Back to home page

OSCL-LXR

 
 

    


0001 ===============================
0002 IEEE 802.15.4 Developer's Guide
0003 ===============================
0004 
0005 Introduction
0006 ============
0007 The IEEE 802.15.4 working group focuses on standardization of the bottom
0008 two layers: Medium Access Control (MAC) and Physical access (PHY). And there
0009 are mainly two options available for upper layers:
0010 
0011 - ZigBee - proprietary protocol from the ZigBee Alliance
0012 - 6LoWPAN - IPv6 networking over low rate personal area networks
0013 
0014 The goal of the Linux-wpan is to provide a complete implementation
0015 of the IEEE 802.15.4 and 6LoWPAN protocols. IEEE 802.15.4 is a stack
0016 of protocols for organizing Low-Rate Wireless Personal Area Networks.
0017 
0018 The stack is composed of three main parts:
0019 
0020 - IEEE 802.15.4 layer;  We have chosen to use plain Berkeley socket API,
0021   the generic Linux networking stack to transfer IEEE 802.15.4 data
0022   messages and a special protocol over netlink for configuration/management
0023 - MAC - provides access to shared channel and reliable data delivery
0024 - PHY - represents device drivers
0025 
0026 Socket API
0027 ==========
0028 
0029 ::
0030 
0031     int sd = socket(PF_IEEE802154, SOCK_DGRAM, 0);
0032 
0033 The address family, socket addresses etc. are defined in the
0034 include/net/af_ieee802154.h header or in the special header
0035 in the userspace package (see either https://linux-wpan.org/wpan-tools.html
0036 or the git tree at https://github.com/linux-wpan/wpan-tools).
0037 
0038 6LoWPAN Linux implementation
0039 ============================
0040 
0041 The IEEE 802.15.4 standard specifies an MTU of 127 bytes, yielding about 80
0042 octets of actual MAC payload once security is turned on, on a wireless link
0043 with a link throughput of 250 kbps or less.  The 6LoWPAN adaptation format
0044 [RFC4944] was specified to carry IPv6 datagrams over such constrained links,
0045 taking into account limited bandwidth, memory, or energy resources that are
0046 expected in applications such as wireless Sensor Networks.  [RFC4944] defines
0047 a Mesh Addressing header to support sub-IP forwarding, a Fragmentation header
0048 to support the IPv6 minimum MTU requirement [RFC2460], and stateless header
0049 compression for IPv6 datagrams (LOWPAN_HC1 and LOWPAN_HC2) to reduce the
0050 relatively large IPv6 and UDP headers down to (in the best case) several bytes.
0051 
0052 In September 2011 the standard update was published - [RFC6282].
0053 It deprecates HC1 and HC2 compression and defines IPHC encoding format which is
0054 used in this Linux implementation.
0055 
0056 All the code related to 6lowpan you may find in files: net/6lowpan/*
0057 and net/ieee802154/6lowpan/*
0058 
0059 To setup a 6LoWPAN interface you need:
0060 1. Add IEEE802.15.4 interface and set channel and PAN ID;
0061 2. Add 6lowpan interface by command like:
0062 # ip link add link wpan0 name lowpan0 type lowpan
0063 3. Bring up 'lowpan0' interface
0064 
0065 Drivers
0066 =======
0067 
0068 Like with WiFi, there are several types of devices implementing IEEE 802.15.4.
0069 1) 'HardMAC'. The MAC layer is implemented in the device itself, the device
0070 exports a management (e.g. MLME) and data API.
0071 2) 'SoftMAC' or just radio. These types of devices are just radio transceivers
0072 possibly with some kinds of acceleration like automatic CRC computation and
0073 comparation, automagic ACK handling, address matching, etc.
0074 
0075 Those types of devices require different approach to be hooked into Linux kernel.
0076 
0077 HardMAC
0078 -------
0079 
0080 See the header include/net/ieee802154_netdev.h. You have to implement Linux
0081 net_device, with .type = ARPHRD_IEEE802154. Data is exchanged with socket family
0082 code via plain sk_buffs. On skb reception skb->cb must contain additional
0083 info as described in the struct ieee802154_mac_cb. During packet transmission
