and perform all both end-user and admin functions served by the Java app. It would also replace the ISY Portal functionality found at: https://my.isy.io/index.htm with a modern look. FInally, I envision this running as a Node server on a Polisy box so it would be integrated in with the Polyglot service -- but I need to do some more studying to figure out how that would work. In short, it would pull together the following three disparate GUI's - and add an end-user dashboard functionality with the current HousePanel feature. And of course it would be mobile friendly.

Thanks very much - one comment... if you have a polisy box, it runs much better there than on a rPI. Just ssh into your polisy and follow the same instructions. Then use the URL of your polisy box to launch the app. This is how I am running it in my house.

That’s the plan and the goal. I’m even thinking it can be merged with a Polyglot app so it actually is an install of a poly node - since both can be Node.js servers. More to come

Hi folks ... making steady progress. New version of HousePanel posted today - Version 2.228 Also I'm excited to share the first wave of tutorial videos for how to install and operate HousePanel. These videos show you how to setup HousePanel on a rPi or a Polisy box, and how to get tiles set up and configured. More will be added to the same YouTube channel so please be sure to bookmark the channel for future reference. Enjoy.

The documentation on www.housepanel.net is woefully out of date - and it was written for the SmartThings and Hubitat version that was riding on top of a web server. The ISY modified version is a pure Node app that works great on a smart phone or tablet. It is also a ton easier to set up as the videos explain. With that said, there is a lot to do to migrate out of hobby mode.

I completely agree and totally get it. HousePanel at present is transitioning from "hobby" mode to "pro" mode - but it isn't there yet. I just finished making some videos that given instructions for setting it up. Next I will make an automatic script. Next I am investigating an automated setup that just works by installing onto a Polisy box. Its all work in progress. I know there is a market out there for this for all the reasons you stated which is why I'm motivated to make the transition. Stay tuned. In the meantime, if you or others want to use it as-is, these videos should help:

Hi everybody - I spent the week updating HousePanel and developing introductory YouTube videos that I plan to post tomorrow. I think when you see these you will see that HousePanel is the future of smart home GUI’s. The ISY interface is fully customizable and built on industry standard CSS and HTML5 tech. I would love to hear your feedback. Michel - I found and squashed the bug we discussed. I also added some new goodies that I think you will like. Whether you like HousePanel or not, my advice is for ISY to insist on a solution that is flexible and based on industry standards. If there is a better option than HousePanel then go for it I haven’t seen one. stay tuned.

Thanks ... tracking down the bug that gets new devices confused upon first install. Only shows up on new installs so it’s hard to find. Stay tuned. Michel- I recall you saw this bug show up in your testing.

One more update... next I will focus on the video and pulling together the business model, so stay tuned. This update includes full support for variables and programs. You can display or change variables, and you can activate any of the elements of a program from a HousePanel tile. The eye candy below shows two tiles reflecting programs. The first one is the default look. The second one has been customized using the built in tile editor to show off how flexible the GUI editor is. Just grab the latest in the GitHub repo and give it a whirl. This will likely be the last update before I lock down the code into a commercial mode so enjoy.

HP can do this without any coding. You just have to create a display only skin. This skin hides the values and shows icons. You can show both or show only the values like “on” or “DON” or “present” etc. the tile editor can do this too but it would be tedious to go through each tile type. On the scaling, the default skin sets some tiles to a fixed size. This can be changed in a new skin to auto scale all tiles to their content. Or you can mix and match. HP just renders whatever the skin says and it’s all in standard CSS. I have two other skins that I will dust off to show what I mean above. Here's the first one - I call it "skin-modern". It has a cleaner more modern look. Notice the blue buttons are gone as I put this skin in Kiosk mode so users can't edit things. I will add this skin to the GitHub repo in the next release.

Hi folks - I uploaded Version 2.225 of HousePanel to GitHub today. This version includes minor bug fixes and adds support for both "int" and "state" variables. Both variable types will show up as fields in a tile with the name "Variables". The field values are the variable values set on the ISY and they will update dynamically as they are changed on your ISY. If you like you can even use these in the Rule engine provided on the HousePanel side to do things like "if a variable is greater than 5, then turn on a Hubitat light. Here are simple instructions for how to install HP. I abandoned the NPM install method so only the GitHub repo will work. You just need to clone it or download the zip file. git clone https://github.com/kewashi/hpserver.git cd hpserver sudo npm install node hpserver.js >& hpserver.log & The above is an exact copy of what I did on my Polisy to install it there. Once that is done, then just launch your browser and point it to the URL of your Polisy or your rPI - or wherever you did the install. Here's some "eye candy" to give you a view of what HP can do. I am working on a video to show how to go through the install and config steps and to show off some of the GUI features. I now have tested it with a Z-Wave Ecomotion motion detector and it works just fine. I'm also working on a transition plan to a B2B model so stay tuned for that. And have fun playing now - once the B2B model is launched these early adopt freeware versions will stop. Until then I would love to get some more feedback from early adopters on their experience so I can make it better.

