Presentations

Z-Wave Alliance is Now an SDO

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What does an SDO mean you might ask? An SDO is a Standards Development Organization and the Z-Wave Alliance has now legally become a non-profit SDO. What this means to you is that Silicon Labs no longer control the progress of Z-Wave, the members of the SDO now control it. Read more details about the SDO in the Z-Wave Alliance Press Release.

There are seven founding members: Alarm.com, Assa Abloy, Leedarson, Ring, Silicon Labs, StratIS, and Qolsys. If you’re employed by one of these companies, join a working group and make your ideas known! There are six different membership levels with varying “voting rights” and costs so your organization can choose a level based on interest and budget.

How will this impact you and your IoT device development? In the short term probably not much, early next year however, expect to see the first Z-Wave product pass thru the new certification requirements based on the specifications produced by the SDO. Longer term this is all part of Z-Wave becoming an open standard with more silicon providers and software stack provides implementing new features all to make Z-Wave last for years to come.

The goal is to make Z-Wave THE sub-GigaHertz radio standard for IoT devices. Z-Wave is simple, low power, doesn’t require a lot of FLASH/RAM (IE: it runs on cheap MCUs) and most of all interoperable all the way back to devices released over two decades ago. Sub-GigaHertz means the radio passes thru walls and travels longer distances with less interference than the 2.4GHz protocols.

I want to remind everyone to register for the Works With Virtual Conference coming up in just a few weeks! Click below to check it out – HEY it’s FREE!

Register for the Works With Conference by clicking here. Learn how to integrate into Amazon, Google, Apple an other IoT ecosystems.

Works With is much more than just Z-Wave. All the key eco-system players are there explaining in detail how to be a part of their world. This is a technical conference so don’t miss it. I’ll be giving a demo of the latest version of Simplicity Studio V5 and how to quickly build, debug and certify Z-Wave applications.

Z-Wave Works With Amazon, Google, Samsung, Apple, Comcast Virtual Conference

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Silicon Labs is hosting what was intended to be an in-person conference in Austin Texas but is now a virtual online conference on IoT ecosystems – the Works With Smart Home Developer Event September 9-10. The best part is it is now FREE to attend any of the in-depth technical sessions and you don’t have to wear a mask. The downside is that we don’t get to experience all that great music down in Austin – well, there’s always next year!

Virtual IoT Works With EcoSystems from Google, Amazon, Apple for Z-Wave development engineers
https://workswith.silabs.com/

I am hosting the Z-Wave track and will be making several presentations including a detailed look at Silicon Labs latest release of Simplicity Studio V5 which just came out yesterday. We’ll also have presentations on developing Z-Wave Smart Hubs and Z-Wave Certification. I’ll also be describing some IoT failures – you learn more from your failures than your successes. We have speakers and engineers from all of the ecosystem partners, not just Silicon Labs folks. Learn from the experts from across the industry!

What is Works With 2020? The smart home developer’s virtual event where you will have the opportunity to interact with our ecosystem partners from Amazon, Google, Samsung, and Z-Wave to connect devices, platforms and protocols and be able to immerse yourself in keynotes, a panel discussion on Project CHIP, hands-on, and technical sessions led by smart home engineers who are building the latest advanced IoT devices. The Works With event is live, all-online, free of charge, and you can join from anywhere around the world.

Works With Z-Wave Apple, Google, Amazon, Samsung IoT SmartHome conference 2020

Click here to Register Today and feel free to forward to the rest of your team.

Here’s an overview of what you won’t want to miss:

Specialized Engineer-Led Tracks – Educational sessions and technical training designed for engineers, executives, developers, business development and product managers.

Hands-On Workshops More than 12 workshops and hands-on sessions to give you experience, knowledge and confidence to develop and accelerate smart home development.  

One-on-One Developer Meetings – Schedule a meeting with Silicon Labs or an ecosystem partner to get 1:1 technical guidance.

Join me in September and learn how to smoothly get your IoT device plugged into any and all of the ecosystem partners. Register today, it’s totally free and you can join from anywhere in the world. See you September!

Z-Wave Virtual Academy

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Z-Wave Virtual Webinar Wednesdays at Noon Eastern US time

Doctor Z-Wave will be giving a hands-on live demo of getting started using Z-Wave with Simplicity Studio on Wednesday June 17. This is a live demo with just a couple of slides so you don’t want to miss it. The session is a short roughly 30 minutes with time for Q&A afterward. I will show you some simple things on setting up Simplicity to make your life easier when getting started. If you can’t make it, it will be recorded and available via the Alliance web site.

