Kona Micro FAQ

Kona Micro FAQ

#1 Accessing the battery and SIM slot

To access the battery and SIM slot on the Kona Micro first unplug the AC power and Ethernet connections. Next, remove the two Phillips screws on the back of the module. A Phillips #1 screwdriver is required to remove these screws. Once the screws are removed the battery cover will slide down and off the module. Do not remove the Torx screws holding the module together. The battery, if present, is connected to the module with a short cable. Pull vertically on the connector body, not the wires, to remove the connector and battery. The SIM slot is at the edge of the module housing. See Figure 1.

Figure 1: Battery and SIM area, battery cover removed

The SIM holder is "push to install / push to remove" style and accepts only Micro SIMs. To remove the SIM, press in on the exposed edge of the SIM until you hear a click, ~ 2mm. Then release the SIM and it will eject out of the SIM holder by ~4mm. The SIM can then be pulled from the SIM holder. To insert a SIM, insert the SIM into the holder and press until you hear a click. Release the SIM and it will move back slightly and stay captured by the holder.

#2 SIM installed but not detected

Some customers have experienced problem with SIMs not being detected by the Kona Micro. It was found that pressing the SIM into the SIM slot allowed detection but when released the SIM was no longer detected. This problem was traced to the SIM presence detection switch in the SIM slot. When Nano SIMs using Nano to Micro adapters are used, the switch is not reliably activated. Nano SIMs and most Nano to Micro adapters are slightly thinner than a standard Micro SIM. This difference in thickness causes the problem.

For this reason, only Micro SIMs are recommended.  Also, please note that you will be required to power cycle the gateway after inserting the SIM card so that it can be detected.

#3 SSH Client no longer connects after gateway software upgrade

Security has been enhanced for Micro gateway software versions 1.3.0 and above.  Refused connection issues have been observed with older SSH clients - especially PuTTY.  The solution is to update the SSH client to the latest available version.  

#4 Does the Kona Micro support LoRaWAN version 1.1? 

The current Kona Micro GW is LoRaWAN 1.0.4 and LoRaWAN 1.1 compliant. 

#5 Does Kona Micro have an internal LoRa antenna?

The Kona Micro GW has an external LoRa antenna which is supplied with each GW. 

#6 What is the Kona Micro LoRa antenna gain?

Antenna peak gain is 1 dBi.

#7 Does the Kona Micro support encryption?

The only encryption supported is through the MQTT bridge. Currently the MQTT connection is not encrypted, but encryption through MQTTS is planned.

#8 Does the Kona Micro support transmission of static information about LoRaWAN channel data?

Yes, the Kona Micro GW supports RSSI, SNR and quantity of the transmitted and received packets.

#9 Does the Kona Micro support transmission of alarms?

Yes, alarm information is retrieved by the SNMP agent. This info is accessible on the TEKTELIC network server via the MQTT bridge.

#10 Can the Kona Micro be powered by USB – 5V/500mAh?

No, the Kona Micro GW is powered by a 12V, 1A AC-DC power adapter, supplied with each GW.

#11 What is the Kona Micro Battery Capacity?

The Kona Micro backup battery capacity is 2600 mAh, 18.72Wh The battery provides approximately 4 hours of backup power. The backup battery is optional and must be purchased from TEKTELIC.

#12 What if I see high rate of CRC failure on a set-up that includes Kona Micro GW and Tektelic sensor?

One of the reason for high rate of CRC failure is the difference in the number of channels supported by Kona Micro GW and Tektelic Sensors. While Kona Micro GW supports 8 channels, 64 channels are supported by Tektelic Sensor. Therefore, it is recommended to set the Default channel mask on sensor for 8 channels at the device level in the Advanced Network Settings tab (shown in screenshot below) from Tektelic NS.


                                                                                                                Figure 2: Setting up Default Channel Mask for Sensor


#13 How can I install and run Loriot PF  on my Kona Micro GW?

 it is possible to install and run Loriot or any other Packet forwarder on Kona Micro GW.

  1. However, care has to be taken while installing Loriot PF on GW as Tektelic Packet Forwarder will be running by default  before Loriot PF can be installed.
  1.  Hence, Tektelic PF must have been removed or stopped running before installing Loriot PF. Else, GW may have two different types of PF running on it making the GW unresponsive.

  2. Loriot PF file can be downloaded from Loriot NS. Below is the screenshot to find the correct type of Loriot PF file.


    Figure 3: Loriot Packet Forwarder file for Kona Micro

  1. To do that, we recommend to use KonaFT's network-switcher tool. Below is the Screenshot capturing the utility of network-switcher.
                                                                                                                             Figure 4: Network Switcher on KonaFT

  1. Upload Loriot Packet Forwarder file to the GW using File Transfer option. Once the upload finishes, click on Switch option to configure the Loriot Packet Forwarder for the GW.

    A dialog box shown  below will appear. It contains various types of Packet Forwarder from different vendors.

     

    Figure 5: Dialog Box for configuring Loriot PF

 

  1.  Click on the Packet Forwarder Type field to select the Loriot Packet Forwarder. Select Loriot from the drop-down menu.
  1. Type the path of the loriot-tektelic-kona-micro-SPI-0-latest.sh file in the Source url field. Path shall be: file:///dev/shm/loriot-tektelic-kona-micro-SPI-0-latest.sh
  1. Enter root as the username and GW Serial ID as the password to proceed forward.
  1. Click OK to configure Loriot Packet Forwarder.
  1. Wait for few minutes to reflect the changes in Kona Micro GW.
On successful change in the type of the packet forwarder, You can see Loriot running as Current Pkt Fwd in the Packet Forwarder Application.

#14 How can I use Spectral Scan feature on Kona Micro GW on Tektelic NS?

  1. Spectral Scan option available on Tektelic NS is an OAM enabled function. Therefore, Tektelic MQTT Bridge must be installed and configured on Kona Micro GW.
  1. In order to ensure Tektelic MQTT Bridge is running on Kona Micro GW, you can click on Gateway Information tab and check if GW information is showing up.
  1. Once you make sure MQTT Bridge is running, click on Spectral Scan option, which will open up a window as shown below. ( NOTE: Below screenshot is for North American Kona Micro GW.)


  1. Note that 500KHz Start Freq, kHz field must have frequency at least equal to or greater than that entered in 125KHz Start Freq, kHz.




  1. Violating this condition will disable Start Spectral Scan option in the screen as shown below.



  1. Upon entering the information in different fields properly, click on Start Spectral Scan to see Frequency versus Power graph. Wait until the progress bar on top indicates the completion. You shall be able to see the graph below.


  1. You can also select the particular channel's spectral scan by selecting that channel from Channels drop down menu.


#15 How does user configurable Connection Manager (CM) and Network Monitoring (NM) works for Kona Micro GW?


  1. BSP v3.0.2 includes user configurable CM and NM parameters, which can be accessed through KonaFT v0.35 or higher.
  1. Both these features can be found in Misc tab located under Board Details. Attached image shows CM and NM feature on KonaFT.



Below is the summary of Connection Manager and Network Manager as a part of BSP V3.0.2 for Kona Micro GW.

Connection Manager:

Upon disabling Enable Ping Test button in Connection Manager(CM),

  1. CM simply checks for IP on WWAN0 interface every X seconds.
  1. In case of not getting IP on WWAN0 for Y consecutive times, CM will reset the modem.
Upon enabling Enable Ping Test button in Connection Manager(CM),
  1.  CM simply check for Pings on 8.8.8.8 (By default) using WWAN0 interface every X seconds. (Note: Default ping address can also be changed by the user.)
  1. In case of not able to ping  8.8.8.8 using WWAN0 for Y consecutive times, CM will reset the modem.
Where the value of X and Y can be configured by User in Connection Manager Configuration window in KonaFT.

By default X= 60 and Y=3

 Network Monitoring:

  1.  If no WWAN0 or ETH0 connection is available, then after 6/10 ping failure, NM will set the No Backhaul counter to 1 and keep wait until it reaches to (Z-1) seconds.
  2.  Upon reaching Zth second, NM will reset the GW.

 Where the value of Z can be configured by User in Network Monitor preferences window in KonaFT.

By default Z=60

#16 How can I install OpenVPN on Kona Micro GW?

From BSP 2.2.x and onwards for Kona Micro, OpenVPN has been included as a part of the BSP release itself. Thus, OpenVPN will be available by default on the GWs having BSP version newer than v2.2.x.

For the Kona Micro GW with a BSP older than v2.2.x, it is recommended to upgrade the BSP to the latest version to get OpenVPN installed. Once you upgrade the BSP to any version newer than 2.2.x such as v3.0.2, OpenVPN will be installed along with the BSP upgrade


#17 How can I configure Kona Micro gateway to forward and receive packets from other network server?

  • To configure the gateway to forward packets to any network server , you will be required to make changes in server_address field in config.json file.

  • You can make changes in this file through KonaFT. Below is the procedure.

 

            1) Go to Configuration.

 

            2) Click on Refresh files and it will bring config.json file.

 

            3) Click on Read option to read the file.

 

            4) In server_address field, enter network server web address of your choice as shown below.



 

            5) Click on Write option to save the changes.

 

            6) Power Cycle the gateway.



