Variety of Issues, core is likely something Com/WiFi

[ngoodman]

I've been logging to SEG since 8/2014. I think the GEM is an amazing device; monitoring 32 channels, the 1-wire, and the Pulse counters with WiFi posting to web services at the price is amazing! I think Brultech has really found a sweet spot; it's a perfect product fit for me!

I'm moving to my own data system, and am now trying to configure GEM to do a simple "HTTP" get (format 3) to my website. My expectation is that this should be easy in land of SBCs, Raspberry Pi and Internet of Things (aka 2015), but my experience has been that it's quite the opposite. Having the WiFi/Ethernet be some sort of COM bridge is kinda wonky which I suspect is the core issue.

It simply did not work (set Data Post to my URL, hostname, packet format). Figured it's time to update to latest and greatest... after 5 hours of various searching in this forum, and various combinations of baud rate changes, recovery mode firmware, swapping to USB power supply instead of provided one, restoring to factory defaults, popping battery in and out, I've been able to update my firmware to ENG 1.49 and COM 4.0. Was hoping that would improve the world; it has not.

Things seem to be most stable with:
- A USB power supply and NO Battery

Things I experience:
- When accessing the web page, it sometimes 5 or six times to even show. Occasionally, it will simply stop working and browser will hang
- When accessing the web pages, sometimes they are partial. Sometimes, a page just starts downloading (as if it's not HTML or ascii) sometimes pages start "halway through" where the entire top half of the page is missing.
- About 50% of the time, from the GEM Network Utility "Get GEM Info" returns either a Timeout, or gobbly gook FAIL notice.
- To date, the GEM has never once performed a simple HTTP get to an IP (I set up a local Node server, and have a remote php location as well. URL, IP's nothing works. Tried to get it back to SEG and it no longer works either.
- Pings work perfectly, just seems that everything on the HTTP stack server/post.
- Copious and complete combinations of Real Time Status (on/off), Keep Alive String, Keep Alive Pulse, Baud Rates COM1, Flow On/Off it all still is broken.

My guess is that it's some core issue (packet size, Keep Alive thing, or core Comm setup that is cause ALL my issues. Posting here to hopefully get some of the experts to set me straight! Help is very much appreciated, and as I resolve my issue I promise to write up any lessons learned so that those that come after me...

Screen shots (more in reply to follow):

gem_packet_send.png (77.56 KiB) Viewed 2001 times

gem_network.png (40.46 KiB) Viewed 2001 times

gem_advanced.png (113.78 KiB) Viewed 2001 times

[ngoodman]

More screenshots.

Thanks again, for any light anyone can shed on this. I really really really want to get my GEM stable and working in the modern InterWebs as it IS the perfect product specs in my book.

[ben]

The WiFi-only option can really be a pain. One immediate thing I've noticed which will improve your performance is to up your baud rate on COM1. 115200 should improve page loading significantly. Do it through the GEM Network Utility.

You might consider doing a Factory Defaults in the GEM Network Utility, you'll have to set your CTs up again afterwards but it'll ensure your Adv. settings are OK.

Keep the real-time status as "ON".
Flow Control off.
Put the battery back in.

Once that's all setup, try cycling power to the GEM.

[mwareman]

Ben,

Is there any way to purchase the Ethernet module from you and replace/upgrade a WiFi only GEM?

Michael.

[ben]

Ben,

Is there any way to purchase the Ethernet module from you and replace/upgrade a WiFi only GEM?

Michael.

The on-board WiFi module has to be disabled (hardware-wise) in order to use an on-board solution.

You could use an EtherPort and use a DB9 cable through the COM1/2 headers.

[mwareman]

Ben,

Is there any way to purchase the Ethernet module from you and replace/upgrade a WiFi only GEM?

Michael.

The on-board WiFi module has to be disabled (hardware-wise) in order to use an on-board solution.

You could use an EtherPort and use a DB9 cable through the COM1/2 headers.

OK, thanks. I'll give that a try!

[ben]

Ben,

Is there any way to purchase the Ethernet module from you and replace/upgrade a WiFi only GEM?

Michael.

The on-board WiFi module has to be disabled (hardware-wise) in order to use an on-board solution.

You could use an EtherPort and use a DB9 cable through the COM1/2 headers.

OK, thanks. I'll give that a try!

The ports expose RS232, you technically can use any serial-to-ethernet adapter come to think of it. Just need a cable adapter for it.

[tfalk]

Any luck with this?

I have the GEM working perfectly using XAMPP on a Windows PC on my home network. At the same time, I have several websites hosted on lunarpages so I figured I would try to install the standalone server, set up a mysql database and move everything to the hosted server.

Yeah, not happening.... Either I get nothing going to the server at all or the rare occasions I've been able to get messages actually showing up on the server log, all I get are HTTP 500 errors and an error in the btech/logs file saying error in minutedata. I created the mysql database using the instructions I found in another thread, updated the database.php file to reflect the values I used on CPanel when I created the database. Latest attempt, I don't see anything being sent to the server at all. If I reset and point it back to my localhost server, it runs fine.

Next step will be to do a complete reset on the GEM and start from scratch since I'm guessing something is getting crossed up in the communications. Maybe I'll start a new thread but I was wondering if the OP ever got anywhere with his com issues...

[ben]

HTTP 500 indicates a problem with the webpage. When you switched to MySQL, there should be some updated php files also beyond the database page.

My guess is one of the models is calling a query function that MySQL doesn't support, but SQLite does.