My final post

Community Playground General Discussions
#41

AP15e -

It is a damn shame that you feel you need to move on to get the functionality you need. Unfortunately, it is also understandable.

I have only been involved with the Vera for a bit over 5 months, so I can only speak with my short amount of experience. Before I purchased my Vera 3, I did some research. During the research I found that there were 5 different UIs that had existed on the Vera. As a developer, this said to me that the underlying engine must be rock solid, otherwise developer time would be focused on that over making a new UI. Over the months, I have found that my assessment is incorrect.

When you look at successful products out there, the UI doesn’t change much. If you look closely at Windows and Mac OS X you will see that the underlying UI has been the same for a long time. Things get added on and tweaked to make the UI better, but at a fundamental level, windows are drawn on the screen the same way and UI elements are just made to look a little different as version progress.

For HA systems, it seems that the UI is only marginally important. It can be the most beautiful UI in the world, but if the underlying system doesn’t work how users expect, the UI is worthless.

In my opinion, there are four places that could be improved that would make the entire experience better.

  1. Basic logic in scenes. (if/then/and/or/not) I realize that LUA is supposed to be the answer for this, but most people see code and run away.

  2. Developer documentation. I agree with those that say that having a full LUA tutorial isn’t something that MCV should take on. There are plenty of sites out on the net that have good LUA documentation. Instead, if someone went through each of the XML files that ship on the Vera and asked themselves, “Is there documentation on how to do this?” An example would be the “Get” actions that are in almost every device’s XML, nobody seems to know how to do this in LUA. Good documentation of the XML and JSON files would also be great. Along with a fairly simple example, and a fairly complex one.

  3. Full support for features. The most obvious one (for me) is Insteon, though there are plenty of others. The documentation claims that Insteon is supported, but the implementation seems half-assed at best. And when people post on the forum that “MCV is focused primarily on Z-wave” it is only rubbing salt in the wounds. If MCV wants to focus on Z-wave, that is fine. Take all Insteon support out and don’t claim that it is supported. (When you tell a customer that something is ‘supported’ they expect that it will perform comparably to other devices that claim to support the technology.)

  4. Debug-ability. Getting an error in the logs that says something is wrong with your LUA code on line 856 is useless if you can’t figure out what line 856 is. I have spent an insane amount of time adding logging to my code to try to narrow down where an error is. It is worse when you are trying to help someone through a problem and they give you a similar log line.

I’m not trying to be a negative Nancy here, I have enjoyed playing with my Vera 3 and hacking stuff up on it. And I plan to continue to do so. But, as my friends like to remind me, I am not normal. I also understand the realities of product management and development, as I work for a small company myself. But I also know how important it is to have prompt bug fixes to keep your customers happy.

Again, it is a damn shame to lose someone like AP15e. Whoever is behind that alias has provided an insane amount of help for people on this forum. We will miss you. :cry: ← Never thought I would get to use that one!

#42

AP15e,

I missed this message due to travel. I see the message and sentiment have been heard by the forum members and like the other members of this forum I have benefitted from your knowledge, effort, help and plugins. Hopefully MCV understand the impact of what they have lost and I know other who frequent the forum do. Thanks for all the work you did, it was always greatly appreciated. Good luck.

#43

Seems like MiCasaVerde feigned concern for a bit then ran away. It would be great if MCV had the ballz to have an ongoing, constructive dialog about the gaps/needs for the Vera.

MCV… you have a good community here willing to go out of their way to help… get your head out of your butt.

#44

I don’t understand MCV’s reticence to engage more openly in some discussions. Lots of other companies embrace their communities. It’s understandable not all discussions will be positive and many answers may not please the community. Ignoring the matter is worse, though.

#45

They believe its a waste of their time responding on the forum, and they think they could better spend this time coding I’m afraid!

#46

That sounds all well and good… but WTF are they coding? A new UI?

#47

LOL probably or multiple for when we hate the next iteration too! They are likely already on about UI7 internally :slight_smile:

#48

One of my responsibilities is to monitor the forum, pick the feature requests and add them to a prioritized list and notify the testing team and/or the developers about bugs. Your complaints and requests don’t go unnoticed (at least not most of the time ;D).

#49

I have owned a Vera 2 for about 9 months now, and as an Electrical Engineer in the semiconductor industry I do know something about product development as well as customer support. I doubt anyone on this board believes MCV doesn’t notice the complaints and requests. I think what frustrates us all is the fact that MCV doesn’t seem to care or respond to the complaints and requests.

[quote=“Aaron, post:43, topic:171421”]Seems like MiCasaVerde feigned concern for a bit then ran away. It would be great if MCV had the ballz to have an ongoing, constructive dialog about the gaps/needs for the Vera.

