Stoker Log 4.2


 
A

Amir

TVWBB All-Star
OK, finally got the motivation to work on the program again
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Nothing major. Just the ability to move the text boxes on the graph. And a more visible temp display for the fire.

Let me know what you think: http://la.gg/upl/StokerLogSetup42_1.msi

To move a box, move the mouse over it, hold the shift key down and then move the mouse. Let go of the shift key and the box will remain put.
 
Oh, and I removed the alarm settings that didn't make sense, like fire alarm for the food (i.e. a low temp in addition to high temp).

Hopefully folks didn't have a use for it that I could not tell....
 
Amir,
A million thanks for this program. One feature I would love to see added is a really, really big display of current temps. Maybe even a separate page that shows nothing but current temps in large print. This would help while sleeping, so one could monitor temps without lifting their head of the pillow and wiping the crusties from their eyes.
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Thanks,
 
Originally posted by Dave M.:
Amir,
A million thanks for this program. One feature I would love to see added is a really, really big display of current temps. Maybe even a separate page that shows nothing but current temps in large print. This would help while sleeping, so one could monitor temps without lifting their head of the pillow and wiping the crusties from their eyes.
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Thanks,
Click to expand...
Thanks Dave. Agree that bigger is better. Is everyone in favor of another window? That is easy to do. But then again, I can also enlarge the ones that are there but don't want to make the rest smaller or have it be too big for some laptops.

What say you?
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Amir, thanks a bunch, I love the ability to move the notes.

the idea of a seperate temps only display window is very appealing. The Text should be fairly large like a 48 pt font or so.
 
Perhaps if the temperature is lower than set for the numbers will be blue, at the set number the numbers will be black and above the temperature the numbers will be red in color. That way you can do a quick "color code" check. Personally I vote for current and target temps being displayed.
 
OK, here is the prototype of the temperature panel. Hit Control-T to pop it up or find it under File menu.

http://la.gg/upl/StokerlogSetup42a.msi

It has 5 color codings. When the temp is within 5% of the target, the background for *target* temp is wheat color. When it goes beyond that, it turns yellow up to 10% and then red. The opposite is aqua and then dark blue. So wheat (near white) is good. Deep blue and deep red, well, bad!
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Let me know what you think.

Since food temps don't change fast and don't set the world on fire if wrong, I am not putting them in. On my laptop, when the app is full screen, I still have room on top right to put this panel. If I put more stuff, it starts to overlap other things.

Amir
 
Thanks, Amir! I think you're right about only displaying the pit temp, as the alarm will sound when the meat is done; and I prefer to think as little as possible at 3am. I would prefer a bigger font for the temp display - maybe user selectable? I'd like to be able to have my laptop further away than my nightstand when I'm trying to sleep, but it isn't a necessity. I'll test this font tonight.
 
OK, so I upped the font to next size: 72 points. There is nothing bigger so there is no point in making it programmable short of using graphics to draw the buttons
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. So let's use this for now so that I can work some of the other features. Longer term, I will probably re-write the UI for the main panel and figure out a more elegant way to incorporate larger fonts into it.

By the way, I am taking feature requests for what else needs adding!

http://la.gg/upl/StokerSetup42b.msi
 
All of these changes are thing that I never would have thought of.

One thing that I (personally) would like is the addition of multiple fans and pit probes...more pits! Right now, I can run three different pits with my hardware and the Stoker interface, but it usually eventually causes your log to crash or freeze. It's been so long since I tried, I forget which it does.
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Thanks for your work on the whole project, whether you add multiple pits or not.
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BOB
 
I also vote for more meat probes and ability to control more than one pit/blower. ( I know, a lot of work, but it's nice to dream . . .)

- Currently I have two blowers and plan on adding a third soon. Also have six meat probes. I sometimes cook on three or four BGE pits at the same time now.

- Sometimes it is nice to have two pit probes during a cook (single blower)one at grate level and the other higher in the dome to monitor temp differences at different parts of the pit during a long cook. Only one is controlling the blower.

The ability to store and recall data/graphs from historical cooks would be a nice feature.

We could see how winter vs. summer affects the same type of cook, different pit temps vs cook times, planning & forcasting cook times, etc.
 
Yeh, more pit probes is the next thing I need to do. Problem is, I walked away from the code and now I am way too afraid to go and change the heart of the engine! It took hundreds of hours to get all the logic right with a stoker and water glass cooling and heating the darn probe to make sure everything holds together.

But I must do what I must do. Are you all game for testing it? If so, I will start working on it later this week....
 
When you do tackle multiple blowers, is it possible to add "tabs" or different page view for each blower? Users can assign available temperature probes to each "blower page". Visually it would keep things as simple as today's program is, but may not meet people's needs (not sure). Thoughts?
 
This is my first upgrade. When I go to install it's telling me that I already have a version installed and that I must remove it before installing. Am I doing this right?
 
Originally posted by LarryR:
This is my first upgrade. When I go to install it's telling me that I already have a version installed and that I must remove it before installing. Am I doing this right?
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Yes, you need to remove the old version. I sometimes bump the version number, sometimes I don't
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Originally posted by A. Vale:
When you do tackle multiple blowers, is it possible to add "tabs" or different page view for each blower? Users can assign available temperature probes to each "blower page". Visually it would keep things as simple as today's program is, but may not meet people's needs (not sure). Thoughts?
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Good suggestion. But then I heard people say they use two blowers with one cook.

I also need to konw what to do with all the other features like lid open, alarms and such. To the extent I wind up duplicating everying, and have them all have seperate state, things get a lot more complicated.

So let's have folks expand on the scenarios and UI wishes 'cause doing this once is hard, twice impossible!
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I wonder if there is a "walk before run" version of this. I am thinking the first step would be to not have it crash in the presence of the second blower. The second step would be have it show the second blower on the same display as now but have it have no other functionality other than show the temps and graph them. That is, lid-open, alarms, etc. only apply to the primary blower....
 
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