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Home Area Network Performance Metrics andMonitoring Phase 2

Test Tools Guide for PET, WET, and Central Site Programs

1020106

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ELECTRIC POWER RESEARCH INSTITUTE3420 Hillview Avenue, Palo Alto, California 94304-1338 PO Box 10412, Palo Alto, California 94303-0813 USA

800.313.3774 650.855.2121 [email protected] www.epri.com

Home Area Network Performance Metrics and Monitoring

Phase 2

Test Tools Guide for PET, WET, and Central Site Programs

1020106

Technical Update, December 2010

EPRI Project Manager

E. Ibrahim

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DISCLAIMER OF WARRANTIES AND LIMITATION OF LIABILITIES

THIS DOCUMENT WAS PREPARED BY THE ORGANIZATION(S) NAMED BELOW AS AN ACCOUNT OFWORK SPONSORED OR COSPONSORED BY THE ELECTRIC POWER RESEARCH INSTITUTE, INC. (EPRI).NEITHER EPRI, ANY MEMBER OF EPRI, ANY COSPONSOR, THE ORGANIZATION(S) BELOW, NOR ANYPERSON ACTING ON BEHALF OF ANY OF THEM:

(A) MAKES ANY WARRANTY OR REPRESENTATION WHATSOEVER, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, (I) WITHRESPECT TO THE USE OF ANY INFORMATION, APPARATUS, METHOD, PROCESS, OR SIMILAR ITEMDISCLOSED IN THIS DOCUMENT, INCLUDING MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULARPURPOSE, OR (II) THAT SUCH USE DOES NOT INFRINGE ON OR INTERFERE WITH PRIVATELY OWNEDRIGHTS, INCLUDING ANY PARTY'S INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY, OR (III) THAT THIS DOCUMENT ISSUITABLE TO ANY PARTICULAR USER'S CIRCUMSTANCE; OR

(B) ASSUMES RESPONSIBILITY FOR ANY DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY WHATSOEVER (INCLUDINGANY CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES, EVEN IF EPRI OR ANY EPRI REPRESENTATIVE HAS BEEN ADVISEDOF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES) RESULTING FROM YOUR SELECTION OR USE OF THISDOCUMENT OR ANY INFORMATION, APPARATUS, METHOD, PROCESS, OR SIMILAR ITEM DISCLOSED INTHIS DOCUMENT.

THE FOLLOWING ORGANIZATION, UNDER CONTRACT TO EPRI, PREPARED THIS REPORT

UrElectronics Inc.

This is an EPRI Technical Update report. A Technical Update report is intended as an informal report ofcontinuing research, a meeting, or a topical study. It is not a final EPRI technical report.

NOTE

For further information about EPRI, call the EPRI Customer Assistance Center at 800.313.3774 ore-mail [email protected].

Electric Power Research Institute, EPRI, and TOGETHERSHAPING THE FUTURE OF ELECTRICITYare registered service marks of the Electric Power Research Institute, Inc.

Copyright 2010 Electric Power Research Institute, Inc. All rights reserved.

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This publication is a corporate document that should be cited in the literature in the followingmanner:

Home Area Network Performance Metrics and Monitoring Phase 2: Test Tools Guide for PET,WET, and Central Site Programs. EPRI, Palo Alto, CA: 2010. 1020106.

iii

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

The following organization, under contract to the Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI),prepared this report:

UrElectronics Inc.5236 RidgeVale WayPleasanton, Ca 94566

Principal InvestigatorJ. Alrawi

This report describes research sponsored by EPRI.

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ABSTRACTIn considering a particular communication technology and protocol, one of the earliest steps thatmust be taken is to review features and performance claims by its publishing agency(manufacturer or supporting alliance). These claims are based on specific conditions, generally

ideal ones. This is mainly because of practicality issues since it is difficult if not impossible tocover a technologys performance in every possible condition where it may be used. Thisapproach also tends to put that technology in the best possible light.

It is the responsibility of the system designer to determine the usability of a specific technologyin a particular application.

In the context of a general definition of SmartGrid, communication plays a pivotal role in itssuccessful implementation. SmartGrid Communication can be categorized in three parts: longhaul Wide Area Network (WAN), the Neighborhood Area Network (NAN) and the Home AreaNetwork (HAN). In order to evaluate each network (WAN, NAN or HAN) alone, or in anycombination of the three, specific test tools must be available. In order to modularize the

required test tools, a system can be modeled using an OSI stack; then there can be severalversions of communication evaluation tools which can focus on a specific layer within the OSIstack and all those below it.

Figure AB-01OSI Stack Model

It is worth noting that all indicated layers of testing can be deterministic except for the PHYlayer. Layer 1 (PHY) is dependent on the environment where it is used plus the designparameters of devices used in the system. This is the motivation behind focusing on the PHY andMAC layers testing in this project.

This project focuses on two specific communication technologies ZigBee (a wireless technology)and HomePlug AV (HPAV) (a power line communication technology); by developing two newtools called the Wireless Evaluation Tool (WET) and the Power Line Communication Evaluationtool (PET).

Both WET and PET test tools concentrate on layer 1 (Physical layer or PHY) and layer 2 (Datalink) (MAC) by simulating other layers.

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To evaluate any communication channel (layers 1, 2) there are common metrics that can be useddespite differences in protocol and interface in use. A summary list of such metrics couldinclude:

Signal Strength

Channel Noise Signal to Noise Ratio (SNR) Physical layer bit carrying capacity Application layer through put capacity Transmission latency Bit Error Rate (BER) and/or Packet Error Rate (PER) Other metrics specific to the PHY or protocolThe objective is to determine the current quality of MAC and PHY communication as well as theability to make predictions of its future performance. The current communication health can be

quantified by BER and PER, while current and future performance can be predicted by signalstrength, channel noise and Signal to Noise Ratio (SNR) and their margins. It can also be helpfulto quantify types of failures in transmission (TX) and reception (RX); if they are errors due toCyclic Redundancy check CRC, or due to security failure and so on. It is helpful to determinenumber of times a packet had to be retransmitted in order to arrive successfully at its intendednode.

It is also valuable to understand the changes in communication quality due to varying conditionsover a sufficiently long period of time (up to twelve months for example). That is why theCentral program, a remote monitoring tool, was developed to assist in long term monitoring. Itincludes the ability to remotely monitor and record a history of the communication channels

metrics in a log file where it can be analyzed at a later time.

Keywords

ZigBeeHomePlug AVHome area networkPHY/MAC layer performance metricsWireless communication evaluation tool (WET)Powerline communication evaluation tool (PET)

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CONTENTS

1 INTRODUCTION ....................................................................................................................1-1

UBT Overview Description...................................................................................................1-1

UST Overview Description...................................................................................................1-1

2POWERLINE COMMUNICATION EVALUTION TOOL (PET)...............................................2-1

PET Features and Theory of Operation ...............................................................................2-1

PET Program Setup.............................................................................................................2-2

PET Program Interface ........................................................................................................2-3

PET Program Limitations .....................................................................................................2-3

3WIRELESS COMMUNICATION EVALUTION TOOL (WET).................................................3-1

WET Feature and Theory of Operation................................................................................3-1

WET Program Setup............................................................................................................3-2

WET Program Interface .......................................................................................................3-3

WET Program Limitations ....................................................................................................3-3

4CENTRAL NETWORK MONITORING...................................................................................4-1

Central Features and Theory of Operation ..........................................................................4-1

Central Program Setup ........................................................................................................4-2

Central Program Interface....................................................................................................4-2

Central Program Limitations.................................................................................................4-2

