Particle Cloud publish and variable

Troubleshooting
1

Greetings,

I just got my photons and i was trying to use some of the examples from the IDE but it seems that i cannot make them to work.

To be short,

I wanted to read the battery status and voltage from the power shield and to put it on the cloud but no luck.

In the sample i have :

#include "PowerShield/PowerShield.h"

PowerShield batteryMonitor;

void setup() {
  
}

void loop() {    
    Wire.begin(); 
    batteryMonitor.reset();
    batteryMonitor.quickStart();
    delay(1000);
    float cellVoltage = batteryMonitor.getVCell();
    float stateOfCharge = batteryMonitor.getSoC();
    Spark.publish("voltage", String(cellVoltage), 60, PRIVATE);
    delay(100);
    Spark.publish("soc", String(stateOfCharge), 60, PRIVATE);
    delay(100);
    //System.sleep(SLEEP_MODE_DEEP, 600);
}

I tried to change Spark with Particle but still no result.

If i use this code :


#include "PowerShield/PowerShield.h"

PowerShield batteryMonitor;

void setup() {    
    Serial.begin(9600); 
    // This essentially starts the I2C bus
    batteryMonitor.begin(); 
    // This sets up the fuel gauge
    batteryMonitor.quickStart();
    // Wait for it to settle down
    delay(500);
}

void loop() {    
    // Read the volatge of the LiPo
    float cellVoltage = batteryMonitor.getVCell();
    // Read the State of Charge of the LiPo
    float stateOfCharge = batteryMonitor.getSoC();
    
    // Send the Voltage and SoC readings over serial
    Serial.print("Battery Voltage : ");
    Serial.print(cellVoltage);
    Serial.print(" ");
    Serial.print("Charging state : ");
    Serial.print(stateOfCharge);
    Serial.println("");
    delay(3000);
}

i can read over serial the values, but if i try to adapt that into variable part does not work.

Here is one of the multiple versions and still no luck


#include "PowerShield/PowerShield.h"

PowerShield batteryMonitor;

char returnString[63];
String someString;

char *BVoltage = "test";
int Voltage = 0;
int SOC = 0;
int rssi = 0;

void setup() {
    if (Particle.variable("Voltage", BVoltage, STRING)==false);
   memset(returnString, 0, 63);
   //Particle.variable("test", returnString, STRING);
}

void loop() {    
    Wire.begin(); 
    batteryMonitor.reset();
    batteryMonitor.quickStart();
    delay(100);
    float cellVoltage = batteryMonitor.getVCell();
    float stateOfCharge = batteryMonitor.getSoC();
    someString = String(cellVoltage);
    strcpy(returnString, someString.c_str());
    delay(100);
    
    Voltage = batteryMonitor.getVCell();
    SOC = stateOfCharge;
    rssi = WiFi.RSSI();
    
    //BVoltage = String(cellVoltage);
    
     Particle.variable("vbat", &Voltage, INT);
     Particle.variable("SOC", &SOC, INT);
     Particle.variable("RSSI", &rssi, INT);
     delay(100);
     Particle.variable("test", returnString, STRING);
    //System.sleep(SLEEP_MODE_DEEP, 20);
}

If i use variable it seems that no matter what i use i get always 0 and if i make that conversion from INT or float to string i get 0.00000.

Any ideas are more than welcomed.

Thanks

2

Hmmm 2 days back i used the example and it worked. Did you solder the shield to the Photon?

3

Nope, i got the shield and the photon with headers so just plug and play, it works nice on serial, i get the values, but no values over the cloud. so i guess the issue is somewhere in the middle or on the coding.

4

Well it seems that the issue was coding,

I just set the variables to String and then converted the result to string and now are working ok, but still i don`t get anything on publish, at least on private , so i guess it is still on pending or something there as well.

5

As for variables, try declaring those in your setup, rather than your loop.
As for publishes, please make sure you don’t cross the limit of 1p/s, with a burst of 4p/s allowed. The first example will exceed that limit, thus leave you at the risk of being rate-limited.

6

Well , regarding variables, i did put them on the Setup part and it seems that they don’t work or at least on me, if i put them on the setup() part i get empty values, when if i put them on the loop() part i get all the values so maybe i’m doing something wrong but it works this way .


#include "PowerShield/PowerShield.h"

PowerShield batteryMonitor;

String Voltage;
String soc;
int rssi = 0;

void setup() {
   Particle.variable("RSSI", &rssi, INT);
  
}

void loop() {    
    Wire.begin(); 
    batteryMonitor.reset();
    batteryMonitor.quickStart();
    delay(100);
    float cellVoltage = batteryMonitor.getVCell();
    float stateOfCharge = batteryMonitor.getSoC();
    delay(100);
    
    Voltage = String(batteryMonitor.getVCell());
    soc = String(batteryMonitor.getSoC());
    rssi = WiFi.RSSI();
    
    delay(100);
     
    Particle.variable("vbat", Voltage, STRING);
    Particle.variable("soc", soc, STRING);
    //System.sleep(SLEEP_MODE_DEEP, 20);
}

So this one works ok for me, as you see i have the RSSI in the Setup part and i get the value , but if i put the bat part i get “XZ” and on the soc part i get “”, nothing so i don’t know why, this is the first time for me to work with photon but it seems that in setup some functions are not called. so i keep it in loop, i don’t know if it’s better or not but it works.

7

Regarding the Publish part i use the code :

#include "PowerShield/PowerShield.h"

PowerShield batteryMonitor;

String Voltage;
String soc;
int rssi = 0;

void setup() {
   Particle.variable("RSSI", &rssi, INT);
}

void loop() {    
    Wire.begin(); 
    batteryMonitor.reset();
    batteryMonitor.quickStart();
    delay(100);
    float cellVoltage = batteryMonitor.getVCell();
    float stateOfCharge = batteryMonitor.getSoC();
    delay(1500);
    
    Voltage = String(batteryMonitor.getVCell());
    soc = String(batteryMonitor.getSoC());
    rssi = WiFi.RSSI();
    
    Particle.publish("voltage", String(cellVoltage), 60, PRIVATE);
    Particle.publish("soc", String(stateOfCharge), 60, PRIVATE);
    delay(1500);
    
    Particle.variable("vbat", Voltage, STRING);
    Particle.variable("soc", soc, STRING);
 
    System.sleep(SLEEP_MODE_DEEP, 60);
}

and it seems that it does not work,

i use from terminal "particle subscribe device_id" and it gives me

Subscribing to "device_id" from the firehose (all devices) 
Listening to: /v1/events/device_id

and that`s it , no response nothing.

i did tried to increase the delay so that i don`t get into that time issue but still no luck .

8

you need to replace device_id with the event name you want to monitor.

Try particle subscribe mine to see any events from devices under your account.

The easiest might be to just use: https://dashboard.particle.io/user/logs

9

i just put that so that i don`t publish my id , but the actual id it is there already

10

Cool thanks, i did not knew about that, it seems that it is publishing something there but all are 0 so i think that i have to edit the code as well to get the right result

Thanks .