Need some clarification on BorderRouter setup with nrf52840 dongle in RCP design

[N.UMAMAHESWAR REDDY]

Hi all, 

I have a Raspberry pi 3B and nrf52840 dongles not DK

I need to setup Openthread  BorderRouter in RCP design, but in the main page of Openthread I couldn't really understand what I actually need to do from dongle side to attach it to Raspberry pi to make BorderRouter up and running.

I couldn't understand Flash RCP part. What need to be flashed into dongle before attaching it to Raspberry pi?

Can someone help me what need to be done from the nrf52840 dongle side?

[mjkuwp94]

I followed this guide to build the Dongle software

https://github.com/openthread/openthread/blob/main/examples/platforms/nrf528xx/nrf52840/README.md

and used this command (substitute where required)

make -f examples/Makefile-nrf52840 USB=1 BOOTLOADER=USB DOT_THREAD_VERSION=1.2

and you can also add JOINER=1 flag above but I don't know if you need it.

If you have a Windows laptop then you can use the gui application "nRF Connect" to program the Dongle.


There are multiple ways to do these things but the way I did required both a Linux computer to compile and then a Windows computer to do the flashing.

Assuming you built the OpenThread Border Router project correctly then you just need to insert the RCP flashed Dongle into a USB port of the pi and reboot, wait a couple of minutes and then use the information in the guide to test the functions.

example of a command you can execute in the Pi:
sudo ot-ctl state

[Kangping Dong]

Thanks @mjkuwp94 for your reply!

The examples in the openthread/openthread repo have been deprecated, better follow https://github.com/openthread/ot-nrf528xx/blob/main/src/nrf52840/README.md

to build a RCP firmware.

BRs,

Kangping

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[N.UMAMAHESWAR REDDY]

Thanks for the reply, 

In the github repo, Programming dongle is just showing how to program a dongle but no where it is mentioned as which .hex file do I really need to flash to dongle to serve as RCP. 

In the nRF SDK for Thread and Zigbee, there is only supported .hex file only for NCP but not RCP.

Help me with which .hex file do I need to flash to serve dongle as RCP.

[Jonathan Hui]

As noted in Building the examples, after a successful build, the elf files can be found in <path-to-ot-nrf528xx>/build/bin/*.

$ ls -l build/bin/

total 9224

-rwxr-xr-x  1 jonhui  eng  1172484 May  5 20:14 ot-cli-ftd

-rwxr-xr-x  1 jonhui  eng  1045680 May  5 20:14 ot-cli-mtd

-rwxr-xr-x  1 jonhui  eng  1183412 May  5 20:14 ot-ncp-ftd

-rwxr-xr-x  1 jonhui  eng  1058440 May  5 20:14 ot-ncp-mtd

-rwxr-xr-x  1 jonhui  eng   252752 May  5 20:14 ot-rcp

ot-rcp is the binary for RCP.

The same section also describes how to convert them to hex files.

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[N.UMAMAHESWAR REDDY]

I have Windows OS and have installed Cygwin, after that installed gnu arm toolchain for windows first and followed the steps from the github page that I found and couldn't process after second command as it has shown some file directory [ openthread/***/bootsrap] is missing and cloned openthread repo and got some relavent errors, installed gnu tools based on Linux as Cygwin is related to Linux and have got those errors that mentioned on those screenshots, tried to fix those with some online references but nothing helpful.

Please let me know where I did wrong and what need to be done to flash RCP to dongle

[Jonathan Hui]

You need to install CMake and Ninja.

If Windows is a requirement, I would suggest using Windows Subsystem for Linux rather than cygwin.

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[N.UMAMAHESWAR REDDY]

Tried Ubuntu on powershell in windows, after successful build and can see some files in build/bin but showing files with no extension, help mw with this.

[Ole Sæther]

Here are the instructions I use to build and create the dongle RCP hex file:
git clone https://github.com/openthread/openthread.git

cd openthread

./bootstrap

make -f examples/Makefile-nrf52840 USB=1 BOOTLOADER=USB

arm-none-eabi-objcopy -O ihex output/nrf52840/bin/ot-rcp rcp-pca10059.hex

Then I use the Nordic Semiconductor nRF Connect Desktop to program the hex-file:
https://www.nordicsemi.com/Software-and-tools/Development-Tools/nRF-Connect-for-desktop

Insert the dongle into your computer and push the button on the dongle to put it into DFU mode. The RED LED on the dongle will lite up when in DFU  mode.

Hope this helps!

[Ole Sæther]

You need to use objcopy to create the hex-file:

arm-none-eabi-objcopy -O ihex output/nrf52840/bin/ot-rcp rcp-pca10059.hex

[N.UMAMAHESWAR REDDY]

There's no Bootstrap file to run inside openthread folder and its inside script. Is this the same?

[Ole Sæther]

There is a bootstrap script:
https://github.com/openthread/openthread/blob/main/bootstrap

[N.UMAMAHESWAR REDDY]

 In step 3 of Setup BorderRouter have connected ethernet cable to install some dependences from bootstrap and setup scripts.

at step 3  INFRA_IF_NAME=eth0 ./script/setup this step has executed successfully 

but at  BORDER_ROUTING=0 NETWORK_MANAGER=1 ./script/setup facing the following issue

Please help me with this.

[Kangping Dong]

>but at  BORDER_ROUTING=0 NETWORK_MANAGER=1 ./script/setup facing the following issue

Since you already have network connection to the Raspberry Pi, it is not necessary for you to execute this

step because NETWORK MANAGER is for creating a personal Wi-Fi AP.

BRs,

Kangping

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[N.UMAMAHESWAR REDDY]

Thanks for all the support,

I have followed all the steps from OTBR setup and could be able to get the ot-rcp image and can see the command outputs as mentioned in the page i.e. for 

>sudo systemctl status 

• avahi-daemon.service
• otbr-agent.service
• otbr-web.service
  

for verifying RCP 

>sudo ot-ctl state

disabled

done

And BorderRouter-AP SSID is visible from Android mobile phone, but when trying to connect, it's not connecting instead showing as just saved.

Help me with this.

Thanks in advance.

[Jonathan Hui]

The Wi-Fi AP issue is likely something to do with the latest version of Raspberry Pi OS. Unfortunately, I do not have a fix available for you.

If there are others that have experience making Wi-Fi AP work on the latest Raspberry Pi OS release on a Raspberry Pi 4B, please let us know.

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[N.UMAMAHESWAR REDDY]

My WiFi access point is working now, following the same steps again worked, and even able to connect to WIFI AP now, but web GUI isn't opening now.

in systemctl status can see that otbr-agent.service is missing.

Need help to fix this!!

[Jonathan Hui]

Can you provide logs that show otbr-agent process starting and exiting to help identify the error?

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