Iiotsys™ IoT Switch: Integration into OpenHAB made easy for MQTT control

OpenHAB Forum.

By invitation of the openHAB foundation president, Kai Kreuzer it gives me pleasure to share our integration of the MQTT based iiotsys™ IoT Switch product.

A iiotsys™ IoT Switch is part of the home automation (internet of things) devices that allows you to control electronic and electrical devices that are connected to it by turning them either on and off or opening and closing them.

For many years we have followed OpenHAB and with our new product, OpenHAB is the platform of choice in which we have chosen to integrate with. We give great thanks to all of you who have made such a phenomenal home automation product possible and kept it open.

In many respects we acknowledge that the true future of the Internet of things lies in the ability to create secure but flexible solutions that integrate using common protocols.

The integration is not based on a add on but PHP code which writes the item, sitemap and MQTT configuration and presents the user with a web interface to manage adding and removing iiotsys™ IoT Switches as well as MQTT cloud accounts. We have also launched a Mobile App for Android which supports pushing this configuration via API into our integration.

The choice in OpenHAB, apart from customizable dashboards and Apps, with MyOpenHAB cloud, extends the ability for consumers to utilize the voice enabled platforms like Amazon and Google plus securely publish their local server instances.

Click is a link to the OpenHAB integration video’s

Click this link to the iiotsys IoT Switch introduction video.

After years in research and development there is simply too much information to publish in this post, the intention is not to draw anyone away from this forum, but in the interests of saving unnecessary repetition you are welcome to visit our website and then comment back on this forum where I will respond.

From time to time we will be updating this topic.

Again I would like to thank Kai and the foundation members for the privilege and opportunity of introducing our humble contribution.

Kevern Upton
Director
KLD TECHNOLOGIES CC (TA) iiotsys™

3 Likes

Sounds cool to have an actual product communicating via mqtt. Mqtt got a lot of love for openhab 2.4 including an embedded broker, thing and auto discovery support (for devices following the Homie convention).
If your mqtt topics are well known, auto discovery for your devices could be added via add-on with limited work only.

Cheers, David

Hi David, thank you for your input. I think in general IoT has a lot of love for MQTT being small footprint, lightweight and secure.

As our products are commercial grade each control action on our base model of which there are several consist of a 7 character encrypted strings and each IoT switch has a unique 24 character encrypted ID.
Further the cloud services segment authorised users to avoid cross control and enhance security, this commercial grade of security is seldom found in localised or as you refer to “embedded” broker services. Additionally efficiencies such as routing, exchanges and the like are also not so prevalent in localised “Homie” conventions.
Although you are correct in that a add-on can be crafted to cater for this complexity of rolling up IoT Switches standerdization of controls to bring about a “Generic” nature in catering for simpler version of add-on is something we considered but negated due to the risks surrounding it.

As I promised Kai, our love of OpenHAB and wanting to align to the openness of the OpenHAB platform means that we had already embedded a local broker service complete with bindings in the images and virtual appliance software that is available for free download on our website. In keeping with the “local server” rationale of OpenHAB the IoT Switch Web management interface (port 80) on the local OpenHAB server will cater or allow the user to specify his/her local server as a MQTT “cloud” instance.

So in essance a user that has deployed switches can use his local embedded MQ broker on his local OpenHAB server, use the IoT Switch Web Management interface, point all his switches inwardly but still enjoy voice control and secure publishing through MyOpenHabCloud platform.

To go a step further, the IoT Switches themselves have embedded webservers which allow for full customization of any MQ settings and more where users can specify;

  • SoftAP SSID and password
  • Station SSID and password
  • MQ Server (Sever URL/IP, Port, Username, Password, Email Address and Unique Device ID (limitation 32 Characters)
  • MQ Action control Keys (ON, OFF, PULSE, STATE, STATUS, REBOOT, RESET and retrive local IP ADDRESS (Limitation 9 Characters)
    Station and MQ Server has first level validation and all sucessfully validated data is stored to EEPROM.

The IoT Switches also support traditional http post / response control so for those guys using OpenHAB in a html way can also still control these devices.

In keeping with the “Homie” we know most guys love to tinker, we have provided pin-outs and TTL programming inputs on our boards so that it can be re-programmed if no one hasn’t already fallen in love with our simple interfaces.
We have complied with best practice and also not embedded the chipset on the board so it can be replaced readily, we also support rs232 interface to the logic board.

Like OpenHAB and again as promised to Kai and the founding members Gensys is about empowering people to use IoT without exposing them to much risk but being open enough to use common principles and not tie them into platforms.

I trust this has answered your question and comments in enough detail, if not please do reach out again with more questions.

Kevern Upton.