RE: Re: xAP xPL EIB C-BUS X10 - choice overload!

["Kevin Hawkins" <lists@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hi Matt,

Sorry yes,  I failed to address the specific temp monitoring
question.

We do already have a xAP connector for the Quasar temp sensor board
- it is written by Edward Pearson and I use some of these boards around my
home . We do not however have a standalone LCD display of the type that you
want that speaks xAP. AFAIK there are no standalone displays that speak
native xAP or xPL - they are aided by a PC application. For the VFD that
was
mentioned a PC application does this. This is probably going to be a fairly
typical approach to start. The Rio mp3 player may have this as an inbuilt
xPL feature I am not sure.
We could however display your temp messages on screen on your PC as
a window that appeared and disppeared using xAP Watcher. You could also
display your message on say a PC using Tivo or on a SliMP3 or Squeezebox
display if you have either of these mp3 players. Indeed the xAP Slim
connector manages multiple players and has a full inbuilt message queue
system (even across multiple players) such that you can be assured you
never
miss a message. A special queue bypass feature is also available for
critical messages to jump to the front of the display queue.  You might for
example be sequentially displaying your incoming emails and then need to
interrupt this to show a critical temp alarm. xAP Slim connector will do
this and then resume the previously queued items. You could also announce
critical temp levels using text to speech.
To an extent you can mix and match xAP and xPL choosing the
connectors from either protocol that enable your hardware. xPLHAL has an
inbuilt bridge between the protocols and this can be scripted to pass
certain schemas between the protocols. The schemas are the information
exchanges essentially between the devices.
As to serial vs ethernet - that will be dependent on how/where you
want to mount the Quasar sensor - the Lantronix MSS100 will Ethernet enable
a Quasar temp sensor board but it is twice the cost of the board in the
first place. If you can RS232 connect that will be far more economic. The
xAP Quasar connector would work with serial or ethernet - in fact it
doesn't
even know/care which it is using.

Hope that helps..

Kevin

> -----Original Message-----
> From: matt_miles_uk [mailto:m_miles@xxxxxxx]
> Sent: 16 March 2004 14:27
> To: ukha_d@xxxxxxx
> Subject: [ukha_d] Re: xAP xPL EIB C-BUS X10 - choice overload!
>
> Thanks for both your opinions - I don't mean to be the
> catalyst for an all out war! :)
>
> Basically, as I stated in my original post I want to
> monitor the temp of my rack with a quasar temp setup (nice
> and cheap!).  CAn this be done with either protocol?  Is
> it better to have a serial interface or an ethernet one?
>



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