5TRAFFIC AGGREGATOR .....................................................................................................5-1

Traffic Aggregator (TA) Features and Theory of Operation .................................................5-1

Traffic Aggregator Program Setup .......................................................................................5-1

Traffic Aggregator Program Interface...................................................................................5-2

6CONCLUSION AND PROPOSED FUTURE DEVELOPMENTS ...........................................6-1

PET Proposed future Improvements....................................................................................6-1

WET Proposed future Improvements...................................................................................6-1

Central Proposed future Improvements ...............................................................................6-1

A UBT/PET USER MANUAL ................................................................................................... A-1

Introduction ......................................................................................................................... A-1

UBT..................................................................................................................................... A-2

Operation Systems Supported: ..................................................................................... A-2

HARDWARE: ................................................................................................................ A-2

UBT SET UP/MODIFY ADDRESS:............................................................................... A-3

STARTING UBT PROGRAM ........................................................................................ A-5

TX ENABLE: ................................................................................................................. A-6

INCLUDE TX IN GRAPH: ............................................................................................. A-7

LOCAL TRAFFIC .......................................................................................................... A-7

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CHANNEL CAPACITY.................................................................................................. A-7

REMOTE SITE.............................................................................................................. A-9

STATUS BOX ............................................................................................................... A-9

WAN APPLICATION..................................................................................................... A-9

PET ..................................................................................................................................... A-9

Select Network Device (HomePlug network device)................................................... A-10

Selecting Node of interest ........................................................................................... A-10

SNR Measurement...................................................................................................... A-11

Tone Map Measurement ............................................................................................. A-11

Connecting to the Internet ........................................................................................... A-11

PET Logging ............................................................................................................... A-12

BWIRELESS EVALUATION TOOL (WET) USER MANUAL AND INTERFACE GUIDEREV 1.8.....................................................................................................................................B-1

Introduction ......................................................................................................................... B-1

Local PWET System Configuration..................................................................................... B-2Select the Com Port ...................................................................................................... B-3

Com Port Setup............................................................................................................. B-3

ZigBee Test Selection Window ..................................................................................... B-4

Test Execution .................................................................................................................... B-4

Coordinator Connection: ............................................................................................... B-4

Radio RSSI and ED Graph ........................................................................................... B-5

Enable Log .................................................................................................................... B-7

Enable NET:.................................................................................................................. B-7

Scn_Chnls:.................................................................................................................... B-7

Clr Stat .......................................................................................................................... B-8CLr ALL ......................................................................................................................... B-8

Proposed IEEE 802.15.4 Counters ............................................................................... B-8

NetWork Re Init ............................................................................................................. B-8

Btry................................................................................................................................ B-8

Remote (Central) WET Server ............................................................................................ B-8

Interface Specifications..................................................................................................... B-10

Introduction ................................................................................................................. B-10

Specific PWET Behavior ................................................................................................... B-11

Types of Packets Accepted......................................................................................... B-11

Packet Type Identification ........................................................................................... B-11

Graph and Data Update Period................................................................................... B-12

Packet Start and Stop Code........................................................................................ B-12

Serial Interface Setup.................................................................................................. B-12

Types of Packets............................................................................................................... B-12

Status Packet (Data[0]=0)........................................................................................... B-13

Loopback Packet (Data[0]=1)...................................................................................... B-13

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Channel Scan Packet (Data[0]=2)............................................................................... B-13

Enable/ Disable Status (Data[0]=3)................................................................................... B-14

Clear IEEE802.15.4 Counters (Data [0]=4)................................................................. B-14

Other Data[0] Codes are Reserved............................................................................. B-14

Embedded Program Structure .......................................................................................... B-14

PWET and EWET packet structure................................................................................... B-17

Data Field Structure .................................................................................................... B-18

CCENTRAL MONITOR/SERVER ...........................................................................................C-1

Buttons Description............................................................................................................. C-1

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LIST OF FIGURESFigure 2-1 Local PET Setup.......................................................................................................2-2Figure 3-1 Local WET System Setup.........................................................................................3-2Figure 5-1 System Overall Diagram...........................................................................................5-1Figure 5-2 Traffic Aggregator Interface......................................................................................5-2Figure A-1 UBT/PET Main GUI................................................................................................. A-3Figure A-2 Entering Network Information GUI .......................................................................... A-4Figure A-3 UBT Results Display ............................................................................................... A-6Figure A-4 PET Program Main GUI ........................................................................................ A-10Figure A-5 Tone Map Graph ................................................................................................... A-11Figure A-6 Select Central IP and TCP Addresses .................................................................. A-12Figure A-7 HPAV Logging GUI ............................................................................................... A-12Figure B-1 Overall Test Setup .................................................................................................. B-2Figure B-2 Com Port Selection ................................................................................................. B-3Figure B-3 Com Port Setting Setup .......................................................................................... B-3Figure B-4 ZigBee Test Selection ............................................................................................. B-4Figure B-5 ED Polar Plot at the Coordinator ............................................................................. B-6Figure B-6 RSSI Plot for Nodes Other than the Coordinator .................................................... B-6Figure B-7 Network Connection Setup ..................................................................................... B-7Figure B-8 Scan All Channels Graph........................................................................................ B-7Figure B-9 Central Main Window .............................................................................................. B-9Figure B-10 Remote Command and Monitor Windows .......................................................... B-10Figure B-11 EWET Software Flow .......................................................................................... B-11Figure B-12 Status Packet Data [0..40] Block Definitions ....................................................... B-13Figure B-13 MAC Metrics Definition........................................................................................ B-13Figure B-14 Rev 1.0 Coordinator Program Flow Chart ........................................................... B-15Figure B-15 Rev 1.0 EndDevice Node Program Flow Chart................................................... B-16Figure B-16 Rev 1.0 Router Program Flow Chart ................................................................... B-16Figure C-1 Central Main GUI ....................................................................................................C-1

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1INTRODUCTION

Prior to this project, UrElectronics had developed UrElectronics Bandwidth Test UBT andUrElectronics Serial Test UST Tools. UBT, with Ethernet interface was developed to EvaluateLong range Wi-Fi installation such as building to building communication. The UST wasdeveloped to evaluate UrElectronics 900MHz radio and its proprietary protocol. Both tools werelater adopted to support other functions such as Ethernet based network evaluation in the case ofUBT and testing industrial RS-485 communication in the case of UST.

UBT Overview Description

UBT is an Ethernet based test tool; it simulates layers 3 to 7 of the OSI Stack, and is able to

generate and capture traffic at the MAC layer (layer 2). It primarily uses ICMP type packets forcommunication evaluation. It involves connecting two computers across an Ethernet network ofinterest. The computer where the user is located is labeled Local while the other is labeledRemote. UBT allows the user to control and monitor traffic on both the local and remotesystems from the same machine, and to do this simultaneously. It provides the option of selectingpacket size and number of bits per second to be sent across the network. Other options includeauto network parameters detection (local and remote MAC address as well as local IP address),Batch processing and logging. It also supports filtering incoming traffic based on IP or MACaddress.

UST Overview Description

UST is able to transmit and receive data over the serial port (RS-232). It is able to send dataacross a serial link where a second computer can capture and analyze received data or return it tothe sender. The sender will compare received data to that sent and determine latency and bit errorrate. This is an essential tool to evaluate relatively long distance RS-232/285/422 wired orwireless serial links.

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2POWERLINE COMMUNICATION EVALUTION TOOL

(PET)

PET Features and Theory of Operation

The PET tool uses UBT as the base engine to generate, send and capture packets over anEthernet connection. There are many Ethernet packet types defined by a 16-bit EtherType fieldwithin an Ethernet packet. Code 88E1 is an EtherType that is reserved for HomePlug. To supportthis project, the packet generation engine was modified to support Ethernet packets of thisHomePlug type.

