Problems with my first OH2 setup

Setup, Configuration and Use Runtime
1

I’ve been running openHAB for 2 years now and thought it was time to move over to openHAB2 but so far I’m having a hard time getting it to do what I want. Well, I actually have a hard time getting it to do anything at all (except installing without error messages)

I’m trying to set it up on a Odroid C1+ running the 14.04.5 image (considering flashing the first 16.04 image but I’m always afraid of the first image…)
I’ve been using the apt-get method.
So far I’ve played around with the Beta Release (offline) and both offline and online for the Snapshot Release.
The online version just got a massive amount of error messages when trying to set it up with standard. Didn’t copy the error log but I think there was something about failing to download files or connect somewhere.

What I’m trying to do as a first step is to get the simplest of sitemaps up and running just displaying the date and time by using the NTP binding.
My thought here was to use the UI for the configuration but I’m not sure that is the way I want to go any more.
I just create the sitemap as per openHAB 1 style and the sitemap is displayed correctly. I cannot however get it to show the correct time.
I’ve installed the NTP Binding under Extensions->Bindings
I’ve created a Thing with the help of Inbox.
I now have two channels (both channels are linked).
Date (ntp:ntp:local:dateTime)
Date (ntp:ntp:local:string)
Under Control the date and time is correctly displayed.
The sitemap is also displayed correctly except that the date is not displayed. Instead only the item name is displayed.
The demo works but that isn’t using the Paper UI as far as I can see.

So, what am I missing??

A few questions I’ve run into during my attempts.

  1. Where is the jsondb file stored on an apt-get linux install.?

  2. What actually happens when you press Install on a binding or action in the Paper UI? The /usr/share/openhab2/addons folder remains empty at least.

  3. If the addon is installed through the Paper UI, are they upgraded when running

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get upgrade

  1. Can you/would it be recommended to install addons manually (or do you have to go through the manual installation then)? What happens during an upgrade in that case?

  2. And last (but definitely not least) what would be the recommended approach for an openHAB2 configuration at this point?

2

Have you seen the Migration Tutorial?

Several of your questions are answered there. It also provides a systematic approach to moving over to OH 2 and right now is about as close as we have to a “Getting Started:” guide.

  • “Where is jsondb file”: I think it is in /var/lib/openhab2/userdata/jsondb or there abouts.

  • “What happens when installing binding”: OH 2 manages everything internally now. the actual jar files get shoved somewhere in userdata/cache but you should never have to mess with that folder. The addons folder is there to allow user to install and use add-ons that are not part of the official distro.

  • “Updating add-ons”: Yes, they get updated when you apt-get upgrade.

  • “Manuall installation”: You can but this should be limited to only add-ons that are not part of the official distro, in which case the upgrade question becomes moot, they are not part of the distro so they do not get upgraded. If for some reason you did manually install an add-on that is part of the official distro, it would not be upgraded by apt.

  • I recommend using PaperUI for add-on installation and managing auto-discovered Things. I recommend (especially for someone migrating from OH 1.x) using the files for everything else. Note that this recommendation is becoming a bit softer as PaperUI and some of the infrastructure in OH 2 is maturing.

Please have a look at the migration tutorial. Many people have found it to be very helpful in both getting a working OH 2 running as well as learning about what makes OH 2 different.

3

:+1:

4

Thx for the info!
Go it up and running now.
I went with the files-for-as-much-as-possible recommendation.