Mesh Security System (Argon Hub, OLED and MP3 Shields) - Part 2

OLED Display

Figure 5. Argon mounted on Tripler with OLED.

Having demonstrated that we can blink a LED on the Argon, we now want to move onto something a bit more useful. The Argon will form the hub of the Mesh Security System and will connect to an OLED and MP3 shield to indicate system status. In Part 2 we will get the OLED and MP3 shields working.

As shown in Figure 5, connection is simple using the Featherwing Tripler. By mounting the shields horizontally rather than stacking them you can still easily see all the indication LEDs. You will have to solder the headers on the tripler and shields. Do the tripler first. I solder one pin and then check that the header is correctly positioned before soldering the rest. It is a lot easier to rectify an issue with only one pin soldered in place. Once you have completed soldering the headers on the tripler you can use this as a jig to hold the pins in place when soldering them to the shields. This will ensure that the shield pins line up with the headers on the tripler.

Figure 6. OLED Operational

The display board is 128x32 monochrome OLED which has 3 user buttons plus reset. This screen is made of 128x32 individual white OLED pixels and because the display makes its own light, no backlight is required. This reduces the power required to run the OLED and is why the display has such high contrast. The board uses a SSD1306 and connects via I2C (pins D0 and D1), so it is very pin frugal. As I2C is a shared bus you can have other shields which utilise I2C connected at the same time (as long as they have different I2C addresses). The three buttons use:

Button	Pin	Notes
A	D4	No pull-up. Can't be used with Ethernet.
B	D3	100K pull-up. Can't be used with Ethernet.
C	D2	No pull-up.

So all up this shield uses 5 pins (D0 - D4).

The library is available in the Web IDE as oled-wing-adafruit and using the display from the Argon is easy. The library takes care of setting the appropriate input modes and debouncing the buttons for you.

I've reproduced my test code stub below. I always like to get each element of a project working before adding the next. This makes debugging much easier.

MP3 Shield

The MP3 Shield is shown in Figure 5 above. This is before the through hole headers have been soldered onto the shield. The shield version that we are using is the Adafruit Music Maker FeatherWing. This shield uses the the VS1053, an encoding/decoding (codec) chip that can decode a wide variety of audio formats such as MP3, AAC, Ogg Vorbis, WMA, MIDI, FLAC, WAV (PCM and ADPCM). This chip also allows you to adjust bass, treble, and volume digitally.

Figure 7. Argon Block Diagram (showing I/O).

Communication is via a SPI interface which allows audio to be played from an SD card. There's also a special MIDI mode that you can boot the chip into that will read 'classic' 31250 Kbaud MIDI data from the UART TX pin. The hardware SPI pins are needed whenever you are transmitting data from the SD card to the decoder chip. If you are using the wing in the special MIDI mode, they're not used.

D11: SPI MISO - connected to MISO - used by both the SD card and VS1053
D12: SPI MOSI - connected to MOSI - used by both the SD card and VS1053
D13: SPI SCK - connected to SCK - used by both the SD card and VS1053

The Adafruit VS1053 Library does include a constructor to define the SPI pins you want to use, but this doesn't help us because:

1. The hardware SPI pins are already connected by the tripler; and
2. The alternative SPI pins on the Argon are D2, D3 and D4 - which seem to be very popular with shield designers!

Figure 8. Adafruit Music Maker FeatherWing Shield.

Next are the control pins required to play music. From left to right, in Figure 9 below, they are:

MP3_DCS - this is the VS1053 data select pin
DREQ        - this is the VS1053 data request interrupt pin
MP3_CS    - this is the VS1053 chip select pin
SD_CS       - this is the SD Card chip select pin

Figure 9. MP3 Control Pins.

Unfortunately the MP3 control pins connected (via the tripler) to the Argon conflict with the A, B and C buttons connected to D2, D3 and D4 from the OLED shield. Thankfully there is no conflict on pins D0 or D1, so we can still control the OLED with the MP3 shield in place. Obviously the designers of the two shields at Adafruit didn't talk to each other!

Figure 10. MP3 Shield Installed.

To summarise, the Argon pins used to control the MP3 shield are:

SD_CS                = D2;                 // SD Card chip select pin
MP3_CS             = D3;                 // VS1053 chip select pin (output)
DREQ                 = D4;                 // VS1053 Data request, ideally an Interrupt pin
MP3_DCS          = D5;                 // VS1053 Data/command select pin (output)
SPI MISO           = D11;               // used by both the SD card and VS1053
SPI MOSI           = D12;              // used by both the SD card and VS1053
SPI SCK             = D13;               // used by both the SD card and VS1053

Figure 10 shows the MP3 shield in place on the tripler adjacent to the OLED shield. To give myself a bit more room, I removed the OLED shield while soldering the header pins to the MP3 shield. I again inserted the header pins into the tripler before soldering to make sure that everything lined up.

