New Victron Toolkit app - Public Beta

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Guy Stewart (Victron Community Manager) asked Jun 20, '24

New Victron Toolkit app - Public Beta

Hello Beta Testers,

We have just released a public beta for the new Victron Toolkit app

Links to download:

iOS

https://testflight.apple.com/join/5omex1YB

Android

https://play.google.com/apps/testing/nl.victronenergy.victronledapp

Users sharing feedback

Please take a screenshot of the page and share the image along with the description in this thread.

In case beta testers want directions while testing, here are several areas to focus on:

- Usability & UX

- Is the Toolkit app easy to navigate? Can users find what they are looking for?

- Can users understand how to use the the Toolkit app without details instructions?

- Do users find the design appealing?

- Performance and stability

- Does the app load quickly?

- Are the transitions in between screens smooth?

- Are there any crashes, freezes, or bugs? When do they occur, and can they be reproduced?

- How does the app perform under different conditions (low battery, poor internet connection)?

- Functionality

- Are all the primary features working as intended?

- Are there any functionalities missing that users expected?

- Are the Toolkit app’s functions consistent? Do features work the same way each time?

- Does the app work well on different devices and operating systems?

- Content and information

- Is the content presented relevant and useful to the users?

- Are instructions and messages clear and easy to understand?

- Feedback on the features

- What additional features do users want?

- Are there any features they find unnecessary or redundant?

- Overall satisfaction

- Are users happy with the app overall?

- Would they recommend the Toolkit app to others?

- What are the main pain points or frustrations users encounter?

- Do users have specific suggestions for making the Toolkit app better?

Upcoming features

US measurement units

toolkit

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Answer 1 · 2024-06-20T09:34:52Z

enodev answered · Jun 20 at 09:34 AM

Tried the app quickly on iOS and macOS, seems to work generally well. No crashes at all and loads reasonable well on my 14 Pro, but not fast, it could feel slow on anything older I guess.

Couple quick observations.

- It's visible that it's not a native app, the onboarding screen does not provide swipe left and right between the pages and does not slide/animate so hard replacement of screens feels out of place

- The app seems to use custom fonts and does not respect system dynamic font size setting so it looks a bit out of place from the other apps... for such simple apps I see no reason to go custom UI route

- The main screen and temperature derating does not use a scroll view as common for these types of widgets on iOS so they feel "strange" that you see a table view but can not drag/play with it :)

- The navigation bar animations are clearly custom... it's visible it's written using some cross platform framework...

- Swipe from left edge to go back does not work anywhere...

But the functionality is there and works, the LED blinking seems to be generally very difficult to decrypt when being novice and looking at the unit and back at the app and trying to figure out which exact blink sequence is that - but I see no obvious way how to make it better, so there I have no complaints...

OTOH, If I understand things correctly Victron Connect is also written using "some" cross platform framework and "feels" much more "at home" on all macOS, iOS, and Android from what I could test.

just my .2 cents,

Martin

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Guy Stewart (Victron Community Manager) ♦♦ commented · Jun 20 at 12:20 PM

Hi @enodev, really good feedback.

One thing in particular was it not obvious that you can tap the active LED lights at the top of the list to filter it?

This was one of the key design improvements to make finding the correct code easier.

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enodev Guy Stewart (Victron Community Manager) ♦♦ commented · Jun 20 at 01:26 PM

Nope, I completely missed that. I guess it comes from the fact that the whole app does not feel native so the LEDs do not look like buttons.

I'd perhaps try to design it as a flow where on the first screen you only have the LEDs and are prompted for the ones that are blinking/solid and then being taken to the second screen... with matching options. Or perhaps not showing anything at all when LEDs are off (As opposed to showing all options)...

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Guy Stewart (Victron Community Manager) ♦♦ enodev commented · Jun 20 at 07:21 PM

Appreciate the feedback, and interested to see if others have the same experience.

