VisibleTesla

[Mario Kadastik]

From what I remember VT was on HVAC tab and I started the HVAC and left it there. Then about 10 or so minutes lates I swapped to graph tab and noticed that the polling interval had reduced after I started the HVAC which was surprising to me as I'd have expected the idling car for 7h would have gathered at low interval and once some action started the app would increase frequency. I guess before HVAC tab I was on charge tab and that's most likely where VT was the 7h the car was standing in front of my office. Hope that helps to explain the polling changes. Also I've disabled sleep in the car and in VT because I want a responsive car and best logging of trips etc. And I don't care that I lose ~24km / 24h when in normal day-to-day driving.

 

[Volker.Berlin]

If you take a look at the FAQ it talks a little bit about security. You can find it online here or in the Documentation folder that comes with VT.

As araxara points out, you can read the code and build it yourself to ensure that the jar file actually reflects the sources that you're reading. The Readme.md file on github has notes on how to set up the build environment.

hans has a good point (that I just added to the next version of the FAQ). You could use an app to monitor all network traffic coming from VisibleTesla and forbid any connections that you don't want. Little Snitch on the Mac is a good example. FYI, VT talks to Tesla, Dropbox (to check for and download new versions), and MailGun to send notifications. It will only check for new versions and send notifications if you explicitly ask it to do so. Otherwise it just talks to tesla.

You may already be familiar with hans' teslams project. If not you should definitely check it out. It's an awesome package and you'll probably find it much easier to do a security review of it than of VT.

Thank you so much for understanding my concerns and for your suggestions. Much appreciated!

 

[jpasqua]

VisibleTesla 0.25.03

I had to remove a bug fix from this release since it caused a worse bug on Windows. I need more time to create a full solution and I'm heading out the door now so I'll have to do it later. This change does not remove any functionality as you'll see in the release notes below.


Version 0.25.03 of VisibleTesla is available here. You can also find it by using "Help->Check for Updates". Many of the changes in this release are based on user input. Some recent, some much older. I will be updating the github repository momentarily to reflect this release. Speaking of which, the build environment now includes contributions by @araxara (thank you!) that allow developers to easily build a packaged Mac app.

This version is not deemed experimental, but it is still collecting quite a bit of logging data related to sleep mode because there continue to be refinements in that area and log data is essential to sorting out problems. Unless you look at the log file, you won't notice any difference based on the increased logging.

VisibleTesla 0.25.03 [01-18-2013]