There are two versions of the Adafruit Music Maker, one includes an amplifier and the other just has a 3.5mm connection for headphones or powered speakers. In retrospect I should have got the one with the amplifier built in. Nevertheless I happen to have a Duinotech 2 x 3W amplifier, so I might as well use that. This is the red PCB shown in Figure 10. Before dealing with this, you will want to make sure that the MP3 shield is working.

Thankfully ScruffR has done the hard work of porting the Adafruit VS1053 Arduino library to work with Particle mesh boards. You will need to import this library and the SDFat library in order to get the shield working. This is easy, just search for the libraries in the Web IDE and then add them. Plug in some headphones (assuming you have the same version shield as I do) and you can use the code below to test the operation of your shield. You will obviously need to copy some mp3 files to SD card before you can play them. Make sure that the names of the files are in the 8.3 format or they wont be able to be played.

Duinotech 2 x 3W Amplifier

Rather than use the 3.5mm jack on the MP3 shield, we will connect directly to the Ground, Right and Left pins next to the headphone jack (Figure 11). They are line level, AC coupled outputs which are suitable for connection to an amplifier.

Figure 11. MP3 Shield Audio Out Pins.

The Duinotech 2 x 3W Class D Amplifier (Figure 12) has greater than 90% efficiency and typically delivers 3W into 4 ohm speakers (or 1.5W into 8 ohms). Its operating voltage range is 2.5 to 5.5 VDC.

The amplifier board uses the PAM8403 chip and power output will be determined by a combination of the input voltage supplied and output impedance. As we are using the regulated 3.3V from the Argon and 8 ohm speakers our expected power output from the amplifier is around 0.5W.

Figure 12. Duinotech 2 x 3W Amplifier.

The amplifier pin out description is provided in the table below.

Amplifier Pinout
Module	Function
R+/R-	Right Speaker
L-/L+	Left Speaker
GND	Ground Connection
+5V	Power Supply
5W	Shutdown Control
GND	Ground Connection
LIN	Left Audio In
GND	Ground for Audio
RIN	Right Audio In

Connection between the MP3 shield and amplifier is straight forward.

1. MP3 Shield L and G connect to LIN and Audio GND on the amplifier.
2. MP3 Shield R and G connect to RIN and Audio GND on the amplifier.
3. R+/R- on the amplifier connect to the right speaker.
4. L+/L- on the amplifier connect to the left speaker.
5. +5V and GND on the amplifier connect to the 3.3V and GND pins on the Argon.

In Part 3 we will complete construction of the Argon Hub and 3D print an enclosure for it. We will then move onto configuring the Xenon's.

Mesh Security System using the Particle Argon and Xenon - Part 1

Introduction

Figure 1. Argon Board plus some other bits and pieces.

I wanted to learn about the (relatively) new mesh capable boards from Particle, and decided a good project for this would be a mesh security system for our two garages and carport. These are some distance from the house and so should provide a good test of the mesh network range.

The system design will look something like Figure 2. The three Xenon's will communicate via the RF mesh to each other and to the Argon Hub. The Argon will monitor the state of the Xenon's and indicate the system status using an OLED and MP3 shield. The Argon will also connect to our LAN using WiFi and provide more detailed security status via  a web page. If you were building a for real security system it probably wouldn't be a good idea to publish the details on the internet.

Figure 2. Mesh Security Block Diagram.

For this first article we will focus on getting the Argon up and configured. Subsequent articles will focus on the Xenon's.

Particle Xenon and Argon Boards

The Xenon is a low cost mesh-enabled development kit that can act as either an endpoint or repeater within a Particle Mesh network.

The boards are based on the Nordic nRF52840 SoC (System on a Chip), and communicate using the IEEE 802.15.4-2006 standard to create a PAN (Personal Area Network). Bluetooth and active Near Field Communication (NFC) is also available. They have built-in battery charging circuitry which makes it possible to connect and recharge an appropriately sized Li-Po battery. The Xenon has 20 mixed signal (6 x Analog, 8 x PWM) GPIOs to interface with sensors, actuators, and other electronics. Programming it is very similar to an Arduino. The board is compatible with the Adafruit FeatherWing layout and shields can be connected to the base board using a FeatherWing doubler or tripler.

