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Recommendations for use as home automation controller?

Posted: Sun Dec 09, 2018 12:10 am
by HarmlessSaucer
Hey everyone! New here.
Just recently bought my first Joggler, after a friend (who used to work at O2) reminded me of them!
I wanted one years back, but forgot about them - Then recently I wall-mounted an old 1st-gen iPad as a home automation controller, and was looking for something else!

Since I’ve had it, I have tried both Xubuntu and Android. I’m looking for something that I can use as a full-screen browser, for my Home-Assistant UI.

The version of Android obviously didn’t have an up-to-date enough web browser, so I couldn’t use that. Xubuntu worked fine, but performance kinda sucked! Anyone got any recommendations on making it run faster? From what I’ve read on here so far, it seems down to the throughput on the USB stick you use, so I may check out some of those.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

Re: Recommendations for use as home automation controller?

Posted: Sun Dec 09, 2018 6:57 am
by dwl99
At the risk of being accused of heresy, have you looked at a Pipo x8 or Raspberry Pi with a touchscreen?

Re: Recommendations for use as home automation controller?

Posted: Sun Dec 09, 2018 2:13 pm
by hawsey
An external SSD gives a performance boost for me .

Sent from my Moto G (4) using Tapatalk


Re: Recommendations for use as home automation controller?

Posted: Sun Dec 09, 2018 2:29 pm
by pete
Here testing Home Assistant on:

1 - O2 Joggler with base Ubuntu on it. Works but slow
2 - RPi - Works
3 - old Shuttle nettop - works fine with Ubuntu 18.10 and Docker these days.

My Jogglers are all configured the same way these days hardware wise using 16Gb ZIF mounted SSD's. I have 15 XPe Jogglers up and running 24/7.

I also utilize Homeseer automation (since the 1990's here).

Best touch screen GUI for me is using the Joggler with an SSD, embedded XPe and a Seabios.

Relating to Home Assistant here have ventured off to modified WiFi firmware devices using Tasmota or Espurna firmware.
Working great here with Mosquitto. I can speak to these devices fine using Home Assistant and Homeseer. I have added temperature or temperature humidity sensors to each build.

1 - 3 RGB controllers with a temperature sensor plus now a digital on off and dimming pot
2 - basic SonOff WiFi module modified as a multiple purpose garage door opener, sensor and temperature sensor
3 - basic SonOff WiFi module modified as a 1-Wire hub. Two of these and one has 5 extended sensors on it.

Not doing any higher voltage lamp switching to date here. (120VAC). The Home Assitant GUI does run slow on the Jogglers.

Re: Recommendations for use as home automation controller?

Posted: Sun Dec 09, 2018 6:30 pm
by hawsey
HarmlessSaucer wrote:Hey everyone! New here.
Just recently bought my first Joggler, after a friend (who used to work at O2) reminded me of them!
I wanted one years back, but forgot about them - Then recently I wall-mounted an old 1st-gen iPad as a home automation controller, and was looking for something else!

Since I’ve had it, I have tried both Xubuntu and Android. I’m looking for something that I can use as a full-screen browser, for my Home-Assistant UI.

The version of Android obviously didn’t have an up-to-date enough web browser, so I couldn’t use that. Xubuntu worked fine, but performance kinda sucked! Anyone got any recommendations on making it run faster? From what I’ve read on here so far, it seems down to the throughput on the USB stick you use, so I may check out some of those.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk
Welcome to the forum :-) as well as perhaps booting from an SSD I always increase the thermal psv to 80 . Better practice would be to add cooling and a proper heatsink .
See below from BuZz's site

https://jwills.co.uk/projects/joggler-x ... tructions/


Overheating / Throttling issues

As you may be aware, the Joggler has problems with the cpu throttling when the temperature reaches 70°C making the system pretty unusable. Previously people have solved this by adding larger heatsinks which improve cooling (Often cutting the case to make space etc). Hacking the Joggler hardware is not something everyone wants to do, but fortunately there is an alternative – you can modify the thermal trip point via software. An unmodified Joggler, after being powered up for some time seems to idle at around 60 – 66°C with the LCD on (less with it off), so it doesn’t take a lot of usage to bring the temperature up to 70°C at which point the throttling starts. By increasing the throttling trip point, the device becomes much more usable for longer periods, and for many tasks, doesn’t throttle at all. Read on to find out how.

