Popular - Twine community

Non-penetrating way to attach Twine

Andrew Breen — Wed, 21 Nov 2012 08:06:03 +0000

The cool part about Twine is the device is a sensor itself (vibration, etc). That implies attachment to something that moves (ie a door). I'd like to do that but I don't want to penetrate my door with a screw. Anyone have success attaching with something non-penetrating that is strong but doesn't impair the surface/finish of where its attached?

2 day battery life

Scott HURLBERT — Tue, 21 May 2013 13:57:15 +0000

Hello, I've tried all kinds of batteries. I have strong wifi. I only have one rule that uses the mag switch, yet I go through batteries in 2 days. Any ideas?

Pebble Integration

Darren Skidmore — Wed, 09 Jan 2013 18:46:06 +0000

Now that a firm release date has been set for the Pebble Smartwatch it would be good to find out the planned integration between Twine and Pebble and what we will be able to do.

I am thinking a good one will be vibration sensing so for example If you are in the garden and somebody knocks your door your Pepple will notify you

People's thoughts for other useful ideas

Moisture sensor, how water proof?

Jay Krusac — Wed, 26 Dec 2012 17:16:07 +0000

Can the entire sensor get wet? I want to use this sensor as a sump pump failure alert, can i lay it flat on the floor? or must I only let the two tips get wet?

Appears to be nonfunctional

Jeff Carpenter — Tue, 25 Dec 2012 18:19:52 +0000

Brand new device - just figuring it out. I ordered a moisture sensor so just using the temperature sensor to play around with the device. I set it up to send an email and SMS at 45 degrees. I have batteries in the device and also have it plugged into an AC power supply through the microUSB jack. So I just checked the dashboard and it says that the last report was 91 minutes ago. That surprised me, that the last report would be that long ago. I turned the device over. I unplugged the power supply and plugged in back in. Nothing. The last report stays at 91 minutes and growing. The orientation never updated when I rotated the device. How do you know if this thing is working or DOA?

Connection for devices (such as the breakout board)

Frank Motta — Mon, 17 Dec 2012 04:54:49 +0000

Is this I2C interface or some other?
Can this accommodate a DHT11 Digital Temperature Humidity Sensor Module ?

Was an iOS App made to interface with Twine/Supermechanical?

Graham Cruickshank — Sat, 06 Apr 2013 21:26:25 +0000

I remember someone in alpha testing a long time ago...

Celcius

Roel Van den Bergh — Sun, 17 Mar 2013 10:37:39 +0000

Celcius instead of Fahrenheit would be welcome!

External temp sensor

erik parker — Mon, 03 Dec 2012 13:46:45 +0000

Any thoughts to making a standard external temp sensor? Would the breakout board accomodate something that isn't simply open/closed ?

Use case: I want to measure temp outside my window in a high rise office building.. don't want to dangle twine out the window..

Cloud Shield GUI?

Joel Finkle — Thu, 07 Mar 2013 13:41:29 +0000

For those of us who already understand the Twine/Spool stuff, could you post a couple pix of the GUI you get for the Cloud Shield?

From the comments on the Facebook post, it's currently only on/off... but how many on/offs are there to the shield interface? If there are two "touch capacitive buttons" and a whole bunch of GPIO pins, it seems reasonable to send more complex signals using multiple GPIO pins. Is this possible? Can I say

If pins 5, 3, 2 and 1 are high,

Then send a message "The number is 23"

Profiling temperature

Jon Plummer — Thu, 08 Nov 2012 17:09:20 +0000

I'd like to use Twine to profile the temperature in my attic. At the moment it seems like I could do that by having Twine submit the current temp to a webserver every handful of minutes, but it's not an area I have any experience in. It'd be great if twine.supermechanical.com could report historical results.

I'll probably do the same in the garage, with the added benefit of having the Twine there warn me by SMS if the garage door has been open for a long time.

I see the vibration sensor but can't make a rule with it?

Kurt Peeters — Wed, 30 Jan 2013 06:13:52 +0000

When i choose add new rule it only shows orientation temp and breakout board?

How can I make a rule with the vibration sensor(I can see the value on the left of the screen?)

Heartbleed Fixes on the Twine.CC site?

Sean McPherson — Thu, 24 Apr 2014 07:40:06 +0000

The website certificates haven't been updated and the site seems to be possibly vulnerable based on generic version info. Any timeline for securing the site & data?

External Temp Sensor

Joel Finkle — Thu, 11 Jul 2013 15:57:44 +0000

Saw the Kickstarter update, and it occurs to me that this is the first external sensor with more than just 1/0 values.

Does this mean we may see other sensors with ranges of values, such as "how moist"?

Also, can we have a rule that compares the internal and external temp values? e.g.

