larryllix

The LED strips I was referring to were these ones. There are no puck lights. http://stores.ebay.com/dealdelight-store/3528-SMD-LED-Strip-/_i.html?_fsub=4530091016 The bulbs in two brands were also mentioned for comparison. I understood you wanted colour capability also. I now understand you only want single colour 5000K white. My mistake. I have only heard of LED strips that can produce warm while and cool white at 3000K and 6500-8000K. The 5000K sounds like a nice colour for a work surface if you can find one.. Here is a 6000-6500K strip. These things are plenty bright with the 120 LEDs per metre making 24w per the 5m strip. http://www.ebay.com/itm/Hot-Sale-5M-3528-SMD-600-Leds-White-Color-Flexible-Strip-Light-IP65-Waterproof-/281173373025?hash=item41773d3061

A phototransistor should work better. Lights acts as an input to the base of the transistor and they switch cleaner with the amplification of the transistor.

Forget the sticky backing. You need the silicone clamps. Once the LEDs are on for 30 minutes they fall off when the sticky backing get warm. RGB LED strips do not produce white light period and not bright enough to do counter work. The LED strips I have are RGNW and the white is almost useless as it is so purple you can't call it white. The latest LED strips I got are RGBWW and they produce a beautiful white and very bright. The MiLight controller with RGBW or RGBWW strips and bulbs produce identical colours for the same codes except the white as noted above. MiLight / LimitlessLED controllers cannot produce white and RGB colours at the same time. The LED strips can produce all colours with beautiful depth and richness but Hue bulbs are lacking green and blue capability. However Hue bulbs fade slowly and can produce pastels colours whereas MiLight controllers can't. They all take a bridge/hub to convert Ethernet to proprietary2.4GHz RF. MiLight hub is WiFi input and Hue is Hardwired Ethernet. LED strips take a controller wired to a 5 pin socket to connect to pre-terminated RGBW strips. A connector is provided at each end of the 5m strips so you can cut them at 122 cut spots and use them as two prewired pieces. 12v 3-5amp power supplies are required with the 2. x 5.5mm plug on the end or two wires for the terminals, your choice for each section. The ISY Network Module can control the Hubs for either Hue or MiLight hubs easily. MiLight Hubs can only handle four groups with as many controllers as desired in each group. Al bulbs and/or strips within a group will all respond to the same color and brightness. I use two MiLight Hubs for 8 groups with 9 sections. One shares two lamps. I ran out of hubs and don't want more.. Hope that helps some of the purchase confusion.

...and the ramp rate of every dimmable device for each scene so that different breeds of lights can look like all dimming or brightening together. Nice to have slow offs and fast ons for MS applications etc.. etc..

If you referring to my calculations the pullup resistor was calculated to be 3200 ohms and used to calculate that as parallel resistor isn't going to work. A parallel resistor can pull the input down to 0.7 volts but the sensor becomes so insignificant in the circuit that the voltage can never return high enough to switch to he logic high state again with sensor at infinity ohms.

If you used 800 ohms to pull it down to 1v and the supply is 5v then the pullup current is E/R = 1v / 800 = 1.25mA Assuming the pullup source is not a constant current and is just a resistor E/I = 4v / 1.25mA = 3.2k ohms. Now with your sensor in series with the calculated pullup resistor with we have 2.25v therefore the current in the circuit is E / R = (5-2.25)v / 3200 ohms = 0.859mA and your sensor is running at 2.25v / 0.859mA = 2618 ohms To make this sensor pull the voltage down to 0.7 volts we require a circuit with a resistance ratio of 0.7 / 5.0v To get this the current in the pullup (3200 ohm) would be E/R = (5-0.7)v / 3200 = 1.344mA and the resistance of the sensor in parallel with a resistor would be E/I = 0.7v / 1.344mA = 521 ohms Since we have a sensor with (calc) 2618 ohms we need a parallel resistor of 1/Rp = 1/Rt - 1/Rs = 1/521 - 1/2618 = 1/650 Our parallel resistor would have to be 650 ohms. Checking our sensor 'Off' voltage and assuming infinity resistance when dark we have a voltage divider using the 3200 ohm pullup and only the 650 ohm parallel resistance we would have a voltage of 5v x 650 / (3200 + 650) ohm = 0.844 volts. = not enough to switch the I/O Link . A parallel resistance isn't going to work! Need a transistor or a phototransistor with a better curve. E and O.E

Again. To put the MS in linking mode press and hold the button until the red LED starts flashing slowly. Do not press it again until done. I see no off timer or sequence to turn the light off and you have a few redundant lines. Big Bathroom Sensor On - [iD 0016][Parent 0017] If Control 'Bathroom Big-Sensor' is switched On And Control 'Bathroom Big-Sensor' is not switched Off <-------this line runs else. else is empty Then Enable Program 'Big Bathroom Sensor 2 Off' Set Scene 'Live - Key H' Off Wait 15 minutes Set 'Bathroom Big Micro Dim' Off <------------if all else fails turn it off anyway Else - No Actions - (To add one, press 'Action') Big Bathroom Sensor 2 Off - [iD 0019][Parent 0017][Not Enabled] If Control 'Master Bed Motion-Sensor' is switched On And Control 'Master Bed Motion-Sensor' is not switched Off <-------this line runs else....else is empty Then Set 'Bathroom Big Micro Dim' Off Wait 3 seconds Set Scene 'Live - Key H' On Disable Program 'Big Bathroom Sensor 2 Off' Else - No Actions - (To add one, press 'Action')

Read the manual very carefully. I know it's is there and still have trouble finding it when looking to reverify but... The button on the back when held puts the MS into linking mode. Two more taps gets it back to normal. Each tap on the button ends a toggling status to the ISY. So ISY will register motion On/Off/On/Off. This is independent of any other settings. Seven rapid taps on the button will force the Dark sensor to send it's status IF the status has changed. My last one only takes five taps. Make sure the dark level setting is reasonable and point it at alternate lighting levels ie. dark/light/dark/light.... It takes a few seconds for the sensing circuit to readjust each time before doing this.

