Updating virtual device Last Update timestamp?

[ryanbuckner]

I have. a virtual on/off device that gets status from a variable. That variable is updated by an API call to a 3rd party device not currently supported by Indigo. It's a back yard gate so it will not change 90% of the time.

I would like to update this Last Update timestamp each time the script runs so I know that the API is executing properly, even if the state does not change.

virtual_device.png (76.65 KiB) Viewed 751 times

I saw this code in the documentation. Is there something similar to update the Last Update timestamp ?

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virtual_devices_interface = indigo.server.getPlugin("com.perceptiveautomation.indigoplugin.devicecollection")
if virtual_devices_interface.isEnabled():
    virtual_devices_interface.executeAction('setVirtualDeviceState', deviceId=DEVICEIDHERE, props={'newValue': 'on'})

[DaveL17]

If I'm not mistaken, if you send a value that's equal to what it's currently set to, the device won't register an update (but I wouldn't swear to that in court).

Here's one option that I *THINK* would work. Using the Global Property Manager plugin, add a custom property to the device and then -- using your script -- set the custom property to something like a timestamp (which by definition will always be different). I'm pretty sure when the value of the custom property changes, the Last Update value will change as well because there's been a change to the device dictionary.

[jay (support)]

I don't think so - the server updates that timestamp automatically when a device changes. But the server is somewhat clever in that something actually has to change before it will update.

You can probably change the variable value to an empty string then set it to the value, like this (which will always force the last update field to update even if it didn't really change):

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indigo.variable.updateValue(12345, "");indigo.variable.updateValue(12345, "true")

If you watch the variable window, you'll see the variable value kinda flash. However, I never saw the virtual device itself to go into and then out of error mode. But it is in fact doing that, it's just not visible in the UI (at least on my dev Mac). It looks like if you trigger using device state changed - on/off state - becomes on then it will not fire when the state changes to error ("") then back to on (true). So that might be a reasonable workaround. You'd definitely want to test any logic around that device to make sure there weren't other side effects.

[jay (support)]

Here's one option that I *THINK* would work. Using the Global Property Manager plugin, add a custom property to the device and then -- using your script -- set the custom property to something like a timestamp (which by definition will always be different). I'm pretty sure when the value of the custom property changes, the Last Update value will change as well because there's been a change to the device dictionary.

That was my first thought, but it doesn't update the timestamp, probably because it's more of a definition/property item rather than an actual device attribute/state.

[ryanbuckner]

If I'm not mistaken, if you send a value that's equal to what it's currently set to, the device won't register an update (but I wouldn't swear to that in court).

Here's one option that I *THINK* would work. Using the Global Property Manager plugin, add a custom property to the device and then -- using your script -- set the custom property to something like a timestamp (which by definition will always be different). I'm pretty sure when the value of the custom property changes, the Last Update value will change as well because there's been a change to the device dictionary.

I just tried this and Jay was right. It didn't update

[ryanbuckner]

You can probably change the variable value to an empty string then set it to the value, like this (which will always force the last update field to update even if it didn't really change):

Since the virtual device state is updated from a variable, what would trigger the device state to update if I set the device value to "" ? I don't want to force a change in the variable because that would cause false on Change triggers

[jay (support)]

Anything other than a boolean as the var value will be treated as an error string. So in effect it will go into an error state and then back out (I think) which will cause the timestamp to update.

Can’t recall if that’ll cause the trigger to fire, but you can easily test that.