LoRaCTP: LoRa Content Transfer Protocol

The code in this repository allows to transfer blocks of bytes ("content") over a LoRa (pure LoRa, no LoRaWAN) channel. The library was tested with content of the size of up to 500kB.

Based on https://github.com/pmanzoni/loractp

Details of the protocol can be found in this paper:

K. Nakamura, P. Manzoni, M. Zennaro, J. -C. Cano and C. T. Calafate, "[Invited] LoRaCTP: a LoRa based Content Transfer Protocol for sustainable edge computing," 2020 16th International Conference on Mobility, Sensing and Networking (MSN), 2020, pp. 539-545, doi: 10.1109/MSN50589.2020.00090.

Technical details

• LoPy4 quadruple bearer MicroPython enabled development board.

• Pysense board

• Expansion board

• Firmware version: Pycom MicroPython 1.20.0.rc13 [v1.9.4-94bb382] on 2019-08-22.

Getting started

These instructions will get you a copy of the project up and running on your local machine for development and testing purposes in your lopy.

Prerequisites

This is the basic information required to set up a suitable development environment for a Pycom device, in this case the LoPy's.

You first need to have Python 3 and Pip 3 installed in your computer. Check here for the proper instructions and code:

https://www.python.org/download/releases/3.0/

$ sudo apt install python3
$ sudo apt install python3-pip

Install the software required to connect to the LoPy device

$ sudo python3 -m pip install mpy-repl-tool

For more information you can check the full documentation

Installing

Now you can download and install the project in your devices.

First download the .ZIP, extract it in your machine.

To install the repository in the LoPy device, open a terminal on the project's location.

Verify if the device has been recognized:

$ sudo python3 -m there detect

Confirm that the device only contains the main.py and boot.py files:

$ sudo python3 -m there ls -l /flash/ *

Upload the files of the repository to the device:

$ sudo python3 -m there push *.py /flash

Files

The code in this folder is written in MicroPython and tested on:

Files contained:

• File boot.py simply disables the WiFi to limit interferences.

• File loractp.py includes the class definition.

• File ping.py and pong.py are an example of a request/response interaction. Basically, ping.py sends a message and pong.py waits for a message and once received it replies it. pingrnd.py sends a random number, pingmsg.py sends a text input by user.

• File plainreceiver.py shows an example of a basic receiving node.

Example of a request/response interaction (ping/pong).

Experimental

Both devices (LoPyA and LoPyB), must have at least LoRaCTP and request/response files.

As a first step, you must run pong.py on the LoPyB. When the device is in listening mode you can run ping.py on LoPyA.

If you want to transmit a tex message between the two LoPy's, you must run pingmsg.py on LoPyA.

The ping/pong example

For the experiment the LoPyA is mounted on a Pysense board.

And the LoPyB on an Expansion board.

Authors

• Kiyoshy Nakamura
• Pietro Manzoni

License

This project is licensed under the GNU GPLv3 - see the LICENSE file for details.