I am having a really frustrating time trying to use the Xtend scripting for rules. Lack of clear documentation, no support for functions, odd (to me) syntax, and no real tooling are making it difficult for me to write what would be simple logic in a more common scripting language. I saw the JSR223 …

[image] imagio: I am having a really frustrating time trying to use the Xtend scripting for rules. Many people do as well. I did as well when I started. Often the frustration comes from trying to write rules using a structural or OO approach which Xtend really fights against. [image] imag…

Thanks for the detailed response! I just installed the JSR223 binding and I am finding it much easier to write my rules in javascript and that they are ending up with about the same length as what I was trying in Xtend anyway. I guess I don’t really see where Xtend offers value over using javascrip…

[image] imagio: I guess I don’t really see where Xtend offers value over using javascript or python given that the API needed to interact with OH is so small and simple. When you look at event based systems: Home automation (e.g. HomeGenie, openHAB, etc), PBX and telecom switches (e.g. Asteri…

One thing I am really stumped on is how to write a library of simple reusable functions for my rules to abstract away common logic. I have a bunch of simple logic which I would like to reuse across rules. DRY (Don’t Repeat Yourself) is always a good coding practice. Here are a couple of scenarios: …

[image] imagio: One thing I am really stumped on is how to write a library of simple reusable functions for my rules to abstract away common logic. I’m afraid we have to wait until OH 2’s new rules engine to support reusable generic rules and rule fragments. You can do it now for all the rule…

I totally agree, I try to adhere to the DRY principle whenever possible. Indeed, I’m used to coding PHP where I could easily set variables that would work wherever they were imported, and define functions for reusable code. I’ve been slightly surprised at how little I’ve actually needed to do in o…

[image] tinkerfailure: I’ve been slightly surprised at how little I’ve actually needed to do in order to have something useful for my uses in terms of ‘daylight’ and AM/PM… And THAT is what I mean when I say the Rule’s DSL is a good fit for HA. Coding all of this logic by hand in rules would …

I was just looking through the comments I have bookmarked and noticed about 3/4ths of them are written by you @rlkoshak . So thanks for writing clearly written, thorough explanations!

[image] rlkoshak: And THAT is what I mean when I say the Rule’s DSL is a good fit for HA. Coding all of this logic by hand in rules would take dozens of lines of code even if using a language like JavaScript plus it would require a lot of polling and such (NOTE: I don’t want to imply that this a…

Is there any progress in porting JSR223 to OH2? Also any other standard language would be fine.

Finding the Xtend syntax really frustrating for writing rules. Can I write rules in another scripting language?

Setup, Configuration and Use Beginners

imagio (Andrew Morsillo) January 27, 2018, 5:43pm 14

I have been using node red as a rule engine and I can heartily recommend it. It is very easy to set up with openhabian and is much easier to use than clunky xtend or manually coding in JSR223. It does not sacrifice any power/flexibility either.