Honeywell Ademco Vista Alarm Panels Plugin via AD2USB

[mathewss]

I am new to Vera2 and have many devices working perfect. I just installed the AD2USB and it works like a dream! Thank you for all the hard work- My alarm installer was amazed. He even used it to program my system. Here is my problem I was hoping for help with:

My Vera2 cannot be in the same area as my alarm panel because of range issues. How can I connect my AD2USB to Vera from across the house?  I have no attic access. I was going to try wireless USB but that will be unstable I think. If Vera could talk to my Windows based servers com port that would do it.

Any ideas?

Thanks

 You can run Alarm wire from your alarm panel or the nearest keypad to your Vera2 the alarm wire can be as much as 300' with no issues.

 ser2sock.c is another option but currently the plugin afaik can only support direct usb connections. If it could support sockets then this would be another option. Connect the ad2usb to your server run ser2sock.c compiled for your OS and have it broacast your AD2USB on your local ethernet on port 10000

 Re
 Sean M

[djrobx]

Vera supports "remote" serial ports.

Internally, Vera converts AD2USB to a socket based connection using "ser2net".   Then, the plugin talks to this socket.   It's trivial to get the plugin to talk to a socket on another machine, you just change the serial port configuration.   If Hohammer uses a "vanilla" serial to socket program he should be able to use his windows server, and just enter the IP address/port in the serial config in Vera.

It looks like ser2sock.c is more complex than just sharing the serial port over a socket though (I'm guessing to support multiple clients), can you elaborate on how that protocol works?

 

[mathewss]

Vera supports "remote" serial ports.

Internally, Vera converts AD2USB to a socket based connection using "ser2net".   Then, the plugin talks to this socket.   It's trivial to get the plugin to talk to a socket on another machine, you just change the serial port configuration.   If Hohammer uses a "vanilla" serial to socket program he should be able to use his windows server, and just enter the IP address/port in the serial config in Vera.

It looks like ser2sock.c is more complex than just sharing the serial port over a socket though (I'm guessing to support multiple clients), can you elaborate on how that protocol works?

 

 Very smart idea on using ser2net. If this is the case then my ser2sock.c is not necessary.

 I was looking for a way to share my AD2USB amongst several systems. Not finding any other solution I decided to just write it and ser2sock is the result.

 ser2sock.c is best suited for cr lf terminated serial data but I have been planning to have a switch for "raw" mode where it does not parse the stream before retransmitting it to all connections. It has a few switches for tuning its use but I would not go so far as to say it had a protocol other than that its TCP/IP socket based.


 I forgot to mention in m last post regarding fixing the device to /dev/adu2sb that that was an example from OSX but its about the same on Linux.
 
Re
 Sean M

[djrobx]

Right.  I'm wondering what changes might be required in the Vera plugin to talk to a ser2sock AD2USB client vs a "dumb" ser2net socket that just relays everything from the serial port? 

I noticed that the AD2USB Mono GUI can't talk to a ser2net socket. 

[waynebrady]

I'm having trouble with the AD2USB + Vera2 integration and was wondering if anyone can provide some insight. I can't seem to get my alarm to arm/disarm (basically no inputs) from my Vera.

I've gotten the files installed from code.mios.com.
I am able to see the Faults being triggered.
I am able to see the status when it is being armed/disarm on the physical keypad.

I only have 1 partition so I entered 1 in numPartitions
I have 2 physical keypads, one at keypad address 16 and another at 17. I've entered these in keypad address as "16,17"

Any ideas?

[djrobx]

Have you checked that the AD2USB is working outside of Vera?   You might hook it up to a laptop and run MonoGUI from the NuTech website.

What panel are you using?  You may need to configure the AD2USB's keypad address and add it to your panel if you have not done so already (unless it's a SE panel, in which case the AD2USB needs to be set to address 31).
 

[waynebrady]

I havent checked that the AD2USB is working outside of Vera, but since I am seeing the states change (Ready/Night) and faults, I assume it's communicating properly.

I am using two 6160 keypads on a Vista 20P (Not SE). How do I add the keypad address for the AD2USB?

*edit*
I just ssh'd into the Vera and looked at the LuaUPnP.log file. Looks like my commands are being read, but I just don't see my alarm disarming. I don't see any noticeable error messages in the log either.

[Thinkfire]

How are you guys figuring out what addresses your keypads are on?

