Guided setup
Main page: Configuration
Next: General configuration
The setup assistant exists because the other pages assume you already know what a sensor group is. It asks one question at a time, and only the questions your previous answers leave open, then creates the things a working zone needs.
It is not a tab: it is a button under Settings, because it is for an installation that has nothing yet, and a tab inviting one with three zones to set itself up was in the way. Use it for a first zone, another one, or a fresh start.
You do not have to use it. Everything it does can be done by hand on the other tabs, and nothing it creates is locked afterwards.
What it asks
What are you watering. A name, the area, and the flow. The flow is the quantity of water this zone delivers per minute, and it is worth measuring rather than reading off a datasheet: every duration is computed from it, so an optimistic figure is the quietest way to water for twice as long as you think.
Where it grows. Outdoors, or under glass or plastic. A greenhouse never receives rain, so saying so stops a rain forecast pausing irrigation that the rain cannot reach, and hides the sources that would measure weather happening somewhere the plants are not.
Where the evaporation should come from. Four answers, in plain terms rather than by the name of the algorithm behind them:
- the weather service you have configured, which needs nothing installed;
- your own weather sensors;
- a sensor that already reports evapotranspiration;
- a fixed quantity per day.
They map onto the three calculation modes. The wizard picks the mode for you.
Which sensors. Only when your previous answer needs them, and only the sources the mode you chose actually reads. Choosing the weather service skips this step entirely.
What it creates
A calculation module, a sensor group and a zone, exactly as the Modules, Sensor groups and Zones tabs would have created them. The recap on the last step lists what is about to be created before anything is written.
Afterwards, the zone is an ordinary zone: change the mode, repoint the sensors, add more zones to the same sensor group, or delete it.