I currently run SimpleControl on 5 devices but use one or more for programming tweaks and updates. Because of this, I run the risk of overwriting newer config files with outdated ones. It would be help to have a version number of the config file with some sort of comparison/confirmation before backing up to Dropbox or Simple Service. It would also help if we could roll back to a previous version of the config file in case of errors.
It would be helpful to have “named configurations” via Dropbox.
Instead of just backup/restore going to “…/Dropbox/Apps/Simple Control” let us specify a configuration name and allow changing it much like the location name. One might have “production” and “test” as names. Then backup/restore would use “…/Dropbox/Apps/Simple Control/production” or “…/Dropbox/Apps/Simple Control/test” depending on the current value for the configuration name.
Although you can painfully simulate this by manipulating the files on the Dropbox side of things, it is error-prone and not easy to do from a mobile device screen.
Since the Multihome feature requires a different Simple Hub in each physical location, and pairing to a Hub syncs the current configuration to all connected devices, using Multihome to switch between configurations at one physical location to try and approach this a different way is even more problematic.
Dropbox works well with Multihome.
In the future, we plan to address this area by internalizing backup and restore to our cloud. We already manage the primary configuration, so we’ll just keep your last 10 backups automatically every day or so along with some number of named/explicit saved configurations. Any of those could be restored to the current location.
Probably not a 5.0 feature. But it’s fairly high priority.
Thank you.
Thanks!
Just to clarify, I think switching between configurations is different than versioning and automatic backup/rollback. Both are useful, but different uses.
From the brief usage of Multihome I’ve done so far, each physical location needs its own Simple Hub (hardware or software) and pairing is per location. So if I am at one physical location, but I try to use Multihome to switch between configurations, the pairing to the same hub is not recommended and could cause configuration problems?
Each Hub is a location. You don’t have to be physically present at a location to sync with that location’s Hub. Whenever you switch location, you’re then talking to that location’s Hub even if it is remote.
Thank you.
So to make sure I understand, with Multihome I cannot create two different locations (“Home” and “Home-Test”) that sync to the same actual Simple Hub in one physical location? ( I assume that I cannot; I am only asking to see if this is an alternative to “named configuration files” to easily swap between two (or more) configurations.
You could have two Hubs in one location, but not one Hub with more than one configuration. 1 Hub = 1 Configuration. So if you had a test Hub and a production Hub, that would work. They would be unrelated locations.
Thank you.