Insteon Communication Program

[toflaherty]

There's some pretty common knowledge on this forum about identifying the quality of insteon communications, but it takes some detective work, which I fear is above the level of most users.  Basically, the procedure seems to be to run the event viewer at level 3 and watch for anywhere hops left < 2.  It seems like it would be a huge help if the ISY automatically logged whenever hops left < 2, along with which device initiated the signal.

 

I'm not sure if it's possible to determine which devices the signal travelled through, if any, but that would be a cool feature too.

 

What I'm picturing is that whenever you log into the admin console, there would be an area which shows a summary of devices that are not responding with strong communication.  The user could then put an access point near these devices to see if it improves anything over a few days without needing to leave a computer running the event viewer, then post-processing the logs.

 

I'm sure there are many people with marginal/intermittent insteon comms that don't know about it until there is a problem and something stops responding, or they notice something becomes intermittent.  A feature like this would help establish strong communication from the beginning, as well as greatly simplify identifying which devices need signal help quickly and easily.

 

I couldn't find if something like this was asked before, so I apologize if it was already suggested by someone else.  I hope such a feature is feasible.  It seems like this would greatly help improve insteon as a system to new adopters of the technology.

[LeeG]

Hops Left=1 is normal for a device on the opposite 120 leg (ISY does not know which 120v leg is powering device).

Hops Left=0 is normal when device starts with a Max hops=1.

 

The idea is interesting but there are some challenges to produce useful information.

[toflaherty]

LeeG - another great example of things I am still learning after over a year of using this stuff.  I find this kind of stuff interesting as a hobby, but I know I am in the minority.  There's no chance many other people would put the time and effort into getting a system like this to the point I have, and I still feel like I don't know enough to take very good advantage of the capabilities yet.

 

The idea was just an attempt to try to reduce the learning curve a little bit and help point to issues that are easily fixed that aren't really "problems" as new people would see them.  I just worry that without making all of this easier, it won't advance like it could.

[stusviews]

Most posters probably stated as a hobby. Chances are everyone who posts at some time put in more than enough time and effort to feel frustrated by how little they knew