The information displayed on your dashboards is displayed as a collection of widgets, organized within a section grid. Widgets display information from your HomeSeer server and let you interact with it. Widgets are given a size and location within the dashboard. You can organize widgets within the dashboard any way you want, giving your dashboards a personalized look.
There are 3 kinds of widgets:
- Device widgets display the status and/or history of a device, and allow you to control the device.
- Event widgets allow you to run an event when tapped.
- Camera widgets display the image from a camera.
- Group widgets allow you to display multiple widgets as a single group. For more information on group widgets, read Working with groups in the dashboards page.
The display options for each type of widget is explored in more detail below. Besides displaying information, widgets let you interact with your server. The Widget actions section explores in more detail the different actions you can configure on your widgets.
Device widgets
Device widgets let you view the status and/or history of a device. They also allow you to control the device. There are 3 different display types you can choose from for device widgets:
- Information displays the status of the device as an image or text or both.
- Controls displays controls to interact with the device
- History shows historical status of the device
History widgets require installing the HSBuddy plugin on your HomeSeer server, as detailed in the Installing HSBuddy section.
The following sections show the different display options for each device widget type. Make sure to also read the Device actions section to learn the different actions that can be configured for device widgets.
Information
A device widget with a display type of Information shows information about the device. This can include the image, name, location and value (as text) of the device. The widget shows this information as a title (slightly larger font size) and one or more subtitles (slightly smaller font size). You can choose what information to show in the title, and what information to show as subtitles.
The following is an example of a widget with its name as title and its value as substitle:
The following is an example of a widget with its value as title and no subtitles:
Status image only: You can also choose to display only the status image (icon) of the device. The image will scale to fit the size of the widget:
Custom icon: You can also to display a custom icon for the widget. You will be given the option to pick from an icon stored on your HomeSeer server.
It is sometimes useful to create a widget with a custom icon that defines custom Device actions when tapped. To get an idea of what kind of widgets you can create, see the Widget creation ideas section.
For more information on custom icons, read the Custom icon picker section.
Using custom icons requires installing the HSBuddy plugin on your HomeSeer server, as detailed in the Installing HSBuddy section.
Status image strip: When the device associated with the widget has other devices related to it in HomeSeer, you will be given the option to include in the widget the status images for one or more of the related devices. If you select one or more of these related devices, the widget will show a strip of icons for each of the selected devices:
Controls
A device widget with a display type of Control shows a set of controls for the device similar to what you would see in the Device details section of the app.
Widget title: You can change what is displayed as a title of the widget (the dark bar at the top). By default it is the name of the device, but you can choose to display the type or location of the device. You can set a custom title as well, or choose to hide the title bar.
Individual controls: Devices sometimes expose more than 1 control type, for example, a dimmable light may expose a combination of buttons and a slider. You can change the display options of the control gadget to include or exlude specific control types.
History
A device widget with a display type of History shows the current and previous values that were set for a device.
History widgets require installing the HSBuddy plugin on your HomeSeer server, as detailed in the Installing HSBuddy section.
Widget title: You can change what is displayed as a title of the widget (the dark bar at the top). By default it is the name of the device, but you can choose to display the type or location of the device. You can set a custom title as well, or choose to hide the title bar.
Related devices: When the device has related devices available, you will be given the choice to include status history for those devices in the same widget. The entries will be collated together based on the time of the status change.
Event widgets
Event widgets let you run an event on your HomeSeer with the tap of a button. The default style of the event widget displays the name of the widget and a Play (▶) button at the right-end which you can tap to run the event.
The Event actions section describes additional actions you can configure for Event widgets.
Button only: If you choose to not show the name of the event under the Display options section, the entire area of the widget will show the Play (▶) button:
Custom icon: You can also to display a custom icon for the widget. You will be given the option to pick from an icon stored on your HomeSeer server.
To get an idea of what kind of widgets you can create with custom icons, see the Widget creation ideas section.
For more information on custom icons, read the Custom icon picker section.
Using custom icons requires installing the HSBuddy plugin on your HomeSeer server, as detailed in the Installing HSBuddy section.
Camera widgets
Camera widgets let you view a snapshot capture from any camera connected to your HomeSeer server. If you tap in any of the camera images, you will be taken to a full-screen view of the camera which will be constantly refreshing the image, similar to the behavior on the Cameras section of the app.
You can access HomeSeer built-in cameras without installing HSBuddy. However, to access cameras enabled via custom plug-ins requires installing the HSBuddy plugin on your HomeSeer server, as detailed in the Installing HSBuddy section.
Widget title: You can change what is displayed as a title of the widget (on top of the camera snapshot). By default it is the name of the device, but you can choose to display a custom title as well, or choose to hide the title bar.
Show loading dots: You can enable or disable showing a set of blinking dots on the lower-right corner of the image when HSBuddy is re-loading the snapshot from the server.
Refresh rate: You can choose the refresh interval for the camera snapshot between 1, 3 and 5 seconds. You can also choose to disable the refresh interval.
Widget actions
You can interact with dashboards by tapping or long-pressing (holding) on the widgets displayed in them. You can configure different actions to take place for each of these gestures on each widget.
The device actions can be configured at the bottom section of the widget editor:
The following sections explore the different actions that can be configured for different types of widgets as well as what actions are set by default.
Device actions
The following actions can be configured for devices:
Device details: If this action is selected, the app will navigate to the Device details section.
Show controls: If this action is selected, the app whill show a pop-up with the Device controls available for the device.
View history: If this action is selected, the app will navigate to the Device history section.
Control device: If this action is selected, you will be given the option to choose a value that the device will be set to. If the device defines specific values for ON, OFF, ON_ALTERNATE, LOCK, UNLOCK, PLAY or PAUSE, you will be allowed to select additional control options:
- Toggle On/Off
- Toggle Last/Off
- Toggle Lock/Unlock
- Toggle Play/Pause
Depending on the display stype of the device widget, the following are the actions configured by default:
| Display type | Gesture | Default |
|---|---|---|
| Information | Tap | Navigate to Device details |
| Information | Hold | Show a pop-up with the Device controls](/pages/devices.html#device-controls) |
| Control | Tap | Determined by the controls displayed on screen. Navigate to Device details if the widget is tapped in an area not covered by the controls. |
| Control | Hold | No action |
| History | Tap | Navigate to Device history |
| History | Hold | Navigate to Device details |
Event actions
The following actions can be configured for events:
-
Event details navigates to the Event details view. This is the default action for a hold gesture.
-
Run event runs the event on your HomeSeer server. This is the default action for a tap gesture.
Camera actions
The following actions can be configured for cameras:
- View fullscreen navigates to the full-screen view of the camera. This is the default action for a tap gesture.
Custom icon picker
⚠ in progress ⚠
Widget creation ideas
⚠ in progress ⚠