CurrentCost User - migrating to OpenEnergyMonitor. Help and Advice please

Submitted by Keen2bGreen on Fri, 28/03/2014 - 23:37

I have a CurrentCost Envir, and would like to start migrating to my own OpenEnergyMonitor.

I understand there are options to do this.

1. Replace all CurrentCost equipment with a new EmonTX and Raspberry Pi base station with webserver

As is: Current Cost Transmitter -> CurrentCost Envir Display -> CurrentCost Bridge

To Be: EmonTx -> Raspberry Pi with RFM12Pi & HDD (running OpenEnergyServer locally) or Raspberry Pi with Rock Solid Gateway posting readings to hosted version of OpenEnergyServer

2. Replace the CurrentCost inhome display with the Raspberry Pi base station with webserver and modify code to decipher the proprietory code CurrentCost uses.

As is: Current Cost Transmitter -> CurrentCost Envir Display -> CurrentCost Bridge

To Be: CurrentCost Transmitter -> Raspberry Pi with RFM12Pi & HDD (running OpenEnergyServer locally) or Raspberry Pi with Rock Solid Gateway posting readings to hosted version of OpenEnergyServer (with modified perl to decipher CurrentCost protocol)

3. Keep all of the CurrentCost and connect the in-home display to a perl based server posting readings to a OpenEnergy Server (Raspberry Pi based or the hosted version). (I read with interest this very useful post http://openenergymonitor.org/emon/node/1418)

As is: Current Cost Transmitter -> CurrentCost Envir Display -> CurrentCost Bridge

To Be: Current Cost Transmitter -> CurrentCost Envir Display -> Serial:USB cable -> Perl based client with custom code -> Raspberry Pi with RFM12Pi & HDD (running OpenEnergyServer locally) or Raspberry Pi with Rock Solid Gateway posting readings to hosted version of OpenEnergyServer!

Who has implemented what? My preference is as follows:

Option 2 if someone has the code and can advise how to apply to the Pi based server.

Option 3 if the Pi based server could run the script which grabs the serial:USB data from the CurrentCost monitor.

Can anyone help and advise me?

Thanks

Re: CurrentCost User - migrating to OpenEnergyMonitor. Help and Advice please

Submitted by Keen2bGreen on Sun, 30/03/2014 - 14:37.

Ok - so I had a go at setting up scenario 3 on my own. I chose scenario 3 because I quite like having the in home display, and I believe it works quite reliably - just the bridge seems to be unreliable. Also there was quite a lot of examples of people grabbing data from the Envir via the included USB Serial cable with perl on a pi

Let it be known I'm no linux or Raspberry Pi expert, a definite noob actually. But I've managed to get it working.

So to recap scenario 3 is:

Current Cost transmitted on my electricity meter (pulse type)
transmits wirelessly to my CurrentCost Envir in home display
connects to the USB port of my Raspberry Pi (HDD build and self hosting)

I have built the Emoncms booting to HDD so a self contained Emoncms system on a single Raspberry Pi. I also put a copy of the envi.pl script (from the post I reference above) onto my Pi SD boot card, and modified it mith my Pi's IP and the API key for my Emoncms read/write access. I also modified the script to comment out the print statements and reference to channel 1 as I don't have any IAM's. I found the envi.pl script wouldn't run without installing some libraries for LWP and Serial Port support. This is what I did to get it working:

On booting the Pi and logging in with the pi user.

sudo bash

apt-get install libdevice-serialport-perl

apt-get install libwww-perl

cd /boot

perl envi.pl &

And that's it.

Its working great.

Now playing with Emoncms, and setting up some cool visualizations and dashboards...

However - I still need help and advice:

I would like to somehow have "perl envi.pl &" run automatically when the pi starts. I've seen various posts, but not sure what the best method should be - any advice most welcome.
I would like to go wireless at some point. So any advice grabbing data via the wireless module from the CurrentCost transmitter would be really appreciated.
Any issues using the Pi with Emoncms installed, as a simple NAS?

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