bottleneck
Choose style:

Author Topic: Router Fallback For App When Cloud Not Found  (Read 4522 times)

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

Offline fillibar

  • Backer
  • *
  • Posts: 2060
  • Thanks: 4
  • Registered : 02/08/2013
    YearsYearsYearsYearsYearsYearsYearsYearsYearsYearsYears
Router Fallback For App When Cloud Not Found
« on: August 20, 2014, 09:26:43 am »
Went to show the Almond app to show off how easy it is to check my Almond+ and got a Cloud Server Unavailable type of message. I had a good Internet connection so I just assume this is a Securifi thing being worked. Annoying (right now) but not critical (at this time). However it did spark an idea.

Could we set the app to connect directly to the router for it's data? I know some people would probably love that as their primary method (rather than having the data in the cloud) but even just having it as a Fallback method would be nice. Yes, it would require people have a DDNS service set up if they want a hostname but that is all pretty easy. Yes, you could just go straight to the WUI in a browser but this method keeps the app useful as well especially since the app gets updates faster.

Just another idea. Hopefully others would find this useful as well.
Almond 3 mesh handling the home.

LGNilsson

  • Guest
Re: Router Fallback For App When Cloud Not Found
« Reply #1 on: August 20, 2014, 09:31:28 am »
Yeah, we're aware of the issue. It's apparently a problem with a load balancer somewhere in Amazon's server park, so sadly not much we can do right now.

The way we've set things up, I'm afraid it would be a major project for us to make the apps talk directly to the Almond+, but point taken, especially for situations like this.
Worst case, the local web UI will talk to the sensors, so that's the fallback at the moment.

Offline fillibar

  • Backer
  • *
  • Posts: 2060
  • Thanks: 4
  • Registered : 02/08/2013
    YearsYearsYearsYearsYearsYearsYearsYearsYearsYearsYears
Re: Router Fallback For App When Cloud Not Found
« Reply #2 on: August 20, 2014, 09:55:35 am »
Totally understood both about the difficulty and the trouble with the servers. At this early stage I feel it is less important but on major adoption (hopefully) it might be more important. Especially as people rely on it for a security mechanism or even just house status.

Maybe as a wiki gets built more, people will identify the workarounds (using the WUI) and best methods for parsing the data to use otherwise.

This may not be the place for it but does the Almond+ provide the sensor status and/or router status in an xml file(s) that could be accessed and used from the WUI? This would solve most of my immediate needs in such scenarios. More interested in always knowing the status then always being able to configure it.
Almond 3 mesh handling the home.

LGNilsson

  • Guest
Re: Router Fallback For App When Cloud Not Found
« Reply #3 on: August 20, 2014, 10:17:38 am »
We're taking this very seriously and it's a real headache for us. The problem is that right now we're waiting on other people to fix the problem and that's the downside of outsourcing hosting. That said, as we're using AWS it should be one of the best options out there.

I honestly don't have a good insight on how all that stuff works, I'm trying to get a better picture of how things work and I'm also pushing for a smarter system to add sensors. That said, all of this will take time and it's things that will be addressed once we have the basics up and running.

Offline fillibar

  • Backer
  • *
  • Posts: 2060
  • Thanks: 4
  • Registered : 02/08/2013
    YearsYearsYearsYearsYearsYearsYearsYearsYearsYearsYears
Re: Router Fallback For App When Cloud Not Found
« Reply #4 on: August 20, 2014, 11:21:28 am »
Understandable. Even though it was an Amazon issue they are basically invisible to the process. So any similar problem looks like Securifi is at fault even when it is outside your control.
Almond 3 mesh handling the home.

LGNilsson

  • Guest
Re: Router Fallback For App When Cloud Not Found
« Reply #5 on: August 20, 2014, 11:25:46 am »
Indeed, at first I thought this was an issue with the updates we've been working on, but it's not. Even so, it's bad news for us.

Offline Automate

  • Backer
  • *
  • Posts: 175
  • Thanks: 1
  • Registered : 03/08/2013
    YearsYearsYearsYearsYearsYearsYearsYearsYearsYearsYears
Re: Router Fallback For App When Cloud Not Found
« Reply #6 on: August 26, 2014, 01:09:13 pm »
Could we set the app to connect directly to the router for it's data? I know some people would probably love that as their primary method (rather than having the data in the cloud) but even just having it as a Fallback method would be nice. Yes, it would require people have a DDNS service set up if they want a hostname but that is all pretty easy. Yes, you could just go straight to the WUI in a browser but this method keeps the app useful as well especially since the app gets updates faster.

I like the way the TCP Lighting app handles this.  When you first start the app it tries to connected to the lighting gateway on the local LAN.  If it can't quickly find it then it switches to using their cloud service.  The app works the same way whether connect locally or through the cloud.  Just a little bit of extra delay if working through the cloud.

 

Page created in 0.047 seconds with 20 queries.