There are lots of other topics for Webinar Wednesdays:

Webinar Wednesday Schedule*: *This schedule will be updated regularly on the Z-Wave Alliance website as the series progresses
May 27, 2020  
  Manufacturing During a Global Pandemic: Insight & Strategy from Companies Who Are Coping Hosted by: Avi Rosenthal – Bluesalve Partners  
June 3, 2020   Social Distance Sales for Uncertain Times: Tips & Insight for Integrators Hosted by: Jeremy McLerran – Qolsys
June 10, 2020   Residential Smart Lock Market: Trends, Use-Cases & Opportunities Hosted by: Colin DePree – Salto Systems
June 17, 2020 Z-Wave 700 Series: Getting Started Hosted by: Eric Ryherd – Silicon Labs
June 24, 2020  
  Feature of Leedarson Z-Wave 700 Series Security Products Hosted by: Vincent Zhu & Michael Bailey Smith – Leedarson
 

Z-Wave for the Smart Home Presentation

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I’m giving a presentation on Z-Wave where you can ask questions and get answers about the opening of the Z-Wave specification among other topics. There are more Tech Talks scheduled and several recent topics were recorded. Follow the links below.

      Logo     Hero       Good news! We have added new Tech Talks. Join us on Tuesdays and Thursdays for live virtual, technical discussions hosted by a lead engineer with time allocated for your questions. We’ll cover topics like battery optimization with BG22, using Z-Wave for your Smart Home Solutions and more. You don’t want to miss these next talks.

Register by clicking here: Tech Talks:
Z-Wave Smart Home Solutions by Doctor Z-Wave
Tomorrow April 23 at 4 p.m ET

Battery Optimization with BG22
Tues, April 28 at 3 p.m. CT
Max Performance on BLE – Simultaneous Connections, Beacons and Scanning
Thurs, April 30 at 3 p.m. CT
SubGHz Proprietary and Connect Software Stack
Tues, May 5 at 3 p.m. CT
How to Measure and Debug Network Performance – Using Silicon Labs Network Analyzer
Thurs, May 7 at 3 p.m. CT

Z-Wave Summit Fall 2018 Philadelphia

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The Z-Wave Summit is usually held only once each year in the USA and it is not to be missed. I’ll give a brief overview of what was discussed at the summit in the short post below. But if you didn’t attend in person, you missed the most valuable aspect of the summit which is the chance to meet and talk to other Z-Wave developers. This year the summit was hosted by Bulogics in the city of brotherly love,  Philadelphia PA. Bulogics is a Z-Wave certification house so they know everything about Z-Wave and how to have a good time!

2018ZWaveSummitMitch.jpg

Summit Notes

The 700 series was officially “revealed” at the summit with many presentations talking about the new ARM based Z-Wave transceiver. The summit has over 140 attendees from 70 companies not including all the Silicon Labs and Alliance employees. This is the largest attendance of a summit to date and reflects the rapidly growing world of Z-Wave.

Matt Johnson, IoT Sr. VP, described the roadmap for multiprotocol chips which include Z-Wave, zigbee, BLE and Wifi as well as proprietary protocols. For the immediate term though the focus is on getting the 700 series shipping. The real key for Z-Wave is the interoperability and certification ensuring every Z-Wave device can communicate with every other device.

Z-Wave product manager Johan Pedersen presented the important improvements in the 700 series over the 500 series:

  • ARM M4 32-bit CPU
  • 150% RF range improvement in the US and more in EU/Asia
  • Lower power and faster wakeup time making coin cell operation a reality
  • Lower cost due to elimination of the external NVM & SAW
  • Single HW build for all regions due to elimination of the SAW filter
  • Longer battery life with 1.8-3.6V operation
  • Serial debugging

By far my main interest as a developer is that we finally have a real CPU with an M4 and serial debugging so I can finally single step my code and figure out where I went wrong!

The next natural question of course is when will the 700 series be a reality? The answer is “soon”. Ugh. Developers kits are supposed to be available soon and the parts will be shipping in early 2019.

Technical Track

On the second day of the summit the groups are split between marketing and technical geeks like me. More presentations on things like the new Z-Wave Plus V2 requirements which will go into effect with the 700 series release. The V2 requirements significantly ups the bar for support for various command classes with the goal of making Z-Wave devices to fully inform the hub of their capabilities. There should be little or no custom coding to support most V2 devices – the device will tell you everything it can do.

