[Starlink] the real state of "smart agriculture"?

[Starlink] the real state of "smart agriculture"?

[Dave Taht]

(I am hoping others on this list with real-world AG experience can
chime in? I enjoy realworld stories about present solutions and pain
points[2])

I have often been dubious of the 5g hope to dominate any major
component of a smart ag architecture except perhaps FWA, (where
starlink is poised and people also want to run fiber) to give it a
good run for the money- 5g chips are too big, too hard to power, and
too complex, and come with a monthly billing model and other
centralized requirements that make organic evolution and solid support
in remote environments dicy and expensive.

I freely concede that I may be wrong, that with sufficient subsidies,
we will end up hanging the equivalent of a cellphone off of every
suitably large piece of gear and ship all the data up to the cloud,
rather than pre-process locally. Certainly the benefits of gps and
drones are being shown every day, along with satellite weather and
other forms of satellite analysis. [1]

But the 5g sensor market? No. Nowadays smart sensors are easily
constructed out of wifi devices such as these which cost 5 dollars or
less:

https://www.amazon.com/DORHEA-Development-Microcontroller-NodeMCU-32S-ESP-WROOM-32/dp/B086MJGFVV/ref=asc_df_B086MJGFVV/

And the more meshy LoRA stuff now has much better range (4 miles), at
low complexity and power also.

then there are things like amazon sidewalk:
https://www.amazon.com/Amazon-Sidewalk/b?ie=UTF8&node=21328123011

And airtags.

[1] On the other hand rigorous analysis of the food we produce has
recently discovered a marked decline in the percentage of nutritious
minerals over the past 100 years. Please see:

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/09637486.2021.1981831

How smart is that?

[2] Massive subsidy and diversion of river resources to the water
hungry california almond industry during the last 7 years of drought
led to the cancellation of the salmon fishing season last year.

You should hear some of the invective that I used to hear aimed at
"the f-ing vegetarians" along the docks I frequent in half moon bay.
That I used to hear, anyway, The docks are eerily silent, the workers
at other jobs, the boats not going out for anything except crab and
squid.

How smart is that? The California water table is a disaster, too. I
vastly prefer salmon to almonds personally....

I guess a meta point is easily gathering tactical data is one thing,
sharing it sanely another, deciding on how to use it strategically,
another.

-- 
:( My old R&D campus is up for sale: https://tinyurl.com/yurtlab
Dave Täht CSO, LibreQos

Re: [Starlink] [NNagain] the real state of "smart agriculture"?

[Frantisek Borsik]

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...and "deez nuts" almond/water/California story is even older:
https://thegrayzone.com/2018/12/04/pistachio-wars-how-the-resnicks-snack-food-fortune-is-fueling-the-assault-on-iran/

Originating with Iranian revolution, Carter, CIA and Resnicks.

It's always fascinating to me how things are intertwined.

All the best,

Frank

Frantisek (Frank) Borsik



https://www.linkedin.com/in/frantisekborsik

Signal, Telegram, WhatsApp: +421919416714

iMessage, mobile: +420775230885

Skype: casioa5302ca

frantisek.borsik@gmail.com


On Mon, Nov 13, 2023 at 1:45 PM Dave Taht via Nnagain <
nnagain@lists.bufferbloat.net> wrote:

> (I am hoping others on this list with real-world AG experience can
> chime in? I enjoy realworld stories about present solutions and pain
> points[2])
>
> I have often been dubious of the 5g hope to dominate any major
> component of a smart ag architecture except perhaps FWA, (where
> starlink is poised and people also want to run fiber) to give it a
> good run for the money- 5g chips are too big, too hard to power, and
> too complex, and come with a monthly billing model and other
> centralized requirements that make organic evolution and solid support
> in remote environments dicy and expensive.
>
> I freely concede that I may be wrong, that with sufficient subsidies,
> we will end up hanging the equivalent of a cellphone off of every
> suitably large piece of gear and ship all the data up to the cloud,
> rather than pre-process locally. Certainly the benefits of gps and
> drones are being shown every day, along with satellite weather and
> other forms of satellite analysis. [1]
>
> But the 5g sensor market? No. Nowadays smart sensors are easily
> constructed out of wifi devices such as these which cost 5 dollars or
> less:
>
>
> https://www.amazon.com/DORHEA-Development-Microcontroller-NodeMCU-32S-ESP-WROOM-32/dp/B086MJGFVV/ref=asc_df_B086MJGFVV/
>
> And the more meshy LoRA stuff now has much better range (4 miles), at
> low complexity and power also.
>
> then there are things like amazon sidewalk:
> https://www.amazon.com/Amazon-Sidewalk/b?ie=UTF8&node=21328123011
>
> And airtags.
>
> [1] On the other hand rigorous analysis of the food we produce has
> recently discovered a marked decline in the percentage of nutritious
> minerals over the past 100 years. Please see:
>
> https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/09637486.2021.1981831
>
> How smart is that?
>
> [2] Massive subsidy and diversion of river resources to the water
> hungry california almond industry during the last 7 years of drought
> led to the cancellation of the salmon fishing season last year.
>
> You should hear some of the invective that I used to hear aimed at
> "the f-ing vegetarians" along the docks I frequent in half moon bay.
> That I used to hear, anyway, The docks are eerily silent, the workers
> at other jobs, the boats not going out for anything except crab and
> squid.
>
> How smart is that? The California water table is a disaster, too. I
> vastly prefer salmon to almonds personally....
>
> I guess a meta point is easily gathering tactical data is one thing,
> sharing it sanely another, deciding on how to use it strategically,
> another.
>
> --
> :( My old R&D campus is up for sale: https://tinyurl.com/yurtlab
> Dave Täht CSO, LibreQos
> _______________________________________________
> Nnagain mailing list
> Nnagain@lists.bufferbloat.net
> https://lists.bufferbloat.net/listinfo/nnagain
>

