💬 FOTA (Wireless Programming)

[maghac]

I am having problems flashing a new bootloader on a 5V 16Mhz Pro Mini board. Or rather. the flashing is fine, it's just that I cannot upload a new sketch via FTDI afterwards.

Here are my custom entries from boards.txt:

## Arduino Pro or Pro Mini (3V3 & 5V, 16 MHz) w/ ATmega328 MYSBootloader
## -------------------------------------------------


proMYSBL.name=ATmega328 16Mhz MYSBootloader 1.3 beta 

proMYSBL.upload.tool=avrdude
proMYSBL.upload.protocol=arduino
proMYSBL.upload.maximum_size=30720
proMYSBL.upload.maximum_data_size=2048
proMYSBL.upload.speed=115200

proMYSBL.bootloader.tool=avrdude
proMYSBL.bootloader.low_fuses=0xF7
proMYSBL.bootloader.high_fuses=0xDA
proMYSBL.bootloader.extended_fuses=0xfe
proMYSBL.bootloader.unlock_bits=0x3F
proMYSBL.bootloader.lock_bits=0x0F
proMYSBL.bootloader.file=MySensors/MYSBootloader.hex

proMYSBL.build.mcu=atmega328p
proMYSBL.build.f_cpu=16000000L
proMYSBL.build.board=AVR_UNO
proMYSBL.build.core=arduino
proMYSBL.build.variant=standard

## Arduino Pro or Pro Mini (3V3 & 5V, 16 MHz) w/ ATmega328 MYSBootloader
## -------------------------------------------------


proMYSBL16.name=ATmega328 16Mhz MYSBootloader 1.3 beta DEV

proMYSBL16.upload.tool=avrdude
proMYSBL16.upload.protocol=arduino
proMYSBL16.upload.maximum_size=30720
proMYSBL16.upload.maximum_data_size=2048
proMYSBL16.upload.speed=57600

proMYSBL16.bootloader.tool=avrdude
proMYSBL16.bootloader.low_fuses=0xF7
proMYSBL16.bootloader.high_fuses=0xDA
proMYSBL16.bootloader.extended_fuses=0xFD
proMYSBL16.bootloader.unlock_bits=0x3F
proMYSBL16.bootloader.lock_bits=0x0F
proMYSBL16.bootloader.file=MySensors/MYSBootloader_16MHz.hex

proMYSBL16.build.mcu=atmega328p
proMYSBL16.build.f_cpu=16000000L
proMYSBL16.build.board=AVR_UNO
proMYSBL16.build.core=arduino
proMYSBL16.build.variant=standard


## Arduino Pro or Pro Mini (3V3 & 5V, 8 MHz) w/ ATmega328 MYSBootloader
## -------------------------------------------------


proMYSBL8.name=ATmega328 8Mhz MYSBootloader 1.3 beta DEV

proMYSBL8.upload.tool=avrdude
proMYSBL8.upload.protocol=arduino
proMYSBL8.upload.maximum_size=30720
proMYSBL8.upload.maximum_data_size=2048
proMYSBL8.upload.speed=57600

proMYSBL8.bootloader.tool=avrdude
proMYSBL8.bootloader.low_fuses=0xE2
proMYSBL8.bootloader.high_fuses=0xD2
proMYSBL8.bootloader.extended_fuses=0xFE
proMYSBL8.bootloader.unlock_bits=0x3F
proMYSBL8.bootloader.lock_bits=0x3F
proMYSBL8.bootloader.file=MySensors/MYSBootloader_8MHz.hex

proMYSBL8.build.mcu=atmega328p
proMYSBL8.build.f_cpu=8000000L
proMYSBL8.build.board=AVR_UNO
proMYSBL8.build.core=arduino
proMYSBL8.build.variant=standard

MYSBootloader.hex is from the master branch of MYSBootloader 1.3.0-beta.3, the other two are from the development branch.

Doesn't matter which one I use, I can never get my 5V 16MHz boards to accept a new sketch via FTDI cable. I have to go back to the standard Pro Mini bootloader.

[gohan]

@maghac why don't you use the ota feature?

[maghac]

@gohan Good question :)

I was afraid it would get stuck in a neverending loop and I would have to cycle power to the board, but actually OTA programming with mycontroller works fine.

