AssetTracker2 (community library)

Summary

A library to support the Particle Asset Tracker 2 using a driver for the Ublox M8Q GPS receiver. This is an update to the original AssetTracker driver. That driver supported a different GPS receiver than is used on the Asset Tracker 2. This version uses the UbloxM8Q_GPS driver to support the Asset Tracker 2 GPS receiver. This version adds support for the odometer and Static Hold (see ublox specs). This version only adds a repository.

Example Build Testing

Library Read Me

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AssetTracker2

A Particle library for Asset Tracker 2. This library requires the UbloxM8Q_GPS driver for the GPS receiver used in Asset Tracker 2, and the libraries Adadfruit_LIS3DH and Adafruit_Sensor which were required for the first Asset Tracker hardware also.

Usage

Connect the Particle Asset Tracker 2 hardware, add the AssetTracker2, the UbloxM8Q_GPS, the Adafruit_LIS3SDH, and the Adafruit_Sensor libraries to your project and follow the example of one of the examples provided with this library. Only the 0_GPS_Features and 1_GPS_Features examples were modified. The other examples are unchanged from what was included with the original AssetTracker library.

See the examples folder for more details.

Documentation

When I first used the AssetTracker 2 hardware I tried the AssetTracker and Adafruit_GPS drivers which were written for a different GPS receiver. Although they worked to parse the NMEA data that the ublox receiver generates by default, they used the wrong protocol for configuration and so all commands were ignored. Also, to get the most benefit from the ublox receiver the ubx protocol must be used. So, I wrote this driver. Rather than support two protocols and suffer with the complexities involved I only implemented the ubx protocol. When the receiver is initialized the NMEA (ASCII) sentences are turned off and ubx protocol messages are enabled.

The ublox driver was written to be as compatible as possible with the AssetTracker driver but the AssetTracker library had dependencies on the non-ublox GPS receiver that was used for AssetTracker 1. I have created the AssetTracker2 library to remove the dependencies, but the AssetTracker2 is now inextricably depedendent on the ublox driver.

The external interface presented by AssetTracker and AssetTracker2 are similar but access methods that were specific to NMEA have been removed.

There is a timing problem on startup that is related to trying to initialize the GPS receiver while the cell, network, and cloud connections are being initialized by the particle system software. The symptom is the GPS receiver doesn't get configured correctly and so the driver never receives ubx messages immediately after initialization.

You can avoid the startup problem by starting in SYSTEM_MODE(MANUAL), then call Particle.connect() after the GPS receiver is running. See examples 0 and 1 for details.

This version of the drivers runs the gps access off a timer interrupt instead of calling it repeatedly in loop(). This works much better without any lost data.

Boiler plate from Particle that I didn't remove:

Contributing

Here's how you can make changes to this library and eventually contribute those changes back.

To get started, clone the library from GitHub to your local machine.

Change the name of the library in library.properties to something different. You can add your name at then end.

Modify the sources in and with the new behavior.

To compile an example, use particle compile examples/usage command in Particle CLI or use our Desktop IDE.

After your changes are done you can upload them with particle library upload or Upload command in the IDE. This will create a private (only visible by you) library that you can use in other projects. Do particle library add AssetTracker2_myname to add the library to a project on your machine or add the AssetTracker2_myname library to a project on the Web IDE or Desktop IDE.

At this point, you can create a GitHub pull request with your changes to the original library.

If you wish to make your library public, use particle library publish or Publish command.

LICENSE

This software was mostly written by someone else. I make no claim to license or copyright.

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