No Programming, Configurable Z-Wave Node with Multi-Sensor-Protocol Support

The management of energy consumption in the industrial field has never been more important. As energy consumption increases, so does society's need to curb it. Many energy management systems have been developed to do just that, but often are expensive with fixed node functionality. These limitations can be overcome with an Internet of Things (IoT) implementation of a universal sensor node. This study aims to develop a low cost, user friendly implementation of an IoT sensor node that supports various sensors and their communication protocols including 1-Wire, I2C, SPI, and UART to be used in an energy management systems. Such a goal is accomplished by developing a no-programming configurable sensor node that utilizes the Z-Wave plus wireless communication protocol and Commercial Off The Shelf (COTS) products. This improves functionality and reduces overall system costs. To make the device more user friendly, the authors develop software architecture that configures sensors by reading Dual In-line Package (DIP) switch inputs, which relieves the user of any programming. Through the testing process, the Z-Uno board on the market was found to be the most applicable piece of hardware to implement the architecture. It is proven that the proposed approach can be a viable option for building simple, user-friendly IoT-based no-programming sensor nodes.