Feature Request: Provide Bin Out Timestamp via MQTT/UI

[robotastic-io]

Idea

Having the timestamp for bin out would allow advanced bin empty features. e.g:

• Automaticaly send robot to bin empty location after cleaning when x hours have passed since last empty, so I only have to empty the bin every 3 days instead of every day after cleaning.
• Send Reminder via SmartHome Software (home assisstant, iobroker, etc.) after x hours since last empty

Possible Solutions:

a) You could monitor the sysout of 'lsof | grep /mnt/data/rockrobo/sounds/bin_in.wav' or bin_out.wav and store the time of access into a variable which gets reported via mqtt and/or accessed via webui.

b) Alternatively in /mnt/data/rockrobo/RoboController.cfg a variable 'bin_in_time' is stored. The variable represents the clean time since the last bin empty in seconds.

With this value and cleaning history we can estimate the time the bin was last removed.

Pseudo Code:

let binInTime = readValueFromRoboControllerConf('bin_in_time');
let historyArray = getCleaningHistory;
let record;

// No History
if(historyArray.length == 0){
    return -1;
}

// Iterate Cleaning History
while(binInTime > 0 && historyArray.length > 0){
    record = historyArray.shift();
    binInTime -= record.duration;
}

// Bin was emptied between runs
if(binInTime == 0){
    record = historyArray.shift();
    return record.endTime;
}

// Bin was emptied during run
if(binInTime < 0 && record){
    return record.startTime - binInTime;
}
else{ // Fallback
    record = historyArray.shift();
    return record.endTime;
}    

[pidator]

Perhaps this repo could help with your idea?

[robotastic-io]

Thanks for the suggestion. It follows a different assumption though. The repo assumes that the bin is full after x minutes of cleaning. It does not give the exact timestamp of bin out. This should work fine as an approximation if you run the robot on a daily shedule.

If however you dont run it on a daily shedule the assumption does not work. The amount of dirt inside the bin correlates with the amount of dirt the robot can pick up from the space it cleans not the cleaning time. Or mathematically speaking:

averageAmountOfDirtGeneratedBySpacePerHour * timeSinceLastBinEmpty = amountOfDirtInBinAfterRun.

Installing a second mqtt client also seems like a little overkill.