IF temp.internal > temp.external+20 then

EMAIL "Wear a sweater, stupid!"

Spam filtering of Twine email

Gerry Mueller — Sat, 15 Dec 2012 20:46:27 +0000

Anyone having trouble getting email from their Twine might want to read this.
After a fair bit of experimenting, I believe if you are sending email to an iPhone @me.com or @icloud.com, Apple does not like the portion of the "From:" field, which will look like this, with each * a hexadecimal digit, the total Twine ID. There appears to be no way to add @supermechanical.net to a "friendly" domain list, so essentially it will have to be up to Supermechanical to persuade Apple to not filter out their Twine messages. I have been in touch with John Kestner about this.
With my other email provider, @symatico.ca (also @bell.net), in Canada, I was able to add @supermechanical.net to a "friendlies" list, but you have to do that using the Sympatico/Bell web interface to Hotmail, which is the actual platform beneath Sympatio/Bell. Once you do that, your Twine email will be downloaded to your phone, tablet, or computer.
One other wrinkle; if you use Outlook on your desktop, it may decide that Twine email is spam, and sort it to your Junk E-mail folder, so you need to keep an eye on that. Further, if you run McAfee Anti-Spam on your desktop, it occasional also sees Twine email as spam, and sorts it to the McAfee Anti-Spam folder. Unfortunately, neither Outlook nor McAfee seem to have a "friendlies" list.

Sigh! This was supposed to make life easier.

How many rules can I create for one Twine?

Øyvind Neuman — Fri, 18 Jan 2013 15:12:59 +0000

Since the Twine doesn't support change in temperature, but only rises above and below.

So to measure temperature I need to setup each temperature from -20C to 30C which amounts to 50 rises above/fall below rules. So I need 100 rules. My finger got a bit tired after setting up 6 rules - so I wonder if there are a maximum amount of rules I can set up.

It would be annoying if the twine wouldn't accept the rules after I spent some hours setting they up.

Magnet Sensor Setup Details?

Derek Erb — Sat, 29 Dec 2012 09:50:52 +0000

My first Twine arrived this morning.

I got the orientation triggers working relatively quickly...

Are there any pictures or videos of successful Twine magnet sensor setups? I want to try the most obvious use of testing for the opening/closing of a door.

I have my Twine setup and connected.
I have my magswitch in it's box.
I have my tiny magnet it the box as well.

The magnet has double-sided sticky tape behind it. I assume I would stick this magnet on to the back of the door near the frame.

My understanding is that I would need to stick the magswitch sensor on to my door frame right next to the magnet, requiring more double-sided sticky tape or screwing it in to the door. I then run the included sensor cable from the magswitch to the Twine. I assume I would also stick the Twine to the wall near the door frame... with more double-sided sticky tape or such.

I assume I can then set up my twine to react when the magnet moves away from, or towards, the mag switch due to the opening and closing of the door.

Before I start sticking elements to my door and wall I would prefer to see an actual working setup... somewhere...

Thanks!

Did you need to configure any port forwarding when setting up your Twine?

Devin Mancuso — Fri, 04 Jan 2013 07:53:42 +0000

I've recently received my Twine but am having no success in connecting it to my account.

I can complete the setup process, with the Twine even reporting that it has successfully connected to my network. If I check my router's DHCP table (Billion 7800n) it shows Twine with an internal IP. However, it can't be pinged and refuses to work; it doesn't appear in my dashboard.

I saw in the troubleshooting documentation: "To communicate with the Internet. Twine needs to be able to get through on UDP port 32887 and TCP port 32888 outbound. Please check your firewall settings on your router and any other upstream filters that may be in place."

Did anyone need to configure any ports on their router to get Twine to successfully setup?

Change Twine Name - My Twine shows up as TWINE1222d68, how can I change that?

John Amschler — Thu, 13 Dec 2012 12:23:04 +0000

Hello!

I'd like to be able to configure the network (host) name of my Twine to anything I want - so it can be Fridge or Alarm.

Thanks!

Need Help On Using iPhone Hotspot as an WAP

m sweaton — Sun, 03 Feb 2013 08:30:18 +0000

Has anyone tried to tether to a smart phone? Trying to tether to an iPhone and cannot get a connection, any suggestions?

Using twine to measure outside temperature

Glenn Miller — Mon, 29 Oct 2012 13:02:25 +0000

The ability to check the outside temperature at my home from anywhere I am is great. A "wish list" item would be the ability to know the barometric pressure. That will be my first project when the breakout board is released.

why i cannot change my forum username ? :-(

Piero Cinotti — Wed, 30 Jan 2013 05:55:27 +0000

actually I have this not-so-cute username: 0412ae229e444fb494735ace970d5c3d1357243204

in edit account im unable to write over ... how can be fixed ?

