May 2014 - OvmsDev - Open Vehicles

my own to-do list... input welcome
by Lee Howard 15 May '14

15 May '14

Hello Everyone, I'm a new OVMS user, and I do appreciate OVMS very much. It's been a nice few days using it. I intend on getting involved in development... particularly with OpenChargeMap (OCM) integration, Chevy Volt integration, and various other features. I've ordered a second OVMS module and antennae to install into another car (2005 Chrysler Sebring - yes, it's blasphemous, I know). Here is my own to-do list, and I welcome all input and feedback regarding this before I start digging-in. Please steer me clear of any pointless endeavours or give me a nod in the right direction where that may be useful. 1) I would like OVMS to be able to update OCM automatically with whatever charging information it can anywhere that the car charges. I would think that it could at least provide voltage and amperage. The user could turn this feature off-and-on via the handheld app or SMS, of course. 2) For the Volt the handheld app gives "estimated range" and "ideal range" (which are always the same) at a value much less than what the car advertises to the driver. For example, the app says "12 miles" when the car says "24 miles". At a full charge the app says "22 miles" and the car says "32 miles". There seems to be some discrepancy, and I would like to fix that, and I think that "ideal" and "estimated" should be different. 3) For the Volt the app reports "Charging 236V 14A" on the slider graphic but "Standard 16A" on the battery graphic. I would like to resolve this discrepancy. (Or maybe just put the word "Max" after "Standard 16A".) 4) For the Volt the app slider to stop the charge (and then to restart the charge) does not work. I would like to fix this. 5) For the Volt the app Control does not have anything under "Features" or "Parameters", and "Cellular Usage" does nothing. I would like to fix this. 6) I would like the server to store all GPS data for the last 7 days and on the app to allow the user to flip-view through each day's travel path (based on the time zone for the geographical location of the GPS data). This way I can show-off my travels easily and check-up on where the car has been over the day without needing to constantly hover over the location view in the app. 7) I haven't tested the remote lock or the valet mode from the app, but I would like them to work if they do not... and I would also like to be able to start the climate controls from the app as I can do from the car's "clicker" remote (to warm or cool the car while it's connected to the charger). 8) I suspect that there is a plethora of information running around on the bus that is currently unused or not displayed in the app. I would like to present as much of that information as can be reasonable to the user. 9) As I intend to use this on my evil Sebring as well as the Volt (mostly for GPS purposes), I will be interested to remedy any problems in doing that. 10) I suspect that updating the firmware via the PICKIT is going to get bothersome very fast. I would like to see it be able to update firmware by downloading it from the data connection. And this last one isn't on *my* to-do list, but I'll just throw this one out there as a pie-in-the-sky idea for anyone who may be interested in running with it... 11) It would be really cool if the OVMS module had a WiFi adapter in it and permitted "tethering" from other WiFi devices for data access. In other words, it would be sweet if my iPad could get internet access via WiFi through the OVMS module's data service. Phones here often have tethering restricted/disabled on them by the service provider... so it's not always easy to tether via phones here... AND the OVMS antenna and signal reception is much better than the on the phones, anyway. As a matter of feedback, I ended up provisioning the module using SMS from my own phone. I tried to do it from the website, but that seemed to do nothing. I found the basic installation and configuration documentation to be either hidden or lacking. I would have appreciated a step-by-step written documentation on installing and configuring the OVMS module. As it stood I ended up digging-out bits and pieces from the Weekend Workshop video, the Tesla Roadster installation/configuration documentation, forum posts, and I even dug into the code at github. If nobody gets to this first then when I don't feel like such a newbie maybe I'll write-up that documentation, myself. Thanks, Lee. -- *Lee Howard* *Mainpine, Inc. Chief Technology Officer* Tel: +1 866 363 6680 | Fax: +1 360 462 8160 lee.howard(a)mainpine.com | www.mainpine.com

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Apple PUSH Notifications
by Mark Webb-Johnson 15 May '14

15 May '14

I've been told (and co-discovered) that the PUSH notifications (APNS) on iOS don't seem to be working for everyone since iOS 7. I finally managed to track down the problem last night - it seems to be related to the way the simulator / device is detected in the latest versions of XCode, so the App is thinking it is running on the simulator (which doesn't support APNS, and notifications are not enabled). I fixed it, but now it seems a bunch of other things are broken when building for iOS 7 in the current version of XCode (such as screen layout, features and parameters, amongst others). So, it is not trivial but I am working on it. Hope to have a testflightapp release within the next few days. In the meantime, if you rely on these notifications and are experiencing the problem, I suggest enabling SMS as a backup. Regards, Mark.

