Configuring and Testing Xbee S1 for Digimesh Network Protocol

The development of swarn robot consists of two main part

1-Algorithm development

2-Platform development

Platform development consists of hull design,power management, networking.

In this post, I will focus on the NETWORKING part. From literature review, I found many form of communication done. The most common and widely used is IR(infra red) which is used by commercially available swarm robot platform such as swarmrobot.org and many more.

The communication can either be centralized or decentralized. 

Centralized communication can cause traffic jam due to multiple access to only one node to send/received data.

Decentralized communication offer reliable communication protocol. In our case, we implement a mesh network topology. Mesh network remove single point failure. To implement that, I choose to use multiple  Xbee S1 and Xbee Pro S1 to prove the mesh network.

Step1- Hardware needed

• 3 Unit of Xbee Module (Xbee S1/ Xbee Pro S1- 
• 3 Unit of Xbee Programming Board (SKXbee)
• 3 unit Micro USB Cable
• Multiple power bank (optional)

Step 2- Installing XCTU from Digi.com

Link:

http://www.digi.com/products/xbee-rf-solutions/xctu-software/xctu#productsupport-utilities

Step 3- Upgrade firmware

Step 4- Modify parameter ( Important!!)

Step 5- Testing communication between Xbee

Step 6- Prooving DigiMesh 'self healing' feature.

Next Tutorial- Range Test using XCTU