Note if you make the changes below you are allowing the machine to run hotter than it is set to run by the firmware. You could permanently damage your device by playing with the thermal trip points. Do this at your own risk!

The default throttling trip point is 70°C. I have successfully increased this to 80°C on my Joggler. There is another safety trip point at 100°C where the cpu will halt/stop. We won’t of course be playing with that one. Boot up the image and enter a terminal and type.

sudo nano -w /boot/grub.cfg

At the end of the line that contains “splash” add the parameter “thermal.psv=xx” where xx is the trip point you want for the passive cooling (throttling) – for example to increase the passive throttling point to 80°C use “thermal.psv=80”. This means that your machine will not start throttling until it reaches 80°C rather than 70°C. It is possible this could shorten the life of your device, however I have been running my Jogglers like this for years with no problems.




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Re: Recommendations for use as home automation controller?

Posted: Mon Dec 24, 2018 12:35 am
by roobarb!
HarmlessSaucer wrote: Sun Dec 09, 2018 12:10 amSince I’ve had it, I have tried both Xubuntu and Android. I’m looking for something that I can use as a full-screen browser, for my Home-Assistant UI.
Base system with Midori browser - uses the Chrome rendering engine, so compatibility is great, but super-light, so runs like the wind.

I'm really trying to get Bionic released for the OpenFrames in the new year (it's 95% done, just some really basic stuff left to tidy) and that runs Midori (or even full Chrome) with no issues at all.

Re: Recommendations for use as home automation controller?

Posted: Mon Dec 24, 2018 11:42 am
by HarmlessSaucer
Thanks for the input everyone! Sorry for the late reply! Merry Christmas! :mrgreen:

dwl99 wrote: Sun Dec 09, 2018 6:57 am At the risk of being accused of heresy, have you looked at a Pipo x8 or Raspberry Pi with a touchscreen?
I actually hadn't heard of the Pipo x8 until I Googled it just now... pretty cool! I have to say tho, as much as I love Raspberry Pi and I know it would work, the cost was the prohibiting factor here.

hawsey wrote: Sun Dec 09, 2018 2:13 pm An external SSD gives a performance boost for me .
When you say external SSD, do you mean still connected via the USB port? I thought that bus was the bottleneck?

pete wrote: Sun Dec 09, 2018 2:29 pm Here testing Home Assistant on:

1 - O2 Joggler with base Ubuntu on it. Works but slow
2 - RPi - Works
3 - old Shuttle nettop - works fine with Ubuntu 18.10 and Docker these days.
Oh nice - Did you actually install Home-Assistant on the Joggler itself? I'm running it on a Intel NUC running under Docker, so really I'm just looking to render the web interface remotely on the Joggler.

pete wrote: Sun Dec 09, 2018 2:29 pm My Jogglers are all configured the same way these days hardware wise using 16Gb ZIF mounted SSD's. I have 15 XPe Jogglers up and running 24/7.
I think I read your post on this, I'm up for a challenge so I might give that a go! :)

pete wrote: Sun Dec 09, 2018 2:29 pm Best touch screen GUI for me is using the Joggler with an SSD, embedded XPe and a Seabios.
Interesting.. not sure how well XPe would work - I'm having issues with older browser engines and Home-Assistant as it is. Unless you can confirm if the interface renders? :D

pete wrote: Sun Dec 09, 2018 2:29 pm Relating to Home Assistant here have ventured off to modified WiFi firmware devices using Tasmota or Espurna firmware.
Working great here with Mosquitto. I can speak to these devices fine using Home Assistant and Homeseer. I have added temperature or temperature humidity sensors to each build.

1 - 3 RGB controllers with a temperature sensor plus now a digital on off and dimming pot
2 - basic SonOff WiFi module modified as a multiple purpose garage door opener, sensor and temperature sensor
3 - basic SonOff WiFi module modified as a 1-Wire hub. Two of these and one has 5 extended sensors on it.