HomePlug supports a set of messages referred to as Management Message Entry (MME). These

messages are used to manage, configure and monitor a HomePlug network. These messages aretransported via HomePlug type Ethernet packets.

The PET program uses these messages, MMEs, to identify the nodes on the network and, basedon the users command selection, interrogate each node within the network to obtain its statisticscounters, Signal to Noise Ratio (SNR) or Tone Map between two nodes.

Once the PET/UBT program is executed, a selection between UBT and HPAV must be made. IfHPAV is selected, the PET GUI is displayed. The user must then select the network interfacedevice from a list populated by the program of all available network devices. Once the correctdevice is selected, the program will issue Network info request Network Info which will returnthe list of HPAV linked nodes (AVLN) in the network of which the requesting station is a

member. As a result, relevant information from each AVLN is sent back.Once the program receives information to identify MAC addresses of all nodes within thenetwork, it will list each nodes MAC address and that of the computer it is connected to in orderto enable its selection for obtaining statistics, SNR and Tone Map measurement.

The PET program will issue Link Statistics MME to each node detected to obtain and display itsstatistics counters.

HPAV divides an AC cycle to 5 intervals (incase of 60 Hz). The average of all AC cyclesintervals of each node is displayed in conjunction with its own MAC address. The program willinterrogate each node once every three seconds and update the display. It will display transmittedPBs (Physical Blocks) successfully, failed and percent rate of failure, Received PBs successful,

failed and percent rate of failure, Transmitted MPDUs (MAC Protocol Data Units) successfully,failed and percent rate of failure, received MPDUs received successfully, failed and percent rateof failure, and number of collisions.

After the networks nodes have been identified, the user has the option of selecting a node andrequesting SNR or Tone Map information. These requests will apply to the path between therequesting machine and the selected node.

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When SNR information is requested, the program will issue Receive Tone Map CharacteristicsMME to retrieve modulation per carrier of the tone map.

The modulation used by each carrier is utilized to determine the number of bits per carrier. Themodulation used is dependent on the SNR of each tone.

Therefore the SNR can be calculated as follow:

SNRslot

Carriersrirbitspercarcarrirs

/})28,22,16,10,7,4,2,0{][(0

==

ATNslot

=SNR

slot- 60

Carriers: the number of enabled carriers.

Bitspercarrier: Number of bits per tone per slot; 0 10 bits determined by type of modulationused for that tone.

When a Tone map is requested, the program will also issue aReceive Tone Map

Characteristics MME request. The program will graph the determined average number of bitsused per tone over all used AC cycle slots based on the received modulation used on each tone(carrier).

For the United States, there are 5 slots for the 60HZ AC and 917 tones (carriers) are used. Theprogram will assume 150 Mb/s physical layer bit rate which corresponds to 7 bits per carrier or6419 (7*917) cumulative bits for 917 carriers. It will display the percentage of the sum (over 917tones) of all bits per carrier reported by the device for the network path requested. This can beused as a rough indicator of the physical layers capacity. It can also be used to determine theimpact of devices added to the power line (as noise sources) on the total bandwidth available toHomePlug AV. This number may not have a linear correspondence to the available segmentschannels capacity, but it provides a valuable comparison tool.

PET Program Setup

Figure 2-1Local PET Setup

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In order to operate the PET program, a HPAV network must be set up with more than one node,and at least one packet must be transmitted over the link between any two nodes of interest. It isimportant to note that the program is able to measure the communication channel quality (SNRand Tone Map ) between the node where the program is operating and any other node within thenetwork (example over segments AB or AC). The program is not able to measure thecommunication channel quality on any segment not directly connected to it (example segmentBC).

PET Program Interface

The PET Program is limited to an Ethernet Type interface. The communication between the PETprogram and the HPAV is based on HomePlug type Ethernet packets.

PET Program Limitations

There are many features that can be added to the PET program. These features can be added inthe future if it is determined that they are needed. The following are some of these features

The current PET program is not able to configure HPAV for QOS and security. The Tone Map displays the average bits per tone of the 5 AC slots. The program can be

modified to display the tone map of each AC slot independently.

The program is not able to provide communication channel quality measurements betweennodes that are not directly connected to the requesting system.

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3WIRELESS COMMUNICATION EVALUTION TOOL

(WET)

WET Feature and Theory of Operation

The WET program is based on UrElectronics serial Test (UST) evaluation tool. The program isable to assemble, send and receive data (packets) over a PC com port (or USB simulated comport).

There are two sections to the WET program, a PC based WET (PWET) and an Embedded WET(EWET).

The current PWET program is designed to physically connect to the coordinator of ZigBeenetwork and will communicate to EWET. EWET is an embedded application (EndPoint) that isrequired to be available within the coordinator and other nodes of the ZigBee network to supportPWET. EWET in the coordinator is able to generate its own status and receive those of othernodes within its network and forward them to the PWET program via com port. The EWETapplication in other ZigBee nodes will send their status to the coordinator. EWET is also able torespond to commands generated by the PWET program. The following are commands that aresupported by the current version of PWET program:

Loopback Energy Detection ED (the coordinator only) Clear counters Enable / Disable sending status Receive status packetsThe format of these commands and their responses are included in the WET user manual.

Upon connecting the coordinator to the computer, it will periodically transmit its status packetsto the PWET program. The status packets include its long and short addresses, parent if any (zerois sent for short and parent addresses for the coordinator), RSSI (equivalent to Energy Detectionwhen no other radios are present in the network), LQI (zero in the case of the coordinate), thevalues of the proposed IEEE 802.15.4 counters as well as sensor information if any are available.

When other radios are powered up, they will transmit their status packets to the coordinatorwhich will forward them to the PWET program.

Once the program receives a status a packet, it will compare the long address against a list oflong addresses of already existing radios. If it finds a match it will replace the earlier storedpacket with the one just arrived. If does not find a match it will enter the arrived status packet ina buffer link list of active radios in a location such that the link list will have the radios sorted by

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their long address in an ascending order. A second thread will periodically display and processthe link list of the active radios.

The user has the option of having the RSSI plotted by including the radio of interest and enablinggraphic check boxes.

He/She can send packets to included radios (by selecting INC) by enabling continuous TX orLimited TX (number of packets must be specified). The inter-packet gap (IPG) and Delay toreturn before error must be specified. The program will send loopback packets to selected radiosone at a time. It will hold back on sending the next packet until the first has arrived and the IPGtimer has expired or the Delay to return before error timer has expired without receiving a reply,at which time the error counter for that radio is incremented.

The user may select Scan channel where PWET will request the coordinator to measure RFenergy (ED) of each of the IEEE 802.15.4 2.4GHz band channels and graph the results. It isimportant to note that measuring ED is valid only if there are no other radios transmitting withinthe network. When executing ED, the EWET program will halt the ZigBee stack by disablinginterrupts, retrieve and store radio register values, force the radio into a receive mode at each

channel, and have it execute an ED measurement. This is done by communicating directly to theradio. Once an ED measurement is completed, the original radio state is restored. The EWETwill assemble a packet with the obtained ED information and transmit it to the PWET programvia an ED type packet for display.

The PWET also allows the user to locally log all the obtained data (except for ED), clear EWETcounters and connect to the central program via the Internet.

