Wireless Device
A wireless device is a physical sensor or virtual resource that connects to the platform without using physical cables. It can directly or indirectly send data to the platform and respond to commands from IoTConnect. Here’s what a wireless device connected to the internet can do:
- Receive external instructions: You can send commands, OTA updates, etc., via wireless device configuration. The message direction here is only from the cloud to the device.
- Send a device’s internal representation: The internal representation includes device health, firmware version, event triggers, or device states like sensor temperature or whether the light is on or off. The message direction here is only from the device to the cloud.
Wireless devices are fundamental IoT entities capable of generating telemetry data and responding to commands. IoTConnect stores the device’s telemetry data as wireless device attributes. The platform then takes action, analyzes, and visualizes this data. If necessary, IoTConnect also sends commands in response.
Why Wireless Device Management
Let’s consider a scenario involving commercial buildings, as explained in the users and roles module. If your IoT solutions manage these buildings and you have wireless devices on each floor, you can use wireless device metadata to identify their locations, such as on the ninth floor.
Suppose your buildings have centralized HVAC systems. With IoTConnect, you can send commands for the wireless device to activate a specific function when set conditions are met. For example, turning on the heater when the temperature reaches ten degrees Celsius. The wireless device follows its pre-programmed logic, changes its internal state, and turns on the heater upon receiving the command.
To ensure that wireless devices are in the appropriate state and their configuration is applied correctly, you can report the states of each wireless device (on/off, temperature, etc.) to IoTConnect. This helps validate that the temperature is below or equal to ten degrees.
This seemingly simple process involves the following steps for wireless devices:
- Creating a template
- Adding a wireless device
- Creating wireless device attributes
- Implementing commands
- Extracting wireless device properties
- Defining roles
- Executing OTA updates
That’s why wireless device management is crucial. This user manual guides you on how to manage wireless devices in IoTConnect.