PHCA Variable Value Settings

If you want specific notification settings for a variable, you set those through variable value settings. You can configure font color and individual notification options for each variable and its different values. For instance, you could set up PHCA to notify you when your garage door opens, but not when it closes.

After editing or creating a new variable, choose the “Edit Variable Value Settings” button at the bottom of the screen. There you will see a page with all of the currently designated variable values. To create a new value setting, choose “Add variable value setting” from the options menu. Alternatively, you can edit an existing value setting by tapping that entry.

The first setting is for the variable value. For instance, for the garage door status, you will probably have two settings: open and closed.

The next setting is for the font color. You might want the word “open” to appear in red when the door is open, and to appear in green when it is set to “closed”.

The last setting is for the notification options. The options are None, toast, status bar, and toast and status bar combined. These refer to how you would like to be notified when a variable is updated to the designated value over C2DM push messaging. Variables can be updated “in the background” when phca is not running and these settings refer to how you would like to be notified. The none setting does just as you would expect. No notifications will be made when the variable is set to this value. Toast settings display a small message that last on the screen for just a couple of seconds. Note that toast notifications can only be displayed when the phca app is running. The standard way of receiving background notification in Android is through the notification status bar. When this option is selected, you will also enable an option to choose a corresponding alert sound (you can also choose no sound). Finally, you can also choose to receive both toast and status bar notifications. Again, the toast will only display if the phca app is running in the foreground.

When you are done making changes, tap the “Save Settings” button to save your changes.