Mozilla has developed an open gateway for the Internet of things

Apple, Google, Amazon, Samsung - each of these companies has its own standards and programs for managing smart devices of its own brand. As a result, they can often communicate only with their “relatives” produced by the same company. The Apple HomePod smart column will refuse to back up data to the Amazon or Google cloud and will not execute commands from the Andrioid-smartphone. It turns out that for the full integration of all appliances in the house should be from one company. This is clearly an abnormal situation.

Last year, the Mozilla organization announced that it was working on creating a single free framework - programs and services for the Internet of Things, which work using the open standard Web Things API , which uses JSON, REST and WebSockets API.
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The framework should become a single gateway for interaction between “smart” devices from different manufacturers (Things Gateway). Now the organization has officially announced the launch of the Mozilla IoT project, laid out the program stack and published a guide on building a smart home system using Raspberry Pi. The application for standardization of Web Things API was submitted to the W3C on February 2, 2018.

The table shows the current zoo of protocols and services that are used by device manufacturers of the Internet of Things. Each company has its own cloud service, its own communication protocol with applications. Devices work under different operating systems. The only common thing between them is support for the WiFi network protocol.



Mozilla sees its mission as “ensuring that the Internet is a global public resource, open and accessible to all. The Internet, which really serves people in the first place, when people can independently form their own experience and are empowered to do so in a safe and independent environment. ”

IoT devices should be primarily controlled by users, not manufacturing companies. If a person wants to connect a smart column from one manufacturer to the lighting system of another manufacturer, he is entitled to do so regardless of the manufacturer’s desire. This is a legal right of a person, because the smart column is in his private property and he can do anything with it.

The goal of the Mozilla IoT project is to create a decentralized secure network on open standards with an emphasis on security and privacy.

Since its first announcement in June 2017, Mozilla has collaborated with the maker community, with testers, developers and end users, to prepare a project for a viable open system. The Raspberry Pi 3 single-board mini-computer was chosen as the central hub of the IoT home system.

In the current version, the Things Gateway software stack supports the following functions:

• Voice commands to devices through a microphone on a computer.
• The rule engine (“If this, then that”) for determining the logic of the interaction of devices with each other.
• Layout of premises with the imposition of devices on the map at home
• "Virtual" versions of devices that are currently not available: smart lights, switches, sensors, etc.
• Plugin system to support new protocols and devices.
• New system for secure authorization of third-party applications (via OAuth).

Raspberry Pi 3 has built-in support for WiFi and Bluetooth. To connect other protocols like Zigbee or Z-Wave, some models of USB dongles are supported: Digi XStick (ZB mesh version) or any OpenZWave-compatible devices.



To deploy the free Mozilla Internet of Things gateway, you need to download and install Things Gateway 0.3 software image on Raspberry Pi. By the way, you can experiment with this program on a PC or laptop: it is distributed with open source codes, so you can build it yourself from the sources.

After installing the certificates and the web server, the Mozilla Things Gateway is ready for use. It works as a WiFi access point, broadcasting a network name (SSID) “Mozilla IoT Gateway”. You can connect to it from a laptop or smartphone - then the settings page will automatically load. As an option, the Raspberry Pi gateway itself connects to an existing wireless network.

Mozilla Things Gateway works with real or self-signed certificates. If necessary, you can install certificates from an authorized center, for example, GlobalSign has a public key infrastructure specifically for the Internet of Things , which is able to issue up to 3000 certificates per second. But in general, at the gateway setup stage, when selecting a subdomain, Things Gateway automatically generates a Let's Encrypt SSL certificate and establishes a secure connection for remote access to the system via the Internet.



After the gateway has been configured, a window opens for adding devices to the local network of the Internet of Things.



From here you can turn on / off devices and view their properties. For example, the screenshot below shows a smart switch with on / off buttons.



On the property screen, the switch shows the current power consumption, voltage, amperage, and frequency.



For a smart light bulb, on the appropriate screen you can set the brightness and color of the lighting.



Of course, all these settings can be made from proprietary software and programs that come bundled with each of these devices. But the fact of the matter is that there are many devices, and each one has its own control program. The open standard Web Things API and the free gateway from Mozilla should in the future combine all these gadgets of different companies into a single system.

“Each manufacturer usually creates its own application that works only with its own brand,” writes Mozilla. “If the future of connected IoT devices continues to include proprietary solutions, their cost will remain high while the market will remain fragmented and grow slowly. Consumers should not be tied to a specific product, brand or platform. This will only result in a premium payment for such simple things as a smart light bulb. ”

Mozilla believes that the future of connected devices should be more like an open web. It should be decentralized — control should be given to the people who use these devices.

Everyone is invited to participate in the further development of the free framework.

Mozilla IoT Project on Github
Installing Mozilla Things Gateway on Raspberry Pi