Indoor modeling for ZigBee communication and link budget software development – IPS Citycom Technology Limited

Abstract

Nowadays, short range wireless technology is being more and more popular in home, office and industry automation applications. As ZigBee is a low cost, low power and wireless mesh network standard, IEEE 802.15.4 standard and ZigBee wireless network technology are the best solution for the implementing the reliable indoor control and monitoring applications. With the increased popularity of short range devices, it is important for the system engineers to have a clear analysis of the indoor RF link strength. As the use of low power in ZigBee technology, the ability of ZigBee communications is complicated because of the obstructive indoor environment. Due to the multipath propagation, the received signal varies rapidly where several waves arrive at the receiver via different paths and with different phases. In this project, different indoor propagation models were investigated and compared. An indoor propagation model was proposed for the software development. The factors for the proposed model were determined according to the measurements in different scenarios. Based on the propagation model, the software for link budget analysis was developed by using Visual Studio and Microsoft .NET Framework platform. The software allowed users to positioning the ZigBee devices on a floor plan. By selecting and configuring the devices, the link budget of the ZigBee communications could be analyzed and compared.