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pathetic piss kitten @kitten@elizabeth.cat
9mo
kitten playing with trackers okay, so, my tinkering with Bluetooth beacons/trackers begins

I bought a bunch to be able to play around and see which one its holder likes the most
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masukomi @masukomi@connectified.com
9mo
kitten playing with trackers @kitten I know you're looking for something homebrew, but I wanted to point out the Fi collars if you're not aware of them.

tryfi.com

they're not compatible with FindMy BUT they have some nifty hacks for enabling GPS tracking AND battery life:

- uses your phone va BT if its around instead of its own GPS
- talks with a base station to determine if it's "left home" & only invokes its GPS tracking then (via your phone or its internals)
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masukomi @masukomi@connectified.com
9mo
kitten playing with trackers @kitten we have to recharge them every few weeks I think.

I dunno if you can get ahold of whatever internals they're using, but I'm a big fan of how it works (except for the annual subscription 😉)
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pathetic piss kitten @kitten@elizabeth.cat
9mo
kitten playing with trackers @masukomi hmmm, these look nice, specially the fact they are already designed to be fitted in a collar

but yes, even beyond the homebrew interest, I feel the fact that they can't depend on Apple or Google tracking network and require its own internet uplink makes them less of an option... for starters, it means they're a lot more expensive. this device I just flashed costed me just 6€ + the coin battery
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masukomi @masukomi@connectified.com
9mo
kitten playing with trackers @kitten Agreed. The thing they offer that the others don't is not just saying "they're here" but "they took this path to get here" AND they work when the creature being tracked isn't near anyone's phone.
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pathetic piss kitten @kitten@elizabeth.cat
9mo
kitten playing with trackers first contender: nrf51822 (like almost all the boards), with an incorporated SHT30 temperature and humidity sensor, using a CR2032 battery

this one is my favorite for the moment, both because of the neat small form factor, and because the seller provides the pinout for the board... except mine doesn't match any of the ones they provide..but I asked them, see if they can provide it.

a.aliexpress.com/_EJjjOxI
small black PCB with a nrf51822 microcontroller in it and a small button in the center
the board inside its white plastic case, with a blue plastic button, in my hand
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pathetic piss kitten @kitten@elizabeth.cat
9mo
kitten playing with trackers the second, another nrf51822, this time by itself, and this time using a CR2477 battery

this one... is not looking good. it's just too big, and that's with half the PCB empty. besides, the case has no way of attaching it to anything

it does have an upside though: I found the datasheet in the internet, with the pinout. not only that, it has 4 available digital I/O pins, which means: potential

a.aliexpress.com/_EHqjtVA

www.holyiot.com/tp/2019042814310092401.pdf
big black PCB with a chip in the middle, marking "N51822" barely visible
the chip in a big bulky black round case, in my hand
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pathetic piss kitten @kitten@elizabeth.cat
9mo
kitten playing with trackers and the last one! this one I bought to see if anything could be done with it, but it's not an nrf51822, so I don't know if I will be able to flash it. it has a st17h65b chip

I bought it for two reasons: it's factory compatible with both Apple's FindMy network and Google's Find Hub, and it has an integrated speaker that can beep! the form factor is also very nice

a.aliexpress.com/_EJau7Zq
larger black PCB with a lot more components in it
larger but flatter case with a button and some leds
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Lis (≙) retired account @lis@luisa.is
9mo
kitten playing with trackers @kitten I like the case of this one, it’s black neocat_aww
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pathetic piss kitten @kitten@elizabeth.cat
9mo
kitten playing with trackers @lis yes!!

although at least all of them are black in the inside
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Maaike 🔜 eth0 @ayke@blahaj.social
9mo
kitten playing with trackers @kitten haven't heard about that chip before! It's not on Mouser or Digi-Key so must be kinda rare. Perhaps only meant for the Chinese market?
Looking at the datasheet it looks quite capable, it has a Cortex-M0 and plenty of flash/RAM.
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pathetic piss kitten @kitten@elizabeth.cat
9mo
kitten playing with trackers @ayke it seems very associated to these tracking devices, yes
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pathetic piss kitten @kitten@elizabeth.cat
9mo
kitten playing with trackers the third one, also nrf51822, this one is a bit weird... two button, and it's clearly a devboard embedded in a larger PCB. also CR2477

