X10 Community Forum

🔌General Home Automation => Automating Your House => Troubleshooting Automation Problems => Topic started by: sorova on June 30, 2008, 04:57:16 PM

Title: Problem recognizing Lamp Dimmer
Post by: sorova on June 30, 2008, 04:57:16 PM

Ok, I am using Active Home and it works fine. However, I am developing my own software for the CM11A and when I unplug the lamp dimmer and plug it in again for some reason my software won't work.

If I run Active Home it springs back to life and I can then run my software. All I am doing is sending bytes to the ports - the right ones I hope since the light will switch on and off and dim. So why can't I recognize the device any more if I unplug it and then plug it back in? It's almost as if the CM11A has a memory for each device like a network - but that can't be right.

Must I initialize the CM11A in some special way?

Thanks

S.

Title: Re: Problem recognizing Lamp Dimmer
Post by: Dan Lawrence on June 30, 2008, 05:04:51 PM

What are you writing for the CM11A?   BTW, what O/S is on the computer the CM11A is connected to?

Title: Re: Problem recognizing Lamp Dimmer
Post by: Brian H on June 30, 2008, 07:14:00 PM

Is the lamp module one of the newer ones with soft start? Like does it go on and off by ramping up and down or fast on and off?

Title: Re: Problem recognizing Lamp Dimmer
Post by: Charles Sullivan on June 30, 2008, 08:41:42 PM

Quote from: sorova on June 30, 2008, 04:57:16 PM

Ok, I am using Active Home and it works fine. However, I am developing my own software for the CM11A and when I unplug the lamp dimmer and plug it in again for some reason my software won't work.

If I run Active Home it springs back to life and I can then run my software. All I am doing is sending bytes to the ports - the right ones I hope since the light will switch on and off and dim. So why can't I recognize the device any more if I unplug it and then plug it back in? It's almost as if the CM11A has a memory for each device like a network - but that can't be right.

Must I initialize the CM11A in some special way?

Thanks

S.

What type of lamp module do you have?  A 2-way module like the LM14A or some of the Smarthome modules will transmit an X10 signal when plugged in which may confuse your software if it's not expecting it.

Title: Re: Problem recognizing Lamp Dimmer
Post by: sorova on June 30, 2008, 10:25:19 PM

It's an LM12. I send the following
(in  Hex)

Send 0466

wait for the checksum reply (6A)

then I send 0662

wait for the checksum  (68)

then send 00
answers 55 and on comes the light.

If I then switch the light off and back on from the mains switch it doesn't work any more.


Thanks

Title: Re: Problem recognizing Lamp Dimmer
Post by: sorova on July 01, 2008, 02:38:04 AM

Could it have something to do with Polling? Does the device coninually poll to "hear" new devices and their status and I must read this data somehow if I
unplug one? Or tell it to re-poll. I noticed in the Heyu  code (by a poster in this thread that he has this...)

/*
 *  The CM11A sends data back to the computer whenever it sees a command
 *  come in over the AC buss.  This should (theoretically) allow the compuer
 *  to track the status of all modules.  Upon startup, this program should
 *  check for a poll before anything else.
 *
 *  Check for a poll (0x5a) from the CM11A, If we get one within a
 *  second, we should send 0xc3 to tell it that we are ready to read
 *  it's output.
 *
 *  If the showdata flag is set, we print.  Otherwise we just eat the output.
 */

Or am I barking up the wrong tree?

S.

Title: Re: Problem recognizing Lamp Dimmer
Post by: sorova on July 01, 2008, 02:40:01 AM

Ps - I also noted that this library here

http://brian.vallelunga.com/code/x10/

also suffers from the same problem for some reason.


S.