WET Program Setup

Figure 3-1Local WET System Setup

It is expected that the coordinator is programmed with EWET code and is connected to a PC viaRS-232 or USB cable. Other radios also programmed with EWET may be powered up. These

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radios will associate themselves with the established ZigBee network and transmit their statuspackets to the coordinator which will forward them to PWET for display and processing.

WET Program Interface

The physical interface between the PC and the coordinator is limited to RS-232 or USBconnection simulating RS-232. Communication between the coordinator and other nodes isbased on the ZigBee protocol. Each node in the network must be programmed with EWET inorder to transmit and process packets from PWET via the coordinator.

WET Program Limitations

Energy Detection (ED) measurement requires all nodes within the network to stoptransmitting before the ED measurement is valid. However, stopping transition by all nodesduring ED measurement may impact the networks performance.

Wet program is unable to change the active channel. Changing the active network channeldynamically will ensure gaining the benefit of ED measurement.

To have reliable results of loopback measurement, all nodes must be commanded to stoptransmitting their status during loopback measurement. In order to reduce interactionbetween loopback packets and status packets, care must be taken to efficiently make use ofresources available to the radios microcontroller.

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4CENTRAL NETWORK MONITORING

Central Features and Theory of Operation

The Central program uses UBT as the base engine to generate, send and capture EthernetTCP/IP packets. Once the TCP port is entered and the Receive button is selected, the program isenabled to initiate a TCP session with clients requesting to establish communication.

On the client side, in order for PET and PWET to setup communication to the Central program,the user must first select the Network setup button. He/She must enter the IP address of the PChosting the Central, its TCP port, and a unique Home ID (to identify the home where the client isresiding) must be entered. Finally to enable communication, the Enable NetworkCommunication box must be checked and the connect button must be selected. This will initiate

a request to establish communication with the Central. If a home includes both PET and WET(HPAV and ZigBee systems) then two home ID must be reserved; one for each.

The client will send its first status packet to register itself with the Central. The Central willrespond by highlighting a home icon and displaying the new clients homeID, and will retransmitthe received packet to the client in the case of PWET, and will send a status request in the case ofPET. For PWET the control of the local program is transferred to the Central.

In order to initiate a command on the Central program for either PWET or PET, the highlightedicon corresponding to the house of interest needs to be selected where a command window(s)similar to those of the client will appear.

Selecting a Central PWET home Icon, will display monitoring and command windows. Themonitoring window will display status information periodically as it does on the client but at aslower rate (about once every three seconds). The command window is used to send commandsto the PWET client. In the case of the PET program, only one window will be displayed.

All commands available to local clients for both the PET and PWET programs are also availablevia Central PET and WET for the exception of Energy Detection ED which is only available vialocal PWET.

A packet from a client is received by the Central program in two segments: the header and body.The Header has the same size across all client types and includes the same parameters. Itincludes homeID, Client type (PET, WET), structure Size and Structure type (WET status, PET

status, SNR and ToneMap). Once the header is received, the program can prepare to receive thebody of the packet based on the information embedded within the header. It identifies whichhome icon the received packet belongs to based on the homeID, and prepares to support eitherWET or PET protocol. If the incoming packet is of a WET type, then the program can support aWET status packet, if it is PET type, it can support PET status, PET SNR or PET ToneMappacket structures.

The Central program, based on the information provided by the header, will reserve memory tostore the incoming packets body. It will check if the GUI of the home icon is enabled. If so it

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will display information provided by the incoming packets body. It will also store it in adesignated logging file if logging is enabled for that particular home.

The program assembles the returned packet based on the protocol of the incoming packet towhich it belongs. In the case of WET, if the GUI of that particular home is not enabled, it willsimply return the packet as it was received. If the GUI is enabled, the state of the command

window is used to update the returned packet. In the case of PET, if the GUI of the homeidentified by HomeID is not enabled, a status request is sent in response to the incoming packet.If the GUI is enabled, it will check if a request for SNR or Tone Map is available. If not, arequest for status is sent. Otherwise a SNR or Tone Map request is sent.

Central Program Setup

In order to run the Central program and have clients connect to it over the Internet, the routermust be setup to forward the selected TCP port to the IP address of the PC where the Central isrunning.

Central Program Interface

Connection of the Central program and the Internet is based on TCP IP Ethernet type of packets.

Central Program Limitations

There would be an advantage if Central is modified to be a Web based program. This will requirea change in the overall structure of the remote monitoring implementation. The home andCentral programs must be changed to clients to a web server known as Traffic Aggregator.

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5TRAFFIC AGGREGATOR

Traffic Aggregator (TA) Features and Theory of Operation

The Traffic Aggregator (TA) application is based on the UBT engine, and receives andtransmits Ethernet TCP IP packets. The traffic aggregators main purpose is to collect trafficfrom all homes and concentrate it in one stream that can be directed to a specific PC that ishosting the Central program. The current TA architecture has two sections, Server and Client.The Server is used to have all the homes direct their traffic toward it by using the TAs IPaddress and designated TCP port. The TA server will collect the traffic and forward it to itsClient (TF), which will send it to Central by specifying Central's IP and TCP port. The Centralwill operate as a Server. It will receive and process the traffic as described in the previoussection. The total system structure is depicted in the following figure.

Figure 5-1System Overall Diagram

Traffic Aggregator Program Setup

In order to run the Traffic Aggregator program and have clients connect to it over the Internet,the router must be setup to forward selected TCP port traffic to the IP address of the PC wherethe Traffic Aggregator is running.

The IP address and TCP port of the Central PC must be entered in order to forward theaggregated traffic to the Central program.

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Figure 5-2Traffic Aggregator Interface

Traffic Aggregator Program Interface

Connection of the Traffic Aggregator program and the Internet (home clients and the central

programs) are based on TCP IP Ethernet type of packets.

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6CONCLUSION AND PROPOSED FUTURE

DEVELOPMENTS

The combination of WET (PWET and EWET), PET, Central and Traffic Aggregator TAprograms are valuable tools to evaluate HAN systems. They are able to collect importantparameters, perform long-term logging and enable current and future prediction ofcommunication health of the network.

These programs can be easily adopted to evaluate NAN and even WAN systems. This is truesince the communication's parameters that need to be monitored are the same for all.

The internal program structure for the Central is designed in such a way that it can facilitate

support for other protocols or applications. It will require further development to support otherprotocols such as Wi-Fi, WiMax, ERT and other protocols and applications.

Remote communication over the Internet can be easily ported to any Ethernet TCP/IP basednetwork such as a utilitys network. Further it can be modified to monitor a utilitys equipmentfor evaluation of long term monitoring and control. It can also be adopted to simulate DR signalpropagation and evaluation.

Suggested future development can include:

PET Proposed future Improvements

Add more Features to PET such as QOS and security configuration To improve PETs Lab usability, each AC slot can have its own Tone MAP as opposed to

displaying the average of all slots

Add features to enable communication channel quality between nodes that are not connectedto the unit where the PET program is connected

Add more Physical interfaces that will allow the PET program to interface to other popularPLC technology such as Lon Works and other

Since the PET program has an Ethernet interface, it can be ported to other communicationplatforms that also support Ethernet such as Wi-Fi and WiMax.

WET Proposed future Improvements

Add the ability to change the active channel dynamically Add support for SEP1.0 (2.0)Central Proposed future Improvements

Convert the system structure to support web based monitoring

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Include communication heart beat to the home Icons. Also provide an alarm (such as audio,email cell phone text message) if the heart beat stops

Include support for parameter limits. A set of limits can be entered and the program willcompare it with incoming values. If these values are outside these limits, then the programcan issue an alarm (such as audio warning, email or cell phone text message). These limits

can be based on protocol and even equipment manufacturer. Include a logged data processor. This processor can analyze logged data automatically. Develop Linux based PET and PWET applications to run on a low cost embedded single

board computers. This also helps in embedding these applications in actual products such aselectrical meters or thermostats.

