News

Release of OED version 1.0.0

September 2023

The final touches are being put on OED version 1.0.0 and it will be released at the end of September 2023. This is the largest change ever made to OED and includes two years of effort. It changes OED from being able to work with electrical energy data to virtually any resource. The significant new features are:

• OED now supports virtually any unit including site defined units. Users can graph in any unit and that can be different from what meters collect in. For example, OED supports energy units, power units, mass units, temperature, money and CO₂. To support this feature there are new admin pages for conversions and units. As such, it is more than an energy dashboard and has become a resource dashboard.
• Information can now be normalized by area. As such, any graphic can show the data per square feet or square meters.
• Most admin pages have had their look completely redone so information shows up on cards and there are separate pop-ups for creating and editing items.
• Many of the underlying software packages used by OED have been updated for better features and continued security.
• Each meter knows the frequency at which readings are provided and uses this information to more intelligently choose the quality of data shown when graphing. This now means that OED can graph data in a nice way that is provided on long time scales, such as monthly.
• There are many UI (User Interface) updates across the OED pages.
• Many other issues were addressed.

Release of OED version 0.8.0

January 24, 2022

OED is pleased to announce the release of version 0.8.0 that contains these new features:

• For maps: maps can include groups, the time range can be selected as day/week/4 weeks, auto select map if only one available, sort map names alphabetically on menu, full support for maps rotated from true north, admins can set the maximum circle size, and maps can be made the default graphic type.
• The speed of getting data for graphing was improved. This change also allows for the seeing of the original meter values instead of minute points when the user zooms in on a line graphic.
• The x-axis date on line graphics now gives the middle of the dates included in the raw data in the point. The dates labeling bar graphics are now inclusive to remove the next day.
• Admins can now view/edit all values on groups such as GPS, note, etc.
• Exported data includes both start and end time/date and bar data is sorted by date.
• Support for eGauge meters.

Other changes

• Obvius uploads now use the Obvius OED user so the old environment variable is eliminated.
• More items are internationalized and all Spanish strings are done.
• Improved site installation and directions.
• Uncalibrated maps cannot be made visible by the admin.
• Leaving a page edited by the admin now warns about unsaved changes.
• Rate limiting was added to total requests and requests for raw data. The default limits can be adjusted by the admin. This should stop users from making repeated requests either by mistake or to be malicious.
• Chart links: chart links for bar graphics now work and resized line graphics have better links.
• Packages were updated so most security issues have been addressed.

Release of OED version 0.7.0

15 September 2021

OED is pleased to announce the release of version 0.7.0. This is the fairly major release that contains these new features:

Data acquisition

• OED now accepts both meter and reading upload via CSV files.
• CSV uploads can either be done via a drop zone on an admin page or through a script
• OED accepts readings in many new ways including cumulative with or without reset, only having end only date/time, either chronological order, control over gaps between readings and variation in the length a reading spans and files with duplicated readings.
• CSV files can be either gziped or not and can have a header row or not.
• Significant enhancements in error checking and reporting for acquired readings.
• Acquisition of MAMAC and Obvius data go through the enhanced data acquisition pipeline so these have all the new features.

Other changes

• Map enhancements include correct calculation of circle size and allowing arbitrarily rotated maps (admin interface coming on that).
• You can now export the raw meter data on a graphic and not just the graphic points.
• OED now supports multiple types of users so you can grant access for admin, CSV upload & Obvius upload, and ability to export larger quantities of data rights individually.
• Anyone using OED can now change to another supported language to override default language.
• Color of lines, bars and circles were improved.
• Hovering over a graphic now shows fewer digits so more user friendly.
• User warned if JavaScript is not enables since site will not function properly.
• A number of general issues/bugs were addressed.

Release of OED version 0.6.0

2 March 2021

OED is pleased to announce the release of version 0.6.0. This is the first major release in a while. It contains many new features including:

Graphics Changes

• Use Plotly for all graphics which allows for zooming and scrolling in line graphic.
• Added a map graphic to show usage geographically.
• Simplified comparison graphic.

Other Changes

• Help popups inside OED web pages that link to full help pages.
• OED is now time zone aware. This means that all graphics now show the meter time rather than local time which varied by user.
• Support for acquiring meter data from Obvius.
• Created standard pipeline for acquiring data and clear API for its usage.
• Many issues/bugs were addressed.

This release marks to continued progress of OED. We expect to have 1-2 more releases over the next half a year that will contain new features and enhancements of the current features. OED is moving toward release 1.0 which will move OED away from just displaying electricity to being able to display all resource types such as water (volume), gas (energy), recycling (weight), etc. OED will also be able to display resources in many ways such as usage (kWh, volume, etc.), cost (money), CO2, etc. Sites will be able to use local units for each item, e.g., metric or English units, cost in local currency, etc. While the target date is not yet set we hope this will be completed within the year.