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Re: [Starlink] the real state of "smart agriculture"?

[Nathan Owens]

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I have about 2 years of ag experience…
- farming is expensive and highly variable margin year to year, which makes
it hard to justify investing in tech unless the payoff is very obvious /
quick.
- the tech that does exist isn’t standardized. Got a pivot from Zimmatic
and one from Valley? 2 separate apps and whatnot. And the price to get a
cell modem board for it is like $1500 + a subscription.
- much of the smart field monitoring stuff is subscription based; you can’t
own it, and it’s not open.
- integrating and using all this stuff requires some tech skills, the
average age of a farmer is in their 60s, and not all of them are tech savvy
(many are).

On Mon, Nov 13, 2023 at 4:45 AM Dave Taht via Starlink <
starlink@lists.bufferbloat.net> wrote:

> (I am hoping others on this list with real-world AG experience can
> chime in? I enjoy realworld stories about present solutions and pain
> points[2])
>
> I have often been dubious of the 5g hope to dominate any major
> component of a smart ag architecture except perhaps FWA, (where
> starlink is poised and people also want to run fiber) to give it a
> good run for the money- 5g chips are too big, too hard to power, and
> too complex, and come with a monthly billing model and other
> centralized requirements that make organic evolution and solid support
> in remote environments dicy and expensive.
>
> I freely concede that I may be wrong, that with sufficient subsidies,
> we will end up hanging the equivalent of a cellphone off of every
> suitably large piece of gear and ship all the data up to the cloud,
> rather than pre-process locally. Certainly the benefits of gps and
> drones are being shown every day, along with satellite weather and
> other forms of satellite analysis. [1]
>
> But the 5g sensor market? No. Nowadays smart sensors are easily
> constructed out of wifi devices such as these which cost 5 dollars or
> less:
>
>
> https://www.amazon.com/DORHEA-Development-Microcontroller-NodeMCU-32S-ESP-WROOM-32/dp/B086MJGFVV/ref=asc_df_B086MJGFVV/
>
> And the more meshy LoRA stuff now has much better range (4 miles), at
> low complexity and power also.
>
> then there are things like amazon sidewalk:
> https://www.amazon.com/Amazon-Sidewalk/b?ie=UTF8&node=21328123011
>
> And airtags.
>
> [1] On the other hand rigorous analysis of the food we produce has
> recently discovered a marked decline in the percentage of nutritious
> minerals over the past 100 years. Please see:
>
> https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/09637486.2021.1981831
>
> How smart is that?
>
> [2] Massive subsidy and diversion of river resources to the water
> hungry california almond industry during the last 7 years of drought
> led to the cancellation of the salmon fishing season last year.
>
> You should hear some of the invective that I used to hear aimed at
> "the f-ing vegetarians" along the docks I frequent in half moon bay.
> That I used to hear, anyway, The docks are eerily silent, the workers
> at other jobs, the boats not going out for anything except crab and
> squid.
>
> How smart is that? The California water table is a disaster, too. I
> vastly prefer salmon to almonds personally....
>
> I guess a meta point is easily gathering tactical data is one thing,
> sharing it sanely another, deciding on how to use it strategically,
> another.
>
> --
> :( My old R&D campus is up for sale: https://tinyurl.com/yurtlab
> Dave Täht CSO, LibreQos
> _______________________________________________
> Starlink mailing list
> Starlink@lists.bufferbloat.net
> https://lists.bufferbloat.net/listinfo/starlink
>

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Re: [Starlink] the real state of "smart agriculture"?

