WiFi function

[JNock]

Is there a detailed set of instructions for the settings connecting it to computer etc on the gs? Where I installed the inverter I can’t see the screen at all. I just got mine and set it up, loving it so far, just need to get the settings dialed in for my application.

[The Blind Wolf]

5 hours ago, JNock said:

Is there a detailed set of instructions for the settings connecting it to computer etc on the gs? Where I installed the inverter I can’t see the screen at all. I just got mine and set it up, loving it so far, just need to get the settings dialed in for my application.

Yep, if you got it on your wifi.  type in http://genetry."your GS ID code which is I think under about" /local  then that should bring up the  GS screen on your phone or computer.

[The Blind Wolf]

Sid is still working on adding more to the wifi, but that is screen sharing mode on local wifi, not over the internet, it will not work if you try off your network.

[Sid Genetry Solar]

6 hours ago, JNock said:

Is there a detailed set of instructions for the settings connecting it to computer etc on the gs? Where I installed the inverter I can’t see the screen at all. I just got mine and set it up, loving it so far, just need to get the settings dialed in for my application.

Sorta....almost.  I need to put some finishing touches on the manual, and then release 1.1r4 which has a local network screen mirroring function, where you can literally control the inverter screen from your phone/laptop as though you were at the LCD, as "previewed" here:

 

This will require connecting the inverter to your WiFi, and then downloading the update (once I release it), and then you'll be able to use the screen mirroring function on your local network only (won't work over the cloud MQTT server).

Hoping to release a somewhat preliminary manual later today/tomorrow, it'll be far better than nothing.  Want to get updated inverter photos in it, etc., and then post it on the website and forums here.

[Sid Genetry Solar]

For now, if you go to WiFi -> Configure Settings (bottom of the screen), the inverter will generate a WiFi hotspot (GS_Inverter), which you can then connect your phone to.  It should pop up a captive portal on your phone ("Sign into this network") which will allow you to select the WiFi network you'd like the inverter to connect it to.  After that is completed (sometimes have to try twice for some reason...haven't been able to pin down why), you can access the stats remotely from the cloud server at wifi.genetrysolar.com (though this does not allow you to change settings on the inverter).  Once I release 1.1r4--this weekend I hope--you'll have to download that update on the inverter, THEN the screen mirroring function will work over local network access (i.e. "http://genetry-12345678.local/remote.htm")

[JNock]

8 hours ago, Sid Genetry Solar said:

For now, if you go to WiFi -> Configure Settings (bottom of the screen), the inverter will generate a WiFi hotspot (GS_Inverter), which you can then connect your phone to.  It should pop up a captive portal on your phone ("Sign into this network") which will allow you to select the WiFi network you'd like the inverter to connect it to.  After that is completed (sometimes have to try twice for some reason...haven't been able to pin down why), you can access the stats remotely from the cloud server at wifi.genetrysolar.com (though this does not allow you to change settings on the inverter).  Once I release 1.1r4--this weekend I hope--you'll have to download that update on the inverter, THEN the screen mirroring function will work over local network access (i.e. "http://genetry-12345678.local/remote.htm")

Thanks for the reply I’m going to pull it back out and get the WiFi configured so I can control it from inside

[Tim]

Please excuse my ignorance but for me I'm going to have to turn on my phone hotspot and cloud settings to connect and communicate with the inverters when I get them?the screen mirroring sounds great.

Edited June 25, 2021 by Tim
I have those turned off.

[Sid Genetry Solar]

12 hours ago, Tim said:

Please excuse my ignorance but for me I'm going to have to turn on my phone hotspot and cloud settings to connect and communicate with the inverters when I get them?the screen mirroring sounds great.

There's lots of possibilities; for now, the inverters need a WiFi hotspot/router to connect to (even if it doesn't have Internet, you can still use the local server functions to get data/control the inverter on the yet-unreleased 1.1r4).  In the plans is an "AP" mode, where the inverter will generate a hotspot and you can connect to that to read data/control the inverter.

For the current firmware, if your phone is the hotspot, you'll probably need to use a second device (i.e. laptop/tablet) to configure the inverter to a hotspot; I don't think most phones will let you connect to a network while maintaining a WiFi hotspot.

[BlackWaterPark]

On 6/25/2021 at 6:41 AM, The Blind Wolf said:

Yep, if you got it on your wifi.  type in http://genetry."your GS ID code which is I think under about" /local  then that should bring up the  GS screen on your phone or computer.

