Quick Mesh Project

qMp 3.2.1 Clearance stable release has been published. This release comes after the previous 3.2 stable release and is based on the latest OpenWrt 15.05.1 Chaos Calmer release. The main differences from the previous release are the improved support for certain devices introduced in OpenWrt , and also a few bugs and fixes in both. It is recommended to use qMp 3.2.1 Clearance version to deploy new Mesh networks and to upgrade nodes running previous releases that might be outdated. Most likely, this will be the last release based on OpenWrt, as further development in qMp will be based on LEDE.

Before upgrading to this release from older versions, make a backup of all your configuration files in the /etc directory. You can use the command line tool "qmpcontrol upgrade" to automate the upgrade process.

Changes since the previous release (3.2):

• Based on OpenWrt 15.05.1 Chaos Calmer
• Using latest BMX6 stable version
• Added support for Lamobo R1 boards
• Added support for Alfa N5 devices
• Added support for TP-Link TL-WDR3500-v1 devices
• Added support for TP-Link TL-WA7510N devices

Changes since the previous release (3.2-rc3):

• Based on OpenWrt 15.05 Chaos Calmer
• Using latest BMX6 stable version
• Added support for Microduino MicroWrt devices
• A few bugs solved (see below)

Changes since the previous release (3.2-rc2):

• Based on OpenWrt 15.05-rc3 Chaos Calmer
• Using latest BMX6 stable version
• Proper declaration of VLANs for BMX6 in /etc/network/interfaces (backported from Kalimotxo/QinQ)
• Coherent naming scheme for precompiled binary images
• A few bugs solved (see below)

Changes since the previous release (3.2-rc1):

• Based on OpenWrt 15.05-rc2 Chaos Calmer
• Improved support for Ubiquiti XW devices
• Using latest BMX6 stable version
• Improved sysupgrade hash calculation method based on the device name
• 802.11s mesh support
• ...

Changes since the latest stable release (3.1):

• Based on OpenWrt 15.05-rc1 Chaos Calmer RC1
• Support for new devices (Ubiquiti XW devices, TP-Link and Ralink/Mediatek-based devices)
• 802.11s mesh support
• ...

Fixed bugs since the latest stable release (3.2):

• #383 Fixed error in the upgrade system due to image name changes
• #381 Fixed Chaos Calmer's missing packages signature key

Known issues

• #366 Devices based on the Atheros ar71xx (Atheros) platform containing a switch (e.g. NanoStation M5 XW) can not combine untagged+tagged VLANs on the same port. Therefore, switched cable interfaces can't be used for BMX6 meshing

The qMp 3.2.1 firmware binaries can be found at http://fw.qmp.cat/Releases/3.2.1. Otherwise, you can compile your own images with your preferred options:

git clone https://dev.qmp.cat/qmpfw.git qmpfw-3.2.1
cd qmpfw-3.2.1
git fetch --tags
git checkout tags/v3.2.1
git checkout -b v3.2.1
QMP_GIT_BRANCH=v3.2.1 make checkout
cd build/qmp && git checkout -b v3.2.1 && cd ../..
make J=n T=target

where n is the number of parallel threads to use in the compilation (1, 2, ..., 8...) and targets is the name of the device target to build the image (list them by issuing the command make list_targets).

On Tuesday 3^rd May 2016, during the Battle of the Mesh v9, the Linux Embedded Development Environment (LEDE) project was announced.

Citing its website, "The LEDE project is founded as a spin-off of the OpenWrt project and shares many of the same goals. We are building an embedded Linux distribution that makes it easy for developers, system administrators or other Linux enthusiasts to build and customize software for embedded devices, especially wireless routers."

We wish huge success to the LEDE project and we'll be testing it as the base for the qMp firmware in the following days.

Stay tuned!

 

The Wireless Battle of the Mesh is an event that aims to bring together people from across the globe to test the performance of different routing protocols for ad-hoc networks, like Babel, B.A.T.M.A.N, BMX6/BMX7, OLSR, and 802.11s and static routing. Of course, new protocols (working on OpenWrt) are always welcome.

Many developers and community networkers will join the event to hack, test, discuss, explain and learn. If you are interested in dynamic routing protocols or wireless community networks you can't miss this event! The Battlemesh is free of charge and open for all.

This year the event will take place from Sunday 1^st to Saturday 7^th of May 2016 in Porto, Portugal. It is organized locally by INESC TEC (Institute for Systems and Computer Engineering, Technology and Science), a private non-profit research & development institute located on the campus of the Faculty of Engineering of the University of Porto.

The qMp community endorses and supports the Battle of the Mesh v9, and teams with other communities to foster the development of bottom-up community networks.

The qMp project will support the event by:

• joining and promoting the event
• providing networking hardware for the routing protocols testing
• helping to set up the experimentation testbed and analyze measurements results
• giving talks about the progress of our community

Many other communities endorse and support the Wireless Battle of The Mesh v9. If you are interested in coming, join the event's Mailing List to stay up to date with the latest news.

Join us now and free the network!

Some weeks ago, Jason from Microduino™ kindly sent us three samples of the MicroWRT Core boards and asked us to give them a try and use them with qMp. We added the support for these devices in the recent qMp 3.2 Clearance stable release and played with them a little bit to build a small mesh with sensors.

The MicroWRT is a small and cheap development board based on the MediaTek MT7620A SoC (which integrates Ethernet networking and 2.4 GHz WiFi 2T2R), with 64 MB of RAM and 16 MB of flash storage. It is fully supported by the currently latest OpenWrt 15.05 Chaos Calmer release and, since recently, by the qMp 3.2 Clearance stable release.

The MicroWRT boards have a great performance and the SoC is well supported by qMp/OpenWrt. The devices are a great option to build a wireless mesh network that integrates sensors and actuators, thanks to their expansion board that allows integrating Microduino (Arduino-compatible) boards.

We have detailed the process of building a small mesh network with three of these devices, adding the Microduino board with a sensor and sharing the information all over the mesh network in the following two articles:

Experimenting with the Microduino MicroWRT (I)
Experimenting with the Microduino MicroWRT (II)

According to Jason from Microduino, the devices will be available for purchase in a few weeks.