Feature wish/idea- node to send data to VRM

[houser42]

Hello, Just a thought, as I have been using this excellent software on several PV installs with Victron gear for a while now and this keeps coming up.

It might be very useful for many users to have the ability to route some data from a few nodes in the Node Red environment into the VRM Advanced widget view. Maybe a "Route to VRM node" that allows ,say 10 instances or so, to keep it manageable? The advantages are probably obvious and I am sure users would find many ways to use such a node but some examples would be:

• kW and kWh readings from various sources that are in the NR environment, such as smart plugs for longer safekeeping of energy consumption data.
• a custom widget that has several temperature readings like battery and ambient temperature overlayed.
• tank and energy consumption overlayed in a custom widget. etc.. Again, just a thought, FWIW.

[freakent]

The obvious answer is to send those readings to your GX device, the GX device will then forward them on to VRM. You could use my generic driver, dbus-mqtt-devices, to register your devices and send the data via node-red.

[houser42]

Thanks @freakent I think my question may have been a tad unclear. I think I am doing what you say. I just also wanted a way to display some basic stuff FROM NR on the VRM dash and in advanced widgets. Many thanks again regardless.

[freakent]

Yes, I understood the question, although I don't know exactly what you mean by "advanced" widgets. Include a screen shot so there is no misunderstanding. The point is that the data displayed in VRM comes from the GX device. So if you send the correct data to GX, it should be available for you to use in VRM widgets.

[houser42]

Ok, sorry, so there is a function called "custom widget" that could potentially be used to overlay something like humidity over temperature, two different tanks, several house temps or the like. Data I would want to keep in the VRM for maybe a year at a time. This data is only available as yet on the NR side of things AFAIK. This is not vital in any way but would certainly be very nice to have if it could be done. Many thanks again for your comments.

[freakent]

I use an advanced widget to show temperature readings from multiple temperature sensors on one chart. That temperature data is fed into the GX device.

The issue about more than 6 months worth of data is a different one, if you want to hold data over a longer period of time you might want to look into using Grafan as a dashboard.

[houser42]

Interesting... Ok, just so we are on the same page: Are those temp sensors connected software-wise to the native Venus OS side of it or on the Node Red side? I have the data saved in the Node Red Dash as long as I like, but it is not ideal and a little volatile with what is saved at the disk with updates and NR migrations. A great feature of the VRM is also that the data is there even when the GX device is offline.

[freakent]

It's irrelevant, they are all connected to the Venus dbus. The dbus on the GX is what's important.

[houser42]

Ok, not irrelevant on the systems I maintain. But I think I see what you mean. Thanks again.