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I'm attempting to get some ZigBee equipment to communicate with each other. I've had some success with the XBee USB, but I have had to switch to Telegesis recently. This piece appears to have a specific AT command set. Will it be compatible with ZigBee sensors made by other companies?

Also - I've run across a few APIs for ZigBee. Are they all just AT commands at the core?

Peter Mortensen
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ethrbunny
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2 Answers2

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AT commands are just used to configure the Telegesis ZigBee module. It's a SoC and can work in any mode (coordinator/router/zed). On the other side, it talks the ZigBee language and can communicate with any ZigBee certified device. So it can be used to create a ZigBee network or can be included in any ZigBee network.

Peter Mortensen
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user2712705
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All ZigBee radios should interoperate -- you just need to make sure they are configured to join to each other. With XBee modules, be sure to set ATZS to 2 so the radios form and try to join a true ZigBee network. The default setting of 0 is for non-ZigBee networks.

To have modules join to each other, you'll need to know the PAN ID and possibly link key used to secure the network.

Once you start communicating via ZigBee, expect to use these modules in an API frame mode, where you need to set address information (destination node, source/destination endpoint, cluster) in the headers.

tomlogic
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  • Can you recommend a resource for how to interpret the packets? I can get my sensors to (apparently) join the PAN created by the Telegesis USB device but I can't seem to get the data from them. – ethrbunny Jul 10 '13 at 19:10
  • You probably need to send ZDO discovery packets, followed by ZCL discovery, followed by ZCL commands to read attributes on the sensors. If you still have the XBee modules and can get them to join, there's a sample program in the [Digi XBee ANSI C Library](https://github.com/digidotcom/xbee_ansic_library) called `zigbee_walker` that can discover all of the endpoints/clusters/attributes and display the current values. (Disclosure: I wrote most of that library, and that sample program.) – tomlogic Jul 10 '13 at 20:42
  • I don' think these are attributes as such. They are PIR 'motion sensors'. Should be sending a packet when they detect heat (or a change in heat) – ethrbunny Jul 10 '13 at 20:43
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    You probably need to get a ZigBee sniffer to show you all network traffic and decode the packets for you. Finding an inexpensive sniffer could be a challenge, but I believe Wireshark can do it with the correct hardware. – tomlogic Jul 10 '13 at 20:47