• User-Visible Changes
  • General
    • Addition: You can now select a date range when exporting Location data or Statistics data. Please see the documentation for details.
    • Refinement: More work on sleep mode. Remember that when VisibleTesla is in sleep mode, its first priority is to allow your car to sleep. It will miss data in this mode. The only question is how much. I've added more heuristics that will minimize the amount of missed data, but it will always miss some. After all, it is actively trying to leave the car alone.
    • Refinement: Additions and updates to the documentation. Note that many of the screen shots have not been updated to reflect the latest version.
    • REMOVED FORM RELEASE: Fix: VisibleTesla keeps several files that store statistics and location data. If you run multiple copies of VisibleTesla on the same computer and connected to the same car, both copies might write to the files at the same time. The result is not pretty. In this version, if you try to run two copies of VT pointed at the same vehicle, the second copy of VT will pop up a dialog with a warning message and then exit. You can still run multiple copies of VT, but each must be pointed at a different vehicle.
  • Login
    • Addition: If you log in when the car is sleeping, you'll get the normal dialog box that asks you whether you want to wake up the car or let it sleep. In previous versions if you chose to let it sleep, VT would simply exit. Now it overlays the login Tab with a panel saying that the car is asleep and the app will start automatically when it notices that the car is awake. There is also a "Wake" button that you can press at any time to force the car to wake up. You can also quit the app at any time while it is in this mode.
    • Fix: There was a situation where the app would successully log in but then get stuck on the Login tab. This was caused by an underlying problem communicating with the car. The login activity only communicates with Tesla's servers. That means that the login can succeed even if the car cannot be contacted. In the latest version users will be presented with a Dialog explaining that a problem has occurred and what to do instead of just a silent failure.
  • Overview
    • Refinement: The area on the overview tab that used to display the car's VIN will now allow the user to toggle between displaying the VIN or the firmware version. The toggle setting is remembered between runs of the application. You can toggle back and forth between VIN and firmware version all you want while running the app. If you quit and restart, VisibleTesla will begin in whatever state you left it in (displaying VIN or firmware version).
  • HVAC
    • Refinement: The temperature range slider now covers the same range of temperatures as the iPhone app and the car itself. When the units are Fahrenheit the range is 62 (LO) to 90 (HI). when the units are Celsius the range is 17 (LO) to 32 (HI).
    • Fix: There was a problem experienced by some European users that caused any change to the temperature to result in the temperature being set to the lowest setting (LO). It is possible for users in the US to experience this problem but only if the language setting on their computer is something other than US English (e.g. German).
  • Location
  • Charge
  • Graphs
  • Trips
    • Refinement: Days in the calendar which have trips are highlighted with green text to make them easier to spot.
    • Fix: Yet more work on tracking down problems with units.
      • The elevation series in the graph is now in meters or feet depending on the car's GUI setting (feet if set for miles, meters if set for km).
      • Speed in the map (shown when hovering over a marker) and speed in the graph now reflect the car's gui setting (mph or km/h).
      • The two y-axes are now as follows: The left y-axis represents elevation (in feet or meters as displayed in the legend). The right y-axis gives speed and power.
      • The "Speed" and Power legends now shows units (mph or km/h and kW respectively)
      • When hovering over a map marker, the displayed speed is now labeled with the appropriate units.
    • Fix: Problem where mapping multiple trips with an embedded graph would not work. The graph represented only the first trip rather than all of the segments.
  • Scheduler
    • Refinement: Executing a scheduled event will now wake up the application in addition to waking up the car. The exception is if the command to be executed is to put the app into sleep mode.
  • Notify
    • Refinement: Shortened messages for more convenient viewing on phones and tablets. Fixed a bug where subjects were empty.
    • Refinement: Added "Stopped" as another Charge State value.
  • Prefs

• Under-the-covers
  • Integrated and slightly modified @araxara's contribution that allows developers to easily build VisibleTesla as a fully self-contained Mac application. Thanks @araxara!
• Known problems
  • Occassionaly thinks the car is not charging when it really is.

 

[tokuro]

this 03 release does not read prior trip and other data (at least on my Win7VM). I have older copies (01 & 02) and they don't have issues reading older data. My preference for a folder location is to use default location so that data should be read across upgrades...

 

[jpasqua]

this 03 release does not read prior trip and other data (at least on my Win7VM). I have older copies (01 & 02) and they don't have issues reading older data. My preference for a folder location is to use default location so that data should be read across upgrades...

Thank you for the report tokuro. I have temporarily pulled 0.25.03. I'll put it back up once I resolve the issue.

--- Update ---

I have confirmed that this is a file locking problem that is Windows specific. I am looking into how to fix it.

--- Update 2 ---

The fix is going to take a while. I'm going to back this feature out of 0.25.03 and re-release it.

 

[jpasqua]

Sorry about releasing, pulling, and then re-releasing 0.25.03. I've fixed the problem that was popping up on Windows and will put that in 0.25.04. For now, feel free to use 0.25.03 and let me know about any other problems that you might encounter.

Speaking of which, a user in Norway reported that when using the "Speed Hits or Exceeds" notification, a notification message was sent saying that the car was going 927.0 km/h! These cars are fast, but not that fast. I haven't been able to recreate this. I would love to know if any other users have had this problem - especially in Europe. I've identified one potential problem, but it's difficult to reproduce. Any other reports would help.

Thanks,
Joe

 

[ebbrey]

Noticed a change in the sleep behavior in 0.25.03. It used to let the car sleep. If the window was minimized or in the background and i selected it. It would state "Sleeping @ xx:xx". Now i notice that the car wakes up/stays awake if i touch the icon.

Edit: Tried some more.. If i leave the app on the overview window. I notice it refreshing for a while. How long do you need to let the app be inactive before the car gets to go to sleep?

