The LIBRARY basement part 12

Semtech rolling out more on Basic Station and LoRa Edge portfolio, deployments & ref designs:

…and teams with Tago.io to deploy related services:

New RPi 4 based Compute Module launched…

Latest from L-A:


Download copy of 1.04 package here:
https://lora-alliance.org/resource-hub/lorawan-104-specification-package

IoT Network Companies Have Cracked Their Chicken-and-Egg Problem

https://spectrum.ieee.org/telecom/wireless/iot-network-companies-have-cracked-their-chicken-and-egg-problem

In case anyone missed it last week The RPi Foundation launched an integrated system based on customised RPi4 pcb derivative embedded in keyboard and also available as a kit… I couldnt resist and ordered :slight_smile: 2 arrived Friday (1 went awol :frowning: ) now looking at use cases around dev, IoT & TTN etc. as well as for kids education and learning… available or on backlog at usual RPi resellers…e.g.

Latest Semtech Results - Wireless & Sensor Group sales up 32% on strong LoRa contribution :slight_smile:

LoRa Alliance introduces QR code standard for rapid, zero touch device onboarding. LoRa Alliance members to have specific ID’s for embedding in the code.

https://lora-alliance.org/in-the-news/lora-alliancer-accelerates-massive-iot-introduction-zero-touch-device-provisioning

@wienkegiezeman @johan @laurens will TTN/Community have access to an ID code (vs TTI?) that we can use at scale to rapidly onboard TTN based devices? :thinking:

Specification/Requirements Doc. TR005:-
https://lora-alliance.org/sites/default/files/2020-10/TR005_LoRaWAN_Device_Identification_QR_Codes.pdf

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While good to see this being released, I would have thought the standard would have been made extensible and future proofed by using a tagged method (eg something like Json or similar).

Also a little surprised by the small number of contributors, would have thought quite a few others would have participated.

Yeah the QR code spec is finally here, and it will drastically improve device onboarding.

Today I’m hosting a webinar for device makers, and I’d love to see community members there too, as they are building community products or contemplating about going commercial with their work. Please sign up here: https://thethingsnetwork.us11.list-manage.com/subscribe?u=20406705fec6d7d4b2ab1d6cc&id=58e3d8ae1b.

The webinar will mostly be around the device repository: https://github.com/TheThingsNetwork/lorawan-devices

As for @Jeff-UK’s question on whether the community can make use of TTN’s vendor ID (428) still needs to be decided. It looks like it doesn’t come with responsibilities, certification requirements, etc, so it doesn’t seem like there are many problems with doing that.

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JSON doesn’t fit; QR codes should be as small as possible so the aim was to reduce the number of characters. As for extensions, there’s the Proprietary extensions, see document. Device makers can put anything in there.

This doesn’t say anything really. Contribution, i.e. the listed names on the spec, is different from participation. In the LoRa Alliance, unless you submit a Word diff in a committee call in a specific format, you’re not a listed contributor of the specs.

Thanks, I’ll have a closer look.

Hi Johan thanks for the prompt feedback. Have signed up for this afternoons session but participation is dependent on if I can get frm meeting in time - will session be recorded/released on You Tube?

Generating QR codes for typical TTN experiments and small qty deployments might not be impacted but would be interested on the call to know if it can be made viable for batch builds/deployments say 100 up (50up?), as that would be a game changer and would make wider use of TTN (and potentially then TTI longer tem) much more viable after any cost/benefit eval given the proportion of time taken to manually run through and register apps and each and every node manually, once through any prototyping
and/or development phase, even when taking mainly off the shelf hardware from other vendors - poss as a subsystem to the complete node. :thinking: It may be the route forward is for the LoRaWAN Module/ Subsystem vendors to use these with deployers leveraging their QR code for actual device/system deployment & onboarding… I dont know how might work but just putting the thought out there for comment… :wink:

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All of @Jeff-UK and probably more - witness last nights thread with the 200+ LWL01’s that weren’t getting provisioned, not particularly due to finger issues, but if there was something to scan that had enough info in it to just make it happen, all of that angst would have been avoided and the OP wouldn’t be spending the day typing in long complex strings between now & Christmas.

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Yes, it will be streamed on YouTube and available after

That is definitely the idea. LoRa Alliance members get a vendor ID and so they can make their devices recognizable for the entire ecosystem. It’s just that we need to decide whether we make TTN’s vendor ID available for the community to use, for end-to-end testing.

Right. This is exactly what we’re addressing today in the webinar.

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Hmmm, interesting - I wonder if there will be some general purpose ones made available or allow someone to sell a sub-section of their ID in the same way I get my EAN’s - not strictly the scheme, but allows the smaller businesses to have proper IDs where being a member would be prohibitively expensive.

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Hi

Isn’t it possible for every seller to use a QR code to get the necessary info?

Ok it would be a different one and they need a website with the info behind it.

It’s a bit more technical - still need to review the info, but it gives setup information for the individual device and would be something the manufacturers would provide in the first instance. But like everything, it’s a new system and will probably evolve. See the links in @Jeff-UK’s post above - the PDF is only 16 pages so from my perspective, one bath long.

If you want to make suggestions, The LoRa Alliance will be happy to receive your $20,000 membership so you can contribute to the committee meetings :wink:

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The proposal is more than just QR.

But everybody can make a QR code with the most needed id’s and other info or a link to a webpage with the needed info.

The included QR code should redirect to this forum.

ac7b56b934bbc59d888f323d3f1c7297

Yes, anyone can make a QR code (not that I said it was just about QR codes or that only special people can make them) - but will it provision your device? That’s the point of this specification. Network & application server interfaces / API’s that can pick up the information can then automagically enter the relevant keys & EUI’s without anyone having to copy them from labels.

And as part of the specification is embedding a LoRa Alliance Id, for now it will only be special people that can do this.