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Digital manufacturing project using Twizy
by Michael Balzer 10 May '14

10 May '14

Hi everyone, there's a DDM project going on at LocalMotors, they will use the Twizy powertrain: https://localmotors.com/AlexFi/the-3d-printed-car-aka-direct-digital-manufa… I joined the discussion to point them to the OVMS for powertrain tuning. It's also interesting as this could lead to some kind of body kit to optimize Twizy aerodynamics. Regards, Michael -- Michael Balzer * Paradestr. 8 * D-42107 Wuppertal Fon 0202 / 272 2201 * Handy 0176 / 206 989 26

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Leaf canbus
by Nigel Jones 10 May '14

10 May '14

I have the OVMS module running in my car so found an hour tonight to start looking through the source - sorry it's taking a while to catch up, so forgive the newbie questions too...... One thing I noticed is that I'm getting a 0% state of charge indication, and regular texts saying my battery is low (for testing I setup the sim with unlimited texts.....). I see there was a commit last year which used some of the data from the spreadsheet at https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0An7gtcYL2Oy0dGRaSWl6VTV2eXBQMy… which I found references from the nissan leaf forum discussion at http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?f=44&t=4131&start=340 If I'm not mistaken the OVMS currently reads the CAR CanBus ? There's an indication in the spreadsheet that CAN message 0x5b3 contains SOC information - but in fact the spreadsheet refers to it as SOH. I have a leafDD and I think this is also known as the Hx figure -- ie it seems to vary with battery age/capacity -- mine for example is down to around 82%, but it is not current state of charge, so I don't think decoding that will help? GIDs are what I use in daily driving as they are absolute. The sheet suggests that figure might be retrievable from this message, but then most people would only see a % of 95% for example as life is lost? Is that's what's wanted? I suspect not for the overall SOC figure. I can't see much else decoded yet (I was looking for low hanging fruit!) on the CAR canbus - instead most work was done on the EV canbus, including looking at state of charge etc. So the question comes how to bridge the data from that bus onto the CAR can. There was reference to this previously on the list at http://lists.teslaclub.hk/pipermail/ovmsdev/2013-October/001712.html It would appear the way to get any of the EV can data is to actively request the data. I can see examples of CAN data requests in the tesla module but haven't yet figured how I might for example retrieve CAN msg 0x5bb for example (it's one of the ones to try). I can also see the developers guide p24 which refers to writing on the bus. I'm also wary of the need to be careful in making active requests rather than the easier passive monitoring! Can anyone point me to an example of how I might do this? I'd make that call from the ticker functions? and then handle it in the poll right? Apologies if this is all covered in the nissan leaf forum thread - I have 39 pages to read now... Thanks Nigel. nigel(a)cherrybyte.me.uk -- ---- Nigel Jones

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Open Charge Map
by J-C Saint-Pô 04 May '14

04 May '14

Hello guys, Just a reminder. http://openchargemap.org/ is used as database of chargingstations in the OVMS apps You can add / remove chargigstations via http://openchargemap.org/site/poi or http://openchargemap.org/app/ For some uses you need to login. This can be done via your twitter google+ or facebook-account. So no extra account to be made solely for OCM here some other examples of apps/ websites that use OCM http://openchargemap.org/site/develop/apps Here the google+ community of OCM https://plus.google.com/u/0/communities/112113799071360649945 Kind Greets J-C

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Umm..
by Nigel Jones 04 May '14

04 May '14

I was playing around with SMS comments on the newly installed OVMS today (V2 experimental) when the device seemed to stop responding, and a remote "RESET" didn't help, nor did power off/on. I brought it inside (without checking LEDs), connected up to the Pickit 3 clone I'd used earlier and .. nothing ... can't connect. Rebooted, removed/readded USB device (hw & sw) In the MPlab IPE I have PIC18/PIC18F2685 / PICkit3 selected. In advanced/Power "power target circuit from tool" is selected I am unable to "connect". All LEDs are lit on the Pickit3, no LEDs on the OVMS board I'm not familiar enough with the environment to figure out if this means the ovms module is dead, or the pickit. At some point prior to rebooting the pc ( as a test) I did notice some errors from the IPE of low USB voltage. I've since switched USB port When I used the pickit earlier and selected "Power device from tool" the ovms module etc was powered up (LEDs active). Any sugeestions? My next plan is to try a completely different PC to remove that from the equation. I'll also check the ovms leds when connected to vehicle - from memory the red led was lit. I did note the module was very warm - sat on the centre console, but I think this was just as the car was in bright sunlight.... My gut feel is it's a combination of needing to reset the ovms (in the car it does at least still power up) it seems, just is uncontactable, & a problem with the programmer since I should be able to connect without a device attached - and potentially use the on-the-go programming support Mine is a clone pickit - has anyone else had issues with these vs the microchip originals? thanks Nigel. -- ---- Nigel Jones

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Just up and running with OVMS (leaf)
by Nigel Jones 04 May '14

04 May '14

Hi, Just a quick update. As of yesterday all my hardware arrived so I spent an hour or two this morning setting up OVMS I have the toolchain sorted, and was able to build the v2 experimental fw from source. This incldues a definition of OVMS_CAR_NISSANLEAF so should load the leaf prototype module The firmware also flashed fine though I had to use the standalone flash tool rather than the IDE for this step as I couldn't find the option to provide 5V from the programmer? Never mind.... Once flashed I was able to go through updatign password, registering,. including on openvehicles website. I can chat via SMS, and can see the car in the android app. I can get GPS data and check firmware revision. Great. I did though when configuring specify a vehicle type of "LE" +44NNNNNNNNNN:Module: VehicleID:XXX VehicleType:LE Units:K Notifications:SMSIP 9:36 AM Me:MODULE XXX K SMSIP LE 9:36 AM I then updated this by replacing the correct "NL" for LE, but now I just get back: VehicleID:JN1FAAZE0U0005853 VehicleType: Units:K Notifications:SMSIP NO idea why vehicle type is NULL. I tried a reset. I was thinking I may reset the config completely, but have I done anything obviously wrong? Is it possible to change vehicle type once set? Very early stages of learning... with the intent of course to refine the leaf support :-) Nigel. ---- Nigel Jones

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