As a slight variant and addition to that, above, have a very long time off on the bathroom light and if motion is detected in the hallway make an assumption the person left and shorten the time off for the bathroom. If bathroom motion is detected again, reset the sequence and start a very long timer again. This gives a compromise that can work for people not moving too much. I wouldn't put a short auto-Off in a bathroom. You may be caught in the shower in the dark. Energy saving with the new LEDs will never pay for the MS anymore. It's about convenience now. I can walk in most common areas in my home now with my hands full of boxes and never have to touch a lightswitch. I have MSes in all my bedrooms and occasionally I get asked by guests making sure they are not webcams.

The learning curve for event based software can be tough for some people. It will come. I spent a few years working on an event based system that controlled electrical grid systems that controlled a good portion of our economic area of the province. You make mistakes on that one you pay and pay so dummy training systems and emulators were written to prove everything before installation into the real deal. Even still, ISY gave me a run for my money. Now when I look back at programs I wrote a year ago I think, "That's dumb. I could have done it this way, so much better". Don't be discouraged. Use canned programs from people and you will still find yourself improving on them for your needs, and then improving them again, later. It's a cool hobby controlling the world.

I avoid scenes in most cases for clarity and lack of comm handshake. However they do afford an increase in speed for response when ISY is not involved eg. MS/LampLinc and the reduction in lines of code for multiple devices is nice.

But Windows still cannot print out a directory listing. It was so easy on a Unix work-alike system back in the 80s.

Thanks giesen! I've been looking for a service like that for many years. Perfect location too, although I am now 4 hours away but once or twice a year.... I really should give aartech.ca a kick again. They usually have prices in Can that can't be beat.

Control statement are not two state. Statuses are two state. Status can be On or Off Control can be On, Off or neither, Three states..

Well there are a few methods. Use a pink noise generator in the kid's room. Ring the doorbell every five minutes while he/she sleeps to condition a lack of response. Wait until they are teenagers sleeping, then you won't be able to get to answer the door if you try. You have to cook pizza for that

Yup. All devices should also send the analogue value and just let the home automation controller sort it out. Sometime we don't want all the distributed intelligence and want more control, but technology is changing rapidly and it was created in an older technology era....what?... five ten years ago?

Just doing a review of the literature n the two devices the T8900 states it supports third party api whereas the T7900 doesn't. Can the T7900 be controlled from ISY without another box of is another box (RPi) required to comm between the two? Another concern is the use of C degrees. Do these stats suddenly pop up with at least 0.5 degree resolution when C is turned on? I can't find any indication of that.

Thanks Paul. Unfortunately the $190 turns out to be $419 after participation in their RipUglobex shipping program. This is the same baloney that eBay is ripping foreign importers off with. Now our dollar is caving with the oil prices but adding on huge amounts to the already quoted $23 to ship UPS to Canada is ridiculous. I'll be watching closer for other sources but I have t make sure this stat has the capability to run my heating systems.

I've been looking for a Venstar but can't seem to find even a trace of one like the T8900. Seems like they are vapourware.. EDIT: Ooops I just found one at $469...ouch!

You should be able to set your scene to any level you want at any time. Read the example programs here http://forum.universal-devices.com/topic/16694-50-latency-question/

I think of control and status as Control is the signal sent from a device and status is the current state of a device. So you can send and receive a "control On" signal as many times as you want but once the device has "status On" it won't change anymore. Event based programming is quite different than linear flow programming although we do use the latter inside our programs. It can give linear flow programmers a tough time at the beginning.

Interesting I have just had two batteries go dead in MS units and neither reported a lowBatt. One unit had to be factory reset and restored. The other just self-healed after battery replacement. Some testing is coming. I need to fix my variable PS unit first. @Michael. The MS units can take a few minutes after making adjustments to recover and act properly. The factory reset is a prerequisite for the MS units. Over half of mine (I have 9) acted really strange until factory reset.

Those 9v battery clips get broken wires inside them really easily but if you have warranty go after it.

Geeesh. I would get a text message 5 minutes after the visitor left, sometimes. I couldn't rely on that system to notify me before the visitor beat the door down and was driving down the street again. SMS is background processing for the mobile providers and gets delivered when the comms are not busy. I used to be able to rely on Blackberry BBMs for instant messages but even they can come in an hour later lately. The light flash sounds good but I doubt I would see lights outside on the deck in the sun. Insteon really needs a chime. If you went directly into the IO Link, isn't there a way to disconnect the input from the output contact? I created and wired my own system with a relay but the whole thing nullifies your Elk setup.