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Hardware budget #56
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Udit's LoRa demo is rad and I'm a huge fan however it does drive the cost of running the full workshop up and if I'm not mistaken is largely dependant on his hardware running Steamlink in Toronto. I think if we are considering stocking hardware for these purposes we should determine if we should keep or scrap module 6 due to it's uniqueness compared to the hardware used in the rest of the modules and, by extension its increased cost on a per workshop level. I would also do more research into reputable SD card sales if you haven't already, there is a widely known scam where the drive will appear if it is 32 GB (or whatever is advertised) but in reality the card is something like a 4 or 8 GB drive and will overwrite/cause problems once you attempt to load anything over the actual drive limit. Easy to get burned on Aliexpress and Amazon like that. |
I think those are the Chinese knockoffs. Not sure if the "Samsung branded" ones are the issue. The more reputable brands also do a better job in wear leveling.
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Lora + RPI maybe? |
Adding some details re:LoRa and Steamlink. Steamlink has three components:1. NodeThe purpose of the node is to be a low power remote device for sensing and actuating. We're currently using an Adafruit Feather which is powered by an ARM M0 chip. You can program it with a standard ARM toolchain but it has great support with the Arduino IDE making it extremely beginner-friendly 2. BridgeA bridge is actually a node that supports two network interfaces instead of just one. The purpose of a bridge is to bridge the two networks, ie. MQTT messages that are received over a TCP/IP to the LoRa network. We have been using a custom circuit with an ESP8266 interfaced with a standard LoRa sx1276 module from Semtech over SPI, but Steamlink bridges also work on boards like this one from AliExpress In theory, we could interface a LoRa radio directly with a Raspberry Pi over SPI which is what the Dragino HAT does in a more user friendly form factor. 3. StoreThe purpose of the store is to manage the network by monitoring radio links, updating routing information, and hosting the web console. The store is implemented on Python. It can run on any linux machine, including a Raspberry Pi with a simple Please see this repo for more info regarding Steamlink. I agree with @Shrinks99 that it does drive up the cost of the hardware. Maybe module 6 could be an optional/stand alone piece over the long term. Also agree with @darkdrgn2k that the LoRa stuff isn't that integrated with the rest of the ecosystem. Porting the nodes to Raspberry Pi hasn't been in the scope of Steamlink so far where the focus is more on low power devices. That being said, I think it would be very useful for applications such as running an out-of-band long-range admin channel for Toronto mesh nodes. If anyone else wants to take the lead on this work, I'd be happy to support their effort. |
@Shrinks99 I think it will be great to have a LoRa / non-WiFi frequency component in the workshop series, because it's important to experience communication outside the realm of 2.4G and 5G, and start those discussions about tradeoffs (range vs. speed for example), where earlier components have built up concepts of. I am trying to get a realistic estimate of how much it would actually cost, and think we can definitely have hardware packages modularly distributed. @uditvira the integrated board from AliExpress is much cheaper than a Adafruit Feather, is there a reason why we cannot use that same device for both Node and Bridge? What does setting up look like for the three components? @darkdrgn2k while it is nice to see how LoRa can fit with a Raspberry Pi, it looks like the Dragino hat assumes Raspbian and requires quite a bit to configure. I wouldn't want there to be a need to deviate from existing Mesh Orange flow. It's better for any integration to be done in a way over more portable interfaces (e.g. on a separate board communicating with the Raspberry Pi over IP). In the future, if we move onto other boards (e.g. Orange Pi Zero), we are not stuck with having to redo Module 6. |
👍 I agreed i think exploring other open frequencies and protocols is important
Longer term i think this is a bad model as the end goal for the lora with our mesh nodes is out of band communication. If its IP it cant really be out of band. I would suggest something like a serial link (that could easy be done via a USB-TTL connection. But this is a discussion for another time. In conclusion If charlie ever finishes his heat map (for example) it may be nice addition to planning networks. |
None at all, you can absolutely do this. The feathers are slightly better quality and seem to be less finicky with different power cables, so we used them during the workshops.
I created this repo to help with the setup. Let's track issues that are related to steamlink workshop setup there as they come up. |
Due to 1 month lead time for Toplinkst order and we will likely need the adapters soon to move forward on some collab opportunities, I am going to put in an order for 60 pcs next week k? |
Where are you shipping them? |
Can I ship to you @darkdrgn2k? Yea these are marked as tomesh. I wonder if it's possible to keep some stock with Ryan too? |
Submitted order to Toplinkst for:
Waiting on invoice. I am also interested in ordering two of each of these:
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@benhylau sorry I'm late to the party-
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@dcwalk @dasanchez I started this to keep track of things: #72 Allocation between Toronto Mesh vs. give out to collaborators is unspecified at the moment. @darkdrgn2k and I gave out a couple to get things moving for now. |
One of the main difficulty in having other groups facilitate this workshop is hardware requirements:
With the IPFS Research grant, we can have some hardware budget, and I propose to have two pools:
CAD 1700 to stock currently-working devices
Edited (25 Sep 2018): Added link to buy USB headers for wireless adapters.
According to this article the Samsung Evo Plus 32 GB seems like a good choice for write performance since we are likely going to be swapping a lot on the disk. The option with the case for $0.01 is also useful for labelling purposes.
CAD 300 to explore new devices
There are other radios that are interesting and it'd be great to have a budget to purchase some to explore. Current vendors we have a relationship with are Toplinkst, Dragino, and newly Alfa. The TOP-S5 satisfies most of our requirements (i.e. dual-band, 802.11s, external antennas, Linux drivers, cost) but there are still attributes that can be improved (e.g. range, stability, speeds, packaging, global availability, etc.) and it would be nice to not be completely dependent on one model.
We should also use this budget to explore the class of SBCs that:
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