DCHit, my van is actually pre CAN-Bus, but I agree with the general premise. I had a job offer in Poughkeepsie along time ago, but an offer from Burroughs in Santa Barbara, CA (Goleta)won out. I think it was actually the location, I graduated high school across town from IBM, Endicott. I will be very interested in what you come up with on your Can-Bus projects.
The status program has taken some new turns, one of the reasons I chose the phidget SBC is that it had a WiFi interface, and while you could attach and write programs to read serial data over it also, it was limited bandwidth, different programing language, etc.
I eventually moved to putting in a 12 volt router, that gave me better access to share data from other interfaces.
Today, I capture data from my PentaMetric Battery Monitor, also data from my Morningstar Solar controller. I have in the works, a program to also capture data from my Magnum Inverter/charger. All three of these have different communication protocols.
Test Programs from PentaMetric and Morningstar Controller
This allows me to utilize existing data from devices instead of recapturing it. I also am looking at replacing some of the other IO functions with CAN-Bus driven devices, currently testing a Axiomatic UMAX181000 data logger with 4 thermocouples , 7 Analog inputs, and 3 A/D inputs, The four thermocouples will replace the Phidget thermal couples I was using, currently measuring outside, inside, refrigerator and a floater. The analog inputs now cover just Water Tank Level, Propane Tank Level, Grey Water Level, Current Refrigerator, Current from Alternator. Using a Axiomatic UMAX030310 18 input/output digital controller to pick up some of the other IO pins used that were used by the Phidget Controller. Oh, and currently testing an mVEC power distribution slave module.THis will move everything to automotive grade equipment.
I will say that I never really had any issue's with the Phidget equipment running in the van , in both cold and hot temperatures. The move was more predicated on my own development inside of the CAN-Bus world. I have had more time constraints limiting my development of this, some setbacks with the CAN-Bus switches I purchased and the ability to control as I want. But everything is basically going well with that project.
-greg