Insteon Switch - Program Issue

[fmk2]

I have a program that turns on certain lights in the evening, including the cans in our living room.  This program has been running for many years without issues.  But recently, the living room Insteon switch has stopped responding to the program.  The switch works fine locally and via the Admin Console or UD Mobile, but when my program runs the switch doesn't respond.

I've tried resetting the switch and then Restoring the device, but it hasn't helped.

Are there other things I can try, or is this switch now defective in some way?

[tazman]

If you right click on the program you can pick run then and the program should execute, if that works then there is probably something wrong with your If part of the program. If all seems fine I would try recreating the program.

[Guy Lavoie]

If it turns on from the Admin Console, the switch itself appears to be ok. The issue appears to be the program.

Have you tried right clicking on the program and selecting "Run Then"? That would execute the actual instructions immediately. If that doesn't work, try editing the program by simply re-selecting the same devices for the "Then" statements (as if you were changing them) and then saving the program, and retest.

 

[oberkc]

Another factor that can affect performance is a change in your electronic situation around the house.  If yours is like mine, you have prolifically added/modified/moved (new appliances, computers, gadgets) to your house.  All this can affect the quality of the electric power and the performance of Insteon.  

I have also suspected that, as Insteon devices age, the memory can become less reliable and links can become corrupted.  Unfortunately, you have already tried the steps (restore) that would usually remedy this problem, at least temporarily.  

[fmk2]

Thanks for the replies.

Yes, I've run the program from the "Run Then" option, and all the lights in the program respond except this one switch.    Likewise, everything but the one switch responds to "Run Else".  And as I mentioned, this isn't a new program — it's been running fine for years.

I was hoping maybe there was something I could do to get it to start responding, but it sounds like the switch is probably defective.

[paulbates]

We haven't seen the program. Do you turn on the light as a device or in a scene? If in a scene, remove the switch from the scene and add it back in, then retest

[Guy Lavoie]

Did you try re-selecting the same switch from your device list, as if you were editing the program, then saving the changes?

If the switch works ok from the Admin Console, I doubt that it's defective. I really looks like it's something in the program. How about making a test program with just that switch as an action? If that works, you could try recreating your initial program.

[fmk2]

OK, here's the program:

The switch in question is 'Living Area / LR Lights'.

I haven't tried creating a test program as Guy suggested... I should have thought of that.  I'll try that today.

[Guy Lavoie]

Ok, have you tried editing the program, by clicking on the line "Set 'Living Area / LR Lights' On Level 72%", and then selecting the exact same device from the list, and the other options for that line, and then clicking on "update" (this sounds irrelevant, but sometimes the actual link to the device can get lost and needs to be redone that way). then Save Changes and test "Run then" again.

Creating a test program would also be a good test.

[fmk2]

Yes, I have tried reselecting the switch, hitting "Update" and then Saving.  No change.

I wrote a quick test program that was set to execute at 1:45pm.  It included that switch and one other so I had a known-good switch to compare with.  In the test program, the problem switch came on as expected, but the so-called known-good switch did not come on and the eisy reported no longer having communication with it!  Maybe it's a coincidence, but the timing seems suspicious.

I'll try deleting and reselecting the problem switch (again) in my program and see if that fixes the issue.  Worst case, I guess I could delete the program and recreate it in entirety — it's not like it's a huge program.

As for the known-good switch that now has communications issues, I suppose I need to address that separately.

Tons of fun.

[Guy Lavoie]

That's awkward. Maybe there are communications issues (ie: noise) causing issues. Maybe it's caused by one of the other switches being turned on before it. Just for fun, try swapping the first and third items (the third being the problem one) and see if that changes anything. Or, since the routine is scheduled, try putting the problem switch in it's own program (and removing it from the original program), but schedule it one minute before the original program. Just trying to narrow down what the problem might be. 

[fmk2]

Pulling the switch into it's own program as a test is a good idea.  I'll do that this afternoon and see if the program runs successfully at the designated time.

I had something else odd happen last evening.  A program that I have to dim the lights when watching TV ran on its own.  It isn't a scheduled program — I normally run it from a button on the UD Mobile dashboard — but it ran twice within about 10 minutes.

At that point, I decided something must be scrambled in the eisy, so I rebooted it.  No strange behavior yet today, so we'll see how things go.

[fmk2]

After fairly extensive testing, both on the problem switch on its own (with a test program), and by making various modifications to the program in question, I've learned a few things — and effectively solved the problem:

• I discovered that the feedback from Z-Wave switches to UD Mobile is very slow... on the order of 20-30 seconds.  I noticed this by watching the status of the switches in UD Mobile when running the program.
• That led me to wonder if the delay with Z-Wave might be interfering with communication to the problem Insteon switch, which was the last switch in my program.
• Playing with various "Wait" times to try to let the Z-Wave communication finish didn't help.
• Moving the problem switch to the top of the program (making it the first switch to be turned on) did work, but only if I used the "On" command to that switch.  Using the  "On Level" command that I had been using resulted in the Insteon switch not responding.

I've now set the default On Level for the Insteon switch at the level I want the lights set to when the program runs.  With that set, I can issue the "On" command in the program and the lights come on to the level specified in the switch settings.

So in the end, the problem was likely the use of the "On Level" command rather than any delay or interference from the Z-Wave devices, although it may have been a combination of the two... it's hard to tell.

Regardless, it seems I may have found the solution.

 

[Guy Lavoie]

I cannot possibly see how Zwave and Insteon could interfere with each other. Two totally different systems.

But keep observing how your changes work out, and let us know.

[Techman]

@fmk2

There should be no delay with UDMobile showing the status of a Zwave device. Have your run a sync on UDMobile lately?  You may have poor communications in your Zwave mesh network. Do you have anyZwave repeaters installed?  Are your Zwave devices 300, 500 or 800 series?

