Wireless nRF24L01+ sniffer for MySensors

[Yveaux]

@marceltrapman it's written in C (got a cpp extension on visual studio...) but builds heavily on Windows api for serial comms and named pipe interfacing.

[daulagari]

Impressive project, that indeed deserves the title "Embedded Innovation" :thumbsup:

Did dead the blog posts, very good documented, good to have this information.

I am eager to see more of the Wireshark protocol dissector/analyzer. I find looking at traces almost always the best way to get familiar with protocols.

[marceltrapman]

@Yveaux hmm ok. Will check it out first on my Windows box.

[ch3b7]

Very good job man! i have a question! can i use a vb.net program to send commands from the gateway (conected via usb) to sensors. if y use de command SERIAL.WRITE (in vb.net) dont work!

[Yveaux]

@ch3b7 better create a new topic for this, but I don't see why it wouldn't be possible

[marceltrapman]

@Yveaux Do you have any idea why I get this error when compiling:

NRF24_sniff.ino: In function 'void loop()':
NRF24_sniff.ino:287:20: error: 'class CircularBuffer<_NRF24_packet_t>' has no member named 'clear'

I am using Arduino 1.5.7 (but 1.0.5 generates the same error).
As mentioned in your post I created a separate 'Arduino Sniffer' folder with its own libraries in there.

Any idea what I am doing wrong?

[Yveaux]

@marceltrapman I recently added the clear method to the circular buffer implementation. Maybe I forgot to commit to the sniffer repository... I'm mobile right now, so maybe you can check the circular buffer component in the root of my GitHub account. If this does have the clear method you should copy that over the one from the sniffer repo.
I'll check things tonight....

[Yveaux]

@Yveaux damn, forget it... The latest version is only on my development pc then... I'll update the repo tonight.

[marceltrapman]

@Yveaux said:

@Yveaux damn, forget it... The latest version is only on my development pc then... I'll update the repo tonight.

I had already 'sniffed' the libraries and could not find it but I always think it is me doing something wrong :)

No problem, the rest is installed.
Uploading the sketch was the last thing to do!

[Yveaux]

@marceltrapman Good to hear you got that far!
I knew I missed something... Now it should be fixed.
Please try again!

[marceltrapman]

@Yveaux said:

@marceltrapman Good to hear you got that far!
I knew I missed something... Now it should be fixed.
Please try again!

Thank you, I will check out your updated sketch and load it into my Arduino.
Not sure that I will have the time to test it tonight though (but I must admit that I am a bit restless :) ).

[marceltrapman]

Compiling and uploading went well. Now the rest :)

[Yveaux]

@marceltrapman Apparently you're the first to build the 'thing', so thanks for pioneering!

[marceltrapman]

@Yveaux Not a problem, I like being a pioneer and I greatly appreciate the efforts you put into this :)

I thought I had everything in order this afternoon.
Installed Visual C++ Redistributable Packages for Visual Studio 2012 SP 4 but forgot to test...

Right now, whatever I use 'Visual C++ Redistributable Packages for Visual Studio 2012 SP 4' or (for testing purposes) 'Visual C++ Redistributable Packages for Visual Studio 2013' both x64 I still see the error message 'The program can't start because MSVCR110.dll is missing...'.
A restart should not be necessary but even a restart did not help.

Uninstalling all packages and reinstalling did not help either.

Any idea?

[marceltrapman]

For those following this topic I have not solved it but it could be related to this:
Upgrade to 8.1 and stuff stops working (not what most people would call an "up"-grade).

[marceltrapman]

OK, for those of you on Windows 8.1 this will probably not work 'out of the box'.

For me, a Mac user, the following solution makes complete sense :-P

You have to install or repair Microsoft Essentials and the dll will be available.
Don't ask me why but it works!

[marceltrapman]

Everything works now.

Did not see any packets coming in though but I remember having an issue with a couple of Uno's and I am not sure if this was one of them.

Anyway, I will do some more testing tomorrow.
Very exited :)

[Yveaux]

@marceltrapman Great you got it working man!
In the meantime, please have a look at the last part I wrote, detailing the use of Wireshark and the sniffer: http://yveaux.blogspot.nl/2014/07/nrf24l01-sniffer-part-3.html

For tonight I'm totally done with this sniffer -- Aaaarghhh! ;-)

Btw. Could you also post stuff you had to do to get it working (just a wrapup) to my blog, to keep stuff together? Thanks!

[marceltrapman]

@Yveaux When I am sure that everything really works (including my Uno/Radio) I will sure write a wrap-up to you blog!

[Yveaux]

@marceltrapman said:

both x64

The console application is 32bits. I don't know if the 32 bits versions are included in the 64 bits installers...