0084 the skb->cb is used to provide additional data to device's header_ops->create
0085 function. Be aware that this data can be overridden later (when socket code
0086 submits skb to qdisc), so if you need something from that cb later, you should
0087 store info in the skb->data on your own.
0088 
0089 To hook the MLME interface you have to populate the ml_priv field of your
0090 net_device with a pointer to struct ieee802154_mlme_ops instance. The fields
0091 assoc_req, assoc_resp, disassoc_req, start_req, and scan_req are optional.
0092 All other fields are required.
0093 
0094 SoftMAC
0095 -------
0096 
0097 The MAC is the middle layer in the IEEE 802.15.4 Linux stack. This moment it
0098 provides interface for drivers registration and management of slave interfaces.
0099 
0100 NOTE: Currently the only monitor device type is supported - it's IEEE 802.15.4
0101 stack interface for network sniffers (e.g. WireShark).
0102 
0103 This layer is going to be extended soon.
0104 
0105 See header include/net/mac802154.h and several drivers in
0106 drivers/net/ieee802154/.
0107 
0108 Fake drivers
0109 ------------
0110 
0111 In addition there is a driver available which simulates a real device with
0112 SoftMAC (fakelb - IEEE 802.15.4 loopback driver) interface. This option
0113 provides a possibility to test and debug the stack without usage of real hardware.
0114 
0115 Device drivers API
0116 ==================
0117 
0118 The include/net/mac802154.h defines following functions:
0119 
0120 .. c:function:: struct ieee802154_dev *ieee802154_alloc_device (size_t priv_size, struct ieee802154_ops *ops)
0121 
0122 Allocation of IEEE 802.15.4 compatible device.
0123 
0124 .. c:function:: void ieee802154_free_device(struct ieee802154_dev *dev)
0125 
0126 Freeing allocated device.
0127 
0128 .. c:function:: int ieee802154_register_device(struct ieee802154_dev *dev)
0129 
0130 Register PHY in the system.
0131 
0132 .. c:function:: void ieee802154_unregister_device(struct ieee802154_dev *dev)
0133 
0134 Freeing registered PHY.
0135 
0136 .. c:function:: void ieee802154_rx_irqsafe(struct ieee802154_hw *hw, struct sk_buff *skb, u8 lqi)
0137 
0138 Telling 802.15.4 module there is a new received frame in the skb with
0139 the RF Link Quality Indicator (LQI) from the hardware device.
0140 
0141 .. c:function:: void ieee802154_xmit_complete(struct ieee802154_hw *hw, struct sk_buff *skb, bool ifs_handling)
0142 
0143 Telling 802.15.4 module the frame in the skb is or going to be
0144 transmitted through the hardware device
0145 
0146 The device driver must implement the following callbacks in the IEEE 802.15.4
0147 operations structure at least::
0148 
0149    struct ieee802154_ops {
0150         ...
0151         int     (*start)(struct ieee802154_hw *hw);
0152         void    (*stop)(struct ieee802154_hw *hw);
0153         ...
0154         int     (*xmit_async)(struct ieee802154_hw *hw, struct sk_buff *skb);
0155         int     (*ed)(struct ieee802154_hw *hw, u8 *level);
0156         int     (*set_channel)(struct ieee802154_hw *hw, u8 page, u8 channel);
0157         ...
0158    };
0159 
0160 .. c:function:: int start(struct ieee802154_hw *hw)
0161 
0162 Handler that 802.15.4 module calls for the hardware device initialization.
0163 
0164 .. c:function:: void stop(struct ieee802154_hw *hw)
0165 
0166 Handler that 802.15.4 module calls for the hardware device cleanup.
0167 
0168 .. c:function:: int xmit_async(struct ieee802154_hw *hw, struct sk_buff *skb)
0169 
0170 Handler that 802.15.4 module calls for each frame in the skb going to be
0171 transmitted through the hardware device.
0172 
0173 .. c:function:: int ed(struct ieee802154_hw *hw, u8 *level)
0174 
0175 Handler that 802.15.4 module calls for Energy Detection from the hardware
0176 device.
0177 
0178 .. c:function:: int set_channel(struct ieee802154_hw *hw, u8 page, u8 channel)
0179 
0180 Set radio for listening on specific channel of the hardware device.
0181 
0182 Moreover IEEE 802.15.4 device operations structure should be filled.