**Nederlands topic: Nieuwe app: VarView (een temperatuur of verbruiksmeting tonen op bijv. je Nest Hub of in je web browser)
VarView turns any device value in your home into a calm, full-screen display. Pick up to three values (a battery level, a temperature, the current power usage), give each one a label of your own, and set the background and text colour to match the room. A clock and a date can optionally be shown alongside them. A Flow can also put a message on the display for a set number of seconds, so the doorbell or a finished washing machine announces itself.
The app serves the result on your own network as both a web page and an image, so you can show it on a Google Nest Hub, a Chromecast, a wall-mounted tablet or simply a browser tab. The IP port is configurable and the full address is shown in the app settings. The clock and text size can be set per screen by adding a parameter to the address (for example ?clock=18), and the display shrinks by itself when the content no longer fits. A page cast to a Nest Hub or Chromecast stays on instead of falling back to the clock after ten minutes; add ?cast=0 to keep the old behaviour. All communication stays within your own network and no account is required.
About the permission: Homey asks for full API access because that is the only permission that lets an app read values from devices belonging to other apps; Homey offers no read-only variant. VarView uses it purely to read the values you selected yourself. It never switches, changes or controls anything, and it touches no device other than the ones you picked.
This is how it looks in my living room, with ?clock=25&date=8 added to the address.
Version 4.0.0 is live!
What’s new:
1. Messages from a flow. Three new flow cards: “Show a message” (with a tag from your flow in the text, 1 to 3600 seconds, three styles), “Clear the message” and the condition “A message is showing”. A message now appears on the display the moment the flow runs, instead of waiting for the next refresh.
This is how I’ve set it up myself, for the doorbell and the washer and dryer:
Attention style: for something you need to act on right now.
Subtle style: for something that only needs to be mentioned. There’s a normal style as well. An attention message interrupts a normal one, which then resumes afterwards.
2. Clock and text size per screen. You can add ?clock=, ?date=, ?scale= and ?fit= to the web page address, and the display now shrinks automatically when the content no longer fits, instead of running off the screen.
This is deliberately in the address and not in the settings: one Homey can drive multiple screens, and a 7-inch Nest Hub, a wall tablet and a browser tab on a large monitor each need a different size. A central setting would force one size on all of them. The settings page now shows an example underneath the cast address with your own IP address filled in, so copy and paste is all it takes. Combine parameters with an &: http://192.168.1.2:8034/page?clock=25&date=8
3. Casting no longer stops after ten minutes. If you’d rather keep the old behaviour, add ?cast=0 to the address.
Nest Hub behaviour can differ per firmware version. If something goes wrong: add ?cast=0 and you’re back to the “normal” behaviour.
