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Thread: Uploadable Map for iOS Apps

  1. #1
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    Uploadable Map for iOS Apps

    I think RR2 would do well to have an option to use a map versus a room listing by name. This pretty much could be just like an old-school image map, and RR2 Essentials/Inclusive could just let you pick the areas of the image that are associated with varying rooms. It would a touch of class to RR2 systems and a nice feature to offer customers. I was thinking of this after seeing another user's post regarding an ability to change room naming to something other than alphabetical. I'm happy to sketch this out if it's not apparent.

  2. #2
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    Quote Originally Posted by schalliol View Post
    I think RR2 would do well to have an option to use a map versus a room listing by name. This pretty much could be just like an old-school image map, and RR2 Essentials/Inclusive could just let you pick the areas of the image that are associated with varying rooms. It would a touch of class to RR2 systems and a nice feature to offer customers. I was thinking of this after seeing another user's post regarding an ability to change room naming to something other than alphabetical. I'm happy to sketch this out if it's not apparent.
    I don't disagree that it'd be a nifty feature. But it seems like it'd be a lot of work for possibly not a lot of reward. It'd necessitate there being an image editor and placement tool in the RA2 software. Along with appropriate scaling and positioning within the mobile apps (and don't forget screen rotation!). At the same time it'd invite the inevitable customer criticisms of why doesn't this also support X, Y and Z products too?

    Me, I just want a little more control over list ordering. If I need more UI then I'll use another integration tool.

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  4. #3
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    I understand and agree with your request. However, the room list is really irritating when not everyone is going to know a room name right away. If you want to change the lights individually in a hall, what do you call that hall? Many times some rooms blend together. For example, we have three sitting rooms in my house, which is which? Sure, you could try to give them unique names, but it's just artificial. It would be much quicker to just click on the room needed. The issues you raised with rotation and such would not be hard to program. RR software is just so crazy easy to use that clearly with some training a process could allow this.

  5. #4
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    Oh, we're not disagreeing on much here. I'm dealing with a room/space naming issue in a project now. It's a combined open plan kitchen/family room/breakfast nook, with a door controlling outside patio circuits. Is this just 'the kitchen' or the 'family room' or the 'breakfast table' or the 'patio' or what? Right now they're separate 'rooms' within RA2 and that makes some sense. And in the RA2 software they're manually sorted 'together'.

    It came as an unwelcome surprise to not see them retain that ordering once loaded in the iPad app.

    Taking it a step upward to controls overlaid on an image comes across (to me) as a considerably non-trivial task. Both from a programmer's standpoint and for the integrator.

    It's one thing to have a simple app that makes use of standard keypad images. That's relatively simple. But once you start trying to raise it to the level of an image map you run the risk of disappointing the customers with inferior artwork. Or the costs associated with having that artwork created. Then there's the problem of whether or not this app "should" support all the other things a map-like picture might present. This pushes the app into territory well outside the products Lutron sells and supports. Not to mention the potential conflict with other vendors that DO provide this sort of integration.

    I'm not saying it isn't possible, or that it's not desirable. I'm just thinking about it from my perspective as a software developer and integrator. I see the manual sort ordering as much easier 'low hanging fruit' that could me implemented without excessive efforts. And image map overlays as a Pandora's Box of complications. From a purely selfish standpoint I wouldn't support making that leap if it was a choice between that OR manual sort ordering.

    As for 'not hard to program'... yeah right. Having done image mapping and control overlays in the past, and dealt with resizing and orientation changes, I'm here to say it wasn't trivial. All sorts of nonsense crops up, like text lengths, justification, fonts & their sizes and various translations of the text into other languages (to say nothing of right/left vs left/right text handling!).

    Changing a sort order or having some other grouping is considerably less difficult. But given this deals with embedded devices, that data would have to be stored somewhere and handled across what might be a lot of different interfaces. I've not dug into the RA2 protocols, so there might not even BE a 'good place' to store this sort of data. Embedded devices are notoriously limited on just how much data you can or can't push into them.

    So we want more or less the same thing, some kind of on-app organizing options. Me, I'm going to turn to other products for more sophisticated map-like controls. The apps are just a means for quick control situations that don't rise to the level of needing a full map-like UI.

  6. #5
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    With the Lutron Home Control+ app you will be able to toggle between sorting the items in the system alphabetically, or by the order they were added to the system. Please follow the steps below for how to toggle this setting in both iOS and Android devices.

    iOS:
    - Go to "Settings" on the device
    - Scroll down to "Lutron Home Control+"
    - Toggle the option "Sort Alphabetically" on or off

    Android:
    - Select the "Apps" menu
    - Select the "Home+" option
    - Press the device's "Menu" button
    - Select the "settings"
    - Check or uncheck the box for "Sort items alphabetically"

  7. #6
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    Closing this thread - please see related thread here:
    https://forums.lutron.com/showthread...n-RA2-software

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