[dan]

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I have a business that does various sensing including AG market as well as
bar/restaurant and produce.  We use LoRaWAN because all other techs were
far too costly and/or low performing.  I'll comment in-line.

On Mon, Nov 13, 2023 at 5:44 AM Dave Taht <dave.taht@gmail.com> wrote:

> (I am hoping others on this list with real-world AG experience can
> chime in? I enjoy realworld stories about present solutions and pain
> points[2])
>
> I have often been dubious of the 5g hope to dominate any major
> component of a smart ag architecture except perhaps FWA, (where
> starlink is poised and people also want to run fiber) to give it a
> good run for the money- 5g chips are too big, too hard to power, and
> too complex, and come with a monthly billing model and other
> centralized requirements that make organic evolution and solid support
> in remote environments dicy and expensive.
>

5G is FAR too costly for this.  The AG market and many markets that could
benefit from sensors are far to price conscious.  5G as well as catm and
nb-iot are great if you have a very small number of highly mobile sensors,
but if you need a high number of sensors it's far far far too costly.  And
it's very difficult to run private networks so it's essentially stuck in
the hands of major carriers.  Just look at the catm/nb-iot market, it's
barely alive.

lorawan sensors can be extremely cheap, just a few dollars, and run for
months to years on a battery.  I've placed lorawan asset trackers in
packages and tracked them across country accurately and cheaply.  A $15
sensor's chirps can be extrapolated into location tracking as well as
identification of impact and temps from the sensor.  We currently track a
bait (as in fishing bait) company's cartons in a few hundred mile radius as
well as their coolers and freezers.  We get temps, humidity, and pressure
and can extract door opens from the pressure and a trigger we have built on
the sensors (sharp increase is a door close, sharp decrease is a door
open).  We triangulate location from gateway locations and wifi beacons
much like you get reasonably accurate locations on your PC w/o GPS using
semtek's location services.

I have a small number of catm devices, including catm on my victron global
relays and a few GPS sensors which work great, but I only use them because
I need long distance roaming.



>
> I freely concede that I may be wrong, that with sufficient subsidies,
> we will end up hanging the equivalent of a cellphone off of every
> suitably large piece of gear and ship all the data up to the cloud,
> rather than pre-process locally. Certainly the benefits of gps and
> drones are being shown every day, along with satellite weather and
> other forms of satellite analysis. [1]
>
> But the 5g sensor market? No. Nowadays smart sensors are easily
> constructed out of wifi devices such as these which cost 5 dollars or
> less:


>
> https://www.amazon.com/DORHEA-Development-Microcontroller-NodeMCU-32S-ESP-WROOM-32/dp/B086MJGFVV/ref=asc_df_B086MJGFVV/
>
> And the more meshy LoRA stuff now has much better range (4 miles), at
> low complexity and power also.
>

LoRa isn't actually meshy, you can run some simblance of a mesh on top of
LoRa radios but this is really not necessary.  We have lorawan GPS sensors
that have pinged at 110km away in clear line of site.  We have refrigerator
lorawan sensors that have been read 2km away in a city at other client's
locations.   Lorawan has very cheap gateways that can easily be installed
at client locations for under $100 that can forward to a number of
'national' services (aws iot, helium, the things network) as well as your
own lora stack such as chirpstack.



>
> then there are things like amazon sidewalk:
> https://www.amazon.com/Amazon-Sidewalk/b?ie=UTF8&node=21328123011

Sidewalk is a hybrid not a wireless tech per se, but includes lora (not
lorawan) and is very well distributed.  I have a few test kits for this and
have been very very impressed by coverage.


>
> And airtags.
>
airtags suck.  Slow chirpers, only really useful for tracking with apple's
kit.  I wouldn't consider this a player in the sensor market.


>
> [1] On the other hand rigorous analysis of the food we produce has
> recently discovered a marked decline in the percentage of nutritious
> minerals over the past 100 years. Please see:
>
> https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/09637486.2021.1981831
>
> How smart is that?
>
monocrops I would assume.  Plus longer transit times, earlier harvests and
'truck ripening'.  I would imagine flash freezing of produce as well.

>
> [2] Massive subsidy and diversion of river resources to the water
> hungry california almond industry during the last 7 years of drought
> led to the cancellation of the salmon fishing season last year.
>
Are you coming for my Almond milk?!?!


