OpenBeacon EasyReader PoE II Ethernet

This new design is the successor of our previous design OpenBeacon Base Station 1 - we redesigned the hardware to use a 32 bit ARM processor, two OpenBeacon RF interfaces and a MicroSD card for local data storage. As we used the open gcc ARM toolchain for this design, we were able to release the firmware of this design to the public. This allows users to customize the reader firmware to support novel low power RF applications. An internal 20 pin feature connector provides great extensibility for custom hardware extension. The reader can be power with Power-over-Ethernet (according to IEEE802.3af) or via mini USB 5V=.

You can support our project by buying OpenBeacon EasyReader PoE II Ethernet in our RFID hardware shop.

Firmware Source Code

Join our firmware development - browse our git source code repository or download as Unix tar.bz2 file and Windows ZIP File file.

The EasyReader firmware tree starts at firmware/at91sam7/openbeacon-ethernet/. In application/proto.c you can see the packe handling and encapsulating to UDP packets.

See OpenBeacon Tracker API Installation for setting up this server API and the example code on your own server.

Firmware Update

Use the contained "at91flash"-tool to update to contained firmware.

./at91flash openbeacon-ethernet.bin

The supplied script depends on our modified sam7 tool: http://www.openpcd.org/dl/sam7utils-0.1.1-bm.tar.bz2

Reader Configuration and Network Setup

Connect to the configuration using the externally accessible mini USB port. Under Linux usually /dev/ttyACM0 or higher is assigned to the device. Under Windows please use the supplied Windows driver to create a COM port. As later Windows Versions don't provide a serial terminal software by default, you can use PuTTY to connect to the reader COM port under Windows. Under Linux the 'screen' program (if installed) can be used to connect to the device as follows:

screen /dev/ttyACM0

Often the terminal output will be blank at first. This is normal and you can enter commands as described below.

Getting Help

Enter "?" or "h" to get an overview of available configuration options.

OpenBeacon.org PoE Ethernet II command line help
(C) 2010 Milosch Meriac <meriac@bitmanufaktur.de>
	'a' - set reader address ('t10.254.0.100' for 10.254.0.100)
	'b' - boot again
	'c' - show configuration
	'd' - enable debug output ('d[disable=0,enable=1]')
	'g' - set gateway ip
	'h' - show help
	'i' - set reader id ('i123')
	'l' - red LED ('l[enable=0, disable=1]')
	'm' - netmask config ('m255.255.0.0')
	'n' - network config ('a[static_ip=0, reader_id=1, dhcp=2]')
	'p' - set target server UDP port ('p2342')
	'r' - restore original network settings
 	's' - store configuration
	't' - set target server ip ('t1.2.3.4')
	'u' - reset reader to firmware update mode
	'x' - show system statistics

Configuring a re-flashed reader

By pressing "c" you can view the network configuration. An un-configured reader can be identified by a reader ID of zero:

Active Network Configuration:
	IP          = 10.254.0.0
	Netmask     = 255.255.0.0
	Gateway     = 10.254.0.1

Stored Network Configuration:
	IP by reader ID configuration [1]
	MAC         = 00:50:C2:AB:10:00
	IP          = 10.254.0.0
	Netmask     = 255.255.0.0
	Gateway     = 10.254.0.1
	Server      = 10.254.0.1:2342 [UDP]

System configuration:
	Reader ID:0

After entering a reader ID ("123" in this example) ...

i123

.. the reader prints the ID as confirmation:

reader_id=123

After entering "s" for saving this information and rebooting we need to reconnect the USB serial port by closing and re-opening the serial terminal application. We can print the new network configuration now by pressing "c". As you can see in the default configuration the IP address is derived from the reader id:

Active Network Configuration:
	IP          = 10.254.0.123
	Netmask     = 255.255.0.0
	Gateway     = 10.254.0.1

Stored Network Configuration:
	IP by reader ID configuration [1]
	MAC         = 00:50:C2:AB:10:7B
	IP          = 10.254.0.0
	Netmask     = 255.255.0.0
	Gateway     = 10.254.0.1
	Server      = 10.254.0.1:2342 [UDP]

System configuration:
	Reader ID:123

From OpenBeacon

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