Links lost, sort of...

[andrew67]

OK,

So I did an upgrade from the isy 99i to the 994i. All went smoothly. I then added a scene, cleaned up a few things I'd been meaning to do. Removed and re-added the dual band device which was unsupported on the 99i, and checked. everything appears to work.

 

So then I went to go look at how I did my bathroom all off button, and I couldn't find where the scene trigger was.... OK, must be a link was lost...

I went and checked, and the scene still works. Pushing the D button immediately turns off all lights in the bathroom...

 

So then I checked the link tables in the device. ISY 994 thinks all links are OK. but it doesn't show the D button connected to anything... Yet the D button is clearly connected. I power cycled the control in question, and it still is able to control the scene.

 

So this is clearly a bug in the ISY handling of INSTEON. It can lose track of a link, and even with diagnostics we can't figure it out.

 

Thoughts? I can supply whatever files you would like... I don't really know when the link inside the ISY was lost, but I do have some backup files and I can dump link tables if its needed.

 

Thanks!

[LeeG]

Run Show Device Links Table on the KeypadLinc followed by a Compare when the link record display completes. Post the popup with the Compare results.

 

To restate the circumstances from a different perspective, an ISY Scene definition exists with various bathroom devices as Responders. The KeypadLinc button D was a Controller of the Scene at some point in the past but is no longer shown as a Controller of the ISY Scene.

 

Is this correct?

 

Is the Scene definition correct except for button D no longer listed as Controller?

[andrew67]

Your other comments are correct. the D button was set to turn the scene OFF. I forgot exactly how I did that so I went looking for it. I think the method I like uses the button toggle mode.

[Xathros]

Sounds and looks to me like you have a program like:

 

If
Control  RL2-D is Switched Off

Then
 Set Bathroom Scene Off

Else

 

-Xathros

[andrew67]

Yes, you would think so, except that while I have done programs like that before, this one was specifically set up to be "faster" i.e. to not require a program.

 

And if I pull the plug on the ISY, it still works correctly. So its obviously NOT a program running on the ISY...

 

Hence the question remains...

 

[ motivation ]

 

If there are links that the ISY doesn't know about, i suppose that can be considered ok. If there are links the ISY loses track of, I suppose that can be ok too. But when you compare link tables and the ISY and switches have different functionality but the same link table, then we have a bug that will find a way to create huge problems somehow. especially when you go to add more links... or remove links, and stuff will just stop working, or, worse, there will be dangling links to non-existent devices which won't respond and will slow the whole system to a crawl as every command retries a dozen times.

 

Insteon is already slow enough....

[LeeG]

Button D is the Controller of ten Responders plus the PLM. The ISY is aware of all of these as the Compare results show "Identical". Are there more devices in the bathroom being controlled by button D than the ten listed Responders?

[andrew67]

no,

 

but, the Gui does not show Button D connected to anything, and the scene does not include button D as a controller.

 

Want screenshots?

[LeeG]

Sure. Also what is the ISY firmware level?

[andrew67]

ISY firmware 4.0.5

[LeeG]

Thanks for all the additional data. I believe the problem is the result of an issue in an earlier ISY image involving a Scene that had a Secondary button as Controller with the KPL Load also being controlled by the Scene. Not sure if recreating the Scene will resolve the problem or perhaps the KPL itself has to be deleted and added back under 4.0.5. The problem is old enough that I have not found the topic that documents the problem to see what the solution is. Since the Scene no longer has a reference to button D just recreating the Scene may not clean up the KPL link table.

[andrew67]

OK, so are you saying that there's no internal consistency check at all?

 

Or rather that there is no way to even tell without visually checking every scene yourself that the correct links have been written?

 

That seems awful.

 

How do I figure out if other things have disappeared? or if there are stale links?

 

In fact, how do I tell even if I delete the scene and the kpl, and add both back that other devices in the scene then won't have 2 copies of the link, the one now partly missing, and the new one? Since these devices are part of other scenes too, including one that has all interior devices in it, it seems that this doesn't end..

 

I can't start from scratch, that's kind of the whole point of having the ISY to begin with... Link management...

 

Can you explain how its possible that the ISY agrees with the link table and doesn't show the right information in the gui at the same time?

[LeeG]

"OK, so are you saying that there's no internal consistency check at all?"

 

I do not have access to the code but I would assume the ISY link table information is not sanity checked against the Scene information since you are not getting errors.

 

"Or rather that there is no way to even tell without visually checking every scene yourself that the correct links have been written?"

 

It is not the device links that are wrong, the 'what scene is a particular node is in' information that is not accurate in this case.

 

"How do I figure out if other things have disappeared? or if there are stale links?"

 

I believe the problem centered around Secondary buttons controlling the load but I can't find the topic that I am think about to confirm that. It was an older problem that has long since been resolved.

 

"how do I tell even if I delete the scene and the kpl, and add both back that other devices in the scene then won't have 2 copies of the link"

 

When the KPL is added back use the default 'remove existing links' option.

 

"Can you explain how its possible that the ISY agrees with the link table and doesn't show the right information in the gui at the same time?"

 

The device link table matches the ISY link information because the problem is not with the link records.

 

If I can find the old topic perhaps it will have some additional detail.

[andrew67]

LeeG:

 

Ya. I think I'm getting a sense that there are 2 different databases involved, and that there is no actual enforced consistency between them. Just a set of routines that make changes to both at the same time...

 

Unfortunately this creates the "black art" kind of structure where you have to do certain things in a certain order if there is a problem or else you have no idea what ends up happening.

 

I'm very wary of just taking your suggestion and making more mods to my system because my experience with corrupted databases suggests that thats a bad idea until I get an answer from someone who knows how all of the interactions work... Do I need to submit a bug report?

 

This does explain however the lack of a menu option for "check all of my device links" Wouldn't actually make the scene list and links match...

[LeeG]

I would suggest opening a ticket. The link is at the bottom of any post by Michel.

[Michel Kohanim]

Please submit the ticket one more time and this time with CONTACT information such as email address or phone number and not just 'I'.

 

With kind regards,

Michel

[andrew67]

That must have been a browser incompatilbility... It was all filled out when I pressed submit.