>
> You should hear some of the invective that I used to hear aimed at
> "the f-ing vegetarians" along the docks I frequent in half moon bay.
> That I used to hear, anyway, The docks are eerily silent, the workers
> at other jobs, the boats not going out for anything except crab and
> squid.
>
> How smart is that? The California water table is a disaster, too. I
> vastly prefer salmon to almonds personally....
>
> I guess a meta point is easily gathering tactical data is one thing,
> sharing it sanely another, deciding on how to use it strategically,
> another.
>

There are real dangers in collecting and publishing data unfortunately.  I
have a few sort of a creepy anecdotes from beta testing sensors at a pizza
place.  This is based around 1, 5, 10, 15 minute sensor readings from
dragion temp, humidity, and pressure sensors with triggors on rapid changes
to any reading.

We were able to predict freezure failure 3 weeks in advance on 15 minute
reads by analysing the condensor pump runtimes.
We were able to identify which freezers were the oldest or last refurbished
a couple of ways.  The condensor cycle times compared to the decrease in
temps show how long it takes to cool the box which accurately described the
age of the unit, and the time it took the temp to rise accurately
determined the state of the door seals.  between the two we could identify
which coolers were new, which were refurbished, and which were old and
needed a refurb.  This was over a number of stores in the chain.
that's not so creepy, but it's data extracted from 15 minute intervals that
didn't directly measure the condesor or doors.

However, where it gets a bit more creepy is that we were able to extract
when workers went on break.  accurately.   No door opens, no temp drops, no
changes in pressure meant no workers working, they were out back smoking.
We could identify the smoke breaks PERFECTLY.  That means low pressence in
the front of the store and a back door propped open.

We could also identify the food delivery by changes in the walk-in cooler
pressure, and rise in temps, and very slow drop in temps when freezer was
running.  That means a back door propped open.

We could identify if someone was sitting in the office, or if there were
more that 1 person in the office.  pressure, temp, and humidity all altered
from people being in the room and by a predictable amount.


This seems pretty begning data and private data that the public wouldnt
see, but that we could extrapolate this very accurately from sensors in the
walk-in and reach in coolers should give a little pause about massive
sensor networks and publicly accessible data.  You don't know what you
might expose and what security conserns might pop out from data
'innocently' collected.  Big data is very dangerous.

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[Starlink] bluetooth occupancy sensing

[Dave Taht]

To the tune of dan's comments at the end, today's hackernews
conversation and blog post about what can be done, cheaply, today with
a tiny risc-v bluetooth sensor:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38252566

Somewhat related is "the thing", given to the USA by the soviet union
in 1945, an absolutely brilliant device.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Thing_(listening_device)

In terms of the discussion above, we have met the enemy, and they is us.