MCV… you have a good community here willing to go out of their way to help… get your head out of your butt.[/quote]

This is what really annoys me. You have a community here that really, really wants you to succeed and is willing to help you succeed if only MCV gave a damn and actually listened and responded. An occasional post by Florin is not the same thing as a commitment from MCV to hold a dialog with the community, listen to our concerns, and either work towards alleviating those concerns or explain why you can’t. Maybe it’s resources; maybe it’s philosophical in the plans for Vera; but at least come out and engage with the community and let us know.

#50

Valid point there. As far as I’m concerned, Florin is operating independently from MCV & providing advice off-hours. There doesn’t appear to be any formal commitment to the users to ensure this system behaves as intended.

#51

Regarding the sentiment that we feel the forums are a waste of time and ignore our customers… I posted to this thread in mid-May when it came up and reached out to Ap15e offering concessions to lure him back. We engaged in the discussion, made note of all the recommendations, and the thread has been idle for the last couple weeks and just started up again yesterday. Last night Florin notified me of the activity, and we’re posting again this morning. So I’m not sure why, in 24 hours, it seems the mood degraded so rapidly. We have a full-time person tasked with monitoring the forums. If we’ve given the impression that we’re ignoring the forums, I’m sorry. I’ll talk to Florin more and we’ll try to figure out why users are getting that impression and how to improve it. But Florin indicates that he is posting in the forums. Remember, though, these are community forums and they are primarily for the community to talk to each other. We get hundreds of emails, phone calls, trouble tickets and bug reports every single day. And those are our primary method of responding to inbound requests from customers. There were complaints earlier that we got behind on responding trouble tickets, and we’ve made very concerted efforts the past several months to resolve that, and now our response time to trouble tickets is always 1 business day. So comments like this: “Florin is operating independently from MCV & providing advice off-hours” make my head spin. Of course Florin is NOT operating independently from MCV or doing this work as some gesture of kindness off-hours. Why would anybody think that!? We’re not a charity, so why would Florin be working here as an unpaid volunteer? Florin is an employee and he’s paid to monitor the forums and respond to them. Users complained that there wasn’t enough response to the forums and that MCV should put more attention to the forums, so MCV assigns a full-time employee to participate in the forums every day and the reaction is that he must be working independently?!? I mean if you call Apple for tech support, and you get a guy who picks up the phone and helps you get your iPhone working, are you going to assume he must working independently because Apple couldn’t possibly be providing tech support? I feel like it’s a damned if you do, damned if you don’t. If we don’t have someone participate in the forums, it creates backlash. So we DO have someone participate and it creates even more backlash.

As far the comments like: “WTF are they coding?”, we’ve got a public mantis bug tracking and we publish the changes in our release notes: http://wiki.micasaverde.com/index.php/Release_Notes

Bugs naturally take priority over feature requests, like conditional expressions, and requests for expanded docs, etc. As you can see we get LOTS of bug reports. Many of them requires days of engineering work just to get to the bottom of. For example, I’ve been working on: http://bugs.micasaverde.com/view.php?id=2281

This required buying the hardware, wiring it up, connecting it to a Z-Wave Zniffer to analyze the data and review the logs, prepare a write up for GE/Jasco about the perceived issues, discussions with the engineers at GE to review, discussions with the Z-Wave alliance engineers to resolve issues re: proper implementation of scene-related work, etc., etc. And that was only one of 11 different bug reports that came in that one day alone (5/14). Trust me, our engineers are definitely not sitting on our hands watching YouTube videos.

RE: the suggestions in this forum, there was a lot of good advice about improving the docs, adding features, etc., but as Quixote wrote: “I think that you can work on documentation until the cows come home, but if the device/OS itself is still faulty, it’s pointless.” I know users get frustrated on the delays adding features (like conditional expressions, Lua debugging, etc.), but we do have to prioritize, and bug fixes and compatibility issues always have to come first. There are now well over 500 different Z-Wave devices. And, although, in theory, everyone should be implementing the Z-Wave specs exactly the same, in the real world, there are a lot of compatibility issues that arise, and this requires lots and lots of engineering resources.

I realize we’re not moving as fast as some people want. But, please, let’s put in perspective. Compare our product to our competitors. We guarantee interoperability with all 500+ Z-Wave devices, with a sub 30 day turn-around whenever new devices our added. With our competitors solutions, like those offered by Schlage, AT&T, Verizon, Comcast, etc., none of them support more than 10 devices. None of them allow plugins, programming, customization, or any of the advanced features we do. RE: the feature requests (conditional expressions, etc.), none of them have any of those features either. (BTW, I’m not including HomeSeer in this comparison because it’s a PC-based solution going after a totally different market)

We did hire someone to re-do all our documentation. We’ve committed hundreds of bug fixes in the past couple months and are in the middle of testing a new beta release we hope to offer soon. We tripled the size of our support team and are now completely caught up on trouble tickets. We’ve doubled our server capacity in the past couple months, and have not had any major outages except for a bit yesterday when our racks were getting more upgrades. We will work to better understand the root cause of the frustration that exploded in this thread and address it. But blanket, sweeping statements like there’s “no formal commitment to the users to ensure this system behaves as intended” doesn’t help. It just adds chatter making it even harder to narrow down the real issues and come up with a game plan to address them.

