Xbee / Zigbee

Developer's Corner DIY Hardware
1

Hi,
I have a few Zigbee projects I use with a different branded hub. I use Xbee for the communications.
Today I thought I’d have a brief attempt at connecting my projects to Vera to see what sort of device if any would be associated with the device.
Attached is a brief look at the communication between the hub and my device for anyone interested.

The initial connection looks totally normal. After it requests the manufacturer information it strangely asks again. I suspect that since the returned name isn’t recognised as a supported device it tries one more time. That ends it.
The device that eventually gets built is completely empty. No control or sense.
I suspect Vera only forms a device based on manufacturer and device name rather than the more normal way of identifying the device’s capability from the simple descriptor request/ returned cluster capability.
I’ll play around a bit more with this when I get time. Perhaps spoof a manufacturer name to see if my assumptions are correct.

So if anyone is considering using an Xbee to connect via Zigbee… this might be a small help.

EDIT,
In fact today I got a slightly different behaviour. It built a device from the Cluster spec. It still wants a different manufacturer name… it keeps asking for it but even though the UI says its waiting for response I can still control a relay attached to my device so now it looks quite promising to get something working.
This device is just a home made garage door opener but I have other things so it will be nice to get stable code going using the Arduino and Xbee. Makes for a reasonably priced device that fits into my existing Zigbee mesh.

2

Urgh… if it?s one that?s consistent is it?s inconsistency!
I have a very basic on off switch that Vera can connect with witch tells me that the Zigbee interface with Vera doesn?t operate in a standard way. I read the company?s comments about Zigbee not have standards… I don?t agree. It?s true that there can be manufacturer specific elements but most devices have at least some basic standard behaviour. It?s most common for hubs to identify devices from their cluster group then drill down to manufacturer specific actions later. This isn?t the case here.

It makes for a very inconsistent result at least with ?non supported? devices (which I personally see as a cop out to a limited degree)
I still like the Vera on the whole but there is plenty of potential to tidy up a few things. I can see however that by limiting devices to ?supported? devices, it fits more into a consumer level hub.

I?ll keep fiddling. But I’m guessing that Vera has a long way to go to get a good Zigbee engine running to the extent their ZWave is. It may be using a whitelist rather than allowing configuration from the reported cluster handling.