The Particle Argon is similar but includes Wi-Fi. It can be used as a standalone Wi-Fi device or as a Wi-Fi enabled gateway, repeater, or endpoint for Particle Mesh networks. We will be using it in the second configuration for our network.

The Argon has both the Nordic nRF52840 and the Espressif ESP32 processors on board. As with the Xenon it has battery charging circuitry and 20 mixed signal (6 x Analog, 8 x PWM) GPIOs. Other interfaces include UART, I2C, and SPI.

Programming the boards can be done via an extension to Visual Studio Code or using their online IDE. We will try out both methods.

Connecting the Antenna

The Argon uses two different MCU's for WiFi and BLE/Mesh. The WiFi is done using the ESP32 capability and the BLE/Mesh via the nRF82540. Each communication method uses the following frequencies:

1. WiFi - 2.412 GHz to 2.484 GHz (14 channels)
2. Bluetooth - 2.400 to 2.485 GHz
3. Mesh - 2.4 GHz (uses 6LoWPAN over 802.15.4)
4. NFC - 13.56 MHz

So there is a lot going on around 2.4 GHz if you are using WiFi, BLE and mesh at the same time. This is probably why an external antenna is provided. I assume there is also some smart deconfliction occurring at the hardware or Device OS level.

When talking about the Particle Mesh you may see Thread referenced. Thread is an open mesh networking protocol released by the Thread Group. Particle Mesh uses OpenThread, an open source implementation of Thread released by Nest.

6LoWPAN is an unfortunate acronym that combines the latest version of the Internet Protocol (IPv6) and Low-power Wireless Personal Area Networks (LoWPAN). 6LoWPAN, therefore, allows for the smallest devices with limited processing ability to transmit information wirelessly using an internet protocol. It is a competitor to ZigBee.

Figure 3. Particle 2.4 GHz Antenna

The Argon has 3 antenna connectors (u.FL connector); two on top “BT” (for mesh - nRF52840) and WiFi (for the ESP32), and one on the underside (under the micro-USB connector) for NFC. The Xenon's have 2 antenna connectors; one for “BT” (mesh) and one on the underside for NFC.

The Antenna provided with the Argon is tuned for 2.4GHz so use it for Mesh or WiFi. If you are using NFC, you will need to purchase an antenna tuned for 13.56 MHz. I am going to start out with the external Antenna on WiFi. This is required if you wish to use the WiFi connectivity.

There are two options for the Mesh antenna on the Argon. It comes with an on-board PCB antenna which is selected by default in the device OS and a u.FL connector if you wish to connect an external antenna. If you wish to use the external antenna, you'll need to buy one and issue an appropriate command in the firmware.

Connecting the antenna plug to the u.FL socket on the Argon is easiest done using a pair of long nosed pliers.

First Time Setup

Particle have put together a good video showing how to setup your Argon, so there is no need to reproduce all the steps here. TL;DR - download the iOS or Android app and follow the instructions.

As part of registering your device you will probably have to update the device OS (which abstracts away some of the complexity of programming the Argon). It is all very straight forward and worked well for me. I like the use of the RGB LED to indicate the various states of the device.

Once you've completed the setup you will be able to program your device and send over-the-air (OTA) updates to it.

Flashing the standard blink "hello world" example is a trivial exercise using the Web IDE. I was impressed by how simple this all was. The devs at Microsoft Azure IoT could learn something from this! Next up we will try something a bit more challenging - connecting the OLED and MP3 shields using the FeatherWing Tripler.

Figure 4. FeatherWing Tripler

Programming the Tello Drone using Swift (Part 1)

The Tello Drone

In this article we will explore how to write a simple iOS app in Swift to allow control of the Tello.

Tello is a mini drone equipped with a HD camera that is manufactured by Ryze Robotics and includes a flight controller with DJI smarts. It is a great drone to learn to fly on as you can use it indoors and because it is so light (80 grams), crashing is fairly painless if you have the prop guards on. I have crashed mine (a lot) and the worst that has happened is that a propeller came off, which is easy to replace. It is also relatively inexpensive. You can manually control it using either an app (iOS or Android) on your phone, or a combination of the app and a dedicated Bluetooth remote. Either works fine. If you do get the Bluetooth remote be careful of not moving out of Bluetooth range of your phone while you are flying the drone.

