Riots

[Oitzu]

The bootloader sounds interesting. :)
MySensors also has a bootloader for OTA Firmware upgrades but it don't support working directly out of the arduino IDE or with the serial monitor. You are probably emulating a serial device and redirecting the commands over the "mother" to the "babies"?

[Heinz]

@samulist
The main difference is, that there is already a large community around mysensors. ;)

[cranky]

Am I the only one that actively denigrates IoT projects that demand data be sent to some remote server and then funneled back via a half-baked API? Why not MQTT/CoAP/AMQP ?

Or am I the only one that despises that companies can remotely update firmware at a whim, like the way that Phillips did deactivating all 3rd party lights? It took a day to "fix", but they retain the ability as they choose. https://www.reddit.com/r/Hue/comments/3wy5t7/philips_hue_debacle_the_online_press_is_picking/

Or that my profiling data on all of my devices are, by default, someone else's data? One can glean a lot of stuff from a sensor-covered house. This can be scary: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/224155275_Real-Time_Recognition_and_Profiling_of_Appliances_through_a_Single_Electricity_Sensor

Or that if the internet goes down, all my devices go dumb? Somehow

Device->DeviceGateway->Router->internet->Your Database Server->internet->router->DeviceGateway->Device

is better than....

Device->DeviceGateway->Controller->DeviceGateway->Device ??? Because that's what nRF24L01+ , Arduino Nano, Node-Red, and Mysensors lets me do.

But then again, there's a reason I'm the "Cranky Linux User"....

[Anticimex]

@cranky No, you are not alone. This is also the reason I rolled up my sleeves and sat down and implemented a totally open source security solution. If we ignore the fact that the ATSHA204 is not open hardware of course. But we have a software alternative for those who think that is a problem.

[Zeph]

@cranky said:

Or that if the internet goes down, all my devices go dumb? Somehow

Or if the company sponsoring the proprietary cloud component goes dark or changes their terms of service.

No, you are not alone. There is a place for cloud based services in home automation, but for many of us, being in the middle of essential communications is not it.

[Zeph]

I am guessing that the babies could be repurposed as single unit mysensor nodes (integrated Atmega328 + nrf24L01+ on one small PCB). More expensive than an Ardu Pro Mini + nRF, and fewer I/O's, but perhaps useful for it's small form factor.

[TD22057]

I agree completely. The cloud makes all of these options unusable to me. I understand that data == money these days so I think these companies are trying to figure out how they're going to make enough money to survive and that's part of it - but it's not something I want to participate in.

FYI @zeph if anyone wants to see some cool, ultra small form factor boards, I found these over at LowPowerLabs the other day and they're pretty cool. They are for the RFM69 but that could be changed w/o too much work.
https://lowpowerlab.com/forum/index.php/topic,1254.0.html
https://lowpowerlab.com/forum/index.php?topic=1269.0

[cranky]

In all honesty, I'm not anti-corporation or any of that. But I like my tech, new and old both.

If a company came out with an offering that had a cheap hub (for web interface locally), with a MQTT client to publish data to, I'd be all over it. I'd also like the ability to toggle on/off the "cloud" capability (read as 'Other peoples servers').

But eventually, these services eventually are shut down, upgrade to obsolescence of your hardware, go bankrupt, and oh so many other failure options. And truth be told, most Kickstarters fail. I know a few hardware devs at our local hackerspace that has a fistful of KS one off hardware that had cloud connectivity. Not any more.

Change of topic... slightly

What is the state of the art in IoT hardware that supports open protocols (MQTT/CoAP/AMQP)? Other than roll your own, are there open offerings?

[samulist]

@Anticimex
Cool, yes now I found that library too, looks great.

@Oitzu
Thanks. Yes, that's how we implemented Arduino IDE support. Basically there is USB emulator that catches the STK500 commands from avrdude. Then it encrypts and forwards them over the air to the target board. Very straightforward ... It needs just configuration utility to set the correct target board.

@Heinz
Yes, agree with that.

@cranky @TD22057
In my opinion cloud is needed for two reason:

1. setting up things without need for programming skills (such as; connections between nodes, encryption keys, addresses ...)
   2) managing big amounts of data collected from several sources (alarms, broken machines, freezing pipes,...)

Most of data should be routed device <=> device whenever possible, and stored to cloud only if it gives some benefit for user (and data owner is aware of data storing).

@Zeph
Yes that's possible. Our boards also come preloaded with unique ID number, RX address and AES key.

Br,
Samuli Stenudd
Riots CEO

[Oitzu]

@Oitzu
Thanks. Yes, that's how we implemented Arduino IDE support. Basically there is USB emulator that catches the STK500 commands from avrdude. Then it encrypts and forwards them over the air to the target board. Very straightforward ... It needs just configuration utility to set the correct target board.

Never thought about that solution, you are right, very straightforward. I like that. :+1:

[Heinz]

The greatest thing about mysensors is, that it can be combined with almost any home-automation controller. That was the reason for me to have a closer look at it. I will be able to reuse my whole sensor network when I will exchange my controller in future. Riot would be interesting for me if the hardware is cheap and if there would be a nice housing for the babies, and ofcourse if it would be compatible to mysensors.