On Mon, Nov 13, 2023 at 1:19 PM dan <dandenson@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> I have a business that does various sensing including AG market as well as bar/restaurant and produce.  We use LoRaWAN because all other techs were far too costly and/or low performing.  I'll comment in-line.
>
> On Mon, Nov 13, 2023 at 5:44 AM Dave Taht <dave.taht@gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> (I am hoping others on this list with real-world AG experience can
>> chime in? I enjoy realworld stories about present solutions and pain
>> points[2])
>>
>> I have often been dubious of the 5g hope to dominate any major
>> component of a smart ag architecture except perhaps FWA, (where
>> starlink is poised and people also want to run fiber) to give it a
>> good run for the money- 5g chips are too big, too hard to power, and
>> too complex, and come with a monthly billing model and other
>> centralized requirements that make organic evolution and solid support
>> in remote environments dicy and expensive.
>
>
> 5G is FAR too costly for this.  The AG market and many markets that could benefit from sensors are far to price conscious.  5G as well as catm and nb-iot are great if you have a very small number of highly mobile sensors, but if you need a high number of sensors it's far far far too costly.  And it's very difficult to run private networks so it's essentially stuck in the hands of major carriers.  Just look at the catm/nb-iot market, it's barely alive.
>
> lorawan sensors can be extremely cheap, just a few dollars, and run for months to years on a battery.  I've placed lorawan asset trackers in packages and tracked them across country accurately and cheaply.  A $15 sensor's chirps can be extrapolated into location tracking as well as identification of impact and temps from the sensor.  We currently track a bait (as in fishing bait) company's cartons in a few hundred mile radius as well as their coolers and freezers.  We get temps, humidity, and pressure and can extract door opens from the pressure and a trigger we have built on the sensors (sharp increase is a door close, sharp decrease is a door open).  We triangulate location from gateway locations and wifi beacons much like you get reasonably accurate locations on your PC w/o GPS using semtek's location services.
>
> I have a small number of catm devices, including catm on my victron global relays and a few GPS sensors which work great, but I only use them because I need long distance roaming.
>
>
>>
>>
>> I freely concede that I may be wrong, that with sufficient subsidies,
>> we will end up hanging the equivalent of a cellphone off of every
>> suitably large piece of gear and ship all the data up to the cloud,
>> rather than pre-process locally. Certainly the benefits of gps and
>> drones are being shown every day, along with satellite weather and
>> other forms of satellite analysis. [1]
>>
>> But the 5g sensor market? No. Nowadays smart sensors are easily
>> constructed out of wifi devices such as these which cost 5 dollars or
>> less:
>>
>>
>> https://www.amazon.com/DORHEA-Development-Microcontroller-NodeMCU-32S-ESP-WROOM-32/dp/B086MJGFVV/ref=asc_df_B086MJGFVV/
>>
>> And the more meshy LoRA stuff now has much better range (4 miles), at
>> low complexity and power also.
>
>
> LoRa isn't actually meshy, you can run some simblance of a mesh on top of LoRa radios but this is really not necessary.  We have lorawan GPS sensors that have pinged at 110km away in clear line of site.  We have refrigerator lorawan sensors that have been read 2km away in a city at other client's locations.   Lorawan has very cheap gateways that can easily be installed at client locations for under $100 that can forward to a number of 'national' services (aws iot, helium, the things network) as well as your own lora stack such as chirpstack.
>
>
>>
>>
>> then there are things like amazon sidewalk:
>> https://www.amazon.com/Amazon-Sidewalk/b?ie=UTF8&node=21328123011
>
> Sidewalk is a hybrid not a wireless tech per se, but includes lora (not lorawan) and is very well distributed.  I have a few test kits for this and have been very very impressed by coverage.
>
>>
>>
>> And airtags.
>
> airtags suck.  Slow chirpers, only really useful for tracking with apple's kit.  I wouldn't consider this a player in the sensor market.
>
>>
>>
>> [1] On the other hand rigorous analysis of the food we produce has
>> recently discovered a marked decline in the percentage of nutritious
>> minerals over the past 100 years. Please see:
>>
>> https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/09637486.2021.1981831
>>
>> How smart is that?
>
> monocrops I would assume.  Plus longer transit times, earlier harvests and 'truck ripening'.  I would imagine flash freezing of produce as well.
>>
>>
>> [2] Massive subsidy and diversion of river resources to the water
>> hungry california almond industry during the last 7 years of drought
>> led to the cancellation of the salmon fishing season last year.
>
> Are you coming for my Almond milk?!?!
>
>>
>>
>> You should hear some of the invective that I used to hear aimed at
>> "the f-ing vegetarians" along the docks I frequent in half moon bay.
>> That I used to hear, anyway, The docks are eerily silent, the workers
>> at other jobs, the boats not going out for anything except crab and
>> squid.
>>
>> How smart is that? The California water table is a disaster, too. I
>> vastly prefer salmon to almonds personally....
>>
>> I guess a meta point is easily gathering tactical data is one thing,
>> sharing it sanely another, deciding on how to use it strategically,
>> another.
>
>
> There are real dangers in collecting and publishing data unfortunately.  I have a few sort of a creepy anecdotes from beta testing sensors at a pizza place.  This is based around 1, 5, 10, 15 minute sensor readings from dragion temp, humidity, and pressure sensors with triggors on rapid changes to any reading.
>
> We were able to predict freezure failure 3 weeks in advance on 15 minute reads by analysing the condensor pump runtimes.
> We were able to identify which freezers were the oldest or last refurbished a couple of ways.  The condensor cycle times compared to the decrease in temps show how long it takes to cool the box which accurately described the age of the unit, and the time it took the temp to rise accurately determined the state of the door seals.  between the two we could identify which coolers were new, which were refurbished, and which were old and needed a refurb.  This was over a number of stores in the chain.
> that's not so creepy, but it's data extracted from 15 minute intervals that didn't directly measure the condesor or doors.
>
> However, where it gets a bit more creepy is that we were able to extract when workers went on break.  accurately.   No door opens, no temp drops, no changes in pressure meant no workers working, they were out back smoking.  We could identify the smoke breaks PERFECTLY.  That means low pressence in the front of the store and a back door propped open.
>
> We could also identify the food delivery by changes in the walk-in cooler pressure, and rise in temps, and very slow drop in temps when freezer was running.  That means a back door propped open.
>
> We could identify if someone was sitting in the office, or if there were more that 1 person in the office.  pressure, temp, and humidity all altered from people being in the room and by a predictable amount.
>
>
> This seems pretty begning data and private data that the public wouldnt see, but that we could extrapolate this very accurately from sensors in the walk-in and reach in coolers should give a little pause about massive sensor networks and publicly accessible data.  You don't know what you might expose and what security conserns might pop out from data 'innocently' collected.  Big data is very dangerous.



