Blue Iris

I'm reaching out to request assistance with a challenge I've encountered in configuring BI to seamlessly transition between day and night profiles, particularly in relation to automatic adjustments for daylight saving time based on sunrise and sunset times.

I have set up two distinct profiles for day and night - In an effort to automate the transition between these profiles, I navigated to the schedule section and endeavoured to configure the system to recognise and adjust for daylight saving time changes. This was achieved by selecting the "relative sunrise & sunset" options for each "transition bubble" tab, which collectively represent the entire week, treated as a unified selection.

My expectation was that this setup would enable the system to autonomously adjust on a daily basis, aligning with the actual sunrise and sunset times, thereby eliminating the need for manual schedule adjustments. The functionality seemed promising when I experimented with the "civil twilight" option, as I observed the anticipated dynamic adjustments in the green section (days), suggesting the settings were applied correctly.

Despite these configurations, the system does not appear to automatically modify the profiles daily in sync with the sunrise or sunset times. Consequently, I am compelled to manually manipulate the schedule slider for the day group (Monday to Sunday), which deviates from my original expectations.

To facilitate accurate profile switching, I have confirmed the correct input of my longitude and latitude, anticipating that this would enable the system to trigger the day and night profiles in accordance with natural light variations, akin to the data provided for London at https://www.timeanddate.com/sun/uk/london

Have I missed something here ?

Thanks again

Regards,
SN

You are very close, and it does work as you expected when you get it right. I created new ones so that I didn't lose the original settings. I'll have a look at my notes.

They say:

Go to BI5 > Settings > Profiles. I renamed “Active” to “Active/Day” and renamed “Profile 3” to “Night” – change “Temp Time” to 0 to prevent it changing until the next scheduled change. (Otherwise it is set to change after 480 minutes = 8 hours).

Next, navigate to BI5 > Settings > Schedules and put a checkmark in “enable”.

Add in your Lat/Long, and note the yellow circles that appear over the Monday row to mark sunrise and sunset. Now you need to edit the schedule.

NOTE: Don’t alter the “Default” Schedule settings just in case you need to go back to them.

Press the green plus to the right of “Now editing:” and create a new Schedule. I created one named “Day_Night”.

Next, click on “Select a profile to draw”, and choose “Night”.

You can now use the mouse to draw night over the left and right hand sides (shown in red above). If you grab the outer handles that appear at the top, you can set 00:00 and 24:00 easily, followed by dragging the inner handles over the yellow circles.

After you have an inner handle over a yellow circle, you should see “Relative to sunrise/sunset” become enabled. Tick it for both inner handles, and it will show you how far (in time) from the yellow circle you are.

Set these to zero offset. You can adjust them later if required, but this will ensure that the sunrise and sunset times are automatically calculated and used for your location.

Let me know if that makes sense

Indeed, you have shed light on the situation, albeit with a minor divergence from my initial approach.

I hadn't created a distinct profile within the schedule section but had altered the default instead. Given my fading memory of the original configuration, it seems wise to proceed with the setup as it currently stands.

Your advice mirrors much of what I had deduced on my own, save for the perplexing detail of the profile's default duration being set at 480 minutes. This particular setting remains a mystery to me, as the profiles continued to transition according to the planned schedule, yet failed to account for daylight saving time changes.

The role of the 480-minute setting remains unclear to me, and despite consulting the manual, its purpose eludes me. Nonetheless, following your suggestion, I've adjusted the duration setting from 480 to 0 for both the day and night profiles to align with your notes.

As for the zero offset adjustments you recommended:

Should this be the modification to which you referred, setting both sides to zero, I have verified this against the daylight saving time data for London, noting an impressively minor discrepancy of just a minute. Previously, I was unaware of the necessity to adjust these to zero; my settings were quite erratic, ranging from -10 to +20 for sunrise/sunset times. They were never at zero by default...

Does this adjustment mean the system will now seamlessly update and adapt the profiles as they move through the calendar, autonomously adjusting to the daily schedule? How can I confirm if this is working correctly without the need to ask Alexa to create a reminder 3 minutes before the schedule is set to transition and manually check that way ( which is what I have been doing )?

I presumed the green sliders would adjust and reflect these automated changes, or perhaps now thinking of this , it may be the offset times that are automatically updated by the system?

Lets see, I am hopeful now thanks TimG!

It's totally automatic. It changes itself every day without any input from me. Note "Day_Night" and "Night" at the top, and "Enable" on the left:

The Duration setting is how long the profile will be active before reverting back to 'the default profile. The default 480 minutes would be 8 hours, which is usually long enough.

But, since your changing profiles by a schedule, set the duration to '0', which is 'Forever'.

I'm happy to report that the bubble icons at the top of the schedule panel are now in sync with the daylight saving time schedule, (a single click on either side shows the correct DST daily adjustments).

It seems I had missed the fact that the bubbles weren't initially set to zero and were offset by default.

I can now confirm everything is working as expected.

This will save me ample time by not having to make manual adjustments moving forward

Perfect -- Thank you!
-SN