API Bugs and Feature Requests

[indigo_jay]

I’ve just finished building a Rachio plugin for our smart home software, Indigo, and I’d like to consolidate a few API bug reports and feature requests into a single post.

Bugs

• Fix max zone durations - I currently have a zone with a max duration of 18000 (that’s what the API is returning - “maxRuntime”: 18000,") but when I try to start a zone with that duration I get a 400 error (presumably because it’s >10800).
• iOS status sync bug - when I start a zone, then start another zone, the UI in iOS shows Online rather than Watering Now so it looks like it’s not running even though it is. Refreshing by pulling down doesn’t help.
• Web status sync bug - similar to iOS, but slightly different. If the page is open, the zone change will register and show watering, but reloading the page will cause it to show Online rather than Watering Now.
• The link to the forum in the Support section of the API docs (http://community.rachio.com/c/public-api) doesn’t exist.

Feature Requests

• Pause/Resume schedule - so that a currently running schedule can be paused for whatever reason and later resumed.
• Next/Previous zone - so you can rerun a previous zone or skip to the next zone while a schedule is currently running.
• Local hardware control API (vs cloud-based). It looks like at least one of your competitors allows local control so there is precedent.

All in all, I’m pretty pleased with the API even though we’re not overly-fond of cloud-based APIs. The first version is available on Github for both users and anyone that wants to contribute.

[franz]

@indigo_jay

I’ve just finished building a Rachio plugin for our smart home software, Indigo, and I’d like to consolidate a few API bug reports and feature requests into a single post.

Nice!

@indigo_jay

Fix max zone durations - I currently have a zone with a max duration of 18000 (that’s what the API is returning - “maxRuntime”: 18000,") but when I try to start a zone with that duration I get a 400 error (presumably because it’s >10800).

The limit is currently 3 hours (we throw the error Duration range 0 - 10800 seconds) but I can increase to 10 hours since that is what our Webapp supports. There are other changes going out so this will go out some time next week.

@indigo_jay

iOS status sync bug - when I start a zone, then start another zone, the UI in iOS shows Online rather than Watering Now so it looks like it’s not running even though it is. Refreshing by pulling down doesn’t help.

If you start one zone and go to iOS does it show watering?

@indigo_jay

Web status sync bug - similar to iOS, but slightly different. If the page is open, the zone change will register and show watering, but reloading the page will cause it to show Online rather than Watering Now.

I’ll have the team look into this.

@indigo_jay

The link to the forum in the Support section of the API docs (http://community.rachio.com/c/public-api) doesn’t exist.

Thanks for reporting this.[quote=“indigo_jay, post:1, topic:7767”]
Pause/Resume schedule - so that a currently running schedule can be paused for whatever reason and later resumed.
Next/Previous zone - so you can rerun a previous zone or skip to the next zone while a schedule is currently running.
[/quote]

These are new features being built into the platform, but no date on delivery or access through API.

@indigo_jay

Local hardware control API (vs cloud-based). It looks like at least one of your competitors allows local control so there is precedent.

I’ll forward this to the product team.

Thanks for the feedback!

[ftballguy45]

+1 for local device control. Going to the cloud when unnecessary is a fail. Let us use the API interfaced directly to the controller on our own networks…PLEASE!