# Dashboard 2.0 – One control set for multiple devices per user, without storage
**URL:** https://discourse.nodered.org/t/dashboard-2-0-one-control-set-for-multiple-devices-per-user-without-storage/97278
**Category:** Dashboard
**Tags:** dashboard-2
**Created:** [26 May 2025 16:09 UTC](https://discourse.nodered.org/t/dashboard-2-0-one-control-set-for-multiple-devices-per-user-without-storage/97278 "2025-05-26T16:09:48Z")
**Posts on this page:** 5
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@jussie](https://discourse.nodered.org/u/jussie)
#### Post date: [26 May 2025 16:09 UTC](https://discourse.nodered.org/t/dashboard-2-0-one-control-set-for-multiple-devices-per-user-without-storage/97278/1 "2025-05-26T16:09:48Z")
Hi,
I'm using Node-RED Dashboard 2.0 to control four smart sockets. I want to use a single dropdown to select a socket, and then use one button (on/off) and one slider (brightness) to control the selected socket.
Each user should be able to select and control a socket independently using the same UI. The dropdown works per user (using socketid), but the problem is: you have to manually track the selected value per user, usually with flow.set() or similar. I want to avoid any kind of context storage, and also don’t want to manage socket IDs in arrays or objects manually.
What I’m wondering: is it possible to send a msg with a socketid to the dropdown and retrieve the currently selected value for that specific user? If so, I could avoid storing anything and still know what device the user wants to control.
Thank you in advance!
---
### Author:  [@TotallyInformation](https://discourse.nodered.org/u/TotallyInformation)
#### Post date: [26 May 2025 17:18 UTC](https://discourse.nodered.org/t/dashboard-2-0-one-control-set-for-multiple-devices-per-user-without-storage/97278/2 "2025-05-26T17:18:15Z")
I don't use D2 myself so can't necessarily comment on the details of your question.
However, I do know about socketid and you should note that socketid is _not stable_. It is set to a new value if the users connection drops for any reason. That would include the users browser tab being suspended (either by the browser or the OS).
That is why UIBUILDER maintains several, more stable, ID's. Including a stable clientId which remains the same for all tabs of the open browser profile until the browser is restarted. Also a tabId (generated by the browser) and the IP address of the client.
---
### Author:  [@joepavitt](https://discourse.nodered.org/u/joepavitt)
#### Post date: [26 May 2025 17:20 UTC](https://discourse.nodered.org/t/dashboard-2-0-one-control-set-for-multiple-devices-per-user-without-storage/97278/3 "2025-05-26T17:20:10Z")
Why do you not want to store anything in context?
Node-RED is generslly stateless in its flows. There is no "get" message that can be sent to a widget/node in order to return the current state
---
### Author:  [@omrid](https://discourse.nodered.org/u/omrid)
#### Post date: [27 May 2025 10:31 UTC](https://discourse.nodered.org/t/dashboard-2-0-one-control-set-for-multiple-devices-per-user-without-storage/97278/4 "2025-05-27T10:31:35Z")
You can do that by creating the dropdown with Vuetify or pure HTML within a template node. then you can set/retrieve values to/from the dropdown based on its element Id.
---
### Author:  [@system](https://discourse.nodered.org/u/system)
#### Post date: [10 June 2025 10:32 UTC](https://discourse.nodered.org/t/dashboard-2-0-one-control-set-for-multiple-devices-per-user-without-storage/97278/5 "2025-06-10T10:32:19Z")
This topic was automatically closed 14 days after the last reply. New replies are no longer allowed.