Envisalink - TPI Documentation

[pounder]

Getting back to the comments on the installer mode earlier in this thread, I'm not really clear on why the passthrough is "disabled", and some other general comments.

- # does work to get back out
- installer mode does timeout at the panel on its own (at least on an 1864)

Once the panel enters installer mode aren't the "feedback" messages simply zone updates ? but meant to be interpreted a different way in that mode (I am thinking of how the led keypads display those states) ? So why are they deliberately being filtered out ? It would be simpler to just let them pass through. Forget emulating an lcd keypad, that can all be done higher up in the food chain. All that's needed are the actual messages that are on the bus, and this should be a simple change.

I've already seen by brute force that you can make changes if you just go blind and don't expect feedback. The only disadvantages to that are you can't detect panel response time to throttle your keystream, and you have to force on new settings or assume the panel is in the last known state (which by issuing a 999 you could force I suppose)

Filtering of any sort in the module just seems silly and it defeats a huge area where it could be useful.

[pounder]

Even make the filtering a setting in the web gui on the module - yes I want all the raw messages, or no leave it the "old" way.

[K-Man]

Can you private message me with your email address and maybe we can take this offline? I'm not entirely clear what you're looking for but we have a very active beta community that you might want to be a part of.

[philetaylor]

Hi.

I have been using the TPI for a while with OpenRemote (www.openremote.org) and it works great but I would like to get zone labels (command 002) is this something that you are likely to implement?

Thanks

Phil

[GrandWizard]

I believe it is on the "to do" list.

[Ken98045]

I have 2 TPI questions.

1. The documentation says: "Use the password you use for the local Envisalink" web page. However, it also says that the passwords are 1 - 6 characters long. In fact, TPI will NOT accept > 8 character passwords. The web page will accept > 6 characters. (a) It is very annoying that passwords are so short. (b) Is there anything that can be done to increase the password length? My understanding is that TPI is an open stanard, but I don't know who is "in control" of that standard. (c) The documentation needs to be fixed.

2. How is supporting bypass zones supposed to work? Are we supposed to use "Send Keystroke"? An example would be helpful.

[K-Man]

I'm not really following you on #1. The TPI uses the same password that is used for the Envisalink webpage which is capped at 6 characters. Why so short? Not sure but maybe the oringal developers were being stingy with the EEPROM. Now that I think of it, that's probably exactly what happened as the original version was hosted on a much smaller processor.

Who is in "control" of this document? Me... [maniacal laughter follows]

For zone bypassing you just send keystrokes, like you mentioned. So send "*1XX#" where XX is the zone your want to bypass. If you have programmed your panel to require a user code to bypass, then you will need to send *1YYYYXX# where YYYY is your 4 digit code.

[Ken98045]

Actually, I'm pretty sure I was successfully using an 8 character password for the local Envisalink password on the web page. I did notice that the doco said that it took 1-6 characters for the TPI password. Maybe I just didn't remember what password I was using on the web page since I'm using Last Pass.

[Ken98045]

I tried using Send Keystrokes to bypass zone 02.
The entire string is" 071*102#".
I get an error 500021 which says "partition out of bounds.
The documentation does say something about a partition in the string so I tried adding that. That does work (maybe - see below).

I can get it to work by sending individual keystrokes, but I need to put over 500ms wait between each keystroke or I get an overrun error. Even then it is somewhat hit and miss.

In both cases I also need to put in about a 2 second delay before sending the arming command.

One more question though - I do not get a "partial closing" with the bypass. In addition I do not get
an "LED" indication for the Bypass. The LED might or might not have to do with the fact that I have a 5500 pad, but I would think that I'd get a Partial Closing".

[Ken98045]

One, hopefully final question.
It is possible to maintain a connection to the board indefinitely as long as you periodically send a 000 - Poll and/or a 074 - Keep Alive? I've tried, and as far as I can tell it doesn't help.

I don't think the problem is on my end, but ...