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= AltOS Companion Port
Keith Packard <keithp@keithp.com>; Bdale Garbee <bdale@gag.com>
:doctype: article
:copyright: Bdale Garbee and Keith Packard 2018
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:linkcss:
:pdf-stylesdir: .
:pdf-style: altusmetrum
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:toc:
include::header.adoc[]
== Companion Port
Many Altus Metrum products come with an eight pin Micro MaTch
connector, called the Companion Port. This is often used to
program devices using a programming cable. However, it can
also be used to connect TeleMetrum to external companion
boards (hence the name).
The Companion Port provides two different functions:
* Power. Both battery-level and 3.3V regulated power are
available. Note that the amount of regulated power is not
huge; TeleMetrum contains a 150mA regulator and uses, at
peak, about 120mA or so. For applications needing more than
a few dozen mA, placing a separate regulator on them and
using the battery for power is probably a good idea.
* SPI. The flight computer operates as a SPI master, using
a protocol defined in this document. Companion boards
provide a matching SPI slave implementation which supplies
telemetry information for the radio downlink during flight
== Companion SPI Protocol
The flight computer implements a SPI master communications
channel over the companion port, and uses this to get
information about a connected companion board and then to get
telemetry data for transmission during flight.
At startup time, the flight computer sends a setup request
packet, and the companion board returns a board identifier,
the desired telemetry update period and the number of data
channels provided. The flight computer doesn't interpret the
telemetry data at all, simply packing it up and sending it
over the link. Telemetry packets are 32 bytes long, and
companion packets use 8 bytes as a header leaving room for a
maximum of 12 16-bit data values.
Because of the limits of the AVR processors used in the first
two companion boards, the SPI data rate is set to 187.5kbaud.
== SPI Message Formats
This section first defines the command message format sent from
the flight computer to the companion board, and then the various
reply message formats for each type of command message.
.Companion Command Message
[options="border",cols="1,3,3,9"]
|====
|Offset
|Data Type
|Name
|Description
|0
|uint8_t
|command
|Command identifier
|1
|uint8_t
|flight_state
|Current flight computer state
|2
|uint16_t
|tick
|Flight computer clock (100 ticks/second)
|4
|uint16_t
|serial
|Flight computer serial number
|6
|uint16_t
|flight
|Flight number
|8
|
|
|
|====
.Companion Command Identifiers
[options="border",cols="1,3,9"]
|====
|Value
|Name
|Description
|1
|SETUP
|Supply the flight computer with companion
information
|2
|FETCH
|Return telemetry information
|3
|NOTIFY
|Tell companion board when flight state changes
|====
The flight computer will send a SETUP message shortly after
power-up and will then send FETCH messages no more often than
the rate specified in the SETUP reply. NOTIFY messages will be
sent whenever the flight state changes.
'flight_state' records the current state of the flight,
whether on the pad, under power, coasting to apogee or
descending on the drogue or main chute.
'tick' provides the current flight computer clock, which
be used to synchronize data recorded on the flight computer
with that recorded on the companion board in post-flight analysis.
'serial' is the product serial number of the flight computer,
'flight' is the flight sequence number. Together, these two
uniquely identify the flight and can be recorded with any
companion board data logging to associate the companion data
with the proper flight.
NOTIFY commands require no reply at all, they are used solely
to inform the companion board when the state of the flight, as
computed by the flight computer, changes. Companion boards can
use this to change data collection parameters, disabling data
logging until the flight starts and terminating it when the
flight ends.
=== SETUP reply message
.SETUP reply contents
[options="border",cols="1,3,3,9"]
|====
|Offset
|Data Type
|Name
|Description
|0
|uint16_t
|board_id
|Board identifier
|2
|uint16_t
|board_id_inverse
|~board_id—used to tell if a board is present
|4
|uint8_t
|update_period
|Minimum time (in 100Hz ticks) between FETCH commands
|5
|uint8_t
|channels
|Number of data channels to retrieve in FETCH command
|6
|
|
|
|====
The SETUP reply contains enough information to uniquely
identify the companion board to the end user as well as for
the flight computer to know how many data values to expect in
reply to a FETCH command, and how often to fetch that data.
To detect the presence of a companion board, the flight
computer checks to make sure that board_id_inverse is the
bit-wise inverse of board_id. Current companion boards use
USB product ID as the board_id, but the flight computer does
not interpret this data and so it can be any value.
=== FETCH reply message
.FETCH reply contents
[options="border",cols="1,3,3,9"]
|====
|Offset
|Data Type
|Name
|Description
|0
|uint16_t
|data0
|0th data item
|2
|uint16_t
|data1
|1st data item
|...
|
|
|
|====
The FETCH reply contains arbitrary data to be reported
over the flight computer telemetry link. The number of
16-bit data items must match the 'channels' value
provided in the SETUP reply message.
== History and Motivation
To allow cross-programming, the original TeleMetrum and
TeleDongle designs needed to include some kind of
connector. With that in place, adding the ability to connect
external cards to TeleMetrum was fairly simple. We set the
software piece of this puzzle aside until we had a companion
board to use.
The first companion board was TeleScience. Designed to collect
temperature data from the nose and fin of the airframe, the main
requirement for the companion port was that it be able to report
telemetry data during flight as a back-up in case the
TeleScience on-board data was lost.
The second companion board, TelePyro, provides 8 additional
channels for deployment, staging or other activities. To avoid
re-programming the TeleMetrum to use TelePyro, we decided to
provide enough information over the companion link for it to
independently control those channels.
Providing a standard, constant interface between the flight
computer and companion boards allows for the base flight
computer firmware to include support for companion boards.
|