-- 
:( My old R&D campus is up for sale: https://tinyurl.com/yurtlab
Dave Täht CSO, LibreQos

Re: [Starlink] bluetooth occupancy sensing

[dan]

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I also have bluetooth occupancy sensors lol.  We have a lab test going of
triangulated bluetooth tag locating.  So you put a BLE tag on a device and
*3* or more receivers in a space at different locations and heights which
are documented and then BLE tags are triangulated based on RSSI.  Having
sensors at various heights allows for tracking even the 'z' axis.  These
tags are very cheap, you can buy complete tags for a couple of bucks, don't
even have to build your own, and you can get them built into cutable (or
non-cuttable) wristbands.  You can also do short-term tracking of cell
phone beacons, though privacy mode means that you only get a short
'session' with a phone (because of privacy mode on newer phones) that isn't
paired with something but if you have a phone with a bluetooth headset, the
'locks' the bluetooth mac address and now you can track the phone anywhere
that the bluetooth headsets follow.  You can also track cars which don't
scramble the mac, but you get cars with wifi mac as well.

We can get bluetooth to within inches accurate when it's line of site.  In
a pocket or something it's about a meter because bodies/clothes etc reduce
RSSI unevenly.  The purpose of this is a couple of things, 'patient
tracking' in any sort of a facility like nursing home or hospital, and
device tracking, again in a facility with shared hardware like portable
EKGs and handheld XRays etc that get 'misplaced' and staff has to go on a
hunt for.  It's also much cheaper than lorawan as BLE transmits many times
a second and runs for years while lora is built for more range and only
transmits intermittently, usually 10-60 minutes to preserve battery.

We're testing mainly on dragino and milesight devices.  I'm also having
decent enough luck with mikrotik's knot which can track BLE beacons with
high enough precision.  Mikrotik has their own somewhat expensive BLE
beacons also but these are basically universal.

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Re: [Starlink] the real state of "smart agriculture"?

[Dotzero]

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On Mon, Nov 13, 2023 at 7:45 AM Dave Taht via Starlink <
starlink@lists.bufferbloat.net> wrote:

> (I am hoping others on this list with real-world AG experience can
> chime in? I enjoy realworld stories about present solutions and pain
> points[2])
>

I'm a security techie who happens to own a farm. We run a small grass
fed/finished Angus freezer beef operation in Central East Ohio. I
intentionally keep the operation fairly low tech.  Security is a huge pain
point in the AG sector even if most farmers don't recognize the problem. I
first became interested in AG sector security in 2011 when a friend at
defcon introduced me to someone who hacked a 3pt corn planter remotely.

If you are interested in the use of sensors and tech in AG  then you should
go to something like Farm Science Review (https://fsr.osu.edu/). Ass my
wife puts it, just the vendor area is 100+ acres of agricultural porn. A
lot of the sensing is being done using satellites, aircraft and drones
rather than sensors on the ground. You'll more likely see sensors "on the
ground" in greenhouse operations, milkining operations, etc. I'm attaching
a photo of a combine with multiple antennas. Not sure if it will make it
through the listserv.

>
> I have often been dubious of the 5g hope to dominate any major
> component of a smart ag architecture except perhaps FWA, (where
> starlink is poised and people also want to run fiber) to give it a
> good run for the money- 5g chips are too big, too hard to power, and
> too complex, and come with a monthly billing model and other
> centralized requirements that make organic evolution and solid support
> in remote environments dicy and expensive.
>

The other issue with 5g is the range.

>
> I freely concede that I may be wrong, that with sufficient subsidies,
> we will end up hanging the equivalent of a cellphone off of every
> suitably large piece of gear and ship all the data up to the cloud,
> rather than pre-process locally. Certainly the benefits of gps and
> drones are being shown every day, along with satellite weather and
> other forms of satellite analysis. [1]
>
> But the 5g sensor market? No. Nowadays smart sensors are easily
> constructed out of wifi devices such as these which cost 5 dollars or
> less:
>
>
> https://www.amazon.com/DORHEA-Development-Microcontroller-NodeMCU-32S-ESP-WROOM-32/dp/B086MJGFVV/ref=asc_df_B086MJGFVV/
>
> And the more meshy LoRA stuff now has much better range (4 miles), at
> low complexity and power also.
>

I haven't seen muh LoRA stuff in the field (yet).