The presentation by Alex Capecelatro, founder of Josh.ai, described the future of voice control which sounds amazing. Alex described just how hard voice control really is and has a long way to go before it really works the way we all want it to. I liked his quote from the New York Times: “We overestimate what technology can do in 3 years but underestimate what can be done in 10 years”. Z-Wave has come a long way in the dozen years it’s been around.

Configuration Command Class

2018summitERI gave a presentation on Configuration Command Class Version 4 and all the wonderful things it can do. The most notable point is that 2/3rds of the Z-Wave Plus certified devices have at least one Configuration Parameter. Yet many hubs have no way of modifying or displaying to the user the current value of parameters. Z-Wave Plus V2 mandates support for Configuration Command Class V4 for both hubs and devices so you need to get busy! My presentation title is: “The Chicken vs Egg is over: Moving Your Product to Configuration Version 4” which can be downloaded from this link: Z-WaveAlliance2018EricRyherd.

Interoperables Band

Once again the band The Interoperables played at the evening get together at a local brewery. These guys are really good for having only practiced a couple of times!

2018ZWaveSummitInteroperables

DrZWave joins Silicon Labs

That’s right, I have officially joined Silicon Labs as an FAE covering the Eastern US. I can be contacted at drzwave@Silabs.com.

 

 

 

 

EU Z-Wave Summit 2018 – Amsterdam

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2018EUSummit1IoT Device Testing Best Practices by Eric Ryherd

Click  HERE to see the entire presentation including my notes. If you are a Z-Wave Alliance member a video of the presentation is usually posted on the members only section of their web site. The main takeaways from my presentation are:

  • Have a written test plan
  • Use the Compliance Test Tool (CTT) as the START of your test plan
  • Vary the environmental conditions during testing
  • Test using real world applications
  • Test using complex Z-Wave networks with routing and marginal RF links
  • Test with other hubs and devices
  • Automate testing using tools like the ZWP500
  • Code firmware with failure in mind
  • Utilize the WatchDog timer built into the Z-Wave chip

The presentation goes into detail on each of these topics so I won’t duplicate the information here. I also go thru several failures of devices I’ve been working with. You learn more from failures than you do when everything just works. This is the same presentation that gave last fall in the US summit.

Z-Wave Summit Notes

2018EUSummit4There were nearly 200 attendees at the Summit – a significant increase over last year. One of the main purposes of the summit is to learn what’s new in Z-Wave and what Silicon Labs is planning for the future. The most important news at this year’s summit is the 700 series which was announced at CES in January. Unfortunately we will have to wait a bit longer to get our hands on the chips due to the purchase of Sigma Designs by Silicon Labs. The 700 series chip has been updated to match the other SiLabs microcontrollers so the silicon has been delayed a bit but they expect to ship parts before the end of 2018. Z-Wave will benefit tremendously from a real CPU instead of the very resource constrained 8051 in the 500 series. The feature I can’t wait for is the hardware debugger. We’ll finally be able to single step our C code and inspect variables and set breakpoints. No more PRINTF! Yeah!

Time for hubs to switch to Z/IP and ZWare

The very clear message of the summit is that Z/IP and ZWare are now mature and is THE gateway interface going forward. My initial brief trials with Z/IP were frustrating with poor documentation and the software really wasn’t quite ready. But with the recent release of 2.81 it would appear it is ready for prime time and I’ll have to give it another look. I was surprised by the number of gateway developers that were at the summit and most were already using at least Z/IP and many also using the ZWare abstraction layer. The SerialAPI is the interface most gateway developers have used in the past but this is a very low-level interface. There are many nuances of handling sleeping devices and the complexities of the encrypted security encapsulation when using such a low-level interface. This is where Z/IP comes in which handles nearly all of these lower level details for you. Z/IP is planned to be the only supported interface in the near future and certification costs will be significantly higher if it is not used. ZWare adds another layer on top of the Z/IP which provides much easier C++ objects relieving the developer from having to learn the details of each Z-Wave command class. See the Z-Wave Public web site for more details.

The internal Z-Wave Technical Site (ZTS) is now also available to everyone but you still have to click on “accept terms” to gain access. However the access is granted immediately so you don’t have to wait for “approval”. So anyone wanting to learn about the inner guts of Z-Wave can now do so without buying a DevKit.

