Version 1.4.0.25 (03/11/2016)

Release Notes - Events2HVAC Event Automation - Version 1.4.0

Upgrade Information

If you are upgrading from v1.3.x or earlier versions, please review the system requirement changes section below.

  • The latest version of .NET framework 4.5.2 or 4.6.x may require a server restart after installation.
  • Makes sure you are not using SQL 2005 (v9.0.x) for the Events2HVAC database before you try to upgrade. The update scripts might fail with this version.
  • Make sure you make database backups as with any upgrade. If there is a problem during upgrade and you need to revert back to the previous version, you must have a database backup of the previous version.
  • If you want to take advantage of the Professional edition features (multiple event providers), you will need to upgrade your license to Professional.
  • Your existing license will work as a "standard" edition license.

Please review this link before updating software:

New Features

Standard and Professional Editions

In this version we have split our product into two different editions: Standard and Professional. All 1.3.x and earlier users and license holders will hold a Standard edition and functionality will be the same.

Professional edition will allow E2H to integrate to more than one type and/or instances of event providers at the same time in one instance of Events2HVAC server. Other new features will be rolled out later for this edition as well.

Support for Multiple Event Providers on Single Server

The Professional edition of Events2HVAC allows you to connect multiple types of reservation systems and multiple instances of the same type so you can have a single campus scheduling source to control your building automation system(s).

Large campuses typically have more than one scheduling system in use. Conference rooms may be using Exchange Room Resources to allow employees or students booking meetings via email while academic schedules are on an enterprise event management system. Other buildings may have different requirements so additional scheduling software or multiple instances of the same vendor might be utilized.

E2H can now manage the campus HVAC schedules from one or many scheduling sources.

Google Calendar Event Provider

If you use Google Apps for Work (Business, Non-Profit, Education) or you have a free (personal Google account) you can use the calendar to control Events2HVAC zones. Google Apps makes use of the built-in calendar room resources feature for booking spaces. Google personal calendar will all you to map additional calendars to each zone you want to control in E2H. Both options allow you to implement E2H to a very low cost alternative to automatic HVAC zone scheduling with a familiar, easy to use calendar interface.

Improvements & Fixes

Event Provider Manager

The event provider manager allows the user to manage and create one or multiple instances of any event provider for a single server instance. For Standard edition you can use the event provider manager to swap to different event providers without re-installing the software.

For Professional edition, create a new instance of any available event provider easily without reloading software. You can use as many instances that are allowed in your license.

Event Provider Schedule Updates Changes

All schedule data received from event providers during normal schedule update polling will be cached to the local database. This will allow the UI to have a faster response when dealing with calendar and event data from systems that have slow response times.

Event Provider Schedule Backup Data Previous versions keep 24 hours of scheduled actions (commands) in the command queue. This allows scheduled commands to still be sent even though you might lose the connection to the event provider. Starting at v1.4, Events2HVAC will retrieve 7 days of schedule data once a day. This data will be cached to the local database and updated any time remote schedule data is retrieved.

Now for each regular schedule poll period, if live (remote) schedule data fails, Events2HVAC will look in the cache to see if backup data exists and use it if needed.

System Requirement Changes

We are dropping support for the following software:

  • Windows XP, Windows Vista, Server 2003
  • SQL Server 2005
  • Proliphix NT Device Interface (Obsolete Product)

New requirements:

  • .NET Framework 4.5.2 or higher (4.6.1 recommended)

Known Issues

The following known issues found in this release are fixed in v1.4.1.x:

  • R25 Event Status Settings saves wrong selections (v1.4.0 only)
  • Unable import command center project file with NetworkThermostat NT-IXPB controllers.
  • Test XBus thermostat fails with "BAD COMMAND" NetworkThermostat NT-IXPB controllers.
  • Unhandled error message when Event List or Event Calendar menu items are click and you don't have any event providers activated.
  • If you are using multiple instances of the same type of event provider (e.g. EMS #1, EMS #2) the instances create after the first one will have the wrong event provider ID for rooms and buildings
  • Duplicate equipment items are created after editing equipment parameters when client logged in as "Operator" role