ANT protocol usage question

Wireless & IoT
1

Hi

ANT is said to be easy to setup a Network.

However, I have following questions :

For example, if I buy a ′Nordic USB ANT Stick′ and ‘Transceiver nRF24AP1 with Trace Antenna’ in Sparkfun, setup a simple network to let these two devices to talk to each other in my installation. Do I need to pay any licence fee to anyone such as ANT Wireless(http://www.thisisant.com)? I can not find any document about whether it is free or not for commercial product use.

I am so confused about ANT and ANT+. Is ANT Wireless owns ANT? and everyone needs to pay licence fee to ANT Wireless if using ANT or ANT+?

Thanks!

2

I’ve just been looking at this and chatting with someone at ANT+

If you’re ok to use the ‘public’ network you probably don’t need to do anything else. If you want a closed, or private network then you need to obtain a network key.

Joining the ANT+ alliance gets you a key and access to their diagnostic software and reference designs. You need a company to do this and the developer license is $500.

There’s a seperate license if you want to embed the network key in a commercial product ($700).

Also, if you’re expecting to use sensors from another vendor (heart rate strap for example), if they’re using a private network key, you’ll need that before you can interface with them.

Purchasing the Development Kits get you access to the s/w and resources + some hardware but don’t give you a network key.

The requirements etc are described here

http://www.thisisant.com/images/Resourc … erview.pdf

I’m a bit discouraged because I bough a 24AP1 with the intention of hooking it to Suunto gear only to discover it’s a private network, but the folks at the ANT+ alliance were extremely helpful.

Hope this helps

3

Hi devlinse!

Thanks for you information. It is hard to find others who knows 24AP1 here. javascript:emoticon(‘:cry:’). I got two 24AP1 from SparkFun but so far, I still can not find the way to let them reading each other simply. It makes me very frustrated. I connected them with 2 arduinos seperately. MASTER with this code :

///// Master ///

void setup()

{

Serial.begin(4800);

//reset()

Serial.print(0xa4); // SYNC Byte

Serial.print(0x01); // LENGTH Byte

Serial.print(0x4a); // Message ID Byte ( ANT_RestSystem() )

Serial.print(0x00); // Data Byte N (N=LENGTH)

Serial.print(0xef); // Checksum

delay(1000); //delay 1sec

}

void loop(){

//assignch()

Serial.print(0xa4); // SYNC Byte

Serial.print(0x03); // LENGTH Byte

Serial.print(0x42); // Message ID Byte ( ANT_AssignChannel() )

Serial.print(0x00); // Channel no. 0

Serial.print(0x10); // Channel type

Serial.print(0x00); // Network no. 0

Serial.print(0xf5); // Checksum

delay(1000); //delay 1sec

//setchid()

Serial.print(0xa4); // SYNC Byte

Serial.print(0x05); // LENGTH Byte

Serial.print(0x51); // Message ID Byte ( ANT_SetChannelId() )

Serial.print(0x00); // Channel no. 0

Serial.print(0x31); // Device no. = 0x0031

Serial.print(0x00); // Device no.

Serial.print(0x01); // Device Type Id

Serial.print(0x05); // Man Id

Serial.print(0xc5); // Checksum

delay(1000); //delay 1sec

//opench()

Serial.print(0xa4); // SYNC Byte

Serial.print(0x01); // LENGTH Byte

Serial.print(0x4b); // Message ID Byte ( ANT_OpenChannel() )

Serial.print(0x00); // Channel no. 0

Serial.print(0xee); // Checksum

delay(1000); //delay 1sec

//send()

Serial.print(0xa4); // SYNC Byte

Serial.print(0x09); // LENGTH Byte

Serial.print(0x4e); // Message ID Byte ( ANT_SendBroadcastData->ChannelEventFunc() )

Serial.print(0x00); // Channel no. 0

Serial.print(0xaa); //Data

Serial.print(0xaa); //Data

Serial.print(0xaa); //Data

Serial.print(0xaa); //Data

Serial.print(0xaa); //Data

Serial.print(0xaa); //Data

Serial.print(0xaa); //Data

Serial.print(0xaa); //Data

Serial.print(0xe3); // Checksum

Serial.println();

Serial.print(“Hello world. I am master”);

Serial.println();

}

SLAVE with this code :

///// Slave ///

void setup()

{

Serial.begin(4800);

//reset()

Serial.print(0xa4); // SYNC Byte

Serial.print(0x01); // LENGTH Byte

Serial.print(0x4a); // Message ID Byte ( ANT_RestSystem() )

Serial.print(0x00); // Data Byte N (N=LENGTH)

Serial.print(0xef); // Checksum

delay(1000); //delay 1sec

}

void loop(){

//assignch()

Serial.print(0xa4); // SYNC Byte

Serial.print(0x03); // LENGTH Byte

Serial.print(0x42); // Message ID Byte ( ANT_AssignChannel() )

Serial.print(0x00); // Channel no. 0

Serial.print(0x00); // Channel type

Serial.print(0x00); // Network no. 0

Serial.print(0xe5); // Checksum

delay(1000); //delay 1sec

//setchid()

Serial.print(0xa4); // SYNC Byte

Serial.print(0x05); // LENGTH Byte

Serial.print(0x51); // Message ID Byte ( ANT_SetChannelId() )

Serial.print(0x00); // Channel no. 0

Serial.print(0x00); // Device no. = 0x0000

Serial.print(0x00); // Device no.

Serial.print(0x00); // Device Type Id

Serial.print(0x00); // Man Id

Serial.print(0xf0); // Checksum

delay(1000); //delay 1sec

//opench()

Serial.print(0xa4); // SYNC Byte

Serial.print(0x01); // LENGTH Byte

Serial.print(0x4b); // Message ID Byte ( ANT_OpenChannel() )

Serial.print(0x00); // Channel no. 0

Serial.print(0xee); // Checksum

delay(1000); //delay 1sec

//receive()

// read the incoming byte:

int incomingByte = Serial.read();

// say what you got:

Serial.print("I received: ");

Serial.println(incomingByte, DEC);

}

Regret, they could not communicate to each other. Now I have no other way to test the 24AP1 modules are workable or not. I am planning to buy ANT’s dev kit. May be this is the simpliest way to go.

My goal was trying to use a 24AP1 + program to communicate with Suunto HR belt but seems it is impossible except I can get the network key from Suunto directly. However, I found some codes from Garmin dev forum ( http://developer.garmin.com/forum/viewt … +ant+stick ) . If download this : http://www.vernazza.org/hr_win.zip . You can find keys inside the src. But I’ve ever tried it coz I’ve not yet got the HR belt. Now, I will not use Suunto and Garmin anymore because of the private network key problem. Moreover, there are many small brands’ HR belts in the market recently. Some of them are using 24AP1 and may be using public network.