Summit isn’t all work, work, work

Maker:L,Date:2017-8-26,Ver:5,Lens:Kan03,Act:Kan02,E-YThe Summit isn’t all work all day even though the days are long and filled with lots of technical information. This summit had an evening at the Rosarium park. The park has room for team building games like a maze run, archery, volleyball among other games and of course lots of food and drink. It was a nice ice breaker and a good way to get to know your fellow Z-Wave developers. The networking opportunities are a very large part of the value of attending the summit in person. The evening highlight was a performance by the “Interoperables” Z-Wave Rock and Roll band lead by Alliance chairman Mitch Klein.

CES 2018

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The Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas is THE trade show for smart home technology and all things cool and new and geeky. It’s a massive show and I only spent one day there and never made it out of the Sands convention center which is one of the smaller venues. If you’ve never been to CES it is something to see. The crowds are enormous and the tech is brand new. So new, some of it will never actually make it to market as there is plenty of smoke and mirrors.

Eric Ryherd wireless IoT consultant expert

My purpose is obviously to seek out the latest news about Z-Wave and chat with my clients. The Z-Wave Alliance invited me to man the “Ask the Expert” desk at the show for a few hours which I was happy to do. My expert knowledge of Z-Wave answered simple questions like “what’s Z-Wave?” (It’s like wifi but low power) to complex questions about the rules around Security S2 and SmartStart.

The most common question is always what’s the difference between Z-Wave and Zigbee? My short answer is that Zigbee is like silos. If you can develop an app, gateway and all the devices you need, then Zigbee will work OK. Z-Wave however was a mesh network from day one and every Z-Wave device can talk to every other Z-Wave device regardless of the manufacturer. Z-Wave is built around standardized command classes so every hub knows precisely what format a temperature sensor is sending the data. Is it in celcius or Fahrenheit? Tenths of a degree or hundredths? With Z-Wave, the format is fully specified. The other protocols let you decide the format which is fine if you have the huge budget to do it all. But if your investors have you on a shoestring budget then Z-Wave is the way to go. I have much longer answers to the Z-Wave vs. Zigbee question but much too long to keep your interest in a quick blog post.

The big announcement for Sigma (other than the acquisition by Silicon Labs) is the announcement of the 700 series. Unfortunately details remain shrouded in secrecy but Sigma has put a stake in the ground of having developers kits by summer 2018. Finally having a real 32 bit ARM processor will be a huge productivity improvement for us IoT developers.

I had limited time to walk the floor but it does seem that smart home has finally taken off. There are so many companies making cool gizmos it’s overwhelming. From sun tracking solar powered umbrellas to cameras of every size and resolution to lots of new hubs there is no way one person can take it all in. You’ll just have to see for yourself.

The Z-Wave Alliance booth is even bigger this year filled with companies hawking the latest IoT thingamagiggy using Z-Wave. Every one of them able to talk to all the other Z-Wave doodads. The booth was busy all day long. I did wander past the tiny Zigbee booth buried in the back of the hotel with a few people in it but nothing like Z-Wave.

Z-Wave Summit 2017 at Jasco in Oklahoma City

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“IoT Device Testing Best Practices” by Eric Ryherd

Summit1Click HERE to see the entire presentation including my notes. If you are a Z-Wave Alliance member a video of the presentation is usually posted on the members only section of their web site. The main takeaways from my presentation are:

  • Have a written test plan
  • Use the Compliance Test Tool (CTT) as the START of your test plan
  • Vary the environmental conditions during testing
  • Test using real world applications
  • Test using complex Z-Wave networks with routing and marginal RF links
  • Test with other hubs and devices
  • Automate testing using tools like the ZWP500
  • Code firmware with failure in mind
  • Utilize the WatchDog timer built into the Z-Wave chip

ZWaveSummit2017aThe presentation goes into detail on each of these topics so I won’t duplicate the information here. I also go thru several failures of devices I’ve been working with. You learn more from failures than you do when everything just works. Feel free to comment and let me know what topic you’d like to see for next years summit.

