Quickstart

Introduction

This tutorial should take approximately 20-30 minutes to complete.

This quickstart guide will introduce you to the Blues Wireless ecosystem of tools, including the Notecard, Notecarrier, and Notehub.

note

If you're new to Blues Wireless, you may also be interested in our recurring webinar series, Getting Started with the Notecard , where you can ask questions and get live help.

Throughout this guide, you’ll use serial requests (from our in-browser terminal or the Notecard CLI) to configure the Notecard, simulate sending data from sensors to the Notecard, and to synchronize that data with the cloud. By the end of this guide, you’ll have a basic understanding of the process for building connected solutions with Blues Wireless.

The following video provides an overview of what you'll learn in this guide.

Key Concepts to Know

Before you dive in, it's important to understand a few key concepts:

• The Notecard is a device-to-cloud data pump that reduces the complexity of building connected solutions with a secure, reliable cellular or Wi-Fi connection. It's a 30x35 millimeter System-on-Module (SOM) that's ready for embedding into any project.

• Notecarriers are development boards that help you get started quickly with the Notecard. There are a variety of Notecarriers designed to fit different needs, and many include onboard Cellular and GPS antennas, as well as a USB port for Serial access to the Notecard.

• Notehub is the secure cloud service the Notecard uses to send and receive data. Notehub also provides a console for fleet management and secure connectors for routing data to 3rd party cloud applications.

Notecard and Notehub work together to provide bidirectional wireless communication capabilities, both outbound (from your microcontroller or single-board computer to the cloud):

And inbound (from the cloud to your microcontroller or single-board computer):

Before You Begin

To complete this quickstart, make sure you have access to the following:

• Notecard and Notecarrier-AF.

• Micro USB to USB-A data cable (not a charge-only cable).

• Computer with a USB-A port or a computer with a USB-C port with a USB-A to USB-C adapter.

• A browser that supports the Web Serial API, like Chrome 89+, Edge 89+, or Opera. No problem if you prefer not to use one of these browsers, though. You can follow-along with this guide by installing the Notecard CLI and using the play command to send Notecard requests interactively.

• An internet connection that allows access to Notehub.

• If you’re using a Cellular Notecard, make sure you’re in a location with stable cellular coverage. For instance, avoid a closed room in a cellar where you might have trouble getting a signal.

Connect Your Notecard and Notecarrier

The Feather Starter Kit includes a Notecarrier-AF, a pre-seated Adafruit HUZZAH32 ESP32 Feather, two u.FL cables for cellular and GPS (each with one side connected to the Notecarrier and one side free) an allen wrench for the Notecarrier screw-down post, and a Notecard.

1. Use the allen wrench to remove the screw from the mounting receptacle on the Notecarrier-AF, and rotate the u.FL cables away from the m.2 socket.

   

2. Place the Notecard into the M.2 slot on the Notecarrier. The wider portion of the edge connector slots in on the left. Once inserted, press gently until the Notecard is inserted and the screw receptacle hole is completely visible.

   

3. Using the allen wrench, re-insert the screw into the mounting receptacle and tighten to secure the Notecard to the Notecarrier. Be sure to not overtighten the screw.

   

4. Secure the free end of the u.FL cable connected to the socket labeled MAIN on the Notecarrier to the MAIN socket on the Notecard.

   

5. Secure the free end of the u.FL cable connected to the socket labeled GPS on the Notecarrier to the GPS socket on the Notecard.

note

The Wi-Fi Notecard does not have onboard GPS, and therefore does not have a GPS socket. Skip this step if you are using a Wi-Fi Notecard.

Now you're ready connect to the Notecard over USB and continue with the Quickstart!

Power-up The Notecard and Notecarrier

Connect a USB cable from the Notecarrier-AF's USB port to your PC's USB port.

After plugging in the Notecard, you should see a red LED on the Notecard blink rapidly and then stop. This is normal and signifies the Notecard is performing its initialization steps. If you're using a cellular Notecard a green LED will also periodically blink, which signifies the cellular modem is active.

note

If you’re using a Wi-Fi Notecard you have one additional step: complete our guide to connecting to a Wi-Fi Access Point, as you’ll need a network connection to complete the rest of this tutorial.

Connect to The Notecard

If you want to use the in-browser terminal for this guide, take notice of the window to the right or below. You will be using this interface to communicate, over USB, with your Notecard.

In the in-browser terminal, click the Connect link. A browser prompt will appear asking for permission to connect to a USB Serial device:

• If you're on a Mac, select either Notecard (cu.usbmodemNOTE1) or Notecard (tty.usbmodemNOTE1).

• On Windows, the option will show up as USB Serial Device (COMx).

• On Linux the option will show up as Notecard (ttyACM0).

Once you are connected, you will see the connection indicator change from Serial Disconnected to Serial Connected.

Validate Serial Connection

Now, you're ready to send your first request. Copy and paste the following request into the in-browser terminal (click the COPY button below).

Hit Enter and you'll see a response similar to the example output.

