mesh sensors

[ran]

Hi 

I building a mesh network of sensors that will be spread across a building. 

One node will have a cellular modem and will send the data to the cloud ( gateway ).

Data from each sensor is around ~40 Bytes.

From Mesh perspective - my understanding is the each node is a mesh server that publish the data, The gateway is the client. correct ? 

Also - when do you plan to add sensor model support to your SDK ? I don't see how other model can fit here at all. 

Thanks, 

Ran 

[tesc]

Hi,

In a mesh network, a node uses models, and those models can be server or client models. Nodes holding the "state", in this case sensor data, use server models. Nodes either setting data values on a server, or reading values from it, use client models. Sometimes a node can even have both server and client models. In your use case, the sensors would hold the server models and the gateway would hold client models.

I am not sure regarding current plans for adding model support. Please contact our regional sales manager for your area, as they are the ones in Nordic Semiconductor who handle information sharing with our customers regarding roadmaps and future plans. If you do not know who that is, please open a private ticket or ask in a private message.

There is always an option to create the models yourself. See Creating new models.

Regards,
Terje

[ran]

Thanks. I will contact him. 

As for models, can a sensor (server model) "publish" his data value periodically ? (  let's say sensor needs to send his value every 15 min . )

Also - Would it be possible to run-time select the model a node uses ? I'd like to have 1 binary for both client\server , from FoTA reasons. 

Ran

[ran]

Also - is nRF OpenMesh an option for my usage ? 

[tesc]

Hi,

Yes, server models can publish data values periodically. This is actually part of the Bluetooth mesh specification, that models can be configured to publish periodically.

The simplest solution for "one firmware, two uses" would be have both client and server model on the node, but when you configure the node you configure only the part that you need. You may need to add a separate model for configuring which role the node should have, however, depending on the use case.

If the decision whether to be client or server is a one-time decision, you could write a value to UICR and use that value for deciding which model to use.

nRF OpenMesh is an early mesh solution very similar to Bluetooth mesh, and the nRF5 SDK for Mesh is a continuation of that project. nRF OpenMesh is discontinued, and for new projects you should use nRF5 SDK for Mesh instead.

Regards,
Terje