I want to store & run everything locally (on my own server) and wasn’t sure which storage option was “better”, EmonCMS or InfluxDB.
I played around with EmonCMS for a few days. While it was easy to setup with the IotaWatt, and EmonCMS is energy focused, it was difficult to figure out for my needs. Not sure if it’s my lack of knowledge, or bugs in the EmonCMS interface. Couldn’t get the detailed & flexible stats I wanted.
So I’m now trying InfluxDB/Grafana (also installed locally). Installing was relatively easy (on Debian). I obviously have a lot of reading to do, but was hoping for some guidelines how to “best” setup the IotaWatt for InfluxDB. I realize anything is possible, but it seems like there is a best way to get started.
One confusing IotaWatt config is the tag set entries. The description is too technical for me (I’m just not getting it).
“IoTaWatt assumes the first tag is unique to this measurement and is referenced to determine the time of last measurement during restart recovery. In that way, an IoTaWatt can maintain context and continuity where multiple data sources are writing to a single database.”
I’ve also looked here for help, but have only seen fixed string entries like “Iotawatt = Home”. Does this tag every measurement inserted into the InfluxDB, or does the paragraph above mean the IotaWatt is storing this locally to figure out where to resume measurement uploads (“restart recovery”)? Would this setting only be used for multiple IotaWatts or is it necessary to resume uploads when wifi goes down/up?
Tag sets are also available as $device, $name, $units variables, but I don’t understand how to use them. Are these used to send outputs to InfluxDB?
Should setting up all your inputs to be sent to InfluxDB be the “best” option, then everything else can be calculated from the inputs in Grafana? That way there is no additional space wasted logging something that could be calculated from the inputs(?). i.e. Don’t waste space storing something that can be calculated.
Does each input upload both input values (Vrms + Hz, or Watts + Pf)?
Apologies if I’m asking questions I should be able to easily figure out. Trying to learn IotaWatt, InfluxDB, & Grafana all at once. Like I said, I have a lot of reading to do.
Have been studying this thread. A lot of useful info there that probably answers a lot of my questions (I have to keep studying it). I’m hoping it’s still accurate with recent firmware updates.