[fritzboxtr064] AVM mesh update breaks presence detection in mixed environments

This is just a heads-up for other people stumbling upon the problem. It is most likely a “feature” of the Fritz!Box itself and not a bug in the OpenHAB binding.

Up to now, I had a solid presence detection based on the availability of my mobile phone’s mac address in my home network. The “maconline” item of the fritzboxtr064 binding did a great job. It worked well even with multiple access points, as the central router always was seeing traffic from that mac address and therefore was aware of the device.

Recently, I upgraded my Fritz!Box to the latest firmware (6.90) including the “mesh wifi” feature. Now, as long as my phone is connected directly to the Fritz!Box, everything continues to work. It even works the same way as in the past, when the phone is connected to an access point which is part of the mesh (e.g. Fritz!Repeater 1750 with the current firmware).

But, as soon as the phone is connected to a different access point, it is now detected as offline. :cry:

Update: This post stated in the past that it works at least in the mesh. It doesn’t do that in a reliable way either. FWIW, presence on the Fritz!Box seems to be broken for me since 6.90.

Assign fixed IPs and move over to the network binding. Will also allow you to incorporate the status of fixed network devices into your presence detection. The most reliable indicator for my kids’ presence is their PC’s status :wink:

Fritzbox 6490 User here
I am also using TR064 / SOAP API for presence and since Firmware 06.83 and 06.84 it’s not reliable anymore for clients behind a repeater.

Take a look here:
FritzBox TR-064 Binding - Problem with latest firmware update and device online/offline state

The networkhealth binding works fine for PCs, but unfortunately not for mobile devices due to their battery saving, suspending WLAN connection. At least here…

Try to get around that using the WOL Wake-on-LAN binding.

Do you have a working example for android?

Huh? See binding docs. If you’re looking for a Linux binary to ‘wake up’ devices using their MAC address, check out the wakeonlan or etherwake packages.

No, I was meaning a working example on how to periodically wake up an Android phone - the binding doc only shows a windows and linux example and a quick web search brought no result for Android…

The WOL binding docs have examples how to execute remote commands on a Linux or Windows box.
You can’t do that with an Android.
But that isn’t what WOL is about. WOL means to send a specific IP (or L2, actually) packet to a box (of unknown/irrelevant OS type).

Btw, if you’re using the networkhealth binding to ping your devices at a constant rate of some-10s-of-seconds, they shouldn’t fall asleep.

Ah, okay, so on my Openhabian system on Raspberry, I can simply execute the Linux WOL command to wake up my Android phone?

On the network binding, I actually have a refresh interval of 60 secs and the android devices fall asleep. I will check if 20…30secs work better.

Yes, provided your Android allows for this.
If they only remain online for less than a minute as you say, they’re badly misconfigured. Try disabling some of those energy saver settings.

@bbock I have the same issue here, but I think it has nothing to do with meshing, as I have connected
the access points via “lan-bridge” mode to the fritzbox and not via wireless meshing. I only see my mobile phone’s mac address online when directly connected to the fritzbox but not when connect at an access point…

Did you find a solution / workaround for this? I also use networkhealth binding but newer Androids keep disconnecting (although every energy savings mode is disabled), older Androids <7 work reliable here.

Cheers, Bernd

@bernd_d I have connected them as well via Ethernet. But since 6.90, this is also treated as mesh (according to the GUI), which probably affects the internal handling and things like handover.

Networkhealth is not yet stable for me either, I’m still experimenting with timers. No usable presence detection for the time being… :cry:

My GUI only shows active meshing on the Fritzbox Side - not on at the access points (meshing Icon) - as I have it not activated for the access points. Running Firmware 6.92 - but still no MAC address recognition at the access points…

Interesting. I have enabled the mesh feature for the AP.
Unfortunately, either way, presence doesn’t work with 6.90 or newer.

image

Same here from time to time it is working then sometimes not… 3 Fritzboxes as AP… in one mesh netzwork…

funny thing as well is, that my two dect!200 wireless sockets are now 6 things one for each ap…

I don’t know if this helps, but the latest beta release notes state that all connects and disconnects will be logged inthe whole Mesh.

— Weitere Verbesserungen in FRITZ!OS 6.98-48630 —
Heimnetz: Verbesserung - An- und Abmeldungen werden im gesamten Mesh protokolliert

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FWIW, anyone unable to reliably detect presence using network binding, check out the network binding docs and ARping related options in particular.

Anyone running on 6.98 Labor Firmware? Could you confirm that this issue is fixed in new AVM Firmware?

I can confirm this issue is still existing with tbe latest Labor firmware for the 7490.

As soon as i’m leaving the wlan the Presence Switch just toogles constantly.

This is with just the fritzbox, no repeater involved. I wish i hadn’t upgraded a few days ago. :frowning_face: