Gen 1 Software

STINGR (Stack Transmission & Inter-Nodal Gesture Repository) is the primary software suite used within the HONEY architecture for communication between boards in a HONEY flight stack.

STINGR allows boards in the flight stack to do a number of critical operations and provides a large number of utilities for FTC's, providing an easy-to-use interface that masks the complexity of CAN Bus transmissions from developers. The STINGR library is primarily comprised of operations called Gestures -- any request or response on the CAN Bus is referred to as a Gesture. Gestures are comprised of a series of frames, which provide the following information for each transmission: Type (Request/Response), Source Identifier, Destination Identifier, Data, State Flags, and Checksum.

Gesture Specification

As mentioned above, a Gesture consists of a series of frames, each with a specific purpose. Each Gesture is transmitted on the CAN Bus, and allows all boards to determine if a Gesture is targeted towards them, and act appropriately. This section defines the specification of a Gesture, including a description of each of the frames.

More explicitly, a Gesture looks as so, with the leftmost frames being transmitted first, and the rightmost frames being transmitted last.

Type (Req/Resp) (1 bit)

State Flags (7 bits)

Source Identifier (8 bit)

Destination Identifier (8 bit)

Data (4-500 bytes)

Checksum (8 byte)

Type Frame

The Type frame, the first frame in a Gesture, is a 1 bit frame that determines whether a Gesture is a request from one board to another, or a response from one board from a prior request. This frame is a 0 for a request, and a 1 for a response.

State Flags Frame

The 7 bits following the Type bit are the State Flag bits. This 7-bit frame allows transmitting boards to provide specialty signals to the receiving board. A low bit indicates a flag that isn't down, while a high bit indicates a raised flag. The current flags are as follows, from LSB to MSB.

High Priority

Low Priority

No Override

Reserved

Reserved

Reserved

Reserved

The flags are defined as follows:

• High Priority: The board receiving the request should cease all operation immediately and respond to the request before continuing.
• Low Priority: The board receiving the request can wait to respond to the request until the most convenient.
• No Override: The board receiving the request has no choice but to comply with the request sent -- it should not exert any effort attempting to question or combat the transmitting board. If this flag is low, a board receiving a request has the ability to ask the transmitting board for clarification or request a re-consideration. If this flag is high, the receiving board should execute the request regardless.

Flags are stacking, meaning multiple flags can be high. For example, a high high-priority flag and high no-override flag means a board not only must comply without question, but it should do so immediately prior to continuing any of its standard operations.

Source & Destination Identifiers

The Source & Destination Identifiers, the second and third frames in a Gesture, are 8 bit frames that indicate the source of the Gesture. Each board developed for the HONEY architecture is catalogued and given a unique identifier code. These unique identifiers allow boards to identify who a request or response from, and respond accordingly. Note that each unique board is given a unique identifier -- The Count, the first HONEY-compliant avionics board, has the identifier of 0, but a subsequent revision of avionics would acquire a new identifier code. This allows boards to be aware of the specific revisions that are flying in the stack -- allowing them to dynamically take advantage of the utilities of newer boards as they are added. The identifiers are encoded into the STINGR suite, and one can call a simple function to determine what board was the source or destination, without memorizing or encoding any of these identifiers in local board code.

There is also a unique, reserved designator, which is designator 256 (11111111). This designator is reserved for the broadcast functionality. Gestures with a destination identifier of 256 target all boards in the stack. That is, if a board wishes to notify all boards in the stack of some particular information, it can do so by designating a destination identifier of 256 -- all boards are configured, via STINGR, to process these gestures, even though the destination identifier isn't their own unique identifier. These are formally referred to as broadcast gestures.

The following are the current identifier codes, as of writing (June 21, 2017).

The Count (Gen 4 Avionics)	00000000
Biscuit (Gen 2 BMS)	00000001
Macaw (Gen 1 Radio)	00000010

Data Frame

The data frame carries the entirety of the request or response. This frame is variable in length, and can be as little as four bytes (at a minimum) or as much as 500 bytes (although this isn't a strict limit, but messages should seldom exceed 496 characters).

The data frame, in order to accommodate the large variety of possible data types that might arise in the HONEY architecture, is encoded strictly in ASCII characters as a char buffer. This allows boards to send messages as character strings -- STINGR is designed to understand and decode standardized messages, but this framework allows boards to send absolutely any data.