>
> then there are things like amazon sidewalk:
> https://www.amazon.com/Amazon-Sidewalk/b?ie=UTF8&node=21328123011
>
> And airtags.
>
> [1] On the other hand rigorous analysis of the food we produce has
> recently discovered a marked decline in the percentage of nutritious
> minerals over the past 100 years. Please see:
>
> https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/09637486.2021.1981831
>
> How smart is that?
>
> [2] Massive subsidy and diversion of river resources to the water
> hungry california almond industry during the last 7 years of drought
> led to the cancellation of the salmon fishing season last year.
>
> You should hear some of the invective that I used to hear aimed at
> "the f-ing vegetarians" along the docks I frequent in half moon bay.
> That I used to hear, anyway, The docks are eerily silent, the workers
> at other jobs, the boats not going out for anything except crab and
> squid.
>
> How smart is that? The California water table is a disaster, too. I
> vastly prefer salmon to almonds personally....
>
> I guess a meta point is easily gathering tactical data is one thing,
> sharing it sanely another, deciding on how to use it strategically,
> another.
>
> --
> :( My old R&D campus is up for sale: https://tinyurl.com/yurtlab
> Dave Täht CSO, LibreQos
> _______________________________________________
> Starlink mailing list
> Starlink@lists.bufferbloat.net
> https://lists.bufferbloat.net/listinfo/starlink
>

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Re: [Starlink] [NNagain] the real state of "smart agriculture"?

[Frantisek Borsik]

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This is really cool playground you have there "down under", Rohan. Thanks
for sharing this challenge with us.

All the best,

Frank

Frantisek (Frank) Borsik



https://www.linkedin.com/in/frantisekborsik

Signal, Telegram, WhatsApp: +421919416714

iMessage, mobile: +420775230885

Skype: casioa5302ca

frantisek.borsik@gmail.com


On Tue, Nov 14, 2023 at 12:32 AM Rohan M via Nnagain <
nnagain@lists.bufferbloat.net> wrote:

