"No Internet" & "Local Search Failed" banner messages

Hi. Very new user here, system only initialised yesterday, so still getting used to the portal & mobile app. From what I can see & have read, the mobile app refreshes more often than the web portal, every 10 seconds in theory at home but that seems to to depend on internet connection. I'm finding that the app doesn't update very reliably, sometimes refreshing regualrly, but often showing "Home" mode greyed out & "Away" mode in blue when it only refreshes everyfew minutes. I'm also getting red drop-down messages headed "No Internet" or "Local Search Failed" - my question is, are these talking about the app on my phone not having connection, which would be odd as it has a strong WiFi & internet connection, or the dongle on the inverter not having connection?

The mobile app has two modes: Home and Away.

• Away is basically everywhere outside of your local wifi range. It updates together with GE server, which is on a 5min cycle.
• Home is when your mobile device is connected to the same wifi (SSID) network as your Inverter. Exactly the same. When you start the app goes "Away" first, while also it does a local search (IP based), and if it gets a response from the inverter, it switches to "Home" mode. Now it will get you fresh information every 10sec.

Those messages mean that there is something wrong with your network. Maybe you are not on the same SSID? Or your inverter has a bad connection to your router? I'm only guessing though. You need to get on the web portal, and see what is recorded there.

rio911 Slight correction, maybe it is the new version of the app.
I just left the GE app open on my phone and left it for a bit. When I opened it, my phone was still on the app with a red message on top: "No internet".

After clearing the message, the app was working fine. So, I'm guessing some of the mystery is solved, it is just the phones disabling internet when not in use.

Thanks Rio; the dongle's wifi connection has been patchy since it was set up, and it seems to have been upsetting our wifi network somewhat. It's currently connected to a 2.4g range extender, but drops in and out from time to time, and my iphone which used to be able to link to the main router 2.4g and 5g networks now only sees the 5g ones. That probably explains why the app can't access "home" mode, but when I try to connect my phone to the 2.4g range extender it tells me it's unable to join the network; it's almost as if the dongle has taken that over for its exclusive use.

From reading the 'WiFi Comms Guide_Feb22', it looks like the WiFi dongle is acting as a station (STA) to connect to the customer WiFi, and as an access point (AP) for dongle configuration, both at the same time.
With only 3 non-overlapping channels on the 2.4GHz range (1,6,11), there is likely some significant duplication of channels used.
If you have a newer WiFi dongle (WZ serial number), it looks like there is the option to configure the STA to use the 2.4 GHz range (11bgn) for the best signal level achieved through walls and longer distances connecting to the customer WiFi, then set the AP to use just the 5 GHz range (11ac) on an unused channel. The AP connection range does not matter so much if it just used for configuration of the WiFi dongle when required.

These are just my thoughts on avoiding WiFi channel congestion, so should be checked out with GivEnergy support.

Simon_C Thanks Simon; you may well be right, though I'm already working at the limit of my wifi network knowledge, and the difference between a station and accesspoint is beyond it. My dongle has a WO serial number, I can see on the web interface some of the options you mention, but am reluctant to start changing anything which isn'tmentioned in the set-up guide, so it look as if I may be in for a long wait on hold to speak to someone from support.

I'm having he same issues since updating the App. I've reset the preferences, but the gear icon in the top right is unresponsive as though its greyed out. I'm also running the latest Apple IOS version. Didn't have any issues until the App was updated.

I’ve lost “local” / “home” mode ever since the last major app update too. Manually specifying the IP of the dongle doesn’t work either.

New app update today has fixed the “home” mode for me. Thanks team.

feidhlim Just reloaded the app, and it seems to have sorted it for me too; fingers crossed it sticks, one less bug to worry about!

Tried reloading the App (v3.0.2.3021) on my Samsung but still no access to Home despite it working with the old App.
Had to restart the phone before reloading otherwise it got stuck at 58%.

Any success elsewhere?