BlueHome: new visualisation for Android

[Stefaan]

Hi KNX users,

I have developed a visualisation for Android, called BlueHome. Initially it was intended for personal use only, but after positive feedback from friends and family visiting the house, I decided to polish it a bit further and make it public.

You can find it here on Google Play:
https://play.google.com/store/apps/d....seys.bluehome

As I am only using KNX for heating and lighting, the nr of KNX "devices" that BlueHome currently supports may not be sufficient for more advanced users.
Any feedback on missing functionality would be highly appreciated.

Cheers,
Stefaan

Some screenshots:

[2ndsky]

BlueHome: new visualisation for Android

I don't have any Android devices but nevertheless, thanks for sharing. Why don't you make it open source? Maybe others will then implement the missing devices.

[sunnyhd]

Hi Stefaan,

downloaded your app and created 3 devices.
Works really nice and intuitive. To quickly setup a basic KNX visualisation without the need of any other tool its really cool.

Will you implement missing features on user requests or are you planning to make the source public?

Thanks for sharing
Klaus

[Stefaan]

I am not planning to make the source code available, as you can download the "unlocker" app for 4 euro's. This way you can have unlimited amount of devices and export your configuration to other phones or tablets that you have.

But I will add devices upon request...I am also planning to add a "floorplan" view, in which users can add a picture or floorplan or whatever as background and position the devices where they want on top of it...

I am also working on a server part that you could install on a raspberri pi for example. This server part will keep track of datapoint status, temperatures (to get graphs), status of windows/doors as an alarm function, etc.

Once the server is finished, I will update BlueHome such that it can also talk to this server.

Cheers!

[2ndsky]

BlueHome: new visualisation for Android

Hi Stefaan,

I would not use a solution which depends on one developer. If you decide to quit the support for your application than no one can use it anymore. Because there are great open source visualisations which work plattform independent on any HTML browser. But this is just my opinion.

[sunnyhd]

Looking forward to see your floorplan implementation.

Have you seen the smarthome.py project? It could act as your planned server so that you could focus on the frontend side. If your server isn't that far in development maybe worth checking out.

It offers a WebSocket interface to bidirectional transfer data over JSON and can deliver propably all data you need to display graphs, keep track of the status of the knx devices ...

Regards
Klaus

[Stefaan]

@2ndsky

I understand your worries about a single developer. Actually, one of the main reasons for me to go with a KNX system was to avoid a vendor lock in. But for a complete domotica system, we are talking about a large investment both in time and money to replace it.

For BlueHome, the invested money (4 euro) and time (30 minutes to setup your devices) is worth the risk, I believe. Besides, I think the "risk" is very low: as long as Android remains backwards compatible, you will always be able to use BlueHome in its current version. That is very different from the risk of a switching actuator that physically brakes down.

[Stefaan]

@sunnyhd

Thanks for the smarthome.py hint, I will look in to it!

[liteville]

AW: BlueHome: new visualisation for Android

Sehr einfach zu parametrieren funktioniert auf Anhieb. So muss es heut zu Tage sein.
Nicht jeder hat Stunden und Tage Zeit ein Visu aufzubauen.

Hoffe da kommt noch mehr.
Bei der gesparten Zeit bin ich bereit die Euros zu investieren.
Schön aussehen tut's auch noch.

Gruß
Liteville

[sunnyhd]

Hi Stefaan,

first day of use and 2 things I recognized:

1. Sorting the room menu doesnt keep its state. After closing the app the configured order is gone.

2. Dimmer
When I close the app and reopen it the dimmer devices are getting turned off without doing anything. Its a feature...

Regards
Klaus

[sunnyhd]

Sehr einfach zu parametrieren funktioniert auf Anhieb.

Schön ist auch der Busmonitor direkt neben der Erstellung neuer Geräte.
Die Einrichtung der Visu kann wirklich nicht einfacher sein.
Kein Rechner oder ETS Export notwendig, kein HTML Code oder XML gewurschtel.

Für alle die mal eben in 30 Minuten ihre Heizung,Licht, Szenen und Rollläden visualisieren möchten.

Gruß
Klaus

[sunnyhd]

Hi Stefaan,

I created a short feature request list.

Regards
Klaus

Feature Requests:

Devices:
Blinds
up/stop/down

Temperature
Set Temperature

Weatherstation

Window/Door
open/close

Locks
Lock/Unlock

Motion
Message(Text)

Status overview page
- How many lights are on, doors are open...

Device creator
- Possibility to create own devices
- Upload Icons
Many devices are variations of a switch but need a special icon or text so it would be very handy to set own parameters and own icons.

Startpage
- Room to display when starting the app

Server Backend
Keep track of device states,store data for graphs, create logics, timers...
Defined interface to create Backend drivers
- HitServer
- Smarthome.py
- Gira HomeServer
.
.

Design:
When using landscape mode with tablets it would be nice to use more space for the devices. At the moment your logo is presented twice. This space could be used to display more devices.

Landscape/Portrait mode

Picture view
Pictures of the rooms for controlling the devices. Tap on the lamp to turn it on and the image will change to display the new state. Tap on the TV and it will turn on…
Something like shown in this video (starting from 2.50 min)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a7mI...F9F9F8CD49563E

Personally I don't need a Floorplan because I think it gets messy quite fast when you place devices on it.

Camera
Show Frontdoor or kids room and enable background audio when camera does support audio and stream video or refresh jpg by taping on the video/image it goes to fullscreen mode…
Be able to overlay devices to open the front door for example.

Voice Control
- preconfigured Voice commands

Lights
<Turn> [On | Off] (device name)
<Turn> (device name) [On | Off]

Dimmer
<Set | Raise | Lower | Increase | Decrease> (device name) to [0-100] percent

Blinds
(device name) [Up | Down | Stop]

Scenes
<Run | Start | Activate | Execute> (scene name)

Locks
[Lock | Unlock] (device name)


Status
<What is | Give me> the [status] of (device | scene name)
<What is> the [temperature] of (device name)
.
.
.

Dynamic Lists
- Caller list
- Security Messages
- RSS Feeds

Graphs
- Display energy consumption, temperatures...

Tools:
Tasker integration to trigger devices from Tasker Tasks.
https://play.google.com/store/apps/d....taskerm&hl=en

[sunnyhd]

@Stefaan: Hope I didnt scare you with my feature requests...

Regards
Klaus

[Stefaan]

@sunnhd

Certainly not. I think they are all very nice features, and I will try to add them one by one to new updates of BlueHome :-)

I have send you a private message about the bugs you found:
- the room order I fixed
- the problem with the dimmers: I cannot replicate it here at home...

[sunnyhd]

Hi Stefaan,

I can confirm that the order bug is fixed.

The dimmer problem only occured by the one dimmer I tried which was wrong configured in the ETS. All other dimmer work fine.

Thanks for the german translation.

Looking forward to test the upcoming features.

Regards
Klaus