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A-1

AUBT/PET USER MANUAL

Note: This user manual is for a tool that is continuously evolving. It describes currently availablefunctionality and the content of the user manual is expected to be updated periodically to explainnew features and services.

Introduction

These tools include two programs the Ur Bandwidth Test (UBT) and Power line communicationevaluation tool (PET).

The UBT is an Ethernet base test tool; it simulates layers 3 to 7 of the OSI Stack, and is able to

generate and capture traffic at the MAC layer (layer 2). It primarily uses ICMP type packets forcommunication evaluation. It involves connecting two computers across an Ethernet network ofinterest. The computer where the user is located is labeled local while the second is labeledRemote. UBT allows the user to control and monitor traffic of both local and remote systemsfrom the same machine simultaneously. It has the option of selecting packet size and number ofbits per second to be sent across the network. Another option includes auto network parametersdetection (local and remote MAC address as well as local IP address), Batch processing andlogging. It also supports filtering incoming traffic based on IP or MAC address.

The PET tool uses UBT as the base engine to generate, send and capture packets over anEthernet connection. There are many Ethernet packet types defined by a 16-bit EtherType fieldwithin an Ethernet packet. Code 88E1 is an EtherType that is reserved for HomePlug. To support

this project, the packet generation engine of the UBT has been modified to support Ethernetpackets of this HomePlug type.

HomePlug supports a set of messages referred to as Management Message Entry (MME). Thesemessages are used to manage, configure and monitor a HomePlug network. These messages aretransported via HomePlug type Ethernet packets.

The PET program uses these messages, MMEs, to identify the nodes on the network and, basedon the users command selection, interrogate each node within the network to obtain its statisticscounters, Signal to Noise Ratio (SNR) or Tone Map between two nodes.

The PET is a tool used to evaluate PLC type of communications PHY /MAC of the protocols

supported while the UBT is intended to measure the protocols application layer performance.Currently the PET program supports HomePlug AV with the following functionality:

HPAV statistics HPAV Signal to noise ratio (SNR) HPAV ToneMap

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UBT

UBT is a low cost and easy to use program designed as a tool to debug and evaluate Ethernet (Afamily packet-based computer networking technologies for Local Area Networks [LANs] 1)network connections.

It is designed to determine the connection functionality, throughout (bandwidth) and type ofservice provided as a function of packet size. UBT can be used in wireless as well as with otherEthernet connection technologies to determine basic functionality and optimum settings.

UBT helps in determining network bottlenecks, functionality type of service rules and networkelements limitations. UBT is an essential tool for network software and hardware development,wireless compliance testing as well as installation and deployed network monitoring and testing.

Operation Systems Supported:

UBT is PC based software that will run under Windows NT4, NT2000, Windows XP andWindows7 platforms.

Notes:

1. Running the program on Windows7, find the PET.exe file, (usually it is inc://programs/PET), right-click, go to properties, compatibility. Change from the list to

windows XP.

2. Some security settings might stop Wincap program for setting up. You might need to go tothe installation package and install it manually (see installation).

HARDWARE:Its performance is limited by the speed of the processor and the resources available to it, theminimal recommended to use a system is a 1 GHZ processor and 128 Megabytes of RAM.

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Figure A-1UBT/PET Main GUI

This is the first GUI presented by PET/UBT program. This is the point where UBT or PETtesting can be selected. Click on HPAV, The program will progress to HPAV Test.

If UBT test is intended than Modify add# must be selected first if this is the first time to setupsupport for the connected network. Otherwise Set Address can be selected to activate theselected network address as shown below.

HomePlug AV (HPAV) Tests

To initiate HPAV testing (PET), press: The following GUI will be presented

UBT SET UP/MODIFY ADDRESS:

This option is to setup network information manually or automatically. To setup network

information Press: The following Dialog will appear

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Figure A-2Entering Network Information GUI

For Manual network configuration, the user must enter IP address and MAC source anddestination address of the local and remote machines as well as selecting the network interfacedevice in both the local and the remote machines.

For automatic network detection, the user must enter destination IP address and press Detectparameters. Note: The two machines (local and remote) must be able to ping each other in orderfor the auto network detection to work.

If you are planning to transmit traffic, you will need to know the source and destination MACand IP addresses, they can be obtained from CMD window (DOS window) by typing ipconfig/all.

Destination IP address can be obtained by one of the following methods. Obtaining thedestination IP address by typing ipconfig/all at the destination PC and enter the MAC and IPaddresses manually or allow the UBT program to determine it by entering the destination IPaddress and select Detect Parameters.

Once the network has been detected the user must:

Enter a label for reference only (optional) Enter Type of service

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A-5

Type of packet ICMP or UDP. If UDP is selected, the UDP source and destination ports mustbe entered:

Select Filter 1 Select Filter 2

Select to enable/disable filter by TOS

Note: the current version has been characterized for ICMP type of traffic. It is suggested to use itat this time.

Once OK is selected the program will update the pre-selectable address. Now the user may selectone of the selectable addresses and the program will update the system and the applicationwindow (UBT results display) will be displayed. If the System Options System default is set toestablish communication on startup default for both the local and the remote systems and theUBT is running on the remote system, the network flag will indicate the network is up.

UBT uses the filters to monitor the incoming traffic. To monitor all incoming traffic to the

system by set Filter 1 and Filter 2 to source MAC or source IP. The filters are based on the datathe user has entered for the MAC and IP address, if they are incorrect UBT will not be able todetect the traffic coming to the system. The following are options available to the local site.

After the adapter has been selected, the MAC and IP address as well as the filters have been setor select the applicable preset addresses. It is also possible to access the address list byselecting Local Site Local Address. UBT will not receive the correct traffic unless the MAC andIP addresses are entered and the filters are setup.

In order for the program to operate properly the local and the remote system must be able to pingeach other and each system has selected the correct

Network Adapter Source and destination MAC address. Source and destination IP address.STARTING UBT PROGRAM

Before UBT can function properly the following must be done successfully:

The correct Ethernet Adapter selected (see Select the Correct Adapter). The correct source and destination MAC and IP address, type of packet, and Filter 1 and

Filter 2 are entered in both local and remote site machines.

Transmitted Traffic will not be graphically displayed unless Include TX in graph option isenabled.

The default statistics is based on 64 bytes packets; to get correct graphical representation ofthe traffic the correct packet size must be selected. ( the default can be changed by going tosystem_option -> system defaults)

Note: If the correct Ethernet adopter is not selected the program will not operate

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A-6

To start UBT's traffic generation and reception press one of the SET Address form the addressselection.

For Example Press to load the pre set network information to the program using

the following dialog boxes will show.

Figure A-3UBT Results Display

1-Local 1 Mb/S

2-Press TX Enable

3-150 bytes (packet size)

TX ENABLE:

From the command window the user may enable TxEnabled. This selection will enabletransmitting traffic based on the packet size and traffic speed in bits per second selected earlier.

Please note that transmitted traffic will not be displayed graphically unless include Tx is

enabled.

1

2

3

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INCLUDE TX IN GRAPH:

From the command window, the user may enable Include TX in graph. When this option isselected the graph will display the transmitted traffic. Please note when this selection is enabledthe graph will display the sum of transmitted and the received traffic. To distinguish betweentransmitted and received traffic use the numerical stat.

LOCAL TRAFFIC

Note that these options are the same for the local as well as the remote site (remote sitecommunication). The command window refers to the window to the right of the graphs in theapplication window.