You can do what you are asking by defining your own skin that renders tiles as text objects. You will need to know how to write CSS to do this. I had a skin called skin-plain that was like this but it was more work than I wanted to do to keep it current. The HousePanel architecture is set up to allow you to render tiles however you want. Just take some time. Start by going into the GUI editor select Edit on the menu on the bottom the click the green circle the select icons and disable them change the text opacity from 0 to near 100 so the text shows up. Rinse and repeat ken

Updated. Version with bug fixes posted to GitHub - Version 2.221 This includes a powerful rule engine that I will document soon on the website

Glad you got it going. Let me know your feedback.

Thanks @Michel Kohanim that would explain it. All of my testing has been done using http. I didn't even know you could use https with the ISY hub. Ken

Well ... I haven’t seen that before. It looks like the app is have trouble connecting to your ISY to retrieve the nodes. This error message is in the callback from the REST api call to retrieve nodes. It isn’t done with a TLS security token so I am stumped about that. Do you have your ISY configured with TLS? If so I may need to change the headers. Let me research that and get back with you.

One more thing... there was a bug in versions prior to 2.220 so if you have a version before that, update to the latest.

Hmmm well that is progress - you are getting close. Do they show up when you pick the "Show Info" button on the bottom bar? Try restarting your server. Do a kill -9 pid and then restart it using the same prior command: node hpserver.js & Take a look into your .log file to see if it gives you any hints. Let me know what it says.

There was a problem with the way I had it uploaded to npm so try grabbing the source from GitHub as explained above. Let me know if that works better.

Hey @Michel Kohanim and others interested in HousePanel. Today I posted the first truly stable and tested version of HousePanel for ISY. Please replace any prior versions you may have been tinkering with, with this version 2.220 found on GitHub here: https://github.com/kewashi/hpserver Installation instructions are: - copy all files from the GitHub repository, or clone it as usual using "git clone https://github.com/kewashi/hpserver.git" - in the folder where the main files are, run "npm install" (do not list the name of the app after install as this is a local install) - after npm does it's thing, you are ready to launch the server. I suggest piping the debug output to a file using this command: node hpserver.js >& hpserver.log & - give it about 30 seconds to initialize and then launch a browser and point it to your server where you did the above install and port 3080 for example, if you installed it on your Polisy or a Raspberry PI, point to that IP address with port 3080. My Polisy is on 192.168.1.50 so I go to: http://192.168.1.50:3080 This will show you the main HousePanel page. You will be logged in as user "default" which you can change from the Options page. From this page you can explore all the features of HousePanel and play with the two clock tiles that are by default put into each room. But to see the full power of HP, you will need to link a smart home hub. This version supports ISY, SmartThings, and Hubitat hubs. All three can be linked but only one ISY hub is allowed. Multiple Hubitat hubs are allowed. I will explain how to link a hub in a moment, but first I want to show you what HousePanel can do. Here is a screen shot of Version 2.220 with my ISY hub linked and my SmartThings and Hubitat hubs also linked. This screen shows various things that are designed to showcase the flexibility of HousePanel. Let me go through each one: * First, the digital clock tile shows an image of a house in the background. This was selected in the Tile Editor and demonstrates that any tile can have any image of type jpg or png set as the background. The "Home" status in the lower left corner of that tile is the actual state linked from a different tile that contains the home status. This shows how fields can be added to any given tile from any other tile. * The third tile is a Zigbe lamp that has a dimmer capability. Note that the dimmer slider is a different color than the others. I did this to show off that any element of any tile can be customized uniquely. Also note the image is a lamp image. I selected this from a library of options. * The next four tiles are all Ecobee tiles from the Ecobee Polyglot that links my thermostat to my ISY hub. As far as HousePanel knows these are ISY tiles just like any other ISY tile. The formatting of each tile can also be customized. The tiles shown use the default the skin-housepanel skin. (More on skins later). * The analog clock in the second row is a highly customized version of the built in analog clock. I added background color filled circles to make it look cool. * The Office Dome tile is my one and only Insteon light. The responsiveness is amazing on these devices and HP shows that off nicely. * This next tile, "Rule Demo" requires some explanation as it features some of the most amazing capabilities of HousePanel. This is a custom tile. HousePanel can have any number of custom tiles. By default 8 are included but the user can modify that at any time. Custom tiles are place holders for add-ons and mix-ins as I have done here. HP has a built in tile customizer that can be used to add fields from other tiles. Here I have added the state from tile 2 smart home monitor, and a digital time field from the clock tile, and a light switch for my wet bar. The words "Bar Light" are actually a user custom text field. Finally, the blue button underneath Rule Demo is used to trigger a set of commands. These commands are defined in the tile customizer. This particular button was set up to toggle all lights in my office on and off -- but it could have been set to do any number of things. * The Office lamp tile was augmented to show the door status. This is just to show them together. * The door tile was augmented to show another light - this case is the dome light just outside my office. If "rules" and "links" are enabled, then when the door closes, that light will go off. And when it opens, that light will come on. If you don't want links to adopt this behavior you can disable it on the options page. * The office light tile next is just shown slightly larger to convey that tiles can be arbitrary sizes. * Finally, the garage door tile shows a status bar on the bottom. ST and HE tiles keep track of when they were last changed and makes it available as a displayable field. I have not yet implemented this on ISY but I will in a later release. Phew... okay, so now that you see what HP can do, let me explain how to authenticate a hub. Start by clicking on the "HubAuth" button in the bottom ribbon. This will take you to a page that looks like this: For ISY hubs, enter your hub IP in the API Url field, your username in Client ID field, and password in Client Secret field. Then select "Auihorize Hub ..." Yours will probably say "Authorize Hub #0" but mine says Authorize Hub #3 because I have four hubs - One ST, 2 HE, and 1 ISY. It will come back and tell you how many devices it found. Click "Return to HousePanel" after you get that message. Once back in HousePanel, you can then add items to any page using the Edit button and dragging items from the list on the right. Another option is to use the Options menu which will bring up a full blown options page. Full documentation is available at http://www.housepanel.net I know this doc is out-dated so bear with me whiie I update it. Ken