> Hi All,
>
> I am the Head of IT and Engineering for Flavorite, one of the largest
> hydroponic glasshouse producers in the southern hemisphere with ~100ha
> under glass. We predominantly focus on tomatoes, capsicums, cucumbers and
> blueberries (the latter are not glasshouse grown). Glasshouse production is
> typically 60% more water efficient than conventional cropping, or said
> another way, it uses 1/3 of the water of conventional cropping.
>
> We have several different environments that span large distances and use a
> myriad of different technologies to support them.
>
> In the glasshouses our biggest challenge is getting a signal through a
> glass, a metal frame, and thick foliage which is >90% water. Foliage is
> typically very dense and layered which creates a perfect sink for the
> majority of signals.  (eg
> https://investgippsland.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/Flavorite-2-e1574123141523-756x350.jpg
> )
>
> Glasshouse environments:
> In the glasshouse we have long spans (varies but up to 400m/1312ft) of
> centre paths that are up to 4m across and concreted (eg
> https://www.atophort.com/files/News/202110/tomatoes-in-greenhouse.jpg )
>
> The typical temperatures in the glasshouses ranges from about 20C (68F) to
> 45C (113F) - more in direct sun during summer, with high humidity at times,
> this is a barrier for a lot of devices, as it will push a processor idling
> at 50C across the 95C threshold and cause it to crash.
>
> Primary communication there is via wifi, we often use 3 unifi points (Flex
> HD/U6 mesh) to cover the centre path, but we are trialling the unifi Mesh
> Pro AC points as they have shown to cover larger areas. Wifi (or any
> signal) access down rows more than about 5m off the centre path generally
> is poor, but with points up high enough we have enough to keep the fresnel
> zones clear around the APs. One problem here is that we have to mount the
> APs on steel uprights, which may or may not have hydronic heating tubes
> nearby.
>
> Wireless communication for moisture sensing is done by proprietary
> systems, but they typically use LoraWan, with a gateway to the main
> network. These have poor propagation past 50m in these environments due to
> the wavelengths and the foliage, so sometimes do not register correctly.
>
> Even though there is a 5g mobile repeater nearby (~1km away), getting
> reception on any mobile network in a glasshouse is generally nigh
> impossible.
>
> Warehouse/Packing environments:
> Warehouse/Packing environments have a large amount of industrial equipment
> for grading, packing, weighing and sorting fruit for delivery and
> logistics. These environments typically have a lot of metal on the general
> work floor which reflects or grounds signals. The walls and ceiling are
> made of aluminum alloy which sandwiches insulation foam (as the whole area
> is temperature controlled), there is heavy cement reinforced with rebar
> fire walls between major sections, and a cement/concrete floor. The whole
> structure acts as a Faraday's cage, so there are no signals going outside,
> and inside, as mentioned, there is a lot of industrial equipment.
>
> Size of these environments approximates the same as glasshouses - 600m x
> 300m typically.
>
> In this environment we have approximately 60-80 wifi devices, a lot of
> people who use "wi-fi calling" on mobile devices. 5g signal propagation in
> such areas is non-existent, especially in rural areas. Boosters have been
> tried, and failed, many times, with calls dropping out regularly.
>
> Getting any signal propagation across the environment is a challenge.
> Typically how we handle this is by ceiling mounted APs, but we find that
> without AP based SQM these units experience bufferbloat, which causes calls
> to drop out, or pause. The typical farmer mentality in these instances is
> to put in a bigger AP, but this has not solved the problem (even with the
> enormous stadium type units). The next stage here is to try more APs in
> strategic locations.
>
> It should be noted that in some such environments there are multiple very
> large, 16kva (or above) pumps which have large magnetic fields despite
> isolation etc. The way we've managed that is by having more density of
> points in those areas, which improves things but doesn't solve them.
>
> Blueberry fields:
> Blueberry fields are similar to glasshouses, plants grow up to 1.7m
> (5ft6in) and have dense foliage, similar layout to inside of a glasshouse,
> however larger areas (500m/1640ft square is typical) with varying degrees
> of elevation depending on the site. Getting a signal here is also a
> challenge. So far we have deployed Unifi Mesh Pro AC units at the top of
> treated pine poles around 2M up, three of these units allow long distance
> wifi down the main paths (circa 350-400m range each), and approximately
> 10m/32ft into the blueberry rows.
>
> Typical applications here are tablets and phones for voip. Density of
> client devices is much lower than the other environments, with 20 clients
> typically per field at any time.
>
>
> In summary - 4g/5g in these environments is of limited use due to lack of
> ability to foster signal propagation and the fact that these locations are
> rural, which means infrastructure typically is poor in the area.
>
> Cheers
> Rohan M
>
> On Mon, Nov 13, 2023 at 11:44 PM Dave Taht <dave.taht@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> (I am hoping others on this list with real-world AG experience can
>> chime in? I enjoy realworld stories about present solutions and pain
>> points[2])
>>
>> I have often been dubious of the 5g hope to dominate any major
>> component of a smart ag architecture except perhaps FWA, (where
>> starlink is poised and people also want to run fiber) to give it a
>> good run for the money- 5g chips are too big, too hard to power, and
>> too complex, and come with a monthly billing model and other
>> centralized requirements that make organic evolution and solid support
>> in remote environments dicy and expensive.
>>
>> I freely concede that I may be wrong, that with sufficient subsidies,
>> we will end up hanging the equivalent of a cellphone off of every
>> suitably large piece of gear and ship all the data up to the cloud,
>> rather than pre-process locally. Certainly the benefits of gps and
>> drones are being shown every day, along with satellite weather and
>> other forms of satellite analysis. [1]
>>
>> But the 5g sensor market? No. Nowadays smart sensors are easily
>> constructed out of wifi devices such as these which cost 5 dollars or
>> less:
>>
>>
>> https://www.amazon.com/DORHEA-Development-Microcontroller-NodeMCU-32S-ESP-WROOM-32/dp/B086MJGFVV/ref=asc_df_B086MJGFVV/
>>
>> And the more meshy LoRA stuff now has much better range (4 miles), at
>> low complexity and power also.
>>
>> then there are things like amazon sidewalk:
>> https://www.amazon.com/Amazon-Sidewalk/b?ie=UTF8&node=21328123011
>>
>> And airtags.
>>
>> [1] On the other hand rigorous analysis of the food we produce has
>> recently discovered a marked decline in the percentage of nutritious
>> minerals over the past 100 years. Please see:
>>
>> https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/09637486.2021.1981831
>>
>> How smart is that?
>>
>> [2] Massive subsidy and diversion of river resources to the water
>> hungry california almond industry during the last 7 years of drought
>> led to the cancellation of the salmon fishing season last year.
>>
>> You should hear some of the invective that I used to hear aimed at
>> "the f-ing vegetarians" along the docks I frequent in half moon bay.
>> That I used to hear, anyway, The docks are eerily silent, the workers
>> at other jobs, the boats not going out for anything except crab and
>> squid.
>>
>> How smart is that? The California water table is a disaster, too. I
>> vastly prefer salmon to almonds personally....
>>
>> I guess a meta point is easily gathering tactical data is one thing,
>> sharing it sanely another, deciding on how to use it strategically,
>> another.
>>
>> --
>> :( My old R&D campus is up for sale: https://tinyurl.com/yurtlab
>> Dave Täht CSO, LibreQos
>>
> _______________________________________________
> Nnagain mailing list
> Nnagain@lists.bufferbloat.net
> https://lists.bufferbloat.net/listinfo/nnagain
>

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