PACKET SIZE

From the command window the user may select the packet size amount from the pull downmenu. The user may select the following packets sizes: 64,150, 250, 500, 1000 and 1500 bytes.Then select the packet size used to generate the transmitted traffic. It is also used to scale the

graphical display as a percent of full channel capacity.

LOCAL SITE

Local site refers to the machine that the user is working on and Remote machine is the one that isbeen communicated with over the network. The following are the options available to the localmachine.

TRAFFIC AMOUNT

From the command window the user may select the traffic amount from the pull down menu.The user may select 0.1, 0.5, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 20, 30, 40, 50, 60, 70, 80, 90, 100 Mb/s.

Traffic that will be sent when TxEnabled.

Note: each machines transmitting and receiving accuracy is dependent on its availableprocessing power and applications running on during testing. Some speed values may be greaterthan that of wire speed. In that case it indicates that UBT is running freely.

CHANNEL CAPACITY

The default is 10BaseT but the user may select 100BaseT. This selection will set the graphs xand y-axis scales.

Note sending and receiving 100baseT level traffic will require a high performance system.

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EST. COMM

This button is used to establish communication between local and remote machines. This willallow statistics of the remote machine to be displayed locally.

Include Inter Comm.The purpose of this feature is to indicate if intercommunication between local and remotemachine is to be included or not as part of the indicated statistic.

RstRmt#pktThis feature is used to reset statistics.

Rmt StatisThis feature is to enable remote statistics.

BATCH

Is to indicate Batch processing status activated by selecting from the main menu Sys_option->Batch_state.

LOGGING

This window is to indicate logging status. Can be activated by going to the main menu andselecting System_options->Data log.

SYSTEM DEFAULTS

System defaults can be set by going to the main menu selecting System_options->defaults.

Changing adopter/addressesWhen the local graph is in focus (selected), go to local_site_>local address.

Changing Graphical scaleWhen local graph is in focus go to Local_site of the main mane->switch scale. This will togglethe graphs scale between 10BaseT and 100BaseT.

This can also be done on the remote graph by selecting remote graph (bring it into focus) go toremote_site of main menu and select switch scale.

NUMERICAL STATISTICS

Twelve windows in the command window are used to display numerical statistics. The top sixare for the local site and the lower six are to display the statistics of the remote site. Of each of

the six the top three displays received traffic statistics and the other three displays transmittedstatistics. Each set of three displays: bits per second, packets per second and the total number ofpackets that have been processed. Int. com is used to include or exclude UBT internal networkcommunications. It is also possible to enable the sound that gives a sound pitch that correspondsto the number of bits received per second (operational under windows NT). This option helps theuser to get a sound feedback when doing adjustments away from the system. An amplifier maybe used if necessary to boost the sound and or a wireless head set. Note that when the sound isenabled the stat result will be less accurate (This feature is not supported on Windows95/98/CE).

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REMOTE SITE

The user is able to control the remote computer by adjusting the remote commands from thelocal machine. It is interesting to note that the same options that are available for the local siteare also available for the remote site. If you have a weak connection to the remote site, and anacknowledgement for sending a command has not been received the status window indicates the

link is down. It is possible that the remote system did receive the command but the local systemdid not receive the acknowledgement. Also a command is included in the remote site to establishinternal communication. This command will update the local site with the remote state.

STATUS BOX

Status box is used to indicate the remote link status if it is up or down. It uses the status of theprevious communication attempt. If the status of the current attempt is needed the update buttonneeds to be selected. It also indicates the number of command tries it did to send a commandacross the link. The status of the Batch command is also shown. It shows if a batch command isenabled and if it is active.

WAN APPLICATION

This program may also be used in WAN (Wide Area Network is a computer network that coversa broad area/any network whose communications links cross metropolitan, regional and/ornational boundaries so that users and computers in one location can communicate with users andcomputers in other locations) testing applications. To go through a router, a UDP port must beset through the router and the firewall to enable the traffic to go through.

PET

To initiate HPAV testing (PET), press: The following GUI will be presented

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A-10

Figure A-4PET Program Main GUI

To activate testing the following steps need to be followed:

Step 1 Select the Net Device.

Step 2 Select the node

Step 3 Get SNR (to retrieve SNR information)

Step 4 Select Tone Map to see the Tone map window (to display tone Map info)

Step 5 To connect to the Internet (or Intranet) if remote monitoring is needed; Press ->NetworkSetup: to configure the IP and port of the central monitor.

Step 6 Setup Remote monitoring network connection information in the window presented.Blinking sign means it is connected to the server.

Select Network Device (HomePlug network device)

As in Step 1, select the device interfacing to HomePlug network from pull down list.

Selecting Node of interest

As in Step 2, select node of interest to which SNR and Tone Map measurements can be madebetween it and the node connected to machine making the request.

2

14

5

6

3

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SNR Measurement

Once HPAV interface device and the node of interest are selected, when the SNR button shownin Step 3 is selected the SNR results will be displayed in SNR results windows (Bottom left ofHPAV main GUI).

Tone Map Measurement

Once HPAV interface device and the node of interest are selected, when button shown in step 4is selected, a Tone graph will be shown. The values on the right indicate an estimated percentageof channel capacity assuming 150 Megabits per second throughput relative to 7 bits per tone foreach of the 917 available tones.

Figure A-5

Tone Map Graph

Connecting to the Internet

Select Network Setup. The following dialog will appear

1

23

4

5

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Figure A-6Select Central IP and TCP Addresses

Step 6.1 Select the central IP address

Step 6.2 Select the port number

Step 6.3 Add the home ID

Step 6.4 Enable network comm.

Step 6.5 Press connect

Once the program is connected over the network, a blinking indicator will show indicatingsuccessful communication between the PET program and the central node.

PET Logging

To configure logging select Enable logging

Enable Logging window:

The following window will appear to enable logging options. The logging period may beselected as: 10 s, 1 min, 1 hr, or 24 hrs. A current logging session can be stopped by deselectingall types of tests. Logging will produce files "username_HP_Stat.log" for statistics,t_HP_LCL_SNR.log for SNR and t_HP_LCL_TMAP.log for Tone Map which includes thecollected data in the selected directory.

Figure A-7HPAV Logging GUI

Select one or all the following for logging a data to a text file.

The text file is readable in MS Word format.

1-Press Stat (Enable Statistics)

2-Press SNR (Signal Error ratio)

3-Tone map data

4-Press Star/Stop logging

1

2

3

4

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B-1

BWIRELESS EVALUATION TOOL (WET) USER MANUAL

AND INTERFACE GUIDE REV 1.8

Note: This user manual is for a tool that is continuously evolving. It describes currently availablefunctionality and the content of the user manual is expected to be updated periodically to explainnew features and services as they are incorporated.

This is the interface specifications to current Wireless Evaluation Tool (WET). It is expected tobe modified in the future to add more features. For further info, please contact EPRI (orUrElectronics) for the latest update. The following chapters are intended for WET users:

Introduction Local PWET System Configuration Remote (Central) WET ServerThe following chapters are intended for the embedded application developers:

Interface Specifications Types of Packets Embedded Program StructureThe remaining chapters are purely informational.

Introduction

The Wireless Evaluation program (WET) is used to evaluate wireless systems. Its current versiontargets IEEE 802.15.4 based technologies such as ZigBee. It has the ability to support localevaluation as well as remote monitoring over the network (including the Internet). The currentversion assumes a pure RS-232 or RS-232 over USB and can be modified to support native USBin the future. A complete evaluation system includes three sections: Local PC based Wirelessevaluation tool (PWET), remote monitoring (Central Server) and an in the Radio embeddedapplication called Embedded Wireless Evaluation Tool (EWET). This document include the usermanual for both the local and remote ( home and central) programs as well as physical interface

requirements and suggested application flow chart. It is expected that the PWET system will beinterfacing directly to the home coordinator or to a client radio that connects to the coordinatorwith the ability to forward parameters to the local PWET program.

