I have been working on an IoT Project using ESP32 hardware for quite few months.
I have three, four topics which I’m going to integrate in this topic.
Ever since Blynk 2.0 have been launched, I have been eagerly waiting for the support of Voice Assistants (Amazon Alexa and Google Home) out of the box but still seem no support so far. May be I am wrong, please help me if I remained unable to find it here.
While using image button or image gallery widgets every time the state changes the picture takes time to load. Isn’t it a good idea that the pictures stored in phone/tab be used with these widgets to overcome this loading issue?
It would be helpful if a feedback is attached to the Tab widget. Every page in the tab widget should have a unique index which the hardware receives.
The last but not the least, how sweet would it have been if we could attach more than one Wifi networks with every device. One goes off, the other comes into action.
Support from the fellows would help me a lot beautify my project.
Thanks Eugene for your reply.
I used an image widget which displays different images at different times of the day.
And there is an image button which toggles two different images showing its ON/OFF state.
The images have been saved online in my dropbox and I load the images with following instruction in my ESP32.
The problem is the response is delayed. Pictures take some time to load.
I just wanted to ask whether we can save the images in the phone/tab and give its URL number. Please, guide me if its possible.
I’m not really an image gallery or image button user, but I have done some tests with the iOS version of the app.
I’m not clear from your description of the issue if you’re using these widgets as intended, and your code snippet certainly doesn’t make any sense…
The simplest way to use the image gallery widget is to define an integer datastream that has a min value of 0 and a max value that is one less than the maximum number of images you wnat to display, then add the image URLs within the app, like this…
Then, when the value of the data steam changes, the appropriate image is displayed. In this example, I’ve added a slider widget to the same datastream and when I move the slider the image changes (instantly)…
The iOS version of the app has an “Album” option to allow you to choose images stored on your mobile device, although this has some potential issues if you use the Blynk app on multiple devices
It’s the datastream variable value that makes the selected image display. If the images are stored locally then there is no url, just the local path to the image on the device.
I suspect that what you’re doing is providing the url link every time you want to change the image, rather than providing the link once, and having the image change to the appropriate url when the datastream value changes, but it’s impossible to tell based on the limited information you’ve provided.
Dear PeteKnight,
The only problem that I face is a delay in image loading. URLs of the pictures have already been entered in the properties of image widget just the way you did it in one of the pictures. The problem is whenever I set the property of that image by sending INDEX number of a particular image from my hardware, ESP32, it takes the picture some delay to load. An the reason is certainly because these images have originally been stored online in a cloud space. Which causes this delay.
Blynk.setProperty(V1, “url”, 1, “https://image1.jpg”); — Taken this instruction from Blynk Docs!
My question was simply that is there any method that this delay vanishes? Like, I feel, if the pictures are stored in the same device where the Blynk app. is installed it would not cause any delay in loading.
Dear PeteKnight,
Thanks for your feedback.
I read your post very carefully and fully understood.
I have tried Blynk.virtualWrite(vPin,image_index); as well but the result is same.
Perhaps I could not make you understand what my issue is. I repeat it again.
I have saved the images online on cloud. Their URLs have been added in image(/button) widget.
Whenever I call an image with its index no. (that is, Blynk.virtualWrite(vPin,image_index); OR Blynk.setProperty(vPin, “url”, image_index, “https://image1.jpg”) it takes time to load the image.
In my sight, it is because the images saved in the cloud take some time to load. My question is, how can the image loading delay be eliminated?
Secondly, when would the Blynk Support for Voice Assistants (Amazon Alexa and Google Home) be available?
Standard HTTP caching mechanisms are applied when loading images. The most common approach is to use Cache-Control along with ETag HTTP header fields. Most likely these are not set in your links or set to force image loading each time.
I have no idea. I’m not part of the Blynk organisation and have no information about their development priorities.
My only information comes from what is posted to this forum and the Blynk website, both of which you also have access to.
The website does indicate that this functionality is available for white label customers already, and will be available for plus/pro subscribers at some point in the future, but that process isn’t simple…
It’s been around 1 year since it was supposed to be released if I remember correctly. Originally it was part of the “Pro” plan, but was changed to “Add-on coming soon”, but even that was probably 6+ months ago. Anyway, I have no further info, just letting you know it might be awhile before you see it available.
it takes time to load the image.