Programs execute from the top down, being that in your program a zwave device is first in line it's possible that it negatively impacted your program.

Moving the Insteon device to the top of the THEN statement should correct it for now.

 

 

[fmk2]

2 hours ago, Techman said:

@fmk2

There should be no delay with UDMobile showing the status of a Zwave device. Have your run a sync on UDMobile lately?  You may have poor communications in your Zwave mesh network. Do you have anyZwave repeaters installed?  Are your Zwave devices 300, 500 or 800 series?

Programs execute from the top down, being that in your program a zwave device is first in line it's possible that it negatively impacted your program.

Moving the Insteon device to the top of the THEN statement should correct it for now.

 

 

No, I haven't run a sync lately.  That's a good idea, I'll do that now.

I now also have another issue.  A couple Insteon lights — specifically the Living Room and Kitchen — are turning on without any program or switch being activated.  It always happens at 21 minutes after the hour, but not every hour.  I'm still investigating, but I can't find any reason for it so far.

[Techman]

It's possible that their link tables got corrupted. Run a diagnostics/compare on each if the devices to verify the link tables.

Another possibility is that they somehow ended up in a program that runs 21 minutes past the hour. Click on Programs / Summary to see if a program ran at 21 minutes past the hour.

What are your firmware and UI versions?

 

 

[fmk2]

18 hours ago, Techman said:

It's possible that their link tables got corrupted. Run a diagnostics/compare on each if the devices to verify the link tables.

Another possibility is that they somehow ended up in a program that runs 21 minutes past the hour. Click on Programs / Summary to see if a program ran at 21 minutes past the hour.

What are your firmware and UI versions?

 

 

Firmware and UI versions are 5.6.3.

Looking at the programs summary, I do see a couple programs that ran when we saw unscheduled light changes.  One at 11:21pm last night (I woke up around 2am to find the living room lights on), and another at 11:22am this morning (my wife reported that the kitchen and living room lights turned off at that time).  But neither of the programs that ran are scheduled... they run only on demand via a button on the UD Mobile dashboard.

I'll run diagnostics on the devices that are in these programs and see if there's a problem with the link tables.  If so, I'll run "Restore Device" on them.

[Techman]

Current UI and firmware for the eisy/polisy is 5.9.1  You should consider updating as the current release contains improvements and bug fixes. Be sure to read the release note before updating and also make sure you have a backup.

It's possible that the program that ran at 11:21 may be corrupted. Can you post a screen shot of that program.

You should also do a sync on UDMobile.

[fmk2]

I've done syncs on UDMobile recently, the most recent being yesterday.

I didn't realize my firmware was out of date.  I'm used to the ISY telling me when there's an update available, but the eisy hasn't done that.  But no problem... I did the update — including Update Packages — so everything should be current now.

I have a total of 3 programs that ran at random times without being triggered, but all of them ran at 21 minutes after the hour for some reason.

We did have a power outage recently, and I realized that these issues popped up shortly after that time.  So I suspect that may have scrambled some things in the eisy.  Now that I've updated the firmware and rebooted, I'm hoping things will settle down.  I'll let the system run for today, and see if there are any other incidents overnight.

Edited March 21 by fmk2

[Techman]

You should sync UDMoible again being that you updated your firmware.

If those programs randomly run again then you should probably delete and recreate them.

It's possible that your power outage may have caused your issues. You should consider putting your eisy/polisy on a UPS, but not the PLM.

[fmk2]

Thanks for all the assistance.

I've now re-synced UDMobile as well.

Since doing the package upgrades, I'm getting a recurring connect/disconnect from the ST-Inventory node.  The log shows this error:

[fmk2]

Thanks for all the assistance.

Since doing the package upgrades and a reboot, I'm now getting  repeated Connected messages from the ST-Inventory node, one every 30 seconds or so.  If I look at the log, I see this error is repeating with each notification:

2025-03-21 11:59:40 error: NS: uncaughtException: Cannot read properties of undefined (reading 'nodes')

TypeError: Cannot read properties of undefined (reading 'nodes')

at Controller.onDiscover (/var/polyglot/pg3/ns/0021b9026200_5/Nodes/ControllerNode.js:50:29)

at new Controller (/var/polyglot/pg3/ns/0021b9026200_5/Nodes/ControllerNode.js:37:9)

at Interface._addNodeToList (/var/polyglot/pg3/ns/0021b9026200_5/node_modules/polyinterface-v3/lib/Interface.js:523:19)

at /var/polyglot/pg3/ns/0021b9026200_5/node_modules/polyinterface-v3/lib/Interface.js:582:20

at Array.forEach (<anonymous>)

at Interface._onConfig (/var/polyglot/pg3/ns/0021b9026200_5/node_modules/polyinterface-v3/lib/Interface.js:578:18)

at Interface._onMessageQueued (/var/polyglot/pg3/ns/0021b9026200_5/node_modules/polyinterface-v3/lib/Interface.js:361:17)

at dataq.process (/var/polyglot/pg3/ns/0021b9026200_5/node_modules/polyinterface-v3/lib/Queue.js:28:26)

at dataq.add (/var/polyglot/pg3/ns/0021b9026200_5/node_modules/polyinterface-v3/lib/Queue.js:18:10)

at /var/polyglot/pg3/ns/0021b9026200_5/node_modules/polyinterface-v3/lib/Interface.js:336:26

 

I tried restarting the node, but that didn't help.

 

Is there a simple solution for this, or is it something I should post in the Polyglot forum?

Edited March 21 by fmk2

[fmk2]

Never mind... the Inventory node isn't a big deal.  I just deleted it.

[Techman]

Try reinstalling the node server, it should work.