Using clone ELM327 Bluetooth OBDII adapter with Leaf

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Turbo3 said:
There is already a non-visible button to go between screens.

It is at the bottom of the screen (black background area) starting from the page dot area and extending to the version number in the middle.

Tap that area to move ahead one screen or tap and hold to move back one screen.

Everyone knows about this area, right? It was asked for many weeks ago and has been there for a long time now.

oh thanks! good to know. I have only had mine for a day so am completely out of the loop as far as operation goes especially any new stuff. I guess i should RTFM :roll:

**edit**
oh one thing i was going to ask you. When i turn on the batt app and LEAF is off, there is a solenoid clicking sound coming from the black box on the right front side on top of the wheel well. what is it?
 
Turbo3 said:
There is already a non-visible button to go between screens.

It is at the bottom of the screen (black background area) starting from the page dot area and extending to the version number in the middle.

Tap that area to move ahead one screen or tap and hold to move back one screen.

Everyone knows about this area, right? It was asked for many weeks ago and has been there for a long time now.

Sorry, no, didn't realize that. I must have been hitting that accidentally when I was tapping the "dots" in the lower left corner, but didn't realize the long press would reverse the process.
 
Remember, the forum thread is very much fleeting in nature... permanent in storage, but very hard to find the information buried tens of pages behind the current page. Without some intuitive visual cue, there's no way to tell what the heck the interface elements in the app are going to do! I've actually found myself tapping every element on the screen to see if it did something else, just to figure out what else can be done... which works for me, since I'm a geek who always does that. :lol: I knew I could switch pages in one direction that way, but grabbing the battery graphic and swiping is how I usually do it. ;)
 
oh one thing i was going to ask you. When i turn on the batt app and LEAF is off, there is a solenoid clicking sound coming from the black box on the right front side on top of the wheel well. what is it?
I have had that clicking sound as well. It doesn't happen all the time and I can't say whether it is when I use the battery app or when I leave the ELM327 plugged in. It doesn't happen all the time.

Door lock / unlock settings are great! Finally my car doesn't lock me in all the time.

non-visible buttons: think of the app from the perspective of someone seeing it for the first time and not reading all the forum posts here. Features like this should be more intuitive. It is definitely a challenge with limited screen real estate. There are so many features packed into this software its hard to find them all.

Perhaps a video walkthru / demo for new users with screen captures? Once I understand it more I can try to do this.

"terminate instead of run in background": personally to do continuous logging, even when I get a phone call or switch apps, is important. So I don't want the program to quit when i switch apps.
 
kevinleaf said:
oh one thing i was going to ask you. When i turn on the batt app and LEAF is off, there is a solenoid clicking sound coming from the black box on the right front side on top of the wheel well. what is it?
I have had that clicking sound as well. It doesn't happen all the time and I can't say whether it is when I use the battery app or when I leave the ELM327 plugged in. It doesn't happen all the time.

Door lock / unlock settings are great! Finally my car doesn't lock me in all the time.

non-visible buttons: think of the app from the perspective of someone seeing it for the first time and not reading all the forum posts here. Features like this should be more intuitive. It is definitely a challenge with limited screen real estate. There are so many features packed into this software its hard to find them all.

Perhaps a video walkthru / demo for new users with screen captures? Once I understand it more I can try to do this.

"terminate instead of run in background": personally to do continuous logging, even when I get a phone call or switch apps, is important. So I don't want the program to quit when i switch apps.

the clicking sound happened when

car was not on
car not plugged in

which would be the two situations where the app works.

the clicking starts as soon as the app starts up and tries to connect the ELM.

also, i downloaded the log file but having problems figuring out which app to open it with. Using Open Office and it gives me a list of a dozens of apps to open it with but unable to find anything yet. is it a zip file?

another thing; the 12 volt battery monitor seems to be off. i reset the calibration on it several times already but most of the readings seem to be in the 10 volt range which i have to consider highly unlikely. anyone else having issues with this?
 
DaveinOlyWA said:
oh one thing i was going to ask you. When i turn on the batt app and LEAF is off, there is a solenoid clicking sound coming from the black box on the right front side on top of the wheel well. what is it?
I have had that clicking sound as well. It doesn't happen all the time and I can't say whether it is when I use the battery app or when I leave the ELM327 plugged in. It doesn't happen all the time.

another thing; the 12 volt battery monitor seems to be off. i reset the calibration on it several times already but most of the readings seem to be in the 10 volt range which i have to consider highly unlikely. anyone else having issues with this?[/quote]

I could never get that dongle to accurately read the voltage. I haven't tried on the new one that Brain P. so kindly converted to be switched (so it turns off when the car turns off).

