Hi, I have been using Blynk 1.0 for a few years, I have about 15-20 connected devices at any one time (Home IOT). I use Blynk Cloud and have no interest in using Local Server.
I have done some basic testing with Blynk 2.0, replicated a couple of basic I/O projects, two-way data etc, and had limited use of the Web Dashboard. Its’ different, but I’m sure I’ll get to know it if i persevere.
I have read all the docs, guides (such as they are . . . ) and a LOT of forum posts.
Can one of the Blynk developers please answer this simple question:
What features are available in Blynk 1.0 that are NOT available in Blynk 2.0?
I’ve read a lot about the ‘new’ features, I’m sure I’ll discover them as I go along, but I don’t want to commit to transferring all my projects to find that some features have disappeared.
I know you asked for a developers input, but I will share what I have seen so far.
It looks like all of the features of blynk 1.0 are there/available, it is just a matter of accessibility. If you want to use the free plan, your widgets will be limited. To access all of the widgets you will have to pay a monthly (or yearly) fee (I think they call it a subscription). Although there has been a mention of a possible widget pack, but this is only chatter. If you want to use multiple devices (that is, more than one) with the free plan, you have to pay $5/per extra device.
So far the only real new feature I see is the web interface. Which, if you were looking for one, is nice. As I have always just used my phone for my projects it is not really anything special for me. It has really just added a level of complexity that makes getting a project up and running a bit more difficult. I always thought that one of the blynk “selling” points was that you could very easily download a sketch (from sketch builder), load it to a board, make a simple app on your phone, and boom you were online and “IOTing”. I think this has come to pass. There are now many more steps involved to get the same result.
From a business sense this seems to be more of a money maker in the long run than the original blynk 1.0. Although for me, it will probably cost about the same. Most of my projects are not overly complex, and the widgets that are no longer available I can find a way to get around them with some clever coding and using what’s available. Typically my projects use around $5 or energy anyway, so the $5 per device is about the same. The thing I think I will miss the most is the long history of the super chart. I had (I erased it when I moved to a new house) a project with temperature data going back for a long time from one of my temperature sensors. It was nice (and a novelty, not necessary) to look back and see temperature trends and be able to see a temperature from a specific time period. This will no longer be available to me as the free plan only gives 1 week of data, and to be honest I am not even sure the super chart is one of the free widgets.
Many of us will overcome the learning curve of blynk2.0, and adapt to the new features and pricing. Some will probably move to a new platform. Others will attempt to use blynk 2.0 and give up in frustration. The only thing certain is change. Whether that change is good or bad is yet to be seen, and probably depends on your perspective.
Thnx, not fussed about the plans, more so about the features (widgets), I don’t want to have to completely re-develop my projects, and from my limited tests so far I don’t think I will need to.
Honestly, I have been out for over a year, I just hang around for the programming challenges and fun. But if they offer it to all us regulars then I might give it another play around… if I can get past the TILES (I just never liked them, can’t explain)
I know!
I do use tiles on one of my projects, because it works well for that scenario (a lighting setup in the living room, where the primary goal is to turn four lights on/off with a tile tap, but a press/hold will give access to RGB controls etc).
The issue with the new app is that it wont even work well for that scenario, because the new tiles are larger, and and they aren’t contained within a tab of a project.
I think that if there was an optional level above the device tiles, like projects, then it would be more useable.
There’s also no way to see data across multiple devices in the app, but a project view would help with that.
There is talk of introducing a replacement for Projects, but if it happens then of course the devil will be in the detail, and I cant help but think that retro-fitting this is far from the ideal solution.
You are 100% in. So you can start being open minded on tiles. They are pretty good (for its purpose). And when you finally love it, we’ll add projects back
With Arduino IDE, to use Blynk 2.0 you only need to open the BlynkEdgent example thingy, and code.
But with PIO , because that BlynkEdgent isn’t a library file within Blynk library, I cant just write #define and start coding . I need to add the whole folder that contains BlynkEdgent.h and all the stuff that comes with it.
My hopes for the future is an easier use of the Blynk library. Maybe just define it and be good to go
I have similar observations, @PeteKnight . The new philosophy of Blynk 2.0 appears to be one Device through its Template to one Tile. Is this correct? Can I show the datastreams from multiple devices in a single Tile? How?
As an example from old Blynk, I have an app which shows temperature and barometer on one SuperChart. In this example, I have two different ESP8266s providing the temp and barometer displayed. What I want to do is display/control datastreams from multiple ESP32s/8266s into one Tile. The old Blynk panel that shows this SuperChart also shows other datastreams from multiple ESP devices. Screenshot 1 below.
In another app, I have a number of SONOFFs and an ESP32 scheduler - 7 devices - all showing on one panel. I want to see them all at once, or at least see and control all the SONOFFs, even with scrolling. Second screenshot below.
If I understand the new approach, I find the Tiles to be way too large to fit multiple devices on a single mobile panel. , AND the one Tile = one Device approach makes it difficult to combine different datastreams from sensors easily.
All help in understanding the new philosophy welcome. I certainly may be missing something.
Hope this feedback is helpful.
Old Blynk Screenshot 1 mixing datastreams from multiple devices in one Super Chart
Can we do this in Blynk 2.0?
(I just never liked them, can’t explain)
