SBHubRPI

Functionality:

This simple program reads the ble advertisements of the SwitchBot SmartMeter and sends them via mqtt to any mqtt broker. The program should run on a wide range of Linux-based systems as well as should be compatible to any mqtt broker and can so integrated in many home-automation softwares. I have tested it using a Raspberry Pi 3 and ioBroker`s Mqtt broker.

Supported Devices:

Only the Smart Meter by SwitchBot is supported by now, because I only can test with this device, yet.

Run:

The project needs the python packages bluepy and paho-mqtt as external dependencies. On a debian based systems you need the packages:

$ sudo apt-get install python-pip libglib2.0-dev

Then run:

$ sudo pip install bluepy paho-mqtt

Unfortunately BLE scan needs root permissions, so you can run the program by:

sudo python3 app.py [pathToConfigFile]

Configuration:

The program needs a configuration Json-file like the following in order to work.

{
  "brokerIP": "192.168.178.5",
  "brokerPort": 1883,
  "hubName": "RPI_HUB1",
  "brokerUsername": "test",
  "brokerPassword": "123456",
  "scanForSeconds": 10.0,
  "rescanTime": 60,
  "publishOnlyChanges": true,
  "devices": [
    {
      "bleMacAddress": "de:ea:db:ee:f1:23",
      "deviceDescription": "LivingRoom",
      "deviceType": "SB_Meter"
    }
  ]
}

Parameter Explanation:

• scanForSeconds: Specifies the amount of seconds a ble active scan will be performed. This should not be to large and not to small.
• rescanTime: Specifies the amount of seconds which will be waited between different ble active scan runs.
• deviceDescription: Description of the device, can be set free but should be unique. Resulting values of the device will be pushed to deviceDescription/variable
• deviceType: Must be "SB_Meter" by now, because now only the Smart Meter is supported. This might change in future.
• publishOnlyChanges: If this parameter is set true, than only if a change is detected, the data will be published to the broker. If set to false, updates occur after every ble scan operation.

Restrictions/Hints:

• sudo permissions are required to scan for ble devices
• The temperature which will be sent is always in celsius!
• If you get an python KeyError, please check the json config file. All parameters must be set!