The problem is that OTA uploades takes around 10 mins, which is annoying if I want to test something while I have the node on my desk, before placing it somewhere in my house. So while I anyway have it on the desk, I'd like to use the FTDI cable.

Anyway, things seem to work fine now :)

[arraWX]

Is it possible to do FOTA from my raspberry pi (serial gateway + domoticz)?

As it is now I move the gateway from the rpi to a windows pc running MYSController. It would be nice to avoid this step.

[Viciousman]

@arraWX you can create a Ethernet gateway in raspberry pi and connect MYScontroller to you raspberry pi gateway.
See instructions to create raspberrypi ethernet gateway on https://www.mysensors.org/build/raspberry
From there you can perform FOTA in MYScontroller.

[arraWX]

@Viciousman Thank you!

How do I create a Ethernet gateway?

Will I have to build this: https://www.mysensors.org/build/ethernet_gateway

or

Will I have to do some kind of configuration on the rpi and continue using my serial gateway?

[Viciousman]

@arraWX I find more simple to simply connect nrf24 to raspberry pi as instructed in https://www.mysensors.org/build/raspberry
But you can also build the Ethernet gateway with W5100.

[Tommas]

Dear all!

I have an mysensors ethernet gateway and nodes with nrf24 . I have an openhab2 controller. Could i use the above solution to program my nodes over the air through my current gateway? So i write my sketch on windows arduino and send it through my gateway to the node? Or i have to connect my computer direct to nodes over air?

[gohan]

You can use myscontroller to connect to the ethernet gateway and assign the firmware to upload for each node

[Tommas]

Dear @gohan

Thank you! Superb!

[vikasjee]

@gohan , Thanks for this idea... I am going to try this with a serial gateway instead. Do you perceive a problem? Will this work only with an ethernet gw?

[gohan]

Myscontroller works only as ethernet. Mycontroller should also work with mqtt gateway but I'm not sure about serial.

[vikasjee]

@gohan Ook! Are you talking about installing MysController on Raspberrypi (I think not)? If you are going to run it on Windows and connect to Raspi Ethernet gateway remotely then using the the same option we can remotely connect to a serially connected gateway on Raspberrypi (using a USB port) from MysController running on Windows.

Are there steps somewhere to install MysController on Raspi [some Windows pre-installer running on Debian Linux]? I remember reading some Mysensors posts here a couple of years back(!!!), but cant seem to locate it now...

[gohan]

MyScontroller is a windows application.
MyController is a controller that you can install anywhere. I personally try to avoid the usb gateways because of the limitations.

[Nca78]

@scalz do you have any specific reason why you use avrdudes to burn the fuses and burn bootloader separately, instead of using some board definitions matching the bootloader and using the burn bootloader method for Arduino interface ? I think that method is far more user intuitive for the average MySensors user ?

[scalz]

@Nca78 just old school habit ;) I think in the video both ways are explained. But I'll take a look at the howto to make it simpler, agree.

thx for reminding me!

[arraWX]

Using FOTA in myscontroller works only occasionally for me. Sometimes it works fine. But most often I get the following messages and nothing more happens.

The node is a sensebender micro. Gateway is rpi ethernet.

Has anyone experienced something similar? Anyone knows how to solve the problem?

EDIT: Problem solved. Reading this post I now understand that in order to get new fw into the node one has to update the sketch, refresh the repo in MysController and assign it the node.

[gohan]

Once I managed to burn the sensbender micro bootloader to the pro mini, how do I connect the external flash? Just connect it to pins D10 to D13? Is this the correct way of managing the fota in the sketch before the sleep?

[arraWX]

@gohan I recently had some problems with fota and the sensebender sketch you refer to. In this thread @tekka suggested me to enable smart sleep. I used

smartSleep(MEASURE_INTERVAL);

It seems that the smartSleep function has a "built in" MY_SMART_SLEEP_WAIT_DURATION_MS (which defaults to 500 ms). This makes the OTA_WAIT_PERIOD in the sensebender sketch redundant. I deleted it from the sketch.

FOTA now works successfully with my sensebender boards.

[gohan]

I am still in the build phase, I still have to understand how to connect the flash and what to do in the code; also I need to find how to test if everything is is correct