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Answer 2 · 2024-06-21T03:31:42Z

badwolf answered · Jun 21 at 03:31 AM

iPhone 15 Pro, iOS 17.5
the LED section takes a while to load the list, and the only thing clickable under the items is the reset button which crashes the app.

the voltage calculator is nice, but it would be nice if you could switch it to Feet/AWG. Meters to feet isn't hard to convert but MM to AWG i need a chart.

Was really happy to see the derate calculator, it matched the output of my 12/3000 multiplus after i added another cooling fan.

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Warwick Bruce Chapman commented · Jun 26 at 06:29 PM

Ft/°F/AWG is coming in the next major update.

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Alexandra ♦ commented · Jun 22 at 07:15 PM

The status definitions also didn't load for me. (Android)

Opened a different app, sent a message, saw the definition opened in the background but then the only option i have is reset, which crashed the app. (Screen shots the wrong way around)

I did like the design and layout on the ope opening screens.

Making smaller length adjustments (like for battery cables) on the slider is a bit of a fiddle.

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Guy Stewart (Victron Community Manager) ♦♦ Alexandra ♦ commented · Jun 27 at 05:57 PM

On slower connections this page was taking a long time to load. This is now getting fixed.

Note that it was fast enough when there was no internet connection, then it worked offline, but when it was connected it would check if it had the latest codes, and that was too slow.

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Alexandra ♦ Guy Stewart (Victron Community Manager) ♦♦ commented · Jun 28 at 06:20 AM

It does load eventually. It is definitely connection related on my side. I just waited about 3 or 4 minutes there is appeared.

Glad to know they are offline definitions.

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Warwick Bruce Chapman Alexandra ♦ commented · Jun 26 at 06:30 PM

The smaller length adjustments is a PITA and we have it on the list to resolve.

The issue with the loading of the definitions should be resolved in the latest beta released today. Please test and revert.

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Answer 3 · 2024-06-21T07:33:27Z

andrii-podanenko answered · Jun 21 at 07:33 AM

QR code scanner is unusable because of wrong image dimensions. Can't even catch a focus

Android

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Warwick Bruce Chapman commented · Jun 26 at 06:31 PM

This QR code was unusable because it starts with http:// and the scanner was configured for https:// only. This has been resolved in the latest beta release. Please test and revert.

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Answer 4 · 2024-06-21T21:37:00Z

nebulight answered · Jun 21 at 09:37 PM

I'd love to see AWG wire sizes, feet/inches for length and Fahrenheit temps for us over in North America.

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Guy Stewart (Victron Community Manager) ♦♦ commented · Jun 21 at 11:51 PM

Next on the feature request to do list :)

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Rob Duthie commented · Jun 22 at 04:31 AM

I thought USA was slowly changing to metric system ?

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Answer 5 · 2024-06-22T08:06:22Z

markus-001 answered · Jun 22 at 08:06 AM

temperature derating calculator was nice to confirm values on the 250 volt MPPT’s which tend to run much hotter that the 150 volt units with the same amount of PV power.

Volt drop calculator is far better, I can now calculate PV voltage drop as the calculator allows voltages greater than the previous calculator which only had options of 12, 24 and 48 volt.

There is always a miss under standing that goes with online cable length calculators, are they using single run or total run, maybe you could split the cable length to positive and negative with a calculated total for the calculation or a note that says total run positive plus negative length. With these high wattage low volt PV panels in series the long run could be between 7 to 8 meters longer than the short run. Even now I assume the app is using total cable run.

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Guy Stewart (Victron Community Manager) ♦♦ commented · Jun 22 at 10:11 AM

We have added an information button to the top right that explains the run length methodology

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markus-001 Guy Stewart (Victron Community Manager) ♦♦ commented · Jun 22 at 05:50 PM

Thanks Guy, missed that info icon at the top, thinking out loud, could the info icon be located closer to the cable length input.

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Guy Stewart (Victron Community Manager) ♦♦ markus-001 commented · Jun 26 at 01:34 PM

The info button covers more details than just the cable length. Though I agree that is the most useful bit of information that is otherwise ambiguous.

