Glossary Of Terms

Glossary Of Terms

F

• Firmware The software that runs on a specific piece of hardware is called firmware. Both the Mesh Node and Mesh Radio have a custom firmware that performs specific tasks and contains other software. Firmware commonly refers to the entire set of software running on a device, as opposed to one piece of it.
• Flash(ing) Refers to the process of writing a new firmware to a device. The process can be simple or complex depending on the manufacturer of the hardware.

L

• LAN: See Wikipedia: Local Area Network

M

• Mesh Mode Refers to a mode of operation for wifi devices known as 802.11s that allows devices to talk directly to each other without an access point. This is similar to Ad-Hoc mode and allows devices to come in and out of range with each other while still allowing any device to talk to any other device.
• Mesh Network: A mesh network is a peer-to-peer network where there are multiple links between each Mesh Node.
• Mesh Node: Think of a mesh network as a graph. A mesh node is one 'vertex' on that graph. It's the combination of radios and single-board-computers you keep in your home in order to participate in your neighborhood network.
• Mesh Radio Each mesh node uses one or more mesh radios to communicate with other mesh nodes. For simplicity, the radio will sometimes be omitted from diagrams despite being a separate piece of hardware. The job of the mesh radio is to relay traffic between the ethernet plug on the mesh node and a meshing wifi signal.

P

• Peer-to-Peer: Peer-to-peer computing or networking is a distributed application architecture that partitions tasks or workloads between peers. Peers are equally privileged, equipotent participants in the application. They are said to form a peer-to-peer network of nodes.

S

• Stock or Stock Firmware is used to describe the preloaded software that comes on a device when purchased from a store. Not all devices have a stock firmware, but it's important to be aware of those that do because flashing steps for our custom firmware can differ depending on whether a device is running stock or has already been flashed to our firmware.

T

• TFTP Is a method of transferring files that is used by certain devices to receive firmware files.
• TFTP Mode Many devices feature a recovery mode that can be used to re-flash the device firmware. The software for this mode is separate from the firmware, so even when the device software breaks, TFTP Mode can usually be used to reset the main firmware. This mode is used for several devices for the flashing process.

W

• WAN: See Wikipedia: Wide Area Network

Y

• Yggdrasil The software and protocol we use for forming our mesh. To learn more, visit the Yggdrasil Website