Tried a restart. Noticed that the window turned grey. Working fine now .P

 

[Veggen]

Speaking of which, a user in Norway reported that when using the "Speed Hits or Exceeds" notification, a notification message was sent saying that the car was going 927.0 km/h! These cars are fast, but not that fast. I haven't been able to recreate this. I would love to know if any other users have had this problem - especially in Europe. I've identified one potential problem, but it's difficult to reproduce. Any other reports would help.

Hah! My car is way faster:

2014-01-21 16:35:12
Speed hit or exceeded 80.0. Current value: 1860.4

Tomorrow I will see if I can break mach2...

 

[zax123]

This app is awesome, I use it all the time.

I noticed today that the "Speed hit or exceeded" slider only goes to 100 even in Canada, and since we're in km/h, 100 is sloooow... for a Tesla.

Just wondering if you could bump it up to maybe 140 or 150 when it's in km/h.

Thanks!

Rob

 

[jpasqua]

This app is awesome, I use it all the time.

I noticed today that the "Speed hit or exceeded" slider only goes to 100 even in Canada, and since we're in km/h, 100 is sloooow... for a Tesla.

Just wondering if you could bump it up to maybe 140 or 150 when it's in km/h.

Thanks!

Rob

Glad you're enjoying it Rob. Yes, I can make that change. Good idea.

Between jury duty, work, a cold, and bug fixes, it will probably be a while.

Joe

 

[jpasqua]

Providing your own MailGun account

Hello All,

As you may know, VisibleTesla uses the MailGun service to send notifications. All notifications are sent through a single account that I established at MailGun. It has come to my attention that logging information from that service is available to me as the administrator of that account. Some people may be uncomfortable with this from a privacy standpoint. In the next release there will be an option that allows you to supply your own MailGun account (in the form of an API key) so VisibleTesla will use that account for all of your notifications.

I can assure you that I never look at this information (I just realized it was there), but if you are concerned, I would suggest turning off notifications until this new option is available in the Advanced Preferences section and setting up your API key with MailGun so you'll be ready to go.

Just to be clear, you won't be required to set up your own account in the next release, but you will be allowed to do so if you'd like.

This will be documented in the Prefs Tab section and in the FAQ in the security question. It will also be in the release notes as a reminder.

Joe

 

[ZBB]

Just curious... What type of info is logged?

 

[jpasqua]

Just curious... What type of info is logged?

The destination email address and all or part of the subject.

 

[zax123]

Glad you're enjoying it Rob. Yes, I can make that change. Good idea.

Between jury duty, work, a cold, and bug fixes, it will probably be a while.

Joe

Priority 1: take care of that cold! Lots of vitamins.

Priority 2: don't miss out on jury duty...
.
.
.
Priority 1000: Add to the high speed notification on VT for Canucks.

Thanks, Joe!

 

[jpasqua]

People with font size problems

A while back there were a couple of reports from people using VisibleTesla on Windows who were having font problems. In particular the font size was too big and text was being cut off. If there are any volunteers around, I have something I'd like you to try. I've added an advanced preference that lets you do font scaling. The default is 100% and you can turn it down to as low as 70% to make VisibleTesla's fonts fit your screen resolution better. If you're interested in trying this out, send me a PM describing your problem and I'll send you a link to a test version.

Thank you,
Joe

 

[Mario Kadastik]

I keep running VisibleTesla in the background on my laptop hoping it'll record while the laptop is online. However it seems after I closed the laptop on Friday and opened it on Friday at home VT hadn't recorded absolutely anything until I checked it today. Here's a screenshot from the graph part. The laptop was online and being used, the car doesn't use sleep and VT is also told not to sleep.

Oh and I did drive multiple times yesterday... VT didn't see any...

 

[jpasqua]

I keep running VisibleTesla in the background on my laptop hoping it'll record while the laptop is online. However it seems after I closed the laptop on Friday and opened it on Friday at home VT hadn't recorded absolutely anything until I checked it today. Here's a screenshot from the graph part. The laptop was online and being used, the car doesn't use sleep and VT is also told not to sleep.

<pic removed>

Oh and I did drive multiple times yesterday... VT didn't see any...

Hi Mario. There's very little chance for me to get insight into problems like this without a log file. If you can send me the log for this period it might give me some insight.

