RedSea Doser+ReefBeat App: Are there really no notifications??

[anthonymckay]

I've been using a 4 head RedSea doser for couple months now. I recently started using one of the heads for dosing Kalkwasser. Unfortunately this doser has some rather inconvenient limitations for dosing kalk (ie: each head can only dose a max of 1000ml per day, and it can only track a max of 9999ml reservoir volume) but for the time being it's what I have to use.

I recently had a hiccup in my alk/ph due to the kalk reservoir being "empty". It wasn't actually empty, but my reservoir is > 9999ml, so when it had pumped that much, it silently deactivated the head and I had no notifications on my phone about this. Thankfully my Alkatronic measures alkalinity/pH ever 4 hours so by the next day I noticed my alk/pH hadn't gone back up overnight when I usually do all my dosing. I was confused as to why but eventually noticed that the Kalkwasser head in the ReefBeat app was turned off, and the only "notification" the app sends is just a message in the "notifications" tab of the app. So essentially, you only see that alert if you open the app and check that tab, but it doesn't actually send any kind of iOS system wide notification to the Notification Center on the lockscreen. Is this really how they implemented this?? It seems like a massive oversight if so. Checking the notification settings of the app, it only has settings for "Connectivety" and "Battery Replacement".

Tracking remaining volume is great, but if you're not going to alert the user in any meaningful way when it's low/empty....

 

[Lavey29]

I guess if they set it up so it auto dialed you and gave you a verbal update of your tank status the reefbeat app might cost a little more then it does now. I am completely satisfied with my red sea doser and the way the app works. It's really nice that if wifi goes out the doser keeps working as programmed. Others have commented that it would not work with kalk and it seems Red Sea never sought to include that option. More for 2 part dosing and mag or the 4 part red sea trace.

 

[TheBear78]

Does the iOS version give these options?

 

[anthonymckay]

I guess if they set it up so it auto dialed you and gave you a verbal update of your tank status the reefbeat app might cost a little more then it does now.

Huh? That's a bit of an extreme conclusion that I'm obviously not requesting as a solution. If the app itself can have a message in it's own 'notification' tab, it can also simply send a system wide notification in the OS. Like pretty much any other app in existence that alerts/notifies users of something important. The amount of additional code to do so is extremely trivial. Silently disabling a head though when the container is "empty" with no meaningful alert to the user is simply a poorly thought out user experience.

Others have commented that it would not work with kalk and it seems Red Sea never sought to include that option. More for 2 part dosing and mag or the 4 part red sea trace.

Yep, and I'm ok with that and accept that limitation. But as I said, it's what I have to work with for now till I get a dedicated kalk dosing head.

 

[anthonymckay]

Does the iOS version give these options?

Oddly no... it just has:

 

[TheBear78]

My home screen options are the same as you but if I click on the reefdose first then look in the menu there I get the additional choices, specific to the equipment I'm looking at.

 

[HBtank]

Does the iOS version give these options?

It has these under the dosing pump settings, it’s only accessible if you are in the doser part of the app. The volume monitor is off by default.

 

[anthonymckay]

My home screen options are the same as you but if I click on the reefdose first then look in the menu there I get the additional choices, specific to the equipment I'm looking at.

It has these under the dosing pump setting, it’s only accessible if you are in the doser part of the app. The volume monitor is off by default.

I see now, thank you! This highlights that they could probably design the UI a bit better to make it more intuitive that there's additional device specific notification settings, as there's 3 different paths to access the main "notification settings" screen, as well as the 4th way that displays device specific notification settings. The main notifications settings UI could have devices listed at the bottom and clicking on each would navigate to their device specific notifications.

Anyway, glad to discover this wasn't a complete oversight by them