Adding the Flic button to an IoT Central Dashboard

This article describes how to add your Flic button to an IoT Central Dashboard.

Prerequisites:

1. Verify the Flic is online

First we will confirm your Flic is online and paired with the gateway. Make sure it is near the Cascade-500W (within 50 feet). From your IoT Central application, select Devices from the left menu, and select "Flic Button". This will bring up a list of devices.

 

Click on the Flic button that appears in the list. If no devices appear in the list, try repairing it with the gateway and verify it is within range. By default, a chart will appear showing the history of button presses:

 

You should see some data beginning to populate the chart, and you can also rename the device here.

Tip: if you paired multiple Flic buttons before renaming them and can't tell them apart, simply press one of them a number of times and match it to the chart that registers the button presses.

Once you verify the Flic is online, you are ready to add the device to your dashboard.

2. Add the Flic to your IoT Central application dashboard

Start by selecting Dashboard on the left menu. When you provisioned your IoT Central Application, a sample dashboard was created with placeholders for your sensor data. It may look something like this:

The tile placement and contents are very customizable.  For more information about adding and customizing IoT Central dashboard tiles, see this article.

In this example, we want to add the Flic button to see the number of button presses. To do this, click "edit" at the top of the dashboard window. This will make the dashboard editable, allowing you to move/remove/add tiles:

Now, you can remove unwanted tiles and add the Flic:

  • In the left menu, under Device template select "Flic Button"
  • Under Device instance, select the particular sensor you saw in step 1.
  • Under Telemetry, check the "Button Press" box.
  • Click "Add Tile" at the bottom of the menu and it will add the tile to the dashboard.
  • The default chart type is a line chart, but for button presses it is more helpful to see the actual number. Within the tile, click the small ruler icon to bring up visualization options and select "KPI."  Change the Title to "Button Presses" and click "Update".
  • Finally, click "Save" at the top of the dashboard. You should now see the button press tile in the body of the dashboard.

As you press the button more times, this counter will increment. Note that the IoT Central dashboard auto-refreshes about every 30 seconds, or you can manually refresh the browser to update the charts.

Note: If no button presses occurred within the last 30 minutes, the tile will display "Waiting for Data."  Once another button press occurs, the chart will resume displaying the button press counter.

Next up: Creating Alerts for the Flic Button.