I found sort of a pinout, and it has plenty of gpio available... the case is weird though, no easy way of attaching it to anything, although it has some holes in it that could be used

a.aliexpress.com/_EGPL3pO
weirdly shaped black PCB, with a chip in the middle marked N51822, and a button on its side
the PCB in its transparent case, in a similar weird shape
the pinout for the devboard. with the antenna on the top, and the chip facing the viewer, the left side is: ANT, P0.22, P0.23, P0.24, P0.00, P0.01, P0.02, P0.03, P0.04 and the right side: P0.18, SWCLK, SWDIO, P0.16, P0.15, P0.12, P0.08, GND, VCC
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pathetic piss kitten @kitten@elizabeth.cat
9mo
kitten playing with trackers oh no I messed up the order of the posts here
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pathetic piss kitten @kitten@elizabeth.cat
9mo
kitten playing with trackers update for tracker : pinout found and someone already tried stuff in it

github.com/seemoo-lab/openhaystack/issues/35#issuecomment-828338751
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pathetic piss kitten @kitten@elizabeth.cat
9mo
kitten playing with trackers I'm wondering which network will work better here, Google's or Apple's ​:neocat_think:​
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pathetic piss kitten @kitten@elizabeth.cat
9mo
kitten playing with trackers okay, so, flashing attempt !

first of all, I need to solder those cables on the tag's pins, let's see how it goes

(I should clean that mat, I know)
my desktop, with a black mat, and on top of it some soldering supply, a soldering iron, the Bluetooth tag, and some jumper cables cut in half
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pathetic piss kitten @kitten@elizabeth.cat
9mo
kitten playing with trackers well, after a lunch break, and after getting up to speed after so much time without soldering, I think I got it

(btw, every time I try to use a soldering tip that isn't the BC2 I end up regretting it)

let's see if that's good enough
tag #1 with half jumper cables soldered to the 4 relevant pins
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pathetic piss kitten @kitten@elizabeth.cat
9mo
kitten playing with trackers aaaaand it seems it worked!! I made a backup of the firmware originally in the tag. let's write OpenHaystack's one
three terminal windows with OpenOCD running in one, a telnet session where I communicate with the tag, and queried a backup in other, and the hexdump of the dumped firmware in the third
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Lis (≙) retired account @lis@luisa.is
9mo
kitten playing with trackers @kitten neocat_chew_wire
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Maaike 🔜 eth0 @ayke@blahaj.social
9mo
kitten playing with trackers @kitten that flux looks like a nail polish bottle?? Didn't know they made flux like that, seems handy.
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pathetic piss kitten @kitten@elizabeth.cat
9mo
kitten playing with trackers @ayke yes! very handy indeed
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Maaike 🔜 eth0 @ayke@blahaj.social
9mo
cursed, don't @kitten now I need to empty a nail polish bottle to use for this purpose
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pathetic piss kitten @kitten@elizabeth.cat
9mo
cursed, don't @ayke ​:blobCat_eyes:​
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Maaike 🔜 eth0 @ayke@blahaj.social
9mo
kitten playing with trackers @kitten I was actually looking into whether I could reimplement the Google system. Might do that, there's code for that online:
github.com/leonboe1/GoogleFindMyTools/blob/main/ZephyrFirmware/README.md
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pathetic piss kitten @kitten@elizabeth.cat
9mo
kitten playing with trackers @ayke ​:neocat_laptop_notice:​
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Maaike 🔜 eth0 @ayke@blahaj.social
9mo
kitten playing with trackers @kitten it's actually pretty common to have modules like that. It means one manufacturer can design a module and make sure it works well (RF is magic), and others can just plop that on a PCB without worrying too much. Also apparently makes compliance easier.
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pathetic piss kitten @kitten@elizabeth.cat
9mo
kitten playing with trackers @ayke I mean, yes, but for an item in which keeping a small footprint is, or should be, a priority... feels wasteful
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Maaike 🔜 eth0 @ayke@blahaj.social
9mo
kitten playing with trackers @kitten agreed ^^
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Maaike 🔜 eth0 @ayke@blahaj.social
9mo
kitten playing with trackers @kitten Oooh curious what you're going to do with these?
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pathetic piss kitten @kitten@elizabeth.cat
9mo
kitten playing with trackers, kinky @ayke I want to flash OpenHaystack on them and see if I can access its days from Apple's FindMy network. and then wear one attached to my collar, for someone to be able to track
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Maaike 🔜 eth0 @ayke@blahaj.social
9mo
kitten playing with trackers, kinky @kitten Oooh you're giving me ideas ^^

(Robot visor with built-in tracking capability)
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