Not doing any higher voltage lamp switching to date here. (120VAC). The Home Assitant GUI does run slow on the Jogglers.
Very nice! I have a bunch of Tasmota'd Sonoffs for lamps and lights. I have also built a bunch of RGB-LED controllers using ESP8266 boards which work great with Home-Assistant. I also build some ESP8266 based sensor nodes that do light level, temperature, humidity and motion sensing. I have some 433Mhz devices that I'm communicating with via a Sonoff RF Bridge, which I also flashed with Tasmota. All of these devices communicate via MQTT and are then accessed via Siri/HomeKit or Amazon Echo devices around the house. Really pleased with it.

hawsey wrote: Sun Dec 09, 2018 6:30 pm Welcome to the forum :-) as well as perhaps booting from an SSD I always increase the thermal psv to 80 . Better practice would be to add cooling and a proper heatsink .
See below from BuZz's site
https://jwills.co.uk/projects/joggler-x ... tructions/
Thanks! I had a look at this the other day, some great info - I'll have a go at that I think - Thank you!

roobarb! wrote: Mon Dec 24, 2018 12:35 am Base system with Midori browser - uses the Chrome rendering engine, so compatibility is great, but super-light, so runs like the wind.

I'm really trying to get Bionic released for the OpenFrames in the new year (it's 95% done, just some really basic stuff left to tidy) and that runs Midori (or even full Chrome) with no issues at all.
When you say 'Base system' do you mean Ubuntu? I didn't think to try Midori, I honestly forgot it was a thing! :) I'll keep an eye on your work on Bionic - that would be really interesting to test out!

Re: Recommendations for use as home automation controller?

Posted: Mon Dec 24, 2018 1:58 pm
by pete
Did you actually install Home-Assistant on the Joggler itself? I'm running it on a Intel NUC running under Docker, so really I'm just looking to render the web interface remotely on the Joggler.

Yes just to test it and using Chrome / Firefox. It was slow.

I am currently running HA on an old Nettop Intel Atom computer (Shuttle) using Docker to run HA, Alexa API, Node Red, Zigbee MQTT, Samsung Smartthing to MQTT plugins. It is doing well.

Homeseer Pro is running on an Intel based Haswell computer with 16Gb of RAM. It's base is Ubuntu 18.10 64 bit and one instance of an Oracle VB running a micro version of Windows Server for Microsoft SAPI (now 5 voice fonts).

Here have automation that runs the heartbeat of the home which I do not really tinker with. This is via the Leviton Omni Pro 2 combo panel and Homeseer.

Jogglers do best running Linux applications. XPe is really light and running an old propietary touch interface that still works on Windows embedded CE.

Over the years the boxes here have been much hardware modified to work this way. That said there is NO tabletop touch screen that I know of today that will run Android, Linux or Windows. Well except for modded Pipo computers that will do the same. Tabletop Pipo computers are ugly though.

Here have sort of migrated from using Tasmota to Espurna firmware. Latest endeavor has been related to using a magic home controller with Espurna and a hardware digital controller and on and off button for single channel LED lamps under the kitchen counter. Concurrent with said testing also have another 12VDC LED configuration controlled by a dimming 120VAC to 12VDC power supply managed by a powerline UPB switch.

Old automator here starting in the 1970's with X10, then in the 2000's with Insteon then UPB (and Zigbee and ZWave and now Wifi and MQTT).

Merry Christmas to you and your family!!!!

Re: Recommendations for use as home automation controller?

Posted: Wed Dec 26, 2018 10:30 pm
by hawsey
HarmlessSaucer wrote:Thanks for the input everyone! Sorry for the late reply! Merry Christmas! :mrgreen:

dwl99 wrote: Sun Dec 09, 2018 6:57 am At the risk of being accused of heresy, have you looked at a Pipo x8 or Raspberry Pi with a touchscreen?
I actually hadn't heard of the Pipo x8 until I Googled it just now... pretty cool! I have to say tho, as much as I love Raspberry Pi and I know it would work, the cost was the prohibiting factor here.

hawsey wrote: Sun Dec 09, 2018 2:13 pm An external SSD gives a performance boost for me .
When you say external SSD, do you mean still connected via the USB port? I thought that bus was the bottleneck?

pete wrote: Sun Dec 09, 2018 2:29 pm Here testing Home Assistant on:

1 - O2 Joggler with base Ubuntu on it. Works but slow
2 - RPi - Works
3 - old Shuttle nettop - works fine with Ubuntu 18.10 and Docker these days.
Oh nice - Did you actually install Home-Assistant on the Joggler itself? I'm running it on a Intel NUC running under Docker, so really I'm just looking to render the web interface remotely on the Joggler.

