Netbell – Making Deviations from an existing Bell Schedule
The Bell Scheduler is a useful tool for keeping your bells running at your desired schedule but sometimes you may need to run an alternate schedule. This could be if you are running a school bell and have a set schedule but then need a different schedule for a half day or an activity day. Rather than having to make sure you upload the alternate schedule before each day and have to upload the regular schedule afterwards, you can use a virtual relay to act as a toggle between different sets of times on the same schedule. Below I will show an example of how you can do this.
Let’s say we have a normal full day schedule where a bell will ring at 8 AM, 10 AM, 12 PM, 2 PM, and 4 PM. These I have named f1 – f5. Then on March 26 there is a half day, and on March 29 there is an activity day. Each of these sets will start with a toggle which I have named “halfday” and “activity” and are then followed by their own bells. During these days we don’t want the full day schedule to ring.
The first thing you will need to do is log in to your Netbell device and activate the Extended Relay Range. To do this, navigate to the Settings dropdown menu and go to the Settings page. From there check the box that says “Extend Relay Range” and click Save. Now you will have a total of 8 relays you can use. These extra relays cannot directly control a physical device as they are not actually there, however they can be very useful for internal functions within the software. You will not be able to these extra relays from the Relays or In/Out page. Instead you will need to manually enter the address in your browser. After the IP address, the URL should read “/p/relays8.htm”.
We can now set a relay that will act as a toggle to control which set of bells are played in the schedule. In the Relays8 page, choose one of your new relays such as relay 5 and set a timer. At the right side of the page click the Edit button. This relay will need to start before your first bell and turn off after the last bell. If you want it to stay on for 12 hours, set the Pulse Width to 720, and the Pulse Width Multiplier to Min.
Now that we have our toggle relay set, we will need to go to the Tasks page. For the first task, set Device A to Relay, Data A to 06+, Logic to AND, Device B to Relay, Data B to 05-, Device C to Relay, Data C to 01, and Action to On. The second task should be Device A to Relay, Data A to 07+, Logic to None, Device C to Relay, Data C to 01, and Action to On. Now Virtual relays 6 and 7 will both trigger relay 1 which in turn will sound the bells, however we can control what times the bells are triggered on the Bell Scheduler.
Your normal full day can now be scheduled to set off “Bell 6” Monday through Friday. At the beginning of your half days and activity days you will set relay 5 before the day starts. With relay 5 on, relay 6 will do nothing. Your bells for the alternate schedule can then be set to relay 7. After relay 5 turns off, the normal schedule will resume.
