Comments for John's Ramblings

Comment on Wireless Arduino programming by Andy Piper

Andy Piper — Tue, 13 Sep 2011 09:53:06 +0000

Ah I see – I was indeed being too slow! thanks John!

Comment on Wireless Arduino programming by john

john — Mon, 12 Sep 2011 17:27:03 +0000

If five seconds go by without a character being entered then the XRF will leave AT mode.
Getting the OK is good, try immediately entering AT followed by enter. You should get another OK.
Now try another command such as ATBD followed by enter. You should see a response.
If there is no response then likely you have been too slow, start again with +++.
The XRF config program is designed to help with this, details are here. http://openmicros.org/index.php/articles/84-xrf-basics/105-xcm-software-config-for-the-xrf
You can get help from the forums on openmicros.org and there are several helpful articles.

Comment on Wireless Arduino programming by Andy Piper

Andy Piper — Mon, 12 Sep 2011 16:55:24 +0000

… so I can get an XRF module into config mode with minicom at baud 9600 – +++ returns “OK”
After that, most commands appear to do nothing. Hitting Enter returns ERR, after entering any AT command I appear to go into a black hole of unresponsiveness… I am guessing I’m driving something incorrectly?

Comment on Re-purposing the Current Cost bridge device by john

john — Mon, 04 Oct 2010 18:00:29 +0000

Hi Paul, Re: FTDI - I followed the tracks from the ATMega328 and then used a continuity tester to confirm. The short cable supplied (RJ10 to RJ45) was then cut in half and the ends of the wires connected to a set of header pins. I have not (yet) altered the board itself in any way - just loaded up my own firmware. Re: Gas monitoring these posts may help you: Gas meter to CurrentCost to Arduino to Pachube up and running and Final gas meter to current cost circuit Thanks for looking John.

Comment on Re-purposing the Current Cost bridge device by Paul Tanner

Paul Tanner — Mon, 04 Oct 2010 13:38:34 +0000

Thx for the post John, I will follow in your footsteps once I get the 2 extra components you mention.

I have only used standard Arduinos up to now but this one has a great footprint.

When you mention hooking up the the FDTI breakout, how did you locate board RX &TX? Did you find pads large enough to solder to without a microscope?

BTW1. My bridge board seems to have different connectors (2xRJ45) but this may not be an older one.

BTW2. For those who want to add gas (and have a meter with an output of some kind), I am told you can do this with the little boards CC gave out to homecampers. Not sure how this works but at least one homecamper did it. I would probably try to feed straight into the bridge board if I can overcome the soldering challenge to get at the input pins.

As I have mentioned to Chris, PLEEEASE can these boards have a couple of extra pads for hackers. Absolutely no commercial reason for CC to do this but if you don’t ask.. Maybe Tinker will consider a hacker version?

Paul

Comment on Re-purposing the Current Cost bridge device by PowerMeter and Android « Nick Thorne

PowerMeter and Android « Nick Thorne — Fri, 01 Oct 2010 14:43:07 +0000

[...] Been experimenting with programming some Google Android apps using Eclipse + ADT. Some location based ideas are brewing. I also had a tinker with Google AppInventor which is a great tool if you don’t know how to code. But if you do it seriously bends the mind. Lastly, I am now the proud owner of a Current Cost ENVI plus Bridge. All uploading our household electricity consumption in realtime. Nice thing about Current Cost is the platform is pretty open. See some ideas here. [...]

Comment on Re-purposing the Current Cost bridge device by Rob

Rob — Thu, 30 Sep 2010 11:51:22 +0000

Hi, Very interesting. What other applications have or are you adapting this for ?
Anyone found out a way of monitoring gas or water!?

Comment on Re-purposing the Current Cost bridge device by Ross Dargan

Ross Dargan — Wed, 29 Sep 2010 21:34:20 +0000

Brilliant – I managed to get my hands on a prototype board which is similar to the final version and thanks to your great instructions is now ready to do my evil biddings.

Now to think of all the fun things I can make it do!

Ross

Comment on Re-purposing the Current Cost bridge device by john

john — Wed, 29 Sep 2010 20:55:35 +0000

I’m sorry Nick, I have no idea how the provided CC software works. I have my own software to read the serial feed from the Envi and to then update a database on my own web site. If you need help reading the envi feed then I can help you but I do not have details of the communication with Pachube or Google Power Meter.

Comment on Re-purposing the Current Cost bridge device by Nick

Nick — Wed, 29 Sep 2010 16:51:42 +0000

Great bit of hacking !
So first up, I would like to reprog my bridge (acquired today) to update a lot faster than every 5 minutes which can easily miss e.g. someone taking a quick 9KW shower. Or a fridge compressor run. Or indeed a kettle boiling.
I guess functionality is
Read in ENVI 6 second XML updates ;
Tally up average for each 5 or 10 updates ;
Upload XML feed to Google Powermeter ;
repeat;
A Pachube.com press release suggests all traffic is routed via them at present. Maybe hence the slow updates.
Or am I doing the Bridge a dis-service, does it tally up an average for each 5 min update ?

(13.7Kw right now, shower, kettle and microwave all on – yikes !)