#52

Let me cut someone off at the pass … “See they spend all this time in the forums when they could be …” ;D

All jokes aside, I think most of us understand the difficulties and logistics that are involved and as such have made one or to posts to share our feelings and let that be that.

Unfortunately you are only seeing comments from people that need to vent and not the thousands of posts that say would say ‘hey they are trying to do their best so let’s give them the time and space to do just that’.

Unfortunatly it’s not human nature to voice general approval. The loss of a valuable member of the community sucks and there isn’t much any of us can say to fix it. However let’s not forget that this forum has a wealth of valuable members and perhaps we can all help out with some common curtisy.

If you installed a plugin that made Vera better… Or we’re helped by a fellow poster take a second to reply back letting them know they helped you. Don’t wait till something goes wrong with said plugin and you need further assistance. Take a second now to seek them out in the plugin forums and say ‘hey thanks for your efforts’ …

It’s remarkable what some kind words can do for a persons otherwise ordinary day.

Well that’s all, just a word to everyone who’s contributed here…

Thanks a million!
Dave from New Jersey.

#53

Sorry, I have to call you out there.

You have a partly public Mantis bug tracking site, which is not updated by developers anyone with notes about the actual fix, how the fix was tested, even IF the fix was tested, and what release users can expect the fix to be found in.

You sometimes publish some of the changes in your release notes. Case in point: I am running a version which is not even listed on that web page. When the release notes are published, they are often one-sentence entries with no link to Mantis.

Florin is not the problem. The problem is the developers whose actions are indistinguishable from people who think that dealing with a bug tracking system is beneath them.

... chatter making it even harder to narrow down the real issues ...

I think I might have a suggestion there…

#54

hmmm. Maybe if the majority of people saw improvements in the core system rather than the 5% that own the new products that you are focusing on, there would be less of an outrage. I, for one, don’t give a 5#!t at all about GE switches, especially since I’ve been waiting for the half-finished Elk plugin to be completed for something like a year. Even if there is a rather small number of Vera users that own an Elk, the fact that the plug-in is still in limbo is extremely frustrating.

Additionally, I am not a trained management professional, but I am almost certain that one would focus on fixing the features advertised as being standard issue for the product before worrying about other manufacturers’. Afterall, I’m pretty sure they won’t be coming to your aid when you piss off so many of your customers that you no longer need a help desk.

My Vera is completely useless half of the time. It’s fine and dandy that you have people waiting to resolve my support ticket, but unfortunately I have a career and a life. Maybe you should hire your own Q&A team as well instead of relying on me and the rest of the chumps here.

If I sound unreasonable it’s because I’ve been waiting for you guys to get your asses into gear for way longer than most would stand for. This is a clear case of mismanagement and the inability to prioritize the real problems at hand. While MCV does seem interested in fixing their products, I’m not sure where that leaves us because it seems like the person in charge has a bad case of A.D.D. and possibly even Alzheimer’s . LOL

Seriously, though… why would a bug that renders UPnP control of scenes useless when it is advertised as a built-in feature be prioritized as LOW? Anyway, at this point I know I am wasting my breath because I and quite a few others have ranted about this to no avail. I guess we should just file another bug report and act like that counts for something.

#55

You can add me to that list. The Elk plug-in is the reason I purchased my Vera last year. My Elk was my automation controller until I purchased my Vera. Now I cant complete all of my automation setup since the Elk is not fully support. It is sad when an alarm panel can do automation features that an automation controller cant do ??? I don’t understand how you expect to have any progress when you have only Florin watching the forums, working on multiple plug-ins, and other issues he is given to work on.

#56

We all have other jobs, but most of us here manage to contribute and help out in our spare time, and we aren’t even paid for it!

If the MCV team is growing so much, then why doesn’t anyone else other than Florin seem to post?

#57

Florin has helped me personally more than once, and for that I am grateful. But I’ve received far more help from the unpaid volunteers (read: users & forum participants) whose interest is in advancing this home automation protocol. This is not unique to MiCasaVerde, don’t get me wrong. The same goes for, uhm, Windows 7. Apple. BMW, Subaru, Toyota, Pioneer Electronics… any number of products whose post-purchase support is supplemented by user discussion forums. But that’s not the point…

My intention isn’t to disparage MCV. I recommend Vera to everyone. I’ve posted my own “home automation” threads in completely unrelated discussion boards to tout the advantages of using home automation (and Z-wave is all I use, currently). People that come to my house are amazed by the automation I’ve implemented. My friends love it–as a gimmick. And it’s only a gimmick, as well as a completely foreign concept to anyone that doesn’t lean toward the “highly technical.” It’s just like X10 was years ago, and without excellent support it’ll face the same fate. It requires a LOT of screwing with to get it to work correctly. Until things “just work,” there is likely not to be general support/appeal for Vera.

On the subject of UI5, I made the plunge–for about a day. It didn’t work, at all. I’m back to UI4, and pleased enough with it (after incalculable hours of “tweaking”). Although I haven’t explicitly said this, I’m part of the “what are they developing” camp. I don’t really know what you guys do. Right now, I don’t have any express need to upgrade anything, and it’s a good thing, in my mind–because the only major release I’ve experienced from MCV was a major flop. I wish that weren’t the case.

I think you should look at this forum as a group of eager consumers who really want to learn about the product, share their experiences, and see MCV succeed. I might be going out on a limb, but I think everyone wants that.

#58

@ MCV,

I think my “what are they coding” remark was and is valid. I am a Vera 2 user and I’m on UI 4 after an excruciating debacle with UI 5 that lasted about a day. I imagine that a lot of energy has gone into UI 5. Why was this energy not directed toward making UI 4 more complete before the advent of a new interface? As far as I can tell UI 5 is broken in comparison to UI 4, which has it’s fair share of issues. I would like to see all of the bugs in UI 4 fixed. Simple things like scenes for setting a temperature consistently don’t work for me. I have never made any complaints about MCV aside from the poor move to UI 5. I never said an ill word at all before my horrible experience. I’m not going to buy a Vera 3 because you can’t make UI 5 work on Vera 2. I already spent money on it. If I spend an additional $300, or whatever it costs, I will have forked out more than I would have if I had initially gone with HomeSeer. I didn’t go with HomeSeer due to it’s higher cost. I thought Vera would be able to handle everything I would be doing. That was a mistake on my part. UI 5 is a disaster. When you say that you have hired more people and are coding around the clock I have little respect because this effort is all invested in UI 5. You probably wouldn’t have had to hire all of these people if you had continued working on UI 4 and not broken your product with a useless update to begin with. I no longer recommend Vera to anyone. I recommend HomeSeer. The higher price tag is what you have to pay for a working system that does more than control lights and door locks.

#59

First of all i’d like to wish AP15e well in his new life, it’s unfortunate that MCV or his fellow Vera users were unable to persuade him to change his mind.

Skimming through the posts here, there are a lot of negatives and I will admit to waiting quite a while before jumping on the HA bandwagon and i choose MCV because I liked the look/drive and feel and an element of that, was this Forum Community.

In today’s world I don’t just buy a device, I buy the experience and future direction that comes with it too, and it is always a balance, with the bad bits offset by the good. But the risk is always there, that the good can no longer counterbalance the bad…

On a personal note, I work in IT, in a role that requires me to manage the application development, test, release etc requirements of my customers, I cant code/design, but I front the customer and end user experience. In my little time as a user, i can see the MiOS/Vera platform is not the fully rounded and stable solution i hoped it would be - some simple things done poorly - but i can see it evolving.

So in summary, the MCV modrators like Mcvflorin, and contributors like AP15e are for me my front line experience of HA and the MCV world, they do a great job and this forum saves god knows how many calls to a help desk for some of the basics, let alone the R&D they bring too. But it’s also more than that, i and i believe the community want to feel part of the MCV experience, part of the family, assusting the growth and if you can help cultivate that - I firmly believe you will continue to have a rock solid foundation to build from.

Apple & Sonos are two products I thoroughly enjoy on numerous levels,

I firmly believe MCV are in a market of great potential, and I’d really like to see you up there with the above names too.

#60

I continue to root for Vera’s success and love the potential but unfortunately agree with the sentiments above. There was, a while back, a promise to do a final update to UI4 which I think is owed to those who bought V2 as it is known that UI5 has limitations on V2. This seems to have been left in the dust. I also believe if we had spent all the energy on a rock solid UI4 we would be in a better place right now though that is opinion and I have neither business nor programming expertiese. UI5 is officially considered to be superior to UI4 and indeed it has added some important functionality but it is still full of quirks in basic functionality not to mention the gawd-awful giant icons we have all resigned ourselves to. To this day new bugs are being introduced with new functionalty, it is a moving target and we never seem to arrive. Still in MCV’s corner but well understanding the prevailing frustration. Just my 2 cents