I am evaluating Emoncms to see if it can serve as a foundation for a monitoring/visualization project. I have already set up a local instance on my server and have begun logging some test data. I have also read up on the user documentation. So far I like it a lot but need some clarification on the following:
1. I understand inputs, feeds and processes, but what is a "Node" and where would one use it?
2. Can I display the raw logged data in a data table/grid somehow? If so, how?
3. Is it possible to create our own reports and charts on top of enomcms? (I am familiar with php, mysql, angular etc)
4. Alternatively, if #2 and #3 above are not possible, I am thinking of use enomcms just as a "backend" logging platform and then building my own "frontend" for reporting and visualization - would you recommend this?
Any advice or pointers would be highly appreciated!
Re: Evaluating enomcms - A few basic questions
1 - Nodes are sensor devices like the emonTx and emonTH, each node on the network has a unique node ID.
2 - Not within emonCMS itself but you can export feeds as csv files and view in a spreadsheet etc
3 - Getting involved in development is encouraged and if you have the skills then I'm sure many users would enjoy the additional features. Take a look at the emonCMS repo on GitHub most of the code is in modular form located in the Modules folder, there are additional modules like packetgen and event etc that can be just dropped into "Modules" to work. So you can either contribute to the existing files via git or create your own module.
4 - Nothing is stopping you doing that but IMHO it maybe easier to just build on what emoncms has in the form of an additional Module rather than starting over.
Paul
Re: Evaluating enomcms - A few basic questions
Thanks for your responses! I've just started reading through the dev guide to get an understanding of how things are structured.
I do agree that building modules on top of enomcms would be ideal and allow me to extend the base functionality with ease and in a modular way.
Thanks for taking time to respond.