Homeseer Network control of a device

[JohnWPB]

I did some searching on the HS forums, but wow, network and remote are hard keywords are really hard to narrow down the search results!!!!

Does anyone know if there is a way to poll HS over a network? I have an in-wall touchscreen running a program that is capable of sending and receiving information. I am looking to request the status of a HS device, and to send commands to a HS device remotely over the network. I will be using VBscript or AutoIt as the "interpreter " so to speak.

For for instance, I have a vbscript on the in-wall computer, I want to send the command to HS to turn on a lamp, over the network. I am sure there has to be a way to do this, I am just not quite sure how. BTW, I am running HS 1.7x.

Thanks in advance for any help!

 

[DeLicious]

I think you are pretty limited when it comes to HS 1.7x... if you were to upgrade to HS2, there is a script connector plug-in that might be able to do what you want.

 

[Rupp]

I did some searching on the HS forums, but wow, network and remote are hard keywords are really hard to narrow down the search results!!!!

Does anyone know if there is a way to poll HS over a network? I have an in-wall touchscreen running a program that is capable of sending and receiving information. I am looking to request the status of a HS device, and to send commands to a HS device remotely over the network. I will be using VBscript or AutoIt as the "interpreter " so to speak.

For for instance, I have a vbscript on the in-wall computer, I want to send the command to HS to turn on a lamp, over the network. I am sure there has to be a way to do this, I am just not quite sure how. BTW, I am running HS 1.7x.

Thanks in advance for any help!

Can't you run an asp page to toggle the lamp?

 

[CollinR]

HS have a command line interface?

 

[DavidL]

What app are you using for the touchscreen?

Homeseer supports a few ways to talk to it and for it to talk back.

 

[JohnWPB]

Rupp:

I had a feeling someone would metion that I spent months and months creating custom ASP pages for HS, and they work perfectly, as do all of my scripts. When I tried HS 2.0, half of my scripts did not work, and 90% of my ASP pages stopped working. I have a full HS 2.0 Licence here, I just have not switched due to the afore mentioned reasons.

I could use ASP pages, however I do not want to embed a web browser into the program, and would like to be able to communicate directly between the program and Home Seer. BTW, the program I keep refering to is Road Runner, which was intended for a CarPC environment , but works perfectly for my inwall touchscreen. (Weather, theater show times, Lotto results, embedded google earth, scribble pad, calculator, gas price finder.... you name it. It also is fully flash/swf capable for animations, full media control with its built in music database, 110% skinnable, including changing backgrounds, colors and font colors of the interface on the fly, static and animated indicators for device status, interfaces with a temperature board for full indoor/outdoor temperatures, using the fusion brain, capable of 10 digital inputs and outputs as well as 5 analog outputs ect ect ect.

I am not sure of HS has a command line interface, but it does have a COM object. I use the following script to send commands to HS directly: (Written in AutoIt code, and compiled to .exe)
(I pass the house and unit code on a command line when running this script, so I can use a single script for all devices)

dim $mystatus

$DeviceFromRR = $cmdlineraw
$DeviceCode = $cmdline[1]


$hs = ObjCreate("homeseer.application")

; Get the status of a device (Working)
$MyDevice = $hs.devicestatus($DeviceCode)

;Text1 = Str(i)
if $MyDevice = 3 then $MyStatus = "Off"
if $MyDevice = 2 then $MyStatus = "On"
if $MyDevice = 4 then $MyStatus = "Dimmed"

if $MyDevice = 3 then $hs.execX10 ($DeviceCode, "On" , 50)
if $MyDevice = 2 then $hs.execX10 ($DeviceCode, "Off" , 50)
if $MyDevice = 4 then $hs.execX10 ($DeviceCode, "Off" , 50)

I guess the question now, is can you use a COM interface, such as above, on/to a remote machine?

 

[Rupp]

I guess the question now, is can you use a COM interface, such as above, on/to a remote machine?

With HomeSeer 2.x you can run remote scripts. Also try to find the HSC.exe on the HomeSeer bulletin board. This is a command line HS exe.

On a side note. What errors did you get when running your ASP pages? The asp engine didn't change from 1.7 to 2.x. The event object did change but only slightly.

 

[JohnWPB]

I guess the question now, is can you use a COM interface, such as above, on/to a remote machine?

With HomeSeer 2.x you can run remote scripts. Also try to find the HSC.exe on the HomeSeer bulletin board. This is a command line HS exe.

On a side note. What errors did you get when running your ASP pages? The asp engine didn't change from 1.7 to 2.x. The event object did change but only slightly.