Tello Specifications

Tello is Powered by a DJIGlobal flight control system and an Intel processor (Movidius MA2x chipset). The MA2x is based on a SARC LEON processor which has two RISC CPUs to run the RTOS, firmware, and runtime scheduler (Ref: RyzeTelloFirmware). The other specifications are:

• Weight: Approximately 80 g (Propellers and Battery Included)
• Dimensions: 98×92.5×41 mm
• Propeller: 3 inches
• Built-in Functions: Range Finder, Barometer, LED, Vision System, 2.4 GHz 802.11n Wi-Fi, 720p Live View
• Port: Micro USB Charging Port

• Max Flight Distance: 100m
• Max Speed: 8m/s
• Max Flight Time: 13min
• Max Flight Height: 30m

Programming - Firmware Versions

Apart from being a good platform to earn your flying chops, the best thing about the Tello from my perspective is that you can write a script or a program to control the drone remotely. This opens up a lot of possibilities.

Note that there are three different Tello's that you can buy (the Tello, the newer Tello EDU and the Ironman Edition), and they use slightly different API's. So make sure that you use the appropriate version for your drone.

You can work out which firmware you have by connecting your mobile to the Tello WiFi, opening the Tello app, tapping on settings (the gear icon), then tap on the More button, and finally tap on the "..." button to the left of the screen. This should bring up the screen shown below which includes the firmware and app version numbers. My Tello is running firmware version 1.03.33.01. You can download the relevant SDK document for this version.

The Tello EDU uses version 2.0 of the SDK. You can download a PDF of the V2 SDK from here.

Commands that are available in SDK v1.3 but not v2.0 are:

• height?
• temp?
• attitude?
• baro?
• acceleration?
• tof?

Conversely, commands that are available in SDK v2.0 but not v1.3 are:

• stop (hover)
• go x y z speed mid (same as go x y z speed but uses the mission pad)
• curve x1 y1 z1 x2 y2 z2 speed mid (same as curve x1 y1 z1 x2 y2 z2 speed but uses the mission pad)
• jump x y z speed yaw mid1 mid2 (Fly to coordinates x, y and z of mission pad 1 and recognize coordinates 0, 0 and z of mission pad 2 and rotate to the yaw value)
• mon
• moff
• mdirection
• ap ssid pass
• sdk?
• sn?

The Tello EDU also has a swarm mode if you want to control a bunch of drones.

Programming - Python

There are plenty of examples on how to use Python to control your Tello. For drones running v1.3 have a look at the DroneBlocks code. For the Tello EDU (i.e. v2.0 SDK), Ryze Robotics provide some sample code for you to download and try out.

I uploaded the DroneBlocks code using my Raspberry Pi connected to the Tello WiFi and it worked a treat. Given that there are lots of Python examples, I thought I would put together something in Swift and work up to an app which provides additional functionality not found in the official Tello app.

Programming - Swift (iOS)

We access the Tello API by connecting to the airframe via a WiFi UDP port. Once a connection is in place, the drone is controlled using simple text commands.

The first thing we want to determine is whether our device is connected to the Tello WiFi. There are a couple of Swift functions which can assist with establishing this. The Tello SSID name contains the string "TELLO" (see image above), so this is what we will use to determine wether we are connected to the correct WiFi network.


We can use the code above in our ViewController to ensure that we are hooked up to the Tello, and if not provide an alert. The screenshot below shows this implemented in my proof of concept app.

The code for the ViewController is shown next. It should be fairly self explanatory.

UDP

UDP (User Datagram Protocol) is a communications protocol, similar to Transmission Control Protocol (TCP), but used primarily for establishing low-latency, low-bandwidth and loss-tolerating connections. UDP sends messages, called datagrams, and is considered a best-effort mode of communications. With UDP there is no checking and resending of lost messages (unlike TCP).

Both UDP and TCP run on top of the Internet Protocol (IP) and are sometimes referred to as UDP/IP or TCP/IP.

UDP provides two services not provided by the IP layer. It provides port numbers to help distinguish different user requests and, optionally, a checksum capability to verify that the data arrived intact.

The Tello IP address is 192.168.10.1. The UDP Services available are:

UDP PORT: 8889 - Send command and receive a response.
UDP SERVER: 0.0.0.0 UDP PORT: 8890 - Receive Tello state.
UDP SERVER: 0.0.0.0 UDP PORT: 11111 - Receive Tello video stream.

If you want to send and receive via UDP on iOS then the two main libraries in use appear to be SwiftSocket and GCDAsyncUDPSocket.

Swift Socket looks to be the simpler of the two libraries, so I used that for my initial attempt. I put together a Tello Swift class to do the heavy lifting. It is reproduced below and works as advertised. You will need to put together your own UI but if you hook up the relevant buttons in the View Controller then you shouldn't have any problem reproducing what I have done.

I will add a bit more functionality to the app (e.g. video) and then stick it up on the app store for download.