Sodaq tracker board: getting started
u-blox have teamed up with Sodaq to produce two MQTT Anywhere enabled boards based on their SARA Arduino Form Factor R412 and SARA Small Form Factor R412 boards which come pre-installed with our next generation tracker application and an MQTT Anywhere SIM providing an out of the box fully functional tracker prototype.
This page will guide you through setting up and using the Sodaq tracker board.
Setting up your Thingstream account
Thingstream is the service delivery platform for u-blox services. If you don’t already have one, please visit https://portal.thingstream.io/register and follow the instructions to set up a new Thingstream account.
Note that registration is a two step process.
On completion of step 1, you will be sent an email with a link to verify your email address. If you do not receive this email, please check your spam folders and remember to add “thingstream.io” to your safe senders list.
Still need help?
If you need more help or have any questions, please send an email to services-support@u-blox.com.
Add your Sodaq tracker board to your Thingstream domain
Once you have completed your account setup, go to the “Things” page and click on the “Add Thing” button in the top right corner of the screen. You can then select “Redeem your Thing” and follow the instructions to add your new Sodaq tracker board to your Thingstream domain. The redemption code for your Sodaq tracker board is printed on the wallet containing your Thingstream SIM card.
Free activation and credit
Each Sodaq tracker board comes with 3 months of free connectivity on the Thingstream MQTT Anywhere 500 Plan. Your account will also be automatically provisioned with a Thingstream Flow which will take the payload sent by your Sodaq tracker board and send you an email with location and other sensor information. This flow remains free to use unless you edit it in some way.
You will receive an email when your free connectivity period is coming to an end inviting you to continue your subscription by adding payment details to your Thingstream Account.
You can do this at any time by visiting https://portal.thingstream.io/app/account/plan
More information about the available MQTT Anywhere Price Plans can be found on our pricing page.
You're all set.....
Now that your Sodaq tracker board has been added to your Thingstream domain, everything is ready to go. make sure that your MQTT Anywhere SIM is inserted, connect the USB cable next to the SIM tray to your laptop or a suitable USB power supply and connect the battery.
The green LED next to the SIM tray will light up indicating the application is setting up the modem and registering with a network. With a brand new SIM, this could take a few attempts for a first registration.
Once connected, the LED will pulse yellow to indicate that the application is waiting for a GNSS fix
When a GNSS fix is achieved, or the application timesout, the application will publish it's payload and the LED will flash cyan and magenta to indicate completion
You should receive an email containing details of the payload received from your device.
If you want to find out more about what's going on, you can monitor the debug output from the Sodaq tracker board by opening a serial monitor on the laptop that your board is connected to .
You can also check the communication between your board and the Thingstream MQTT broker by opening Traffic Logs from the Thing Details window in the Thingstream portal.