The payload portion of the data frame can be empty -- in this case, the data frame consists of four bytes. These are the start and end designators, which designate the start and end of the data payload. The start designator is '/1' while the end designator is '/0'

Start Flag (2 bytes - '/1')

Payload (0-496 bytes)

End Flag (2 bytes - '/0')

Checksum Frame

The Checksum Frame performs a checksum operation on the payload of the data frame, producing an 8-bit output. Receiving boards should perform an identical checksum operation on the data frame, and compare it to the received checksum value to verify data integrity. Identical checksums indicate proper transmission, while mismatched checksums indicate transmission error.

The current checksum calculation is as follows:

Each byte in the data payload (meaning, data excluding the start and end designators), takes its decimal ASCII value, which is multiplied by its position in the data frame. The sum of these products is the checksum value, which is 8 bytes.

Take the following data frame:

/

1

H

E

L

L

O

/

0

The checksum is performed on the data payload, meaning only HELLO. The calculation for each byte in the frame is as follows, following the guideline of taking the position of the character and multiplying that by its ASCII value:

72 * 1 (H)

69 * 2 (E)

76 * 3 (L)

76 * 4 (L)

79 * 5 (O)

The sum of these products is 1,137, the checksum value.

Operation

STINGR has a specific control flow that must be strictly followed to ensure proper operation. Luckily, most of this is handled within the STINGR internal code. It is described here in full detail, however, for posterity, debugging purposes, and for context in the following section, which enumerates specific methods and their purposes/parameters.

Initialization

Each board using STINGR must initialize the suite in order to properly utilize it. This initialization routine allows proper communication between boards in the stack, as well as gives vital information to each board about the actual structure of the stack, which isn't formally known unless hardcoded (a poor choice).

When a board initializes STINGR, it must provide its unique identifier. Once STINGR obtains the unique identifier of a board, it will send a broadcast gesture on the CAN Bus -- this signal has a destination identifier of 256 -- that is, it is sent to all boards in the flight stack. This is the first gesture sent out by a board, and its definition is as follows:

Type -- 1 (Response)

State Flags -- 0 (no flags)

Source Identifier (8 bit)

Destination Identifier -- 256 (broadcast)

Data -- '/1/0' (empty payload)

Checksum (8 bit)

This particular gesture definition is reserved, and is known as the beacon gesture. It is defined by a strict Type of 1, 0 State Flags, a unique source identifier, a broadcast destination identifier, an empty payload, and a checksum.

The beacon gesture indicates to all boards in the flight stack the presence and identity of a given board. Since all identifiers are enumerated within the STINGR source code, a beacon gesture allows any board to identify what boards are in the stack. Hence, if, for example, Macaw were to send a beacon gesture, with its identifier of 00000010, all boards would receive this gesture, correlate the identifier to that of Macaw, and consequently be aware of the presence of Macaw in the flight stack.

Once a board in the flight stack has sent its beacon gesture, it is now live, and other boards are allowed to send it messages using STINGR. By means of each board in the flight stack sending out a beacon gesture, all boards will be aware of the full definition of the flight stack.

Standard Mode

Once STINGR passes initialization, it enters Standard Mode. In Standard Mode, a board is able to send and receive gestures via the CAN Bus through STINGR. A board may send a message as frequently or infrequently as desired in Standard Mode. The other defining characteristic of Standard Mode is that, in Standard Mode, STINGR will transmit the beacon gesture every 60 seconds. This is known as the heartbeat gesture, and allows boards in the stack to continue to acknowledge the presence of a board, as well as register a boards presence if they hadn't already registered it.

Silent Mode

Silent Mode can be triggered by the Silence Gesture, a gesture reserved for the avionics board. Silent Mode can be triggered for a specific board in the flight stack, or for the entirety of the flight stack.

To put a board into Silent Mode, the avionics transmits a reserved gesture that has a payload of '/0'. The Avionics can request a specific board to enter silent mode by specifying a destination identifier, or it can request all boards to enter silent mode by using the broadcast identifier.

Silence Gesture:

Type -- 0 (Request)

State Flags -- 0 (no flags)

Source Identifier (avionics identifier)

Destination Identifier

Data -- '/1/0/0' (payload is '/0')

Checksum (8 bit)

There is, additionally, a gesture to reverse this, and put a board back into Standard Mode -- this is the Unsilence Gesture, which is identical to the Silence Gesture, except the payload is '/1', as shown below.

Unsilence Gesture:

Type -- 0 (Request)

State Flags -- 0 (no flags)

Source Identifier (avionics identifier)

Destination Identifier

Data -- '/1/1/0' (payload is '/0')

Checksum (8 bit)

Core Functions

The STINGR library features a large array of core functions that allow boards to send, receive, and interpret gestures. There is, however, a control flow that must be followed when initializing STINGR on a given board. The following sections explain the initialization routine, as well as provide a subset of the functions that are available to be used via STINGR.