I am unable to get past that stage in the installation?  (might be helpful to explain that process in the installation page at http://code.mios.com/trac/mios_vista-alarm-panel-ad2usb#no1)

I have 2 keypads, VISTA 20P panel with 2 partitions.  I *assume* the keypads are at 16 and 17 on partition 1.  But I am still not able to control anything.   and still no go.

I tried these variables on partition 1:
16
16,17

Any ideas?

*edit*

I entered 16,17 for partition 2 and now I see that partition 2 Status is: Ready.

Still no status on partition 1.

I cannot seem to store my PIN code and clicking buttons has no effect.

*edit2*
I changed the partition variable from 2 to 1

I now can see the status of the system on partition 1, Stay, Armed, Ready.    BUT  I still cannot seem to store the PIN or control the alarm.

*edit3*

It appears I had to reassign the ad2usb to address 19, so apparently the second panel was on 18.

I put 16,18 in partition one for the address field and now it seems things are working!

Beautiful work.

[waynebrady]

Thinkfire,

How did you assign 19 to AD2USB?

To get the addresss of the keypads, push 1 and 3 and hold. It will tell you.

If you want to change it, unplug alarm, disconnect backup battery and when you plug everything back in, press 1 and 3 to make adjustment.

[wseverino]

see the following: http://www.nutech.com/images/fbfiles/files/visual_quickstart_guide.pdf

Basically, hook up the AD2USB to your PC, Launch Hypertem and follow the directions in the quickstart guide.

[waynebrady]

wseverino, thanks for the visual quickstart guide. Unfortunately, I still have some issues getting it to work on my mac.

This is what I did:

1. Installed the FTDI VCP driver for Mac.
2. connected the USB to my Mac
3. sent "screen /dev/tty.usbserial-A5003uxd 115200" and connected to AD2USB
4. sent "=" to boot up AD2USB
5. sent "!" to begin configuration
6. entered "18" as keypad address (since 16 and 17 are my physical keypads)
7. left code as "0000"
8. Y for Module 01, N for the rest
9. Then, I went to my physical keypad and went into programming mode
10. went to *191 10 to config my address (18)
11. Connected my AD2USB back to the vera
12. Still no luck sending commands to the alarm from vera, although I can read all signals

Thoughts?

[mcvflorin]

@waynebrady

We had a customer with the same problem, and I couldn't find what was causing it. So I sent an e-mail to Sean. Here is my e-mail:

We have a customer with a Vista 15P that wants to use the Ademco Vista plugin but something doesn't work. I studied the problem and it seems that I cannot send any command to the panel. I can receive anything, but whenever I try to send something to it, it doesn't work. It says !Sending.done but nothing happens.

So I thought of 3 causes for this:
1. The PIN code is not correct. The customer assured me that it is correct, so this is excluded.
2. The AD2USB (which is on address 18) is not assigned to any partition.
3. The TX connection to the panel is faulty.

Unfortunately I don't know the AD2USB that well to have an answer to the 2nd possible cause, so this is what I need to know: does the AD2USB needs to be assigned a partition to be able to send commands to it?

And here is his answer:

9 times of out 10 it is because the alarm panel was not programmed to be told that the AD2USB exists.
The alarm panel must be told to enable every keypad on the alarm bus. If the AD2USB is configured
as address 18 and the alarm panel has enabled address this would be programming field *191 for the vista 15.

A "sending.done" would tell me that the TX/RX portions of the bus are correctly connected. If it had been
"sending......done" then it would tell me it was not receiving data back from the panel correctly. I would
say based upon your description the problem exists as a configuration of the panel. It is also possible
that another keypad exists on the same address 18 but I think the results would be different in this case.

This week-end I received an e-mail from this customer saying that after following Sean's indications he got the plugin to work. So a big Thank you! to Sean!

Try this and let me know if it works.

[wseverino]

7. left code as "0000"

Shouldn't step 7 be the installer code?

[waynebrady]

Let me try putting in my installer code to see if that works. I'll also look out for "sending.done".

I did press *191 10* for the Vista20p. Could I be forgetting to submit/save?

Thoughts?

[wseverino]

The installer code is a 4 digit number. Default on a 20P is 4112.

If doing it from the keypad, to enter programming mode by keying in your installer code (default = 4112) plus 800
     (e.g. 4112800).