pete wrote: Sun Dec 09, 2018 2:29 pm My Jogglers are all configured the same way these days hardware wise using 16Gb ZIF mounted SSD's. I have 15 XPe Jogglers up and running 24/7.
I think I read your post on this, I'm up for a challenge so I might give that a go! :)

pete wrote: Sun Dec 09, 2018 2:29 pm Best touch screen GUI for me is using the Joggler with an SSD, embedded XPe and a Seabios.
Interesting.. not sure how well XPe would work - I'm having issues with older browser engines and Home-Assistant as it is. Unless you can confirm if the interface renders? :D

pete wrote: Sun Dec 09, 2018 2:29 pm Relating to Home Assistant here have ventured off to modified WiFi firmware devices using Tasmota or Espurna firmware.
Working great here with Mosquitto. I can speak to these devices fine using Home Assistant and Homeseer. I have added temperature or temperature humidity sensors to each build.

1 - 3 RGB controllers with a temperature sensor plus now a digital on off and dimming pot
2 - basic SonOff WiFi module modified as a multiple purpose garage door opener, sensor and temperature sensor
3 - basic SonOff WiFi module modified as a 1-Wire hub. Two of these and one has 5 extended sensors on it.

Not doing any higher voltage lamp switching to date here. (120VAC). The Home Assitant GUI does run slow on the Jogglers.
Very nice! I have a bunch of Tasmota'd Sonoffs for lamps and lights. I have also built a bunch of RGB-LED controllers using ESP8266 boards which work great with Home-Assistant. I also build some ESP8266 based sensor nodes that do light level, temperature, humidity and motion sensing. I have some 433Mhz devices that I'm communicating with via a Sonoff RF Bridge, which I also flashed with Tasmota. All of these devices communicate via MQTT and are then accessed via Siri/HomeKit or Amazon Echo devices around the house. Really pleased with it.

hawsey wrote: Sun Dec 09, 2018 6:30 pm Welcome to the forum :-) as well as perhaps booting from an SSD I always increase the thermal psv to 80 . Better practice would be to add cooling and a proper heatsink .
See below from BuZz's site
https://jwills.co.uk/projects/joggler-x ... tructions/
Thanks! I had a look at this the other day, some great info - I'll have a go at that I think - Thank you!

roobarb! wrote: Mon Dec 24, 2018 12:35 am Base system with Midori browser - uses the Chrome rendering engine, so compatibility is great, but super-light, so runs like the wind.

I'm really trying to get Bionic released for the OpenFrames in the new year (it's 95% done, just some really basic stuff left to tidy) and that runs Midori (or even full Chrome) with no issues at all.
When you say 'Base system' do you mean Ubuntu? I didn't think to try Midori, I honestly forgot it was a thing! :) I'll keep an eye on your work on Bionic - that would be really interesting to test out!
Yes , usb is the bottleneck but various usb sticks all work differently due to their differing speeds also usb 3 does not necessarily max out a usb 2 .
With experimentation I found that running a Plex server ( for music only ) in the background on top of a Squeezeplay Os external install via an SSD was the only way to get flawless music streaming at a remote location so it must just work better .
Pete has also added pata ports but that is a fiddle ha ha ...

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Re: Recommendations for use as home automation controller?

Posted: Wed Dec 26, 2018 11:33 pm
by pete
Lately here have been tinkering with Magic Home RGB controllers and use of Espurna firmware. It is a bit difficult to solder wires to the little pads on the Magic Home controller.

Wanted local on and off and dimming here due to WAF and (wife acceptance factor) I wanted to also add a DHT22 combo temperature and humidity sensor.

An automation peer modified the Espurna RGB firmware to allow connection of a

1 - Digital potentiometer on/off switch Easy to connect (on 3 pin side it is RX/TX and center ground and switch side it is GPIO 0 and ground.
2 - optional DHT 22 firmware connections are IR pin for GPIO4, ground and 3.3VCC (from IR wires)
3 - optional original IR remote firmware

Put the tiny Magic Home Controller, Pot and DHT-22 in a small box velcroed to under neath the kitchen cabinets connected to an SMD5050 strip mounted on an aluminum rail with a diffuser.