Status Update #5
Early access to the HiTechHomestead Starter LoRa Bundle is almost here
It’s been just under a month since the last update. During the last four weeks my efforts have been focused on validation, testing, and making various user flows presentable. It’s been a real change of pace as my attention has shifted from building new features to closing out all the things that were already mostly working but still a little clunky.
That shift has been both encouraging and discouraging at the same time. It’s discouraging in that many days feel like very little progress has been made. But I’ve built enough experience over the years to know that this is part of the process of building something good. My favorite part of engineering is fleshing out new ideas and features, but at some point you have to draw a line in the sand and stop building and start polishing; turning the half-baked things into something a little more baked (nothing is ever fully baked, is it?). Over the last few weeks it’s been encouraging to see all the big pieces come together and actually look like somewhat of a cohesive system.
Stable node deployment
I currently have three sensor nodes that I deployed out on a fence post just after Christmas. Two of these had the release candidate of the Starter LoRa firmware after all of the rework to migrate to the new WisBlock SDK (read more about that here), and one is still running the pre-migration firmware that is now defunct. All nodes have been reliably transmitting ambient temperature, humidity, external temperature probe reading, approximate internal temperatures, battery levels, and signal strength every five minutes to the local gateway.
The only maintenance that I’ve had to do on any of these since deploying them is to charge up the old-firmware node when the battery died about two weeks in. I took this opportunity to install a small solar panel, and that node has been sitting at nearly full charge since then, even with the short, overcast, winter days we are having in the PNW.
The new node firmware has been running continuously the entire time, the gateway has stayed connected, and the data stream has been steady. This has been one of the more confidence building data points for me. Not because the numbers are perfect, but because the behavior is generally uneventful. No unexplained resets. No gradual degradation. No need to intervene. This is how my personal LoRaWAN system behaves in day-to-day use. Achieving a similar level of reliability and utility on a new hardware platform using the much simpler Simple LoRa point-to-point protocol marks an important milestone for HiTechHomestead. This gives me great hope that the staged progression of the HTH ecosystem actually can be a great on-ramp for small farmers and homesteaders wanting to get started in smart farming without sifting through mountains of forum posts YouTube videos to put all the bits-and-pieces together.
Toolkit state and repeatability
The HTH Toolkit has reached a point where I can reliably reproduce the same setup from scratch, without running into something that is broken and needs a manual intervention.
I have verified the full setup flow on both Linux and Windows. On a clean Windows machine, I can download the installer, install the Toolkit, connect a device configured as a gateway, provision it, and then bring a sensor node online. Data begins appearing in the dashboard without manual database edits or command line work.
Live updates and historical charts are behaving predictably. Nodes are correctly identified, metrics and measurements show up in real-time, and the system no longer requires multiple restarts to recover from unexpected behavior during normal usage. I am no longer chasing issues that only show up after several hours of runtime.
At this point, I can leave the Toolkit running and trust it to keep doing what it is supposed to do.
The major technical pieces all seem to be working fairly well. Yes, there are still lots of improvements to be made, and features on the roadmap that are not yet implemented, but it feels like we are approaching a big milestone and that is exciting.
Documentation is now the constraint
The big effort remaining before this thing goes out the door officially is wrapping up initial documentation. I’ve been working through the user guide with an eye for detail and setting a bar that the guide can be followed by someone with very little technical or computer experience.
The written steps now cover the full path from assembling hardware, flashing firmware, installing the Toolkit, provisioning a gateway, onboarding a node, and verifying data in the dashboard. Writing all the steps has exposed a number of assumptions I did not realize I was making, and working through those gaps has taken time.
What is still missing are two concrete pieces:
Step by step photographs that match the written instructions
A complete, formalized set of parts links for assembling the devices exactly as described
Both are straightforward but are going to take a bit more time to put together. The walkthrough is usable without them, but it is not ready to be handed off until those pieces are in place.
Public facing presence
In parallel to fleshing out the walkthrough, I have also been assembling the public-facing website landing and documentation pages. The main project landing page is in place and and I just pushed the go-live button this evening. You can check out the landing page here to learn more about the project as a whole.
I’ve set up a support desk and have been preparing for distribution of the Starter LoRa Bundle via Gumroad. Lot’s of big rocks are falling into place.
Where things stand
At this point, the Toolkit, firmware, and overall system behavior are stable enough that they can be used by others without constant supervision.
The remaining work is no longer about building out core functionality and foundational modules. The focus over the coming weeks is almost exclusively on wrapping up documentation, adding clarity, and making sure the first experience holds up for someone who is seeing this project for the first time. The walkthrough is still in draft form, and it is missing step-by-step photos and a finalized parts list, but the underlying system is behaving as expected in all of my testing so far.
Early Access
With all of this in mind, I’ve decided to make an early access build available before all of the final polishing is done.
The early access release will include the current version of the Toolkit, the Starter LoRa firmware for both nodes and gateways, and the draft walkthrough in its working state. All of this will be free to download and is intended for technically curious users who are comfortable testing a system that is still evolving.
The system is functional, but not fully polished. Documentation is still being refined, and some sharp edges remain. Feedback at this stage is especially valuable, and a support desk is available for questions, issues, or specific observations from real deployments.
I want to do one more pass through the docs and sanity-check all of the software, but I'm on track to be able open the early access bundle by the end of this week. I'll push out another update when that happens, so go ahead and subscribe if you want to be notified.