"Experience Buttons" - Can you educate me?

[ILoveC4]

I've never used Experience Buttons. I see there are Experience Buttons of 2 flavors - status buttons and scenario buttons. I've never dove in to these, and would LOVE if someone could give me some real world examples of when they're used and how they're configured. I spent a few minutes this morning, but ran out of time and it still wasn't at all clear to me how to get these functional.

The rabbit hole started with the desire to the Remote Finder Pro app, which apparently relies on an "Experience Button". At any rate, I feel like I'm missing something and would love any insight.

[Kevin L]

The BlackWire Remote Finder App requires a Web UI button which also uses an experience button for its icon. It is launching a web page using the touch screens chromium browser. 

[Cbell]

I've never used Experience Buttons. I see there are Experience Buttons of 2 flavors - status buttons and scenario buttons. I've never dove in to these, and would LOVE if someone could give me some real world examples of when they're used and how they're configured. I spent a few minutes this morning, but ran out of time and it still wasn't at all clear to me how to get these functional.
The rabbit hole started with the desire to the Remote Finder Pro app, which apparently relies on an "Experience Button". At any rate, I feel like I'm missing something and would love any insight.

Ditto that. I would love if someone can give some use cases. This will help me determine how I may implement within my project. Also... if there’s any gaps with the native C4 offering, I’d be open to third-party suggestions as well.


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[ILoveC4]

1 hour ago, Kevin L said:

The BlackWire Remote Finder App requires a Web UI button which also uses an experience button for its icon. It is launching a web page using the touch screens chromium browser. 

Do you have documentation on how to set it up anywhere?

[Kevin L]

10 minutes ago, ILoveC4 said:

Do you have documentation on how to set it up anywhere?

Is the documentation tab in the driver not explaining how to use it?

[ILoveC4]

4 hours ago, Kevin L said:

Is the documentation tab in the driver not explaining how to use it?

There is no documentation tab in the driver. 

[Kevin L]

1 hour ago, ILoveC4 said:

There is no documentation tab in the driver. 

To be clear you are using the BlackWire Designs Remote Finder Pro driver and there is no documentation tab? 

[ILoveC4]

6 minutes ago, Kevin L said:

To be clear you are using the BlackWire Designs Remote Finder Pro driver and there is no documentation tab? 

That is correct. 

[Kevin L]

Actually I see that. I will get that fixed. I updated the website URL with some information 

https://www.blackwiredesigns.com/store/c4-remote-finder-pro/#tab_driver-setup

[Cyknight]

8 hours ago, ILoveC4 said:

I see there are Experience Buttons of 2 flavors - status buttons and scenario buttons. I've never dove in to these, and would LOVE if someone could give me some real world examples of when they're used and how they're configured.

Heavy question really. This could contain page upon page of use options etc. I'll try and give a bit of an overview.

First, always remember that experience buttons can be displayed in many menus by choice, so you have more freedom in where they show up.

Let's start breaking them out first into a few 'types' if you will:

*"Basic" built for purpose options. These are really basic options, generally they fall under the UI buttons catagory. No real programming function, but added to enhance visual options and diversity.

Examples are PS4, HDMI, Component, Cassette, Chromecast and so on.

*"Standard" built for one purpose ones. Often these are 'enhanced' re-builds of drivers that already existed for simple function, with added option, though sometimes they add enhancements to the overall system or are used to 'display' a function in an alternate (or more advanced) way to using the more basic screen custom buttons.

A lot of these allow using switches as 'relays' directly, removing the need for funky programming, and add timer features

Examples are Fireplace, Fountain, (Garage) Door, (Ceiling/Extract) Fan, Pump, Door Auto Lock...you get the idea

*"Advanced" built for purpose options. These are more work to setup, as they offer more options/settings or in some cases you need multiple to cover a whole project. They generally exist to make advanced programming easier to do, keep it more contained and/or to give an interface to some advanced programming options.

Examples are RGB Light (select and display color of an RGB light), Announcement On/Off (per room ability to 'block' announcements), Mockupancy Driver, Security (would have preferred the term Courtesy) Light, Snapshot, etc

*"Special" built for purpose options are drivers that are very purpose specific. These genreally ONLY work on T3 screens (and in Composer) at this point.

Examples are Calendar, Notepad, To Do

*"Fun" drivers. More built to test the limits than anything. Ask your dealer to add Clumsy Bird or 2048 - just don't hold me or him/her responsible.

*"3rd Party device" drivers. More and more advanced drivers (or suites) are starting to use experience buttons.

Examples are Ecobee and Powerview drivers

*"Generic" buttons. There are a few very generic buttons, that you can use freely for anything you want, which is I'm guessing largely what you're asking about.

Examples are Countdown, Status UI, Scenario (RGB sort of falls in this category too I suppose)

 

These last ones are primarily used to give the end user better insight and/or control over often asked functions.

Some programming examples I've done for clients or myself:

 

*Count Down:

-Instead of All Off on button press, touchscreen has the option of displaying this (and you can tie it to buttons as well) where there's a countdown to all the lights turning off. So when I'm leaving the house, I press it from my T3 and I have several minutes to actually get out the door, the garage, close everything off and so on.

-Activate it at bed time. Once it's up, all TVs shut off. Again, nothing that couldn't be done in programming already on a button press, but now you have visual feedback.

