Docker stack including all software components to run a private LoRaWAN infrastructure on a Raspberry Pi
It's based on the docker-compose.yaml from the ChirpStack. project but also includes Node-RED and the FROST-Server which the OCG SensorThings API stanadard to store sensor data 'the right way'.
The ChirpStack and the FROST-Server are sharing the included PostgreSQL 11 instance. Node-RED is basically used to turn the sensor data published via MQTT by the ChirpStack application server into observations which are then posted via REST API to the FROST-Server. You need to setup the corresponding flows yourself! A flow consists of a MQTT source connected to the ChirpStack application server, a function node to decode the binary sensor payload and a HTTP output node to post an observation as JSON to the FROST-Server.
To run the stack on your Raspberry Pi just clone the repository, open the file docker-compose.yaml
with a text editor and replace the ip address for the option serviceRootUrl with the ip address
of your Raspberry Pi. Start the docker stack with docker-compose up in this directory and
grab a coffee. Docker will first download all required docker images (about 1.5 GB) and then
start eight services altogether. Don't worry about intermediate ping PostgreSQL database errors
during the initial setup process, it takes a while to create and configure a PostgreSQL instance
on a Raspberry Pi. Same holds true for the initial deployment of the FROST-Server (Java11/Tomcat9).
Eventually, when the load on your Raspberry Pi has settled (check with top in another terminal window),
you can connect to the ChirpStack UI with your favourite webbrowser at http://<ip_addr_raspi>:8000/
replacing <ip_addr_raspi> with the current ip address of your Raspberry Pi. The network-server is
configured for EU868 by default. Use a different configuration file from examples directory
if you need to switch to a different frequency band like US915. The FROST-Servers RESTful API is
available at http://<ip_addr_raspi>:8080/FROST-Server/ and Node-RED at http://<ip_addr_raspi>:1880.
If the stack was started successfully and all services are online (see above), hit Ctrl-C to stop
it followed by docker-compose start to restart it in the background. You should see only green
done messages when restarting the stack.
The subdirectory helper contains a few shell scripts to reset the stack if you want to start
from scratch, to remove it altogether including all docker images and to grand the stack components
full access to the internet, for example if you need to install additional Node-RED nodes.
This stack was originally composed for a barcamp session on LoRaWAN infrastructure presented on the "2. Fachtagung Sensordaten" on the 13./14.11.2019 in Munich and updated to recent ChirpStack components, FROST 1.14 and PostgreSQL/Postgis 11/2.5.1 in July 2021.