The program has the ability to collect and log the following data forwarded form the coordinatorradio:

Radios Extended address Radios Short address

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PanID Channel mask. Working channel Parent short address RSSI LQI Latency Throughput Number of times the radio has re-initialized Number of times a packet had to be resent Number of times a packet has failed to be transported within a set number of retries. Has the ability to collect ED on each of the channels ( REV1.8 ED measurement is optional

on the EndDevice and the Router)

Optional Battery value Temperature value Light value

Local PWET System Configuration

The local PC is expected to connect to the coordinator using a RS-232 connection. Theconnection can be a USB simulating a com port. Once the Coordinator is connected to XP-windows enabled PC and the PWET program is installed, it can be executed.

The coordinator can wirelessly communicate with up to 4 other platforms.

Figure B-1Overall Test Setup

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B-3

In order to Configure the local system PWET after having the physical connections installed,these steps can be followed.

Select the Com Port

Incase of a RS-232 interface, this dialog will automatically appear when loading the program to

select the appropriate com port:

Figure B-2Com Port Selection

Com Port Setup

Once the COM port is selected and the OK button is clicked, the COM port setting dialog boxwill appear. The current version supports baud rate of 38400, 8-bit data, parity none, 1 stop bit,and Handshaking off.

Figure B-3Com Port Setting Setup

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ZigBee Test Selection Window

Once the COM port settings are selected and the OK button is clicked the following dialog boxwill appear. If the radio is connected and the embedded program EWET is installed the MACaddress radios will appear in ascending order. It will also have the background color of the MACwindow blinking between pink and green indicating the reception of a valid packet.

Figure B-4ZigBee Test Selection

Test Execution

Coordinator Connection:

Once the coordinator is connected and powered up, Node 1 color will alternate between greenand pink indicating PC communication to coordinator has been established. The RSSI number isupdated periodically. When no other nodes are powered up this value represents the EnergyDetection (ED) in the vicinity of the coordinator. However, once other nodes are powered up,this value may indicate the signal strength of the communicating radio.

Delay for Return Before Error Specifies the amount of time in ms for the return packet asresult of transmitting a loop back packet before indicating an error.

RSSI and LQI Values: These numbers indicate the RSSI and the LQI values reported byeach node. Lp_Back Success: Indicates the total number of packets successfully transmitted and

received as a result of the loop back test.

LP_Back Error: Total number of unsuccessful transmissions. No returned packet wasreceived within the specified delay for return before error occurred during loop back test.

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ED/RSSI Graph: Selecting Graph of the coordinator without enabling other nodes will givea true Energy detection (ED) measurement. ED is an indication of the noise in the vicinity ofthe coordinator. If other radios are enabled, this graph will indicate the received signalstrength to the coordinator. This graph on other nodes will indicate the signal strengthreceived from the coordinator. In order to have this graph function properly Inc (include)

must be selected. Other Radios Enabled: When other radios configured as part of the network are enabled

and powered up they will be listed in ascending order of their network ID. Also thecorresponding node window background will be alternating between green and pinkindicating that a successful transmission has been received by the coordinator for that node.

Loopback Test: The Inc (include) selection is used to select the radios that are selected toparticipate in the loopback test. Loopback test will help determine the throughput and latencyto each node. The latency indicated to the coordinator represents the minimum latency forcommunication between the computer and the coordinator and should be subtracted from thelatency to other radios. In order to have an accurate latency and throughput measurementStatus enable must be disabled.

To run the loopback test after selecting participating nodes, and the packet size ( in rev 1the packet size is fixed), and the maximum acceptable delay beyond which it isconsidered a failure and inter packet gap IPG is set, either Continuous TX (Free Run) TXor Limited TX can selected.

In Continuous TX run, a packet is sent to each node in sequence. When the packet isreceived from the first node a packet is sent to the next enabled node (Inc selected) afterthe expiration of IPG. This process will run until it is stopped.

In Limited TX the process will stop after the specified number of packets is sent to theenabled nodes.

Radio RSSI and ED Graph

For radios other than the coordinator, when the Graph option is selected, it will plot the RSSIvalue (yellow) of each nodes communication from the coordinator. In order to make thecoordinator ED measurement valid all other nodes need to stop transmitting.

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B-6

Figure B-5ED Polar Plot at the Coordinator

Figure B-6RSSI Plot for Nodes Other than the Coordinator

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B-7

Enable Log

Enable local logging on selected directory and file name

Enable NET:

Enable network communication to the Central server. A valid IP address and TCP port must bespecified as well as the HomeID and Nickname. Currently the program supports home IDsbetween 2000 and 2049.

Figure B-7Network Connection Setup

Scn_Chnls:

Scan channel request channel scan from the Coordinator. Each channel is scanned In order tohave an accurate measurement all other radios within the network must not be transmitting forthe duration of this measurement.

Figure B-8Scan All Channels Graph

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B-8

Clr Stat

Clears displayed statistics. Existing radios information within the network is preserved.

CLr ALL

Clears display statistics as well as existing radios information. It is important that status reportingis enabled prior to selecting this option. Otherwise the radios will have to be rest manually inorder to have its information sent to the local PWET program.

Proposed IEEE 802.15.4 Counters

The following list includes the counters proposed by the IEEE 802.15.4 Working Group in 2010:

TX Number of packet transmitted from the radio to PWET not including status packets. RX Number of packets received by the radio from PWET. Re try once Number of packets that had to be retransmitted once.

Multi re Try Number of packets that had to be retransmitted more than once. TX Fail Number of transmitted packets failed. Dup RX PCKT Number of packets received multiple times. FCS RX Fail Number of packets received with failed CRC. SEC RX Fail Number of packets received with failed security.NetWork Re Init

Number of times the network had reinitialized.

Btry

Battery voltage

Remote (Central) WET Server

This Program is used to continuously monitor and log the status of up to 50 homes (clients)remotely via an Intranet or the Internet. Upon executing the program the following window willappear:

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B-9

Figure B-9Central Main Window

The first step is to enable network communication by selecting RCV ON. At this point the serverwill be listening to the network for homes attempting to make a connection.

Each Home using network set will have the service IP address and TCP port set. Once thenetwork communication corresponding to an icon is established, it will change state as indicatedby the top left icon.

Once the home has made connection the user may click on any of the icon that are lit up. Thecommand and monitor windows will appear as shown below:

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B-10

Figure B-10Remote Command and Monitor Windows

At this point it is possible to monitor the Homes state in real time or execute loop back test,monitor the RSSI, have channel scan or enable data logging for later analysis. Each homes datais stored in a file at a selected directory with a specified file name which will have the home IDappended to it. The features of the buttons on the command window are the same as thoseavailable on the local window

Interface Specifications

This section is intended to help developers to build embedded applications (EWET) on their

platform to interface to the WET tool.

Introduction

The ZigBee platform communicates with the host PC hosting PWET by sending packets over theserial interface (UART). Packets structure is described in the later in this document.

Packets from the PWET to the ZigBee coordinator platform may include commands or loopbackdata. Commands types described by flow charts shown below.

The Status packets are sent by the coordinator and nodes which are part of the network to PWETover the UART com port. Status packet will continue to be sent to PWET unless disable status is

sent.