Here's Phil's response to the clicking which is caused by the LEAF Battery App making requests when the car is off. Quiting the app or unplugging the dongle is the cure but Phil says it is nothing to be worried about.
http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?f=30&t=12857&p=294195&hilit=relay+battery+app#p294195
 
also, i downloaded the log file but having problems figuring out which app to open it with.
Which log are you talking about? There is a BatLog.txt which is a comma separated text file (csv) which you should be able to open with Excel or OpenOffice equivalent. You may need to rename it from .txt to .csv to get the program to recognize it correctly. Comma separated, one line per record, unquotated and first line is a list of fields, in case it asks.
 
kevinleaf said:
also, i downloaded the log file but having problems figuring out which app to open it with.
Which log are you talking about? There is a BatLog.txt which is a comma separated text file (csv) which you should be able to open with Excel or OpenOffice equivalent. You may need to rename it from .txt to .csv to get the program to recognize it correctly. Comma separated, one line per record, unquotated and first line is a list of fields, in case it asks.

oh ya! i have been trying to open the wrong file. I have too many files with "Bat" in them!
 
UkrainianKozak said:
Few weird things with latest beta...
1. Outside temperature while charging is showing wrong value... almost seems like it is C instead of F (Image 1).
2. The cell voltages display sometimes jumps and fill in fully (Image 2)
3. I have a FastCharger communication problem error code (awesome feature-works!) But Clear DTCs is always disabled for me for some reason, so I can't clear this error code...
4. Not version specific and minor, but when upgrading to new version some (not all) of the settings are getting lost, here's the one I noticed: saved DTE value (red triangle on bottom is always resets to 0, while SOC triangle is saved after installing new version); PSI alarm settings - always resets to 38 and no delta warning.
I took a closer look at issue #2.

It is working as designed. You have selected a 50 mv scale and the data you are trying to view has a 742 mv difference. You will need to select a 1600 mv scale to see all the data otherwise it it will go off the top of the screen which is what you are seeing.

The other option would be to change the program to do a temporary scale change so all the data fits on the screen. You would still have the option to change the scale but it will be ignored if the data does not fit within that scale. When the data does fit the user scale would be used.

How does that sound?

========================

Changed the code to include a temporary scale override function and it looks good so it will be included in the next version. The max auto scale has been changed to 4500 mv so under worst case valid voltage readings the graph will always fit on the screen. If the app gets bad data then it is still possible to go off screen if the max voltage is above 4.5 volts and the lowest is zero.
 
Well, the weirdness of behaviour is that it actually does it for few moments only, it kind of flickers for a second with "filled in" screen and then readjusts to fit the scale automatically somehow

Turbo3 said:
UkrainianKozak said:
Few weird things with latest beta...
1. Outside temperature while charging is showing wrong value... almost seems like it is C instead of F (Image 1).
2. The cell voltages display sometimes jumps and fill in fully (Image 2)
3. I have a FastCharger communication problem error code (awesome feature-works!) But Clear DTCs is always disabled for me for some reason, so I can't clear this error code...
4. Not version specific and minor, but when upgrading to new version some (not all) of the settings are getting lost, here's the one I noticed: saved DTE value (red triangle on bottom is always resets to 0, while SOC triangle is saved after installing new version); PSI alarm settings - always resets to 38 and no delta warning.
I took a closer look at issue #2.

It is working as designed. You have selected a 50 mv scale and the data you are trying to view has a 742 mv difference. You will need to select a 1600 mv scale to see all the data otherwise it it will go off the top of the screen which is what you are seeing.

The other option would be to change the program to do a temporary scale change so all the data fits on the screen. You would still have the option to change the scale but it will be ignored if the data does not fit within that scale. When the data does fit the user scale would be used.

How does that sound?

========================

Changed the code to include a temporary scale override function and it looks good so it will be included in the next version. The max auto scale has been changed to 4500 mv so under worst case valid voltage readings the graph will always fit on the screen. If the app gets bad data then it is still possible to go off screen if the max voltage is above 4.5 volts and the lowest is zero.
 
From the screenshot it looks like the Leaf reported a single cell with low voltage which caused the difference to be 742 mv. The app always shows the lowest voltage so all the high voltages go off screen. This is not scaling just setting the offset. When the difference dropped back down to something less than 50 mv the new offset would cause all the data to be on screen. This is not scaling just setting the starting offset.

The new code I added will temporarily change the scaling and would be the first time the app ever changed the user select scale value.
 
Turbo3, Two more suggestions for your awesome app.

#1 Mileage: The vehicle mileage is not displayed on screen 1 when the phone is in portrait mode. It took me awhile to figure out that this was a portrait/landscape thing. Dash-mounted (landscape) the mileage was there. Then, later, when I went to log the data in a spreadsheet, I was holding the phone (portrait) and it was gone. I (stupidly) assumed the data was only available when the bluetooth link was up. After seeing that was not the case, I wondered if I had changed some setting and disabled this feature... Finally, I figured it out.

It is a minor usability issue, I (most people?) assume the same data is there if the app supports screen rotation. My suggestion is a third line of text in portrait mode.