This doesn't work for me.. All i get is a "Hmmm.. Can't reach this page" message. I still don't understand how to bring these screens up on my computer, and the manual speaks in a language that I am not proficient in unfortunately. Is there a video or link that supplies a simplified "Step one: do this, Step 2: do this" format for people who are not as familiar with computing in general?

[Sid Genetry Solar]

53 minutes ago, BlackWaterPark said:

This doesn't work for me.. All i get is a "Hmmm.. Can't reach this page" message. I still don't understand how to bring these screens up on my computer, and the manual speaks in a language that I am not proficient in unfortunately. Is there a video or link that supplies a simplified "Step one: do this, Step 2: do this" format for people who are not as familiar with computing in general?

We need to make one, but I keep either changing things--or planning changes--that would render such tutorials outdated pretty quickly.

As of right now (1.1r5 / 1.1r6), the page in question is the WiFi page.  Scroll down to the bottom of that page; you're looking for the "MD" entry.  (mDNS.)

(please note that it is NOT a good idea to publicly post the "ID" of your inverter--that's the remote access key.  I'm doing it here because this is a debug test WiFi board that is not going to be sold or sent to a customer.)

This is the inverter's local access path.  You can also address it via the IP address listed immediately above; however, unless this is set to a static IP address in your WiFi router, it may change when your router gets restarted.

Depending on your web browser, you may have to adjust the mDNS path.  On my laptop computer running Firefox 97, any of the following methods work:

• http://genetry-c835febd/remote.htm
• http://genetry-c835febd.local/remote.htm
• http://genetry-c835febd.lan/remote.htm

My Samsung S7 phone with Chrome works on any path EXCEPT the ".local" one.

 

Here is a screenshot of my laptop with the first address (which I was surprised actually worked!):

 

You can also access the root page (i.e. remove the "remote.htm" from the path), and you'll get the status page:

 

If you want to integrate this into an existing local dashboard, you can read the "stats.json" file (i.e. "http://genetry-c835febd.local/stats.json"), which shows on Firefox like this:

This file is dynamically generated every time it is accessed.  You might notice that this WiFi board is not connected to an inverter, so all the data is invalid.

 

 

For a future code revision, I am planning a complete renovation of the WiFi handling and the local server access, unifying the sections (i.e. no separate paths for data and remote access).  I can also make the "mDNS" pop up a QR code with the web path embedded in it--in other words, pop up the QR code, scan it on your phone -> bam, local server on your phone.

 

Hope this helps.

[NotMario]

11 hours ago, BlackWaterPark said:

This doesn't work for me.. All i get is a "Hmmm.. Can't reach this page" message. I still don't understand how to bring these screens up on my computer, and the manual speaks in a language that I am not proficient in unfortunately. Is there a video or link that supplies a simplified "Step one: do this, Step 2: do this" format for people who are not as familiar with computing in general?

The manual is quite technical. Probably needs a "quick guide" version of it.

If you've already configured it to a wifi network, use the IP from the screen Sid showed above, like so:
http://192.168.1.X/remote.htm (typical example)

Personally, i set a static dhcp assignment for it, and give it a hostname of "inverter." Then i just go to http://inverter/

11 hours ago, Sid Genetry Solar said:

For a future code revision, I am planning a complete renovation of the WiFi handling and the local server access, unifying the sections (i.e. no separate paths for data and remote access).

When you do this, please leave the ability to use a specific URL to get the desired section. My monitor system loads http://inverter/remote.htm so it goes right to the display. (Kiosk mode... no user interaction) It would be a bummer if it required a click to get the the right page.

Edited March 13, 2022 by NotMario

[Sid Genetry Solar]

8 hours ago, NotMario said:

When you do this, please leave the ability to use a specific URL to get the desired section. My monitor system loads http://inverter/remote.htm so it goes right to the display. (Kiosk mode... no user interaction) It would be a bummer if it required a click to get the the right page.

Revised version leaves the ability to access a specific page by link...instead of a file path, it's a page link, i.e "http://inverter/#remote".  However, I can easily backwards-compatible the "remote.htm" path to the local link as well.

[NotMario]

1 hour ago, Sid Genetry Solar said:

Revised version leaves the ability to access a specific page by link...instead of a file path, it's a page link, i.e "http://inverter/#remote".  However, I can easily backwards-compatible the "remote.htm" path to the local link as well.