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Figure B-11EWET Software Flow

The figure above shows embedded application (EWET) shown in green running on the ZigBeeplatform. The application block calls the ZigBee stack to access the data, status and MACmetrics. It formats the data into packets as described below in section 3.4 and sends the resultingpacket to the host PWET through the UART hardware.

Specific PWET Behavior

Types of Packets Accepted

The Program accepts three types of packets:

1. Status packets AppMessage_t type shown below2. Loopback packets App_rx_Message_t type shown below3. Respond to command packetsPacket Type Identification

The program identifies three types of packets by examining data [0].

4. If data [0] = 0 It is a status packet.5. If data [0] = 1 it is a loopback packet.6. if data[0] = 2 Channel scan data7. If data [0] = 3, data [1] =1 Enable status.8. If data [0] = 3, data [1] =0 Disable status.

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B-12

9. If data [0] = 4 Clear IEEE statistics.10.Other values reserved for future features.Graph and Data Update Period

The program updates the graph and other values every 1.2 seconds for the status packet or everytime a loopback packet is received.

Listed Nodes Order

The program will list the radios in ascending order of short addresses. Each radio must have adistinct short address and will display the bottom 16 bits of its extended address.

Packet Start and Stop Code

Each packet that will be sent via the serial interface to PWET hosted by the PC must start with0x10, 0x02 as a header and end with 0x0a, 0xb0 and checksum (this rev does not examine thechecksum). This is sent in addition to the packet type structure.

Serial Interface Setup

The serial interface will be

Baud rate 38400 1 Stop bit. Parity None. Data bits 8.

Packet Items ProcessedThe program at this time limits it processing to the following items:

extAddr; shortAddr; parentShortAddr; LQI; 0 to 255. 255 defined as excellent link quality. RSSI; -110= -110dm, 0=0dbm; one dbm resolution. Transmitted on data [3] status packet data [0..40]. data[0] is used to identify packet type

data [0] =0 status packet data [0] =1 (loopback), the program evaluate data [1 loopback data size]. The program

sends a fixed packet size; it is up to the coordinator to adjust the transmitted packet size.

Types of Packets

All received and transmitted packets by PWET and EWET are of AppMessage_t structure shownbelow. Packet type is identified by data[0]. The following are valid and accepted by PWET:

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Status Packet (Data[0]=0)

The following assignment of data[0..40] for a status packet sent by EWET to PWET.

Index: 01 2 3 4..35 36..37

3839..40

octets: 1 1 1 1 32 2 1 2

FrameType0: Status

Revision0

Size42

ED/RSSI MACMetrics

(reserved) num_re-initialized

ErrorDetect0

Figure B-12Status Packet Data [0..40] Block Definitions

Data Field description for Status Packet

FrameType: 0Revision: 1 // one for rev 1.0 revision of protocolSize 42 // Size of data field 0 - 41 for StatusMAC Metrics // see MAC Metrics definition below

Error Detect //: set to 0

MAC Metrics (32 bit field in status packet)

Index:-0 4 8 12 16 20 24 28

octets: 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4

macRetryCount

macMultipleRetryCount

macTXFailCount

macTXSuccessCount

macFCSErrorCount

macSecurityFailure

macDuplicateFrameCount

macRXSuccessCount

Figure B-13MAC Metrics Definition

Loopback Packet (Data[0]=1)

The PWET program evaluates data [1 loopback data size]. The program sends a fixed packetsize; it is up to the coordinator to adjust the transmitted packet size.

Channel Scan Packet (Data[0]=2)

Scan Channel command Request packet (from PWET to the coordinator EWET).

data [0] =2 other data values are dont care

Scan channel command Response (from the coordinator to the WET program)

data [0] =2;

data [1] =X;

data [2] = channel 11 (2405 MHz) energy.



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B-14







data [11] = channel 20 (2450 MHz) energy






data [17] = channel 26(2480 MHz) energy.

Enable/ Disable Status (Data[0]=3)

Enable / disable request command packet type and data field definition

If data [0] =3, data [1] =1 Enable status. Data [2..41] dont care.

If data [0] =3, data [1] =0 Disable status data [2..40] dont care.

No response from EWET for this command

Clear IEEE802.15.4 Counters (Data [0]=4)

Clear IEEE802.15.4 counter request command packet type and data field definition

If data [0] =4 Clear IEEE statistics. Data [1..41] dont care

Other Data[0] Codes are Reserved

Embedded Program Structure

The Coordinator embedded program will receive data and command from the PC windows basedWET program.

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B-15

Figure B-14Rev 1.0 Coordinator Program Flow Chart

The coordinator will communicate with router and EndDevice Nodes as shown in the followingprogram flow chart of each:

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B-16

Figure B-15Rev 1.0 EndDevice Node Program Flow Chart

Figure B-16Rev 1.0 Router Program Flow Chart

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B-17

PWET and EWET packet structure

The following are the structures of each type of packets

The windows program will send a two byte header prior to the packet

0x10

0x20

It will also send three bytes as the footer

0x0a

0xb0

0xcc // check sum location. The program currently sends code 0x0cc instead of check0xsum

While the radio will send a two byte header prior to the packet

0x10

0x02

It will also send three bytes as footer

0x0a

0xbo

0xsum // the program currently does not examine the check sum

Status packets structure:

typedef struct{uint8_t messageType; // One byteuint8_t nodeType; // One byteExtAddr_t extAddr; // eight bytesShortAddr_t shortAddr; // Two bytesuint32_t softVersion; // Four byteuint32_t channelMask; // Four bytePanId_t panID; // One byteuint8_t workingChannel; // One byteShortAddr_t parentShortAddr; // two byteuint8_t data[41] // actual data 41 bytesuint8_t lqi; // One byteint8_t rssi; // One byte this byte is spare RSSI

// is transmitted on data[3]uint8_t boardType; // One byteuint8_t sensorsSize; // One bytestruct {uint32_t battery; // four byteuint32_t temperature; // four byteuint32_t light; // four byte

} sensors; // One byte} PACK AppMessage_t;

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B-18

Data Field Structure

typedef struct{uint8_t FrameType; // One byte data[0]uint8_t Revision; // One byte data[1]uint8_t Size; // One byte data[2]uint8_t not used; // One byte data[3]

MAC_Metrics_data_t MACMetrics; // 32 byte data[4..35]uint32_t reserved; // two byte data[36..37uint8_t num_re_initialized // one byte data [38]uint16_t ErrorDetect; // Two bytes data[39..40]

// rev 1 does not processthese bytes

} PACK packet_data_t;

typedef struct{uint32_t macRetryCount ; // Four byte data[4..7]uint32_t macMultipleRetryCount; // Four byte data[8..11]uint32_t macTXFailCount; // Four byte data[12..15]

uint32_t macTXSuccessCount; // Four byte data[16..19]uint32_t macFCSErrorCount ; // Four byte data[20..23]uint32_t macSecurityFailure; // Four byte data[24..27]uint32_t macDuplicateFrameCount; // Four byte data[28..31]uint32_t macRXSuccessCount; // Four byte data[32..35]} PACK MAC_Metrics_data_t;

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C-1

CCENTRAL MONITOR/SERVER

Figure C-1Central Main GUI

Buttons Description

TCP port: TCP port number to receive packet from client. This number should match the samein the client side

Receive?: Press on this button to accept connection with the client side

Global Log: To log on the remote server.

Cancel: Exit (without saving the last changes)

OK: Exit

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C-2

: Home button represents a monitored home /client. When the connection is active thebutton will change color to green. Press the home button to see the client data.

Each home represents a Home ID number.

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