{"req":"card.version"}

{
 "body": {
  "org": "Blues Wireless",
  "product": "Notecard",
  "version": "notecard-1.5.2",
  "ver_major": 1,
  "ver_minor": 5,
  "ver_patch": 2,
  "ver_build": 12200,
  "built": "Dec  7 2020 19:28:29"
 },
 "version": "notecard-1.5.2.12200",
 "device": "dev:8376474736362",
 "name": "Blues Wireless Notecard",
 "type": 11,
 "sku": "NOTE-NBGL500"
}

The JSON response above provides version information of the firmware on the Notecard, as well as device-specific information.

Well done! You have properly set up, configured, and validated your hardware. Next, you'll configure your Notecard to communicate with Notehub.

Set up Notehub

Notehub is a cloud service that securely communicates with the Notecard, provides tooling for managing fleets of devices, allows you to perform over-the-air Notecard firmware updates, and makes it easy for you to route data to your own cloud applications or services.

In this section, you’ll start simple by setting up a Notehub Project and creating your first ProductUID. A ProductUID is the unique identifier you will use to associate a Notecard to a Notehub Project, and ensure that data from the Notecard ends up in the right location.

Create a Notehub Project

1. Sign in or sign up for Notehub using the links below.

   Create a Notehub Account

   Sign up

   Already have an account? Sign in

2. Click "Create Project" on the dashboard. In the New Project card, give your project a name and ProductUID.

   

   NOTE: The ProductUID must be globally unique. To reduce collisions, Notehub prepends a generated namespace based on your account email, for instance com.your-company.your-name:. Enter any identifier you like in the input on the right.

3. Take note of your ProductUID. This identifier is used by Notehub to associate your Notecard to your project.

   

Set up Notecard

In this part of the exercise you'll configure your Notecard so that it knows where to send data. You do this by assigning the ProductUID created in the last step to your Notecard. Setting the ProductUID associates a Notecard to a given Project in Notehub. A Notecard can easily be moved between Projects over time, but it can only belong to one project at a time.

Start by sending a JSON request to your Notecard to configure it. Once the Notecard has finished processing your request, it will send a JSON response back to your computer to let you know that the request is complete. An empty JSON object ({}) from the Notecard indicates a successful request. If an error occurs, the Notecard will return a JSON object with an err key and a string describing the error that occurred.

Copy and paste the following Notecard request, making sure to replace com.your-company.your-name:your_product with the ProductUID you created in the last step (click the COPY button below).

{"req":"hub.set", "product":"com.your-company.your-name:your_product"}

{}

Validate Your ProductUID and Connection

In this section, you'll validate your Notecard configuration by performing a manual synchronization to Notehub and sending synchronization status requests to the Notecard.

Start a Sync

Initiate a synchronization between the Notecard and Notehub with a hub.sync request, as shown below.

{"req":"hub.sync"}

{}

Once a sync has started, you can check on the state of the sync with a hub.sync.status request. When the sync is ongoing, the response will return a status field with the current progress of the sync and a requested field with the number of seconds since the sync was initiated. You can call hub.sync.status multiple times to follow the process of your first sync if you wish.

{"req":"hub.sync.status"}

{
  "status": "starting communications {wait-module} {connecting}",
  "requested": 2
}
...
{
  "status": "modem now ON {modem-on}",
  "requested": 6
}
...
{
  "status": "waiting for wireless service 6 sec [+---] {cell-registration-wait}",
  "requested": 12
}

Once the sync has completed, the response to hub.sync.status includes the UNIX Epoch time of the last sync, and the number of seconds since the last completed sync.

{"req":"hub.sync.status"}

{
 "time": 1615585299,
 "completed": 4
}

{"req":"hub.sync.status"}

{
  "status": "opening notehub: no project was found with product UID product:com.your-company.your-name:your_product {product-noexist} {notehub-open-failure}",
  "requested": 10
}
...
{
  "status": "can't open notehub: opening notehub: no project was found with product UID product:com.your-company.your-name:your_product {product-noexist} {notehub-open-failure}",
  "requested": 11
}

{"req":"hub.sync.status"}

{
 "status": "connect: connection aborted {host-unreachable} {notehub-open-failure}",
 "requested": 10
}

{
 "req": "card.restore",
 "delete": true
}

You're doing great! You have now configured your Notecard and are ready to send Notes to your Notehub Project!

Queue Notes to your Notecard

In this section, you will add Notes simulating sensor data to your Notecard. Imagine your Host MCU reads from a sensor that can measure temperature and humidity information. Your sample data might look like this: {"temp":35.5,"humid":56.23}.

Copy and paste the following request into the Notecard Web Serial Interface, then press Enter to send it to the Notecard.

{"req":"note.add","body":{"temp":35.5,"humid":56.23}}

{"total":1}

This request will create a Note that includes your JSON body and additional metadata like creation time and location. In response, the Notecard returns a JSON object indicating the total number of Notes ready to sync to Notehub. You won't see your Note in Notehub just yet, because the Notecard queues your Notes until it is time to sync them to the cloud.

Excellent work! You have queued your first Note to the Notecard!