The page link sounds fine. As long as there's a url that can be rendered with no clicking that gets there, i'm good to go. Changing the rendered url is trivial - simulating a click to navigate the page is less so.

Have you considered any kind of ModbusTCP or MQTT server feature for more generalized data polling?

[Sid Genetry Solar]

42 minutes ago, NotMario said:

The page link sounds fine. As long as there's a url that can be rendered with no clicking that gets there, i'm good to go. Changing the rendered url is trivial - simulating a click to navigate the page is less so.

Fully agreed.  I'll definitely keep a link to select the page tab.  It's already in the updated HTML files; I've just got to get them all dumped into the firmware.

 

42 minutes ago, NotMario said:

Have you considered any kind of ModbusTCP or MQTT server feature for more generalized data polling?

Sort of, but any of that stuff generally comes with a huge bloated library and large resource requirements.

There's an MQTT server on the inverter (that you LIKELY could reconfigure to a local MQTT broker by changing the listed path in the configuration), though you would lose access to updates...unless you piped the data across.

There is a direct sorta TCP data polling function: read the "http://inverter/stats.json" file for a JSON-formatted list of data.  Dynamically generated every time you read the file.

[NotMario]

2 hours ago, Sid Genetry Solar said:

There is a direct sorta TCP data polling function: read the "http://inverter/stats.json" file for a JSON-formatted list of data.  Dynamically generated every time you read the file.

Yeah, i use that one for my custom stuff. I was just wondering because there are some monitoring products out there that "support" Modbus. It was something i was thinking about because i like well-integrated systems. Having one system monitor my Bank, Generator, PV output shunts, and the inverter is nice and clean.

I'm not very experienced with MQTT, but it sounds to me like what you're saying is i can make a MQTT "broker" (what i would call a server). The inverter already is set to post to topics that would run the gambit of the data in the JSON?
My original thought was the inverter would have an MQTT port open and one could just subscribe to the topics he wanted. But i suppose the other way around works just as well - with the pitfall you brought up.

[Sid Genetry Solar]

8 hours ago, NotMario said:

I'm not very experienced with MQTT, but it sounds to me like what you're saying is i can make a MQTT "broker" (what i would call a server). The inverter already is set to post to topics that would run the gambit of the data in the JSON?

Yes, the JSON data is actually just the MQTT data all pulled together with a bit of formatting.

 

8 hours ago, NotMario said:

My original thought was the inverter would have an MQTT port open and one could just subscribe to the topics he wanted. But i suppose the other way around works just as well - with the pitfall you brought up.

MQTT isn't designed that way; the MQTT client libraries are designed to connect to a common "broker" (server, whatever)...2 clients cannot talk to each other directly, they need a broker/server.

 

8 hours ago, NotMario said:

I was just wondering because there are some monitoring products out there that "support" Modbus. It was something i was thinking about because i like well-integrated systems. Having one system monitor my Bank, Generator, PV output shunts, and the inverter is nice and clean.

If we can find a clean and simple library (i.e. not overbloated messes like MOST libraries are), it might be possible to implement ModBus TCP.

[NotMario]

12 hours ago, Sid Genetry Solar said:

MQTT isn't designed that way; the MQTT client libraries are designed to connect to a common "broker" (server, whatever)...2 clients cannot talk to each other directly, they need a broker/server.

See this is why i say i'm not an expert. Very interesting. That sort of makes sense given it's design.

12 hours ago, Sid Genetry Solar said:

If we can find a clean and simple library (i.e. not overbloated messes like MOST libraries are), it might be possible to implement ModBus TCP.

The protocol is pretty simple as i understand. If you ever seriously consider the functionality, i'll write you a library for it. I presume you use C.
I've been meaning to write an implementation of it at some point anyway. (I run into it occasionally in my line of work)

[Sid Genetry Solar]

25 minutes ago, NotMario said:

See this is why i say i'm not an expert. Very interesting. That sort of makes sense given it's design.

The protocol is pretty simple as i understand. If you ever seriously consider the functionality, i'll write you a library for it. I presume you use C.
I've been meaning to write an implementation of it at some point anyway. (I run into it occasionally in my line of work)

Hey, if you want to 😉

Just write it for the ESP32; developer boards for that are quite cheap.  There might be a super lightweight library out there yet that I haven't found--but to be honest, I haven't really looked.  I really don't like to reinvent the wheel if I don't have to 😉.