#18 Does Kona Micro require any extra configuration for using Verizon SIM card in cellular backhaul?

  • Kona Gateways are certified to work with Verizon SIM card.

  • By default, Kona gateways are equipped with generic firmware. Depending upon what type of APN is used with Verizon SIM card, gateway may require installation of Verizon specific firmware along with additional steps.

  • Below are the two scenarios that list the steps.


  1. If Private APN is set for Verizon SIM:
    • No need of additional firmware installation.
    • Inform TEKTELIC about the Gateway ID through a support ticket. TEKTELIC can add necessary details to the Verizon database.

 

  1. If Public APN is set for Verizon SIM: (i.e. VZWINTERNET)
  • Verizon specific firmware needs to be installed on the gateway.
  • Contact TEKTELIC Support by raising a ticket.
  • Depending upon the BSP version running on the gateway, one of Tektelic team member can help you installing the specific firmware.
​
Also,  Inform TEKTELIC about the Gateway ID while raising a ticket. TEKTELIC can add necessary details to the Verizon database.

#19 Is it possible to restore or roll-back the previous BSP version on Kona Micro Gateway?

  • Yes, it is possible to restore the previously running BSP version on Kona Micro if the gateway has a stored backup of the previous BSP version.

  • If you receive a fresh Kona Micro GW with BSP v2.3.4 from Tektelic, then there would not be any backup of previous BSP as it has been programmed and configured with BSP v2.3.4 at the factory itself.  As it is a new GW , there would not be any backup available at that point. However, you can create backups manually at any time using TEK NS server or KonaFT. 
  • If you upgrade that GW to the latest version, say v3.1.2, some time in the future and then you wish to restore GW back to v2.3.4 , you can do that as there would be a backup stored on the GW because  you made an upgrade to v3.1.2 from v2.1.4 earlier.
  • During an upgrade, a backup of the last saved state of a BSP is saved as a back-up by default.
  • Last saved state could be the state either before BSP on the gateway gets upgraded or the explicit backup taken for a particular BSP running on the gateway.
  • Upon restoring a specific backup, the last saved state of that specific BSP version would be restored.




#20 Which ports will be required to open for Kona Micro gateway on any network protected by firewalls?

  • Below ports will be required for Kona Micro Gateway on a network protected by firewalls.

    Port#

    Purpose

    161

    SNMP

    22

    SSH

    1700

     UDP

    1883

    MQTT



#21 How does the preferred and fail-over WAN settings and the fail-over mechanism work in Kona Mega GW?

  1. In Kona GWs, Network Interface is monitored by the Network Monitoring script (check is every 10 seconds). This will continuously check for number of successful pings on Primary Interface.
  1. Below is the detailed procedure that takes place while connecting an Ethernet or cellular. (By default,Ethernet -> Primary Interface, Cellular - Failover Interface) ( Users can change the preferred and fallback interface using Kona FT or OAM) 
  • After power up, when both eth0 (internet) and wwan0 connected, eth0 is the default route with metric 10 and it has DNS entries.
  • When you plug out the eth0 cable or eth0 cable lost internet connection, after 6th ping fails, wwan0 will become default with metric 20 and it has DNS entries.
  • When eth0 gets Internet connectivity (metric 30), After 16th successful ping, eth0 will become default route with metric 10 and it has DNS entries.
  • Wwan0 will be there with metric 20 always (It should have IP) in the default route entry. Only eth0 changes its metric from 10 to 30 or 30 to 10 based on Internet connectivity.
  • Note that Ping check happens only on Primary Interface. There is no Ping check for secondary Interface. Ping check happens every 10 seconds on Primary Interface.
  1. Ethernet is a by default primary connection for Kona GWs. 
  • If the Primary Interface is not available or No Internet, after 6/10 ping failure, all the packets route via Failover Interface.
  • Once the Primary Interface is connected and it has Internet then after 16/20 successful pings, all the packets route via Primary Interface.



#22 My gateway status reports Offline despite I powered it up and commissioned with correct information on Tektelic NS. How can I resolve this issue?


  • Gateway may report offline status since TEK MQTT Bridge would have been installed on the gateway by default and you haven't updated MQTT credentials for your gateway on TEK NS.

 

  • Below is the procedure to update credentials on TEK NS.

 

  1. Go to the registered gateway.

 

  1. Click on “Manage Credentials” tab as shown in below screenshot.

 

 

 

  1. Below are the default credentials to configure MQTT Bridge.

Username: TEK00XXYY (Where XXYY represents the last 4 digit of the MAC address)

Password : 9-Digit serial number of the gateway. (For example, it would be similar to 1951A0025)

 

  1. Power cycle the gateway

 

 


 






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