Hmmm I thought when it was in the design stages, that one of the main goals of 2.0 was to make it fully ASP compliant, and not the striped down version that HS 1.7 was using (Same goes for VBScript). Is that not the case? I always hated the fact that when I would find a really nice "pure" ASP script, that HS would not run it on it's engine, and error out.

Well the asp pages are pretty complex to say the least I have all sorts of code in the pages that when the status of a device changes, that the images in the page change without having to reload the page, using image replace and a bunch of other "unique" code to make everything work. I can not recall the errors now off hand, as it has been a while.

 

[Rupp]

Hmmm I thought when it was in the design stages, that one of the main goals of 2.0 was to make it fully ASP compliant, and not the striped down version that HS 1.7 was using (Same goes for VBScript). Is that not the case? I always hated the fact that when I would find a really nice "pure" ASP script, that HS would not run it on it's engine, and error out.

Well the asp pages are pretty complex to say the least I have all sorts of code in the pages that when the status of a device changes, that the images in the page change without having to reload the page, using image replace and a bunch of other "unique" code to make everything work. I can not recall the errors now off hand, as it has been a while.

Nope,
HomeSeer 2.x uses a full blown asp and now aspx engine so you can move up to the newer technology.

 

[damage]

not a homeseer user, but why not install the xAP plugin. then you can use the xAP command line sender described here:

http://www.ukha-archive.com/ml/xap/2006-aug/msg00041.html

Michael McSharry should be able to help you with the details...

 

[JohnWPB]

Ok, I am getting closer! I am able to communicate with HS on a local machine, but it is not working over the network for some reason. I have defined the computer that HS is running on in the script according to some code I found by Huggy on the HS forums. If, on the local machine, I rename the machine name, the script fails to work, which is expected. This tells me that the syntax must be correct to define the machine name. On the other hand, it is not working on another machine on the network.

Here is the script I am using to test with, very basic, but still proof of concept at this stage:

Set hs = CreateObject("Homeseer.Application","johnsdesktop")
hs.ExecX10 "A3","on"
set hs = nothing

In the following screen capture, you can see that "johnsdesktop" is visible from the machine that I am running the script on, and the error message I am receiving. I have ensured that the VBRuntime files are installed and up to date. I do not think that is the problem though, as I have had the same problem trying to get this to work in AutoIt script as well. It works on the local machine, but not on a remote machine.

Any help is greatly appreciated, as it must be some simple network thing that I am overlooking or something.

 

[Rupp]

Ok, I am getting closer! I am able to communicate with HS on a local machine, but it is not working over the network for some reason. I have defined the computer that HS is running on in the script according to some code I found by Huggy on the HS forums. If, on the local machine, I rename the machine name, the script fails to work, which is expected. This tells me that the syntax must be correct to define the machine name. On the other hand, it is not working on another machine on the network.

Here is the script I am using to test with, very basic, but still proof of concept at this stage:

Set hs = CreateObject("Homeseer.Application","johnsdesktop")
hs.ExecX10 "A3","on"
set hs = nothing

In the following screen capture, you can see that "johnsdesktop" is visible from the machine that I am running the script on, and the error message I am receiving. I have ensured that the VBRuntime files are installed and up to date. I do not think that is the problem though, as I have had the same problem trying to get this to work in AutoIt script as well. It works on the local machine, but not on a remote machine.

Any help is greatly appreciated, as it must be some simple network thing that I am overlooking or something.

John,
This will not work unless you know how to setup DCOM to allow remote connections to your PC and even this is blocked by most firewalls and antivirus packages block remote connections. With HomeSeer2 this is easy if you have the speaker app installed.

 

[damage]

http://www.cocoontech.com/index.php?showtopic=294

 

[JohnWPB]

Rupp, I am a bit confused:

The asp engine didn't changefrom 1.7 to 2.x . The event object did change but only slightly.

HomeSeer 2.x uses a full blown asp and now aspx engine [ /u] so you can move up to the newer technology.

Did HS2 move to pure ASP code now? If this is the case, it may be worth making the switch. As mentioned with 1.7, it is frustrating finding snippits of ASP code, that will not work with 1.7, as its not 100% compliant.

 

[Rupp]

Rupp, I am a bit confused:

The asp engine didn't changefrom 1.7 to 2.x . The event object did change but only slightly.

HomeSeer 2.x uses a full blown asp and now aspx engine [ /u] so you can move up to the newer technology.

Did HS2 move to pure ASP code now? If this is the case, it may be worth making the switch. As mentioned with 1.7, it is frustrating finding snippits of ASP code, that will not work with 1.7, as its not 100% compliant.

That's fist statement was incorrect and should have stated that the asp engine did change ...
Yes, HomeSeer now uses the ASP/ASPX.net Microsoft engines.