WiFi Antennas

[vbPhil]

Was wondering if it's okay to take off the WiFi antennas on the Polisy Pro? I thought they might be interfering with the Z-Wave dongle and WiFi doesn't work anyway.

[Bumbershoot]

22 hours ago, vbphil said:

Was wondering if it's okay to take off the WiFi antennas on the Polisy Pro? I thought they might be interfering with the Z-Wave dongle and WiFi doesn't work anyway.

WiFi does work.  I used it when I repositioned my Polisy to get it closer to some older Z-Wave devices for exclusion/inclusion.

[vbPhil]

2 minutes ago, Bumbershoot said:

WiFi does work.  I used it when I repositioned my Polisy to get it closer to some older Z-Wave devices for exclusion/inclusion.

Where is the setup or configuration for it checked or entered?

[Bumbershoot]

4 minutes ago, vbphil said:

Where is the setup or configuration for it checked or entered?

It's in the PG2 interface.  It has to be coming to PG3, but I guess it's not there yet.

[vbPhil]

Just now, Bumbershoot said:

It's in the PG2 interface.  It has to be coming to PG3, but I guess it's not there yet.

I had looked for it in PG3 but couldn't find anything.

What would it show up as in my network map if it was connected to the router? I would think there would be some way to check on it's settings using SSH.

[Bumbershoot]

6 minutes ago, vbphil said:

I had looked for it in PG3 but couldn't find anything.

What would it show up as in my network map if it was connected to the router? I would think there would be some way to check on it's settings using SSH.

You can always use the 'netstat' command, but it won't show an inactive interface without in IP address.

In my router, it showed up as 'POLISY' if I recall.  The interface isn't active, so I can't check.

[Bumbershoot]

19 minutes ago, vbphil said:

I would think there would be some way to check on it's settings using SSH.

The command 'ifconfig -a' will get you the MAC address of the interface, if it's active, which you can then look up in your router tables once it's connected.  You might be able to copy that and make a static DHCP reservation in your router before restarting the Polisy to use the interface, as well.  I just looked it up once Polisy WiFi was connected.  YMMV.

Edited April 24, 2022 by Bumbershoot

[vbPhil]

Ok, thanks. I see Polisy in my network map as a LAN connection which makes sense because it's plugged in. Can't remember if I gave it that name or not, but I don't see any wireless connection. It is reserved in DHCP. I'll try unplugging the network cable and restart Polisy to see if that wakes up the WiFi.

Edit: that was a bust. Polisy wouldn't come online without the network cable plugged in. I'm leaving well enough alone. I don't need the WiFi right now anyway. don't want to break anything.

Edited April 24, 2022 by vbphil
additional info

[Bumbershoot]

28 minutes ago, vbphil said:

Edit: that was a bust. Polisy wouldn't come online without the network cable plugged in. I'm leaving well enough alone. I don't need the WiFi right now anyway. don't want to break anything.

I found the IPv4 Networking settings in PG2 to be a bit confusing.  IIRC, you have to make certain that the WiFi interface in actually turned on.  Just removing the ethernet cable and restarting the Polisy won't do it.  In any event, I got it to work when I needed it.  Other than that, I've switched back to using a wired network...

[apostolakisl]

Questions,

Why 3 ethernet ports?  It is a bit confusing right off since you don't know which one to use without trial and error or reading the instructions.  I have not tried changing these settings, but it appears you can turn on multiple ethernet ports at the same time and get different IP addresses.  And I guess you can turn on wifi at the same time as well for 4 simultaneous networks?

[oskrypuch]

Reading the instructions is often a good idea. ?

* Orest

[lilyoyo1]

9 hours ago, apostolakisl said:

 

 or reading the instructions.  

That's a new concept for people. ?

[vbPhil]

9 hours ago, apostolakisl said:

reading the instructions

Where in the instructions do you see that?

[apostolakisl]

8 minutes ago, vbphil said:

Where in the instructions do you see that?

It is actually in the wiki.  But seriously, how frustrating to right off the bat not even know where to plug in your ethernet!

Back to my question, what is the ultimate purpose of having 3 network adapters (plus wifi)?

• Connect one end of the included Cat5e cable to Polisy’s Network Port and the other to your network. You must use the port that’s closest to the right most edge of Polisy when the front of Polisy is facing you (closest to the db-9 serial port). Note: the network must initially be DHCP auto enabled

[Bumbershoot]

55 minutes ago, apostolakisl said:

But seriously, