[Stories] New smart scheduler and other updates!

Naran
Naran
Aug 23, 2017 · 8 min read

Hi, everyone!

We just updated Stories app for Prota OS to include our new smart scheduler on which we have been working on lately. We also made some updates on Prota Space app and Push mobile app. Let’s review what’s new right now!

Need for specific scheduling

Lately, we have been working on scheduling features on Prota OS. Indeed, our daily lives are organized around schedules and plans right from the moment we get up. For instance, you may need a scheduler to have your coffee prepared at 7:15 am every morning except maybe during weekends and holidays. Or you may need to have an automation rule that is executed only during the night or during a specific interval of time. Or you may wish to have some sensor such as weather to alert you at a specific time of the day when you are in need the most and receptive to this news.

At Naran, we are always developing for building a better smart home ecosystem in order to improve your life. So, we thought that improving the scheduling capacities on Prota OS appeared to be a necessity in order to allow your smart home to follow your daily routine and make your life easier and better. We thought that creating automation rules for your smart home was already a great feature, but the ability to choose and set when you want them to be executed, for how long and for how many times appeared to us an important point that we thrived to implement.

Besides, we also listen to the specific needs and suggestions made by you, our beloved users, who contacted us on support.prota.info. Amongst all the requests we got, following are the three common requests we particularly decided to address :

“I want to have my Microbot Push pushing the button every hour of the day.”

“I have a coffee maker that needs to be pressed once to start heating, then pressed again a second time after a few seconds to start actually making the cup of coffee.”

“I need a button pushed every 10 minutes from 10am to 5pm Tuesday- Saturday….”

Those needs deeply inspired us to create our new “Smart Scheduler”. Let’s discover it now!

Explore our new “Smart Scheduler”

The aim of launching this new smart scheduler is to provide you with more ability and freedom to schedule your storylines as you wish.

Sensor: Scheduler

In Stories app, the tool to create automation rules, based on natural language, there was already a Scheduler listed among the sensors. Sensors are elements that will set the condition for the execution of a storyline. With this new update of Stories app, we have improved the Scheduler.

In order to help you set your scheduler easily, we have changed the interface with settings displayed in natural language and added a calendar. Following are the improvements and features for your new smart scheduler:

  • Choose when your scheduler is starting. You can now set when you wish your scheduler to start running by selecting a date and hour as shown in the screenshot below.
  • Select which day(s). As before, you can set up your scheduler to run on a specific day but with this update, you are free to select the days you wish. For instance, you can set up the scheduler to run on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, whereas in the previous version, you had the choice between weekdays, weekends or only on one specific day. Now, you can make any combination you need!
  • Stops repeating. We have added a new feature with the possibility to stop the scheduler from running, starting from a specific date. This can be very useful if you wish to stop a specific storyline running because you want it to run only during the day (or night) or because you are on holidays for instance.

Instruction in Actor: Repeats the operation

When creating your storyline, among sensors, there used to be ‘Timer’. The timer is a feature which allows an action to repeat itself after every xx minutes/ hours a day. We were aware of the confusion that some users may have had while differentiating the functions of Scheduler and Timer. So we decided to integrate the feature ‘repeats the operation’ directly into the action-story. Therefore, users can now generalize the use of a repeater, for any storyline.

How does it work? Well, when you have finished setting the action of your actor-story, you have the possibility to add extra options. With this new update, we have added an extra option in addition to ‘Delay’ which is to enable any action-story to repeat itself xx times every xx minutes or hours.

For instance, if you wish to have your Microbot Push pushed the button every hour every day, you need to create the following story: as a sensor, choose ‘Scheduler’ and set your conditions (starting time and day). As an actor, select Microbot Push, ‘toggle’ as the action. Then, in extra conditions, you will need to set the repeater as shown below:

Weather app condition

We have also added a scheduling feature in Weather app. You can now set the time during the day you wish the sensor to be triggered instead of having it triggered every hour as it was automatically set before the update.

For example, you wish to be informed whether if it will rain today in order to make sure you bring your umbrella. When creating your storyline in Stories app, you can now choose the specific time when you wish to receive this message, at 8:00 am for example, when you are about to leave for work.

Choose when you want to be informed on the weather

To enjoy the improvements of our new smart scheduler, do not forget to update Stories app. To learn how to update an app on Prota OS, please check the instructions detailed here.

Use Cases

Following are some cases you can use the new smart scheduler:

Schedule Microbot Push on your coffee machine

Using Microbot Push, you wish to have your coffee machine prepare the coffee for you at 7:15 am only on working days. Let’s say, for example, that you work on Mon-Tue-Thur-Fri. Besides, as we earlier quoted at the beginning of this article, the coffee maker needs to be pressed once to start heating, and then a second time later to start actually making the cup of coffee.

How to set it up?

Create a new storyline and choose ‘Scheduler’ as the sensor. Set the following conditions:

  1. Select the coming Monday as the starting date and 7:15 am as the hour.
  2. Select your working days: Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, Friday and save the conditions.
  3. Create the actor-story: select ‘Microbot Push’ as the actor and ‘press the button’ as the action and save.
  4. In extra options, choose ‘Repeats operation’ and set ‘1 minute’ and ‘2 times’ as seen below. And it’s done!

MicroBot Push on intercom using “Repeats operation”

Some intercoms need to be pushed repeatedly in order to open the door for the visitors. To set this up, you can use the feature ‘repeats operation’ when you create your action story. You will need to set up the number of times you wish a storyline to be repeated. For example, to have your story repeated 1 time in 2 minutes, you will need to set ‘2 minutes’ and ‘2 times’. The number of times must be more than 2 in order for a storyline to repeat itself.

MicroBot Push with Weather app: Turn on your dehumidifier when it rains

When it’s raining, you wish to turn on your dehumidifier at 9 am, once you have left home to go to your office.

How to set it up?

  1. As the sensor-story, select ‘Weather’ and ‘the weather is ? at [your location]’
  2. Set your conditions: ‘Day = today’, ‘Time = 9’, ‘Weather = rain’ and save.
  3. As the actor-story: select ‘Microbot Push’ as the actor and ‘press the button’ as the action and save. And it’s done!

Other updates

Skip optimization process on Prota Space app

A few months ago, we added an optimization process in order to make Prota OS apps load faster and the interface more reactive overall. Optimization is a key improvement, especially if your network is rather slow.

With this new update for Prota Space app, the optimization process is now more stable. We also added a ‘skip’ button for situations when the optimization process is slow or failed.

Skip optimization while processing or after optimization failure

Skipping optimization may not greatly damage your user experience if your network is fast, however, if your network is rather slow, the apps may take more time to load each time you wish to switch to another one.

Timer bug fix on Microbot Push mobile app

We have fixed some bugs that appeared when setting a timer on Push mobile app:

  • Some users could not change set AM/PM in Timer. This is now fixed.
  • When setting a timer with a special mode such as invert or toggle, some users could not make their Microbot Push push a button according to this mode. This is now fixed: you can use a timer and set your Microbot Push in any mode.

To enjoy these improvements, you will need to:

  1. Update Microbot Push mobile app
  2. Upgrade your Microbot Push’s firmware by following the instructions available here.

What else?

In order to benefit from the latest improvements, make sure your Prota OS and its apps are updated. We have made quick guides to show how to upgrade Prota OS and Prota OS’ apps, don’t hesitate to have a look!

Scheduling was the main update this time, but we are currently working on many more new apps and features, so stay tuned for new updates!

Naran

We develop smart devices and robots for home and office automation. We are the creators of the MicroBots — MicroBot Push, the wireless button pusher that turns dumb appliances into smart devices, MicroBot Sense, and MicroBot Hub, the companion hub. Get to know us at microbot.is

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Naran

Written by

Naran

Developing smart devices and robots for home automation and the Internet of Things. Get to know us at https://microbot.is

Naran

Naran

We develop smart devices and robots for home and office automation. We are the creators of the MicroBots — MicroBot Push, the wireless button pusher that turns dumb appliances into smart devices, MicroBot Sense, and MicroBot Hub, the companion hub. Get to know us at microbot.is

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