Thread border router image for Raspberry Pi 4

RE: Thread border router image for Raspberry Pi 4

Mark — Wed, 10 Mar 2021 15:19:29 GMT

You can also still buy the 3B+

at work we built some factory automation products using the 3B+ and when the 4 came out I had a look at changing but the results I got at the time told me we were better of sticking to the 3B+ and I suppose this was because the design and builds had more maturity.

RE: Thread border router image for Raspberry Pi 4

Edvin — Mon, 01 Feb 2021 15:24:14 GMT

That looks more correct. That means that the NCP running on the Nordic DK/dongle is Thread Certified. The border router RPi image is from Openthread.

The Nordic version is indeed a Nordic demo, intended to get up and running if you are not familiar with Raspberry Pi. If you intend to change anything, I would recommend that you go directly to Openthread's implementation.

As far as I know, the only difference is that the Nordic version sets up the custom network that you can use to set up new network (wifi) configurations without an extra monitor and keyboard.

Best regards,

Edvin

RE: Thread border router image for Raspberry Pi 4

krbvroc1 — Mon, 01 Feb 2021 15:05:43 GMT

[quote userid="26071" url="~/f/nordic-q-a/71002/thread-border-router-image-for-raspberry-pi-4/292287#292287"]Can you please specify where we claim this? I think we claim that our stack and chips are openthread certified, but we do not certify the Raspberry pi.[/quote]

I cannot find the reference and probably misread or assumed. The Openthread website claims:

"OpenThread Border Router (OTBR) has been certified as a Thread Certified Component on the Raspberry Pi 3B with a Nordic Semiconductor nRF52840 NCP."

I probably assumed the image provided by Nordic was based on that certified version, but sounds like it is nothing more than a demo. The version currently at ot-br-posix has moved away from the NCP into an RCP architecture and has moved to Thread 1.2. I have starting testing the newer version under Docker and hopefully it is interoperable with Nordic SDK v4.1.0 openthread implementation.

RE: Thread border router image for Raspberry Pi 4

Edvin — Mon, 01 Feb 2021 14:44:44 GMT

I just want to point out that I am still waiting for an answer from the Thread team.

My assumption is based on the fact that the border router isn't running on an nRF.

From a discussion with a representative from our Thread team I had 6 months ago:

"generally we base on OpenThread Border Router [https://github.com/NordicPlayground/nordic-ot-border-router] (so using rasbian and so on), but with some extensions and mechanisms for automatic configuration and autostart"

So I guess what I am saying is that it is based on:

https://github.com/openthread/ot-br-posix

which is provided by OpenThread.

This is a technical forum, so in general we do not discuss roadmap plans. If you are interrested in this, send me a PM here on DevZone (link to this ticket), and I can give you the contact information to our Regional Sales Manager (RSM) for your area/country. This is also a better way to affect the future road map.

[quote user="krbvroc1"]Nordic claims Thread is certified on the the RaspPi3 but does not provide instructions to reproduce a certified environment?[/quote]

Can you please specify where we claim this? I think we claim that our stack and chips are openthread certified, but we do not certify the Raspberry pi.

Best regards,

Edvin

RE: Thread border router image for Raspberry Pi 4

krbvroc1 — Mon, 01 Feb 2021 13:25:15 GMT

That github link has no code and was a very old 2017 Nordic project before they released the 'official' Alpha version. It looks like it was replaced with just a README file. I do not care about NFC at all, what I am looking for is a reproducible build of what was delivered. At some point I need to deliver some sort of production quality Border Router to accompany all these Thread devices we are building. You are saying Nordic has no plans to provide this? Nordic claims Thread is certified on the the RaspPi3 but does not provide instructions to reproduce a certified environment?

RE: Thread border router image for Raspberry Pi 4

Edvin — Mon, 01 Feb 2021 13:15:46 GMT

It looks like it doesn't work, no. I haven't confirmed this, but I suspect that there are no plans on updating the image for RPi 4. This is mostly a developer tool, and not a home automation tool.

The Border Router Repository is found here:

https://github.com/NordicPlayground/nordic-ot-border-router

But the NFC Daemon tool is not publically available (not our property). This has been requested before in another ticket, but we figured out this is not something we can share.

I am no expert on building these kind of images, but if you manage to exclude the NFC daemon, you can use this to build the RPi image.

BR,

Edvin

RE: Thread border router image for Raspberry Pi 4

krbvroc1 — Fri, 29 Jan 2021 21:06:19 GMT

EdvinI am also interested in this. I would also like to know what build arguments the Border Router software was created with?

The release notes are incorrect and I found another post indicating the Border Router was based on github commit:

https://github.com/openthread/ot-br-posix/commit/e22d81d3050a8b62bea9f2865c51887ac4c426d4

So I know need to know what build options / command line arguments might be needed to reproduce what was delivered. In my case I want to make some modifications, but in the future I also want to run it on a RaspPi 4.

RE: Thread border router image for Raspberry Pi 4

Den — Fri, 29 Jan 2021 19:45:18 GMT

Hello Edvin,

I downloaded border router prebuilt Raspberry pi image used RaspPi_OT_Border_Router_Demo_v4.1.0-1.alpha.img from Nordic link https://www.nordicsemi.com/Software-and-tools/Software/nRF5-SDK-for-Thread-and-Zigbee/Download#infotabs and it doesn't work on the Raspberry Pi4.

Did you get any updated from Nordic openthread team to get the Raspberry Pi image for Pi4 board?

RE: Thread border router image for Raspberry Pi 4

Edvin — Thu, 28 Jan 2021 14:56:28 GMT

Hello,

I am not sure whether or not the Border Router image works with the Raspberry Pi 4. I don't have access to one at the moment. Do you? If so, have you tested it?

I'll check with our openthread team, but I have not received any response yet. I'll let you know as soon as I know whether it works, and/or if there are any plans to make an updated image for the RPi4.

Best regards,

Edvin