Introducing Wi-SUN Development#
Wireless Smart Ubiquitous Network (Wi-SUN) is the leading IPv6 sub-GHz mesh technology for smart city and smart utility applications. Wi-SUN brings Smart Ubiquitous Networks to service providers, utilities, municipalities/local government, and other enterprises, by enabling interoperable, multi-service, and secure wireless mesh networks. Wi-SUN can be used for large-scale outdoor IoT wireless communication networks in a wide range of applications covering both line-powered and battery-powered nodes.
Silicon Labs provides a complete set of hardware and software solutions to help developers design their Wi-SUN wireless products:
Silicon Labs has enhanced Wi-SUN to work with Silicon Labs hardware. The Wi-SUN stack library is available as a software development kit (SDK) installed as part of the Gecko SDK Suite (GSDK) of Silicon Labs SDKs. The two primary elements to getting started with Wi-SUN development are the Silicon Labs Wi-SUN SDK and Simplicity Studio 5.
The Silicon Labs Wi-SUN SDK#
The Silicon Labs Wi-SUN SDK is composed of the Wi-SUN FAN stack and sample applications as well as the addition of metadata to allow for the seamless integration into Simplicity Studio 5. The Silicon Labs Wi-SUN SDK contains the Wi-SUN stack in a library format.
The Silicon Labs Wi-SUN SDK is based on the Gecko Platform component-based design, where each component provides a specific function. Components are made up of a collection of source files and properties. The component-based design enables customization by adding, configuring, and removing components. The application developer can use SSv5’s Project Configurator and Component Editor to easily assemble the desired features by including those components that match the required functionality and by configuring the various properties associated with those components.
For details on the Wi-SUN stack version included within the Silicon Labs Wi-SUN SDK, refer to the Wi-SUN SDK release notes.
Simplicity Studio 5 (SSv5)#
The Silicon Labs Wi-SUN SDK is downloaded through SSv5. SSv5 is the core development environment designed to support the Silicon Labs IoT portfolio of system-on-chips (SoCs) and modules. It provides access to target device-specific web and SDK resources; software and hardware configuration tools; an integrated development environment (IDE) featuring industry-standard code editors, compilers and debuggers; and advanced, value-add tools for network analysis and code-correlated energy profiling.
SSv5 is designed to simplify developer workflow. It intelligently recognizes all Silicon Labs evaluation and development kit parts and, based on the selected development target, presents appropriate software development kits (SDKs) and other development resources.
The GNU Compiler Collection (GCC) is provided with SSv5. Other important development tools provided with SSv5 are reviewed in Development Tools.
Starting Development#
Prerequisites#
Before following the procedures in this document you must have:
Purchased one of the Wireless Gecko (EFR32) Portfolio Wireless Kits with compatible radio boards, listed on https://www.silabs.com/wireless/wi-sun.
Downloaded SSv5 and the Gecko SDK and be generally familiar with the SSv5 Launcher perspective. SSv5 installation and getting started instructions along with a set of detailed references can be found in the online Simplicity Studio 5 User's Guide.
Obtained a compatible compiler (See the Wi-SUN SDK’s release notes for the compatible versions):
Simplicity Studio comes with a free GCC C-compiler.
IAR Embedded Workbench for ARM (IAR-EWARM) can also be used as the compiler for Silicon Labs Wi-SUN projects. Once IAR-EWARM is installed, the next time Simplicity Studio starts it will automatically detect and configure the IDE to use IAR-EWARM. Refer to the IAR-IDE License section in the Development Tools page to get a 30-day IAR IDE trial.
Setup#
Install Simplicity Studio 5 (SSv5), which will set up your development environment and walk you through GSDK installation. Installation instructions are provided in the Simplicity Studio 5 online User’s Guide. This is the recommended method for getting started with development.
Alternatively, Gecko SDK may be installed manually by downloading or cloning the latest from GitHub. See https://github.com/siliconlabs/gecko_sdk for more information.
Using Simplicity Studio, you have easy access to the sample applications and demos. Instructions for quickly beginning to use these to create a Wi-SUN network is included in Getting Started with Application Development.
Support#
Access the Silicon Labs support portal at https://www.silabs.com/support through SSv5’s Welcome view under Learn and Support. Use the support portal to contact Customer Support for any questions you might have during the development process.
Documentation#
Relevant documentation is available through SSv5. It is filtered based on the device selected in either the Debug Adapters view or the My Product view. Hardware-specific documentation for the device can be accessed through links on the OVERVIEW tab.
SDK documentation and other references are available through the DOCUMENTATION tab. Filter with the Wi-SUN Technology Type checkbox to see documentation most closely related to the Wi-SUN SDK. To see documents specific to Wi-SUN, select Wi-SUN under Wireless Technology.
SSv5 and its tools are documented in the online Simplicity Studio 5 User’s Guide.
