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This is the fastest path to seeing real data flow through solarOS: create a customer, add their property, and get a monitored system connected.

What you'll accomplish

Go from an empty organization to a customer whose solar system is reporting live data: the same chain solarOS uses everywhere: Customer → Property → System → MonitoringDevice.

Prerequisites

• A customer exists already, or you're about to create one.
• Whether you need a subscription first depends on the monitoring gate, which is off by default (monitoringGateEnabled on the organization). With the gate off, a customer can connect a system with no subscription at all. A solarOS platform admin can turn it on per organization from Platform → Tenants → [organization], under "Monitoring enrollment" → the Monitoring services enabled toggle; once on, a property needs an active subscription whose plan includes monitoring before the customer can connect a device.

Steps

1. Create a customer

Go to Sales → Customers, click Add Customer, and fill in:

• First Name, Last Name (required)
• Email (required)
• Phone (optional)
• Description: why this customer is coming to you (optional)

Click Add Customer.

2. Add a property

On the customer's detail page, click Add Property. Search for the service address: a real address match fills in city, state, and ZIP for you, then click Save Property.

3. Enroll the property in a monitoring subscription (only if your organization enforces the gate)

If your organization has turned on the monitoring gate, monitoring in the customer portal is gated behind an active subscription whose plan includes monitoring. Go to Monitoring → Subscriptions, click Enroll Customer, and select the property and a plan that includes monitoring. If the gate is off (the default), skip this step; the customer can go straight to connecting their system.

4. Connect the system via Texture

Connecting a device is done by the customer, from their own customer portal, not by staff inside the main app. Have the customer sign into their portal and open the property's monitoring section. Once monitoring access is allowed (gate off, or gate on with an active subscription), they'll see Connect Your Solar System with a Connect my system button. Clicking it opens Texture's hosted Connect flow, where they choose their inverter/monitoring brand (Enphase, Tesla, SolarEdge, etc.) and log in with their provider credentials. Texture redirects them back to the portal when done.

Verify it worked

• The property now has a MonitoringDevice with a connection status. Right after Connect, this is typically PENDING, moving to CONNECTED once Texture reports data.
• The portal's system health banner shows a color (green/amber/red) once there's alert and connection data to evaluate. See Concepts: data model for how that's computed.

Common problems

• Device shows DISCONNECTED right after connecting. This is expected for up to about 15 minutes; solarOS reconciles device connection status on a recurring health check, not instantly on Connect. Give it time before treating it as a bug.
• The portal shows "Start monitoring" instead of a Connect button. Your organization enforces the monitoring gate and the property doesn't have an active monitoring subscription yet. Go back to step 3.
• No customer portal login yet. The customer needs portal access set up separately from their solarOS staff role (if any); portal accounts are a different login than the staff app.