*Status UI

-As it gives feedback by way of a color 'led' on it, I've used these often to indicate whether multiple optional override programming is on or off and to control it at the same time), ie  Exterior lighting schedule is running regular on green, vacation mode on yellow, party mode on blue, off on red.

-Indication of certain events having occured. Used it in one place to indicate which motions were triggered during a day, if doors were unlocked during the day or night when they normally wouldn't be, etc. Similar to what some do using button LED colors, but now on touchscreens.

*Scenario is a basic on/off only version of the Status UI, though it has one significant twist - it was designed to make it easy for dealers to create alternate versions using custom items for the on/off state. There's a few of these around for sale with huge packs of them (Blackwire has one, think Chowmain did one too). These are often liked becasue it will also give a direct status feedback using the different icons, so you can see when a source device is in use. Think, if someone is using the Switch, you see that under the screens in other rooms without having to check the zones page.

[indecision]

Just wanted to say thank you for taking the time to put together that info and post.  Very helpful!

[Time2Jet]

Heavy question really. This could contain page upon page of use options etc. I'll try and give a bit of an overview.
First, always remember that experience buttons can be displayed in many menus by choice, so you have more freedom in where they show up.
Let's start breaking them out first into a few 'types' if you will:
*"Basic" built for purpose options. These are really basic options, generally they fall under the UI buttons catagory. No real programming function, but added to enhance visual options and diversity.
Examples are PS4, HDMI, Component, Cassette, Chromecast and so on.
*"Standard" built for one purpose ones. Often these are 'enhanced' re-builds of drivers that already existed for simple function, with added option, though sometimes they add enhancements to the overall system or are used to 'display' a function in an alternate (or more advanced) way to using the more basic screen custom buttons.
A lot of these allow using switches as 'relays' directly, removing the need for funky programming, and add timer features
Examples are Fireplace, Fountain, (Garage) Door, (Ceiling/Extract) Fan, Pump, Door Auto Lock...you get the idea
*"Advanced" built for purpose options. These are more work to setup, as they offer more options/settings or in some cases you need multiple to cover a whole project. They generally exist to make advanced programming easier to do, keep it more contained and/or to give an interface to some advanced programming options.
Examples are RGB Light (select and display color of an RGB light), Announcement On/Off (per room ability to 'block' announcements), Mockupancy Driver, Security (would have preferred the term Courtesy) Light, Snapshot, etc
*"Special" built for purpose options are drivers that are very purpose specific. These genreally ONLY work on T3 screens (and in Composer) at this point.
Examples are Calendar, Notepad, To Do
*"Fun" drivers. More built to test the limits than anything. Ask your dealer to add Clumsy Bird or 2048 - just don't hold me or him/her responsible.
*"3rd Party device" drivers. More and more advanced drivers (or suites) are starting to use experience buttons.
Examples are Ecobee and Powerview drivers
*"Generic" buttons. There are a few very generic buttons, that you can use freely for anything you want, which is I'm guessing largely what you're asking about.
Examples are Countdown, Status UI, Scenario (RGB sort of falls in this category too I suppose)
 
These last ones are primarily used to give the end user better insight and/or control over often asked functions.
Some programming examples I've done for clients or myself:
 
*Count Down:
-Instead of All Off on button press, touchscreen has the option of displaying this (and you can tie it to buttons as well) where there's a countdown to all the lights turning off. So when I'm leaving the house, I press it from my T3 and I have several minutes to actually get out the door, the garage, close everything off and so on.
-Activate it at bed time. Once it's up, all TVs shut off. Again, nothing that couldn't be done in programming already on a button press, but now you have visual feedback.
*Status UI
-As it gives feedback by way of a color 'led' on it, I've used these often to indicate whether multiple optional override programming is on or off and to control it at the same time), ie  Exterior lighting schedule is running regular on green, vacation mode on yellow, party mode on blue, off on red.
-Indication of certain events having occured. Used it in one place to indicate which motions were triggered during a day, if doors were unlocked during the day or night when they normally wouldn't be, etc. Similar to what some do using button LED colors, but now on touchscreens.
*Scenario is a basic on/off only version of the Status UI, though it has one significant twist - it was designed to make it easy for dealers to create alternate versions using custom items for the on/off state. There's a few of these around for sale with huge packs of them (Blackwire has one, think Chowmain did one too). These are often liked becasue it will also give a direct status feedback using the different icons, so you can see when a source device is in use. Think, if someone is using the Switch, you see that under the screens in other rooms without having to check the zones page.

Really good stuff @CyKnight

Thanks for taking the time.


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[digitaltrader]

Where does one find these experience buttons? Is there an icon library?

[Cyknight]

There's a bunch of them in the online library, they use their own catagory in the search options in composer - as for any online searchable option for end-users, I don't know if there is anything that's really useful (or not)

[LollerAgent]

10 hours ago, Cyknight said:

There's a bunch of them in the online library, they use their own catagory in the search options in composer - as for any online searchable option for end-users, I don't know if there is anything that's really useful (or not)

I think this shows many of them:

https://drivers.control4.com/solr/drivers/browse?q=UIButton&fq=primaryProxy%3A"uibutton"

[LollerAgent]

What would be the ideal button to trigger a macro such as "Goodnight" .. it doesn't necessarily need to show "status" per se, it just needs to be a clickable button on a navigator that executes the macro/action.   I have been using "UI Key - Status Button," but is there a better driver to use for things like this?

[Cyknight]

Function wise, that works just fine.

Some fo the driver pack out there may have a better 'representative' option, but the function wouldn't change