Sounds good ... I’m working hard on debugging it. Making great progress. Should be ready in a few weeks. Latest has the rule feature working. This is one of my favorite features. With this feature a user can define an ad hoc button or switch to operate any number of other devices at once, including devices from different hubs. In my test case I have it turning on and off my office lights where one is a SmartThings light, one is a Hubitat light, and one is an Insteon ISY light. This feature also allows you to link a light to a door so it goes on and off automagically when the door is opened or closed. Similar feature for motion sensor and master lights. Once debugged I think the users here will really like this dashboard.

To run it on the Polisy do this: node hpserver.js >&hp.log & then check the contents of the Hp.log file to ensure it didn’t crash. Send me a post with I’m the crash notice if it crashed.

I already found some bugs of course since posting this. It shouldn’t impact people who want to try just ISY nodes and things. I would wait a day if you want to mix ISY and SmartThings and Hubitat nodes. It will likely continue to a little bumpy as this matures. Update posted to npm and GitHub. By the way, the GitHub repo where you can also download the app is at http://github.com/kewashi/hpserver

[RELEASE HousePanel for ISY] I am excited to share with everyone that the first Beta Version of HousePanel for ISY is now available. You can try it out by installing it using npm as usual as follows: npm install hpserver Or, if you prefer, you can downlaod the source from github and instead do a simple npm install from the folder where you store it. I am running this on my Polisy box and it works like a champ so I would recommend doing that assuming you have one. If you also want to use SmartThings and/or Hubitat devices with HousePanel, you will need to install the HousePanel.groovy application in the respective IDE. If you're a existing ST or HE user, you will know that that involves. The source including HousePanel.groovy can be found here: https://github.com/kewashi/hpserver I have not updated the documentation, but most of the same functionality described at http://www.housepanel.net for SmartThings and Hubitat apply to ISY devices. Supported ISY devices for the moment are limited to switches, dimmers, and thermostats. All other device types can be shown but they cannot be controlled. To get started, start the node server as usual, using "node hpserver.js >& hpserver.log &" This will put all debug statements in a log file. You can also install hpserver.js as a service. Then launch your browser and go to: http://localhost:3080 or if you installed it on a polisy at say 192.168.1.50, then enter http://192.168.1.50:3080 This will shown the default setup which is a digital clock and an analog clock in each room. You can then go to "Hub Auth" to authorize your ISY hub. You will need to enter your username in the clientID field (typically "admin"), and password in the clientSecret field. In the "Fixed Endpoint" field enter: http://yoururl/rest enter anything you like in hub Name, such as "ISY". Then select "Authorize Hub #0". This will read your things into memory. You can then select Return to HousePanel. Then you can use the HousePanel GUI to add things to your pages and edit their look and feel. Lights and dmmers and thermostats can be readily controlled at this point. There is a lot here that I can't fully cover in this short introductory email. Please tinker with it and provide me with feedback. I think this represents the most comprehensive user adjustable GUI available for ISY. May this be the start of something beautiful. **NOTE** I have not yet worked out the business model, but until I do this app is free to use.