GPy and LTE

[jmarcelino]

Hey

we’re still working on the details, but don’t worry it’ll be there when the GPy ships - and it’ll be easy to use :)

Can you share which country you’re based and/or carrier you plan to use? That way I can try to have exactly what you need to do :)

[serafimsaudade]

@jmarcelino

Hi, tks for the fast response.

Cool, so I will wait :).
I'm from Portugal.

[jmarcelino]

@serafimsaudade
Thanks, but be aware that the GPy (and FiPy) are LTE-M (Cat M1) or NB-IoT devices.

These are lower power, lower bandwidth protocols specially for IoT. “Full fat” LTE Cat 1 and above (ie what cell phones use) is not supported.

As far as I’m aware Portugal has no immediate plans for LTE Cat M1 and only doing limited trials for NB-IoT so you may have to wait a while (2018) until the networks catch up and support these devices.

[serafimsaudade]

@jmarcelino Ups.!!! I was not aware about that.
I will contact the portugues carriers to get more info.

cumps,

[serafimsaudade]

Hi.

@jmarcelino You got new's about the GPy shipping?

cumps,

[jasonriedy]

@serafimsaudade I'm sure that by the end of the month it'll be next month...

[jmarcelino]

@serafimsaudade
From what I'm aware GPys should be out of the factory already and arriving soon.

But 1) While we have Cat M1 we're still waiting on low level NB-IoT firmware for our modem (low level, not something we ourselves can do) and 2) We're working with operators for certification to be allowed on their networks.

So we appreciate your patience on the LTE software. Cat M1 and NB-IoT are very new protocols and even operators are having issues.

For Portugal I'm talking with Vodafone Portugal. NOS and Meo seem to still be more on a testing stage for these new LTE protocols.

[serafimsaudade]

@jmarcelino
I'm getting a little worried. I have to submit a prototype at the end of February. Since I have not yet received GPy, I have development stopped.

[jmarcelino]

Hi @serafimsaudade,
I'm sure the GPy will arrive in no time, the post has been a bit slow with the Xmas period. If you are concerned e-mail me your order details - jmarcelino@pycom.io - and I'll check internally.

I'm more worried about NB-IoT support in Portugal. I was in touch with some carriers in Portugal today (MEO, NOS) and deployments seem a bit slow. Will know more on Thursday.

[serafimsaudade]

@jmarcelino tks for the reply.

I send you a email with the order details.

cumps,

[jmahesh]

@jmarcelino I have purchased Gpy with Pytrack. Based in India.
I have tried the basic lte connection code, but unable get connect. Do you have any solutions to connect.

[jmarcelino]

Hi @jmahesh

Note the modem supports LTE Cat M1 and NB-IoT only, not regular LTE.

I think Vodafone India among others are planning a NB-IoT rollout but I have no other concrete information.

We will of course aim to support NB-IoT on the GPy in India when it’s deployed by the operators.

[Redferne]

We got the GPy yesterday (yeay!), upgraded it to:

GPy-1.12.0.b1.tar.gz
MicroPython v1.8.6-849-fcbbfe3 on 2018-01-03; GPy with ESP32 

Inserted a pin unlocked SIM from our own in-house test network and issued the commands:

from network import LTE
lte = LTE()
lte.connect() 

...and got no response at all. So the first question was of course if the SIM was detected? Or any network detected? How can we check this?

In the LTE object, what is referred to by ID? An instance of the LTE object? What other parameters are available?

class network.LTE(id=0, ...)

In the init function, is there a predefined list of CIDs? Which are they? How can we define our own CID for our in-house network, such as MCC/MNC/APN/User/Pass

LTE.init(cid=3)

This method is used to set up the LTE subsystem and to specify a CID (Connection ID) for the connection The arguments are:
cid is a Connection ID. This is carrier specific, for Verizon use cid=3. For others like Telstra it should be cid=1.

[jmarcelino]

Hi @redferne

Those are good questions, thank you.

The current LTE module only supports CID=1 and APN=“internet”. This works in test environments where you have some control of the parameters - for example using the Amarisoft LTE eNodeB emulator. Since we’re still waiting for network certification, in the limited countries that have deployed LTE-M already, releasing this seemed a good compromise.

Clearly we’ll need more flexibility going forward and we’re preparing a new releasec that should offer everything you require.

Current plan is to have that by Monday ( Jan 15th) though it may not be a full public release until a couple of days after.

Since you seem to have the right setup and need it ASAP please get in touch - jmarcelino@pycom.io - and I’ll send you a pre-release build.

Please also let me know which LTE Band you intend to test it on and your operating system (so I send the right firmware tool)

Thanks again

[ninoita]

Hi @jmarcelino, have You information about the deployment of new lte protocols in Italy? In particular, what is the current status for lte Cat m1 in Italy?
Thanks

[jmarcelino]

@ninoita
As far as I know TIM and Vodafone Italia are well into NB-IoT deployments, perhaps TIM has more coverage at the moment but that can change very quickly - for most networks it's a software upgrade.

For us it's probably easier to support Vodafone Italia as we work Vodafone as a group but we're of course open to work with everyone.

As with most European locations (there are exceptions) at the moment Cat M1 is still not deployed outside the labs. But I'm hearing a lot more interest in it fuelled by some really mass market products that will change that landscape.

[ninoita]

@jmarcelino thank you for your reply. If I understood correctly, currently in italy I could use gpy with a sim (Vodafone or Tim) to enable nb-iot but such solution does not allow me to set up an iot application with sensors in movement (cat nb1 does not support handover) or sensors with client mqtt. Do you confirm?

What parameters should I use for lte connection using a vodafone italy?

Thank you

[jmarcelino]

@ninoita
NB-IoT doesn't do handover because it simply reconnects to the next base station. But that's fine for connectionless UDP. It does mean you cannot do MQTT (unless it's MQTT-SN) without some sort of gateway in the middle.

[ninoita]

@jmarcelino ok, it's clear. I already have a GPy and a Vodafone SIM. When can I try my Gpy using NB-IoT? Pycom documentation is only available for CAT M1 now.

[tkerdonc]

Just received my GPys and started trying them with my amarisoft testbed.
@jmarcelino I saw you mentioned Amarisoft in an earlier post, can you confirm that GPys work with their default enb-catm1.cfg configuration ?
APN and CID are indeed in the default versions you mentioned (1 and "internet"), however, the gpy does not stay connected to the infrastructure.

On the device side, I have not uploaded any code but enter the following commands manually :
lte = LTE()
lte.init()
lte.connect()

After that third one, Amarisoft's logs inform me that the device is joining the network, but this is immediately followed by a Detach Request from the GPy, ending in a lte.isconnected() = False after the call to connect() returns.

When using these sim cards with regular phones, we usually needed to put them in roaming mode, since the amarisoft information is not stored on them, could that be an issue here ?

Looking forward to hearing your thoughts.