I'm not sure I understand why you mean when you say that you closed the laptop but that it was online and being used. Do you mean that you closed the lid but still had it connected to an external kbd/nouse/display and were actively using it? Perhaps the lid was closed but you were connected via ssh or screen sharing. Presumably it was connected to the network the whole time and the laptop itself did not go into sleep mode at any time.

Joe

 

[hans]

I keep running VisibleTesla in the background on my laptop hoping it'll record while the laptop is online. However it seems after I closed the laptop on Friday and opened it on Friday at home VT hadn't recorded absolutely anything until I checked it today. Here's a screenshot from the graph part. The laptop was online and being used, the car doesn't use sleep and VT is also told not to sleep.

View attachment 41891

Oh and I did drive multiple times yesterday... VT didn't see any...

This might be a dumb question but since you clearly have a Mac, did you set System Preferences->Energy Saver to say Computer sleep = Never?

If you drove home with your laptop or unplugged it from the wall did you also set Computer sleep = Never for both the "Power Adapter" AND the "Battery" modes?

Also, (only if driving home with your laptop) did you have WiFi or some other internet communications on the laptop for the entire time the data was to be collected?

 

[jpasqua]

VisibleTesla 0.25.04

VisibleTesla 0.25.04 is available here or through "Help->Check for Updates". The "Snap to road" option in the Trips tab should be considered experimental. The font scaling preference had only light testing on Windows and Mac but appears to be working. This is for users who are currently experiencing problems with oversize fonts.

Thanks to several members who tested pre-release versions and to one who not only tested but also submitted a bug fix.

VisibleTesla 0.25.04 [01-26-2013]

• User-Visible Changes
  • General
    • Refinement: Minor styling tweaks on a few of the controls for better visibility.
    • Fix: VisibleTesla can get confused and potentially corrupt data if you run multiple copies on the same computer and connected to the same car. The result is not pretty. In this version, if you try to run two copies of VisibleTesla pointed at the same car, the second instance will pop up a dialog with a warning message and then exit when you close the dialog. You can still run multiple copies of VT, but each must be pointed at a different vehicle.
  • Login
  • Overview
    • Refinement: The Details dialog should now correctly report the region for cars in Europe (used to be reported as "Unknown").
  • HVAC
  • Location
  • Charge
  • Graphs
  • Trips
    • Addition: Experimental support for the "Snap to Road" option. If you check this box, VisibleTesla will try to make the path follow roadways rather than plot straight lines between markers. This is just a guess and can be wrong. The only data VisibleTesla is sure of are the marker locations. This option uses data from Google to help perform the "snapping". Google limits the rate at which this service can be used, so this option can be slow.This setting is not remembered between runs of VisibleTesla. That may change in future versions if this feature gets past the experimental stage.
    • Fix: Some users would see certain highlighted dates as "..." instead of the actual date. This has been addressed. If you're fonts are "chopped off" in other parts of the application, please see the note about the advanced font scaling preference.
  • Scheduler
  • Notify
    • Refinement: The range of values presented by the Speed Hits or Exceeds slider is now sensitive to the selected units. If the units are mph then the range is 0 to 100. If the units are km/h then the range is 0 to 160.
    • Fix: A problem with the "Speed Hits or Exceeds" that would report the wrong current value for European cars.
    • Fix: A formatting problem in notification messages that would use the wrong decimal character.
  • Prefs
    • Addition: Users who are experiencing problems with fonts being too large and not displaying properly may use the new Font Scale setting in Prefs→General→Advanced. Set the font scale to a value lower than 100% to reduce VisibleTesla's font size. Some experimentation may be necessary to find the right scaling. You need to quit and restart VisibleTesla to make it use your new setting.
    • Refinement: Advanced users may supply their own API key for MailGun. This is the service used to send notifications via email. It is up to you to set up an account with MailGun and agree to their terms of service. Supplying your own key provides no new functionality. It does, however, provide better privacy and may help to avoid usage limits. This preference can be found in Prefs→General→Advanced. Please do not use this setting unless you are comfortable acquring your own MailGun key.
    • Fix: A problem that could affect users of the advanced preference for custom Google Maps API Key.
• Under-the-covers
• Known problems
  • Occassionaly thinks the car is not charging when it really is.
  • Screen shots in the documentation are out of date in many places.

 

[steve841]

Joe,

Big "thank you" for your time and efforts on VT ....

Simple as that.