#2 Feature Request: Multi-window support. The Samsung Galaxy S4 (and I assume others) has a "multi-window" feature. It allows two apps to run at the same time, sharing the screen. It would be cool to have Leaf Battery running with a music app, nav app, or dash cam app.

Currently, multi-window is supported by only a small number of apps. Google's apps (Chrome, YouTube, Gmail...) support it along with facebook and some others, but most apps don't support it. I am not sure what app changes are needed, nor how hard they would be. Given that this is only a "nice to have" feature, I would not expect it to be implemented if it required too much effort.
 
patrick0101 said:
Turbo3, Two more suggestions for your awesome app.

#1 Mileage: The vehicle mileage is not displayed on screen 1 when the phone is in portrait mode. It took me awhile to figure out that this was a portrait/landscape thing. Dash-mounted (landscape) the mileage was there. Then, later, when I went to log the data in a spreadsheet, I was holding the phone (portrait) and it was gone. I (stupidly) assumed the data was only available when the bluetooth link was up. After seeing that was not the case, I wondered if I had changed some setting and disabled this feature... Finally, I figured it out.

It is a minor usability issue, I (most people?) assume the same data is there if the app supports screen rotation. My suggestion is a third line of text in portrait mode.

#2 Feature Request: Multi-window support. The Samsung Galaxy S4 (and I assume others) has a "multi-window" feature. It allows two apps to run at the same time, sharing the screen. It would be cool to have Leaf Battery running with a music app, nav app, or dash cam app.

Currently, multi-window is supported by only a small number of apps. Google's apps (Chrome, YouTube, Gmail...) support it along with facebook and some others, but most apps don't support it. I am not sure what app changes are needed, nor how hard they would be. Given that this is only a "nice to have" feature, I would not expect it to be implemented if it required too much effort.
#1 Actually it has nothing to do with orientation. The information on the second line is controlled by the available space on the line. Here is a portrait view on a Nexus 7 that shows mileage. That being said, I will think about shorting the graph to make room for a third line when needed.

16nb.png


#2 Multi-window support is possible with just a few lines added to the manifest file. However, I would need a device to test the case when the window size is changed as that seems to be handled differently than an orientation change so needs special code to trigger redrawing the new size screen.
 
Turbo3 said:
However, I would need a device to test the case when the window size is changed as that seems to be handled differently than an orientation change so needs special code to trigger redrawing the new size screen.


Like say someone with a Galaxy S4 that supports multiwindow?
 
Turbo3 said:
#1 ... That being said, I will think about shorting the graph to make room for a third line when needed.
Thanks.

Turbo3 said:
#2 Multi-window support is possible with just a few lines added to the manifest file. However, I would need a device to test the case when the window size is changed as that seems to be handled differently than an orientation change so needs special code to trigger redrawing the new size screen.
Since I suggested it, I'll test it on my Galaxy S4 and report back.
 
Here is the updated screen 1 with a third line for odometer reading.

It will only appear if there is not enough room on the second line for the odometer reading. This would depend on the orientation and screen size/scale.

This version also has the multi-window code but I don't have a way to test that yet. When I get it up on my new test site I will send out invitations to those you have expressed an interest in testing this feature (must have Samsung device with multi-window support enabled). At this time that would be patrick0101 and sorphin.

178f.png
 
Jim,

Now that you've discovered some more useful data on the bus, any chance you might modify your logging code to include them? I'm thinking of...

  • Odometer
  • Number of L3 charges and level 1/2 charges
  • Tire pressures

It would help with some long-term tracking and trending. Also, any chance of renaming the file to .csv rather than .txt?

Lastly, I see that you've found the motor RPM - have you been able to find the vehicle speed? I'm thinking that a "performance dashboard" would be a good next screen to implement. Various (dials) and [digital displays], laid out like a gasser's dashboard:
Code:
            (RPM)   (Speed)

   (temp)     [Odometer]    (Fuel gauge)
              [Mi / KWh]

Maybe even use the phone's sensors to do some Torque-like things (acceleration, lateral Gs, etc.).
 
Turbo3 said:
This version also has the multi-window code but I don't have a way to test that yet. When I get it up on my new test site I will send out invitations to those you have expressed an interest in testing this feature (must have Samsung device with multi-window support enabled). At this time that would be patrick0101 and sorphin.
Well, I just realized my Galaxy S3 now has multi-window support (with the latest T-Mobile update). I'll give it a try too!
 
I have multi window support and I'd like to try it out. What is the latest version of the app now? I tried to do an upgrade on my v0.26n9 and in Dropbox I see "Beta test is over".
 
kevinleaf said:
I have multi window support and I'd like to try it out. What is the latest version of the app now? I tried to do an upgrade on my v0.26n9 and in Dropbox I see "Beta test is over".
Me too! My ELM327 came yesterday and I'd love to try out the app. I have a Galaxy S3 and a Galaxy Note 8.0, both of which support multi-window. I saw the app is going to the Play store, though, any word on when that might be available?
 
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