Send Notes from Notecard to Notehub

In this section, you'll perform another sync to send your Note to Notehub. As before, you can manually initiate a sync by entering the following JSON request in the in-browser terminal:

{"req":"hub.sync"}

{}

Behind the scenes, your Notecard will again search for a network connection and connect to Notehub. Once the connection is made, the Notecard uploads your Note and closes the connection. As before, you can use hub.sync.status to monitor your in-progress sync:

{"req":"hub.sync.status"}

{
  "status": "begin (anything pending) {sync-begin}",
  "requested": 1
}
...
{
  "status": "upload data.qo (1 changes) {sync-get-local-changes}",
  "requested": 2
}
...
{
  "status": "completed {sync-end}",
  "requested": 4
}

By default, the Notecard places Notes in a Notefile called data.qo. The .qo extension means that the file is an "outbound queue," or a queue that originates on the Notecard and is synchronized with Notehub.

Great work! Your Note has now been transferred from the Notecard to the cloud and stored in your Notehub project!

note

The Notecard is a low-power device (consuming only ~8uA when idle) and is built to be continuously powered. This is important to know because certain features of the Notecard require the current time, which is established upon the Notecard successfully connecting to a cellular network upon startup.

View Notes on Notehub

In this section, you'll learn how to view and interact with your Note on Notehub.

Navigate to Notehub.io.

You will see your project dashboard:

Click on the card with your Project, and the device dashboard for your Project will load. You'll see your Notecard in the Devices list.

Click Events in the left-side navigation. In the Events list, you should see your note in the list with a simulated sensor reading body. Your Note will be listed in the table, along with other session and environment-specific events sent automatically by the Notecard.

It's that simple, your product and data are now online!

Send Notes from Notehub to Notecard

In this section, you’ll learn how to use Notehub to send Notes to the Notecard. You can use either the Notehub UI or HTTP API to send Notes to your Notecard. Once you've added a Note to Notehub, you'll learn how to retrieve Notes with simple JSON requests.

{"key1":"val1"}

{"req":"hub.get"}

{
 "outbound": 60,
 "mode": "periodic",
 "host": "a.notefile.net",
 "product": "com.your-company.your-name:your_product",
 "device": "dev:000000000000000"
}

curl --request POST --location 'https://api.notefile.net/auth/login' \
--data '{"username":"[you@youremail.com]", "password": "[your_password]"}'

{"session_token": "00000000000000000000000000000000"}

curl --request POST --location 'https://api.notefile.net/req' \
--header 'X-SESSION-TOKEN: [your_session_token]' \
--data '{"req":"note.add","file":"data.qi","body":{"api-key1":"api-val1"},
"product":"[com.your-company.your-name:your_product]","device":"[dev:000000000000000]"}'

{}

Sync your Note to the Notecard

Once you've queued a Note on Notehub, the Notecard will need to sync again with the service in order to obtain the Note and place it in internal storage.

Copy and paste the following request into the in-browser terminal to sync the data from Notehub onto the Notecard.

{"req":"hub.sync"}

{}

Once hub.sync.status reports a completed time, the sync is complete.

{"req":"hub.sync.status"}

{
 "time": 1615585299,
 "completed": 4
}

Read your Note from the Notecard

Your Note should now be on your Notecard! To confirm, copy the following request into your in-browser terminal. The request looks at the Notefile in "files", and determines whether there are changes.

{"req":"file.changes","files":["data.qi"]}

{
 "info": {
  "data.qi": {
   "total": 1
  }
 },
 "total": 1
}

Read the Note out of the Notefile by sending the following request to the Notecard:

{"req":"note.get", "file":"data.qi"}

{
 "body": {
  "key1": "val1"
 },
 "time": 1589309597
}

You should see the Note you sent from Notehub as the response to your request.

One helpful thing to know about Notes synced from Notehub to the Notecard is that they are held in storage until explicitly deleted. This extra step ensures Notes queued on the Notecard are not accidentally deleted just because they were read out.

In software engineering terms, note.get performs a peek of the queue by default, but will perform a pop if you specify "delete":"true".

{"req":"note.get", "file":"data.qi","delete":true}

{
 "body": {
  "key1": "val1"
 },
 "time": 1589309597
}

Sending the file.changes request at this point should tell you that there are no more pending notes inside of data.qi.

{"req":"file.changes","files":["data.qi"]}

{
 "info": {
  "data.qi": {}
 }
}

Congratulations! You have now explored both ways to send Notes from the cloud to your Notecard. With that, you understand the basics of bi-directional communication using the Blues Wireless platform!

Next Steps

Control your Notecard from a microcontroller or single-board computer! Check out our sensor tutorials for your favorite language or board.

When you're ready to connect your Notecard project to your cloud app, take a look at our routing tutorials, which cover a number of popular cloud applications and data visualization tools.

For a little inspiration, and to see what developers are building with the Notecard and Notehub, visit our Hackster.io Hub.

note

Don't forget to disconnect Your Notecard!

Once you're done using the in-browser terminal, be sure to disconnect it by clicking the "Disconnect" link in the terminal header.