Z-Wave Summit Notes

One of the main purposes of the summit is to learn what’s new in Z-Wave and what Sigma is planning for the future. The most important news at this year’s summit is SmartStart. The goal for SmartStart is to simplify the user experience of installing a new device on a Z-Wave network. The concept is that a customer will open the package for a device, plug it in, the hub is already waiting for the device to be joined and the device just shows up on their phone without having to press a button or enter the 5 digit pin code. This is a “game changer” as Sigma pointed out many times during the summit. Typically a user has to put their hub into inclusion mode, read the product manual to determine the proper button press sequence to put the device into inclusion mode, wait for the inclusion to go thru, write down the NodeID number, with an S2 device they have to read the teeny-tiny 5 digit PIN code printed on the product (or scan the QR code) and then MAYBE the device is properly included. Or more often, they have to exclude and retry the process all over again a couple of times. SmartStart as you can see will make the user experience much easier to get started with Z-Wave.

SmartStart enables “pre-kitting” where a customer buys a hub and several devices as a kit. The hub and the devices in the kit are all scanned at the distribution warehouse and are all white listed on the hub web site. When the customer plugs all the devices in, they automatically join and all just magically show up ready to be used without the frustration of trying to get all the devices connected together. Unfortunately there are no devices that support SmartStart and there are no hubs that support it either – yet. We’ll get over that eventually but I suspect it’ll take a year before any significant numbers of SmartStart supported devices show up on Amazon.

SmartStart is enabled in the SDK release 6.81 which occurred during the summit. There are some other handy features in this release. The main new feature (after SmartStart) is the ability to send a multi-cast FLiR beam. One problem with FLiR devices is that they are all sleeping devices and briefly wake up once per second to see if someone wants to talk to them. Prior to 6.81 you had to wake up the devices one at a time and each one would take more than one second to wake up. If you have battery powered window shades like I do, there is a noticeable delay as the shades start moving one at a time instead of all together. Both the shades and the remote (or hub) will need to be upgraded to 6.81 before we can use this new feature. That means it’ll be again probably another year before this feature is widely available, but it’ll get there eventually.

There are rumors that Sigma will be announcing a new generation of the Z-Wave transceiver chip in early 2018. I am hoping it will will finally include the upgrade from an 8-bit 8051 CPU to a more capable 32-bit ARM CPU.  The current 500 series relies on the ancient 8051 with very limited debugging capabilities which significantly slows firmware development. With an ARM CPU developers like Express Controls will find it easier to hire engineers who can code and debug firmware and thus we’ll be able to bring more Z-Wave products to market in less time.

A new web site, Z-WavePublic.com, has been populated with the Z-Wave documentation as well as images for the Beagle Bone Black and Raspberry Pi loaded with Sigmas Z/IP and Z-Ware. With one of these boards and a USB Z-Stick anyone can start developing with Z-Wave without having to sign a license agreement. Nice way to get started with Z-Wave for you DIY nerds out there. There were many other presentations on Security S2, Certification, The CIT, Z/IP, HomeKit and many other topics on the technical track of the summit. The marketing track had a different set of presentations so I recommend sending both a technical person and a marketing person to the summit.

Summit isn’t all work, work, work

IMG_20170927_090355The Summit isn’t all work all day though the days are long and tiring. Tuesday evening was a reception at Coles Garden which is a beautiful event venue. Unfortunately it was raining so we couldn’t wander thru the gardens much but Mitch, the Alliance Chairman, kept us entertained.

Wednesday evening was the Members Night at the Cowboy museum. Oil profits made a lot of wealthy Oklahomans who were able to make sizable donations to this huge museum. There is a lot more to see than we had time to explore so I’d recommend spending more time here if anyone is visiting Oklahoma City. Lots of food and drink made for an ideal networking environment with your fellow Z-Wave developers.

 

10 Questions when Reviewing Embedded Code

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Design News posted a great article “10 Questions to Consider When Reviewing Code” and I’m just posting the list here. Follow the link for the full article with the details behind each question.

  1. Does the Program build without warnings?
  2. Are there any blocking functions?
  3. Are there any potential infinite loops?
  4. Should this function parameter be a const?
  5. Is the code’s cyclomatic complexity less than 10?
  6. Has extern been limited with a liberal use of static?
  7. Do all if…else if… conditionals end with an else? And all switch statements have a default?
  8. Are assertions and/or input/output checks present?
  9. Are header guards present?
  10. Is floating point mathematics being used?

My personal pet peeve is #3 – I am constantly reviewing that uses WHILE loops waiting for a hardware bit to change state. But what if the hardware bit is broken? Then the device is DEAD. Always have some sort of timeout and use a FOR loop instead of a WHILE loop. At least the code will move on and won’t be dead. Maybe it won’t work properly because of the broken hardware but at least the device can limp along.