Magnetic switch/sensor not sending email/sms on open or close.

Miguel Buenrostro — Mon, 10 Dec 2012 15:18:13 +0000

I have a Twine with the Magnetic switch/sensor. I have the magnetic sensor on a drawer with the magnet right next to it. I set a rule for "on open" for the switch, but I rarely get an email when I open the drawer.

- The magnet is RIGHT NEXT TO the sensor.
- I've tried closing the drawer, waiting various times, up to 5min before opening it.
- Once open, I've tried leaving it open for several seconds (BUT this trigger should be instant since a drawer or door may open/close quickly).

I have received an email:
- Once when opened.
- TWICE while door was closed, in a room by itself for at least 2hrs. So it wasn't a delayed email.

- I set an Orientation rule, which fires just fine, so far.

I bought it for the magnetic sensor, so if this what I can expect, it will have to go back

Note: Currently battery powered, but going to try micro usb powered to see if it makes a difference.

Any suggestions?

Thanks.

Has anyone got SMS Text messages working with Optus (Australia)?

Andy Horne — Sat, 22 Dec 2012 01:03:22 +0000

Hi,

I have an Optus account, the drop-down for the SMS carrier says "T-Mobile (Optus Zoo)" so I suppose that's it. I tried sending a test SMS but nothing's come through. What format does the phone number need to be? I've tried 438xxxxxx, 0438xxxxxx, 61438xxxxxx and 610438xxxxxx.

Problem with Temperature Monitoring

Javier Rapoport — Thu, 10 Oct 2013 12:19:41 +0000

Is it me or the last change in twine pretty much broke the de-facto temperature monitoring logic?

The logic used to read like this:

TWINE RULE:

WHEN temperature rises above 0...

Trigger after 0 seconds...

Reset 900 seconds after this has been triggered... (900 seconds is 15 minutes, adjust as required.)

The instructions in the webpage support this logic:

How rules work

A rule triggers only at the point when a value is crossed — for example, at the moment that the temperature goes from below 80ºF to above 80ºF.

The "trigger after X seconds" is the amount of time that the condition has to be met (the temperature must stay above 80ºF for X seconds) before it runs the actions.

The "reset" value is the minimum amount of time to wait after the rule has been triggered before it's checked again (remember, it won't trigger until the value is crossed again). It's useful for avoiding multiple notifications within a short amount of time (for example, when you're opening a door a lot).

But...

Now, with the change from "reset" to "untrigger", I tried it and I only got the first report... The problem seems to be with the "untriggering" logic... Since the temperature never falls below 0, it never untriggers so, of course, it never re-triggers either...

So...

Is there a potential workaround for this? I would really like to have an easy way to get an hourly-report of temperature, not just when it goes through a threshold...

Twine for Sale - 140$ Full Sensor - Canada (international)

Twine User — Sat, 16 Feb 2013 03:09:59 +0000

I have a brand new Twine Full Sensor Package for sale 140$+shipping non-negociable.

3 sensors; moisture, magswitch, breakout. The included batteries haven't even been used!

The first Twine I received was defective and I have received a brand new replacement. I was ensured that it has been tested and working.

My experience with supermechanical hasn't been great. It's been sitting on my workbench for a month now unused. I have no interest in using it. I hope someone can make better use of it.

I'm located in Canada. Send your location (zip) so I can calculate shipping; I will ship internationally. 140$+shipping

mike@diputs.ca or PM

Get current value

Chris Cragg — Mon, 05 Nov 2012 16:41:08 +0000

Seems like a basic question, but how do I retrieve the current reading (temperature in my case)? I know the device is setup to post its value to your webservers (webservices). Is there a simple URL to retrieve that value? Is the twine running a webserver itself?

Switch from Fahrenheit to Celsius? **edit, nvm i got it.

bang ly — Tue, 04 Dec 2012 15:17:21 +0000

Does anyone know how to switch the temperature display on the dashboard? Am I crazy? Is it possible?

**edit, I figured it out. The Dashboard displays the change once you've added a temperature rule and changed to Celsius there... sorry for the trouble.

Twine temperature and dashboard display

Kenneth Epstein — Sun, 18 Nov 2012 22:44:23 +0000

I set a rule to send me an email when Twine detects temperature below 72. I am reviewing emails, but the Dashboard display is 76 (this seems too high).

How does the twine decide when to update the server with new data?

Richard Wifall — Wed, 26 Dec 2012 16:48:42 +0000

Could someone share with us the logic or algorithm that the twine uses to update the server with new data?

Usually when I go to the twine dashboard website it says that the twine last updated 45 or 50 minutes ago. So then I'll flip it onto it's side, expecting that a change in orientation would cause it to update, but it doesn't.
This is especially surprising since I have an rule that is supposed to cause an email on an orientation change.