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Answer 6 · 2024-06-22T08:40:22Z

Sebastian answered · Jun 22 at 08:40 AM

As in the instructions, the LED display of an ess system is not shown completely or only in parts.
Combinations can also be displayed on the device.

At the button, the mains on LED is blinking.
There is also possible, that mains on and inverter on is blinking.

This would be the case with feedin and a consumption on the AC-out side.

In the app and in the manual, this flashing can be decoded as feedin from dc to grid and powerassist to ac-out. But this is never described as one status (both green LEDs flashing).

signal-2024-06-22-102835.jpeg (78.3 KiB)

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Guy Stewart (Victron Community Manager) ♦♦ commented · Jun 22 at 10:16 AM

I can add additional edge case codes for this.

Could you please try to explain again though which ESS codes you think are missing in different way?

Is a state missing, or is the state there but the device blinking might not match the app (due to some variation)

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markus-001 Guy Stewart (Victron Community Manager) ♦♦ commented · Jun 22 at 05:45 PM

Hi Guy, I’ll also check next week on our 3~ system. I noticed in a 3~ system on the old app I could not find a comparable LED state for one inverter, two had the same LED state one I could not match.

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Sebastian Guy Stewart (Victron Community Manager) ♦♦ commented · Jun 23 at 07:36 PM

In a ESS the Mains on LED is blinking in the way my picture is showing.
But if there is a load on the AC-out side (>500W or so) then the inverter on LED is blinking.
Depending on the power situation, the green LEDs can blink both, or only one.

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Answer 7 · 2024-06-26T15:42:46Z

Brian Clarke answered · Jun 26 at 03:42 PM

On Samsung Galaxy S7 column headers do not line up with data on volt drop calculator, cable length slider is difficult to use for low value, log scale maybe?

screenshot-20240626-163810.jpg (260.1 KiB)

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Warwick Bruce Chapman commented · Jun 26 at 06:34 PM

Thanks, will advise team.

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Answer 8 · 2024-07-02T14:48:47Z

runout answered · Jul 02 at 02:48 PM

Please could you give a direct link for downloading the app from Victron.

I don't have a google account.

If its FOSS, it would be great to see it in the f-droid store (would be a proof of quality for the source code if they accept it)

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Guy Stewart (Victron Community Manager) ♦♦ commented · Jul 04 at 05:54 AM

I think once the beta is complete we can get stand alone app files for android

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Answer 9 · 2024-07-02T16:18:44Z

dansonamission answered · Jul 02 at 04:18 PM

The iOS beta is full, are you able to increase it?

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Answer 10 · 2024-07-07T20:14:27Z

Tony answered · Jul 07 at 08:14 PM

Dear Victron,

I like the new Victron Toolkit App it works well on my Android tablet.

Would it be possible to add to the Status Definitions the LED definitions for a Cerbo GX?

Many thanks

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Guy Stewart (Victron Community Manager) ♦♦ commented · Jul 08 at 04:18 AM

Hi @Tony,

It would be possible, but probably not until after the official release.

There aren't many for the Cerbo GX, mainly relating to wifi and bluetooth.

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Answer 11 · 2024-07-18T18:26:07Z

matthias-roetzer answered · Jul 18 at 06:26 PM

LED combination does not exist, but yet it does ;)

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Answer 12 · 2024-07-24T09:18:14Z

fitmydashcam-ltd answered · Jul 24 at 09:18 AM

Short cable runs will not take into account the nominal rating of the cable.
Example:

12.8V system, 200A load. 1m length. Recommended 25mm2 cable, whihch has a nominal rating of 170A, so not suitable in my book.
If there could be logic behind this to add the nominal rating into the calc, this would be very useful.

Also, the splash screen take far too long to load when you just want a simple cable calc. Anything more than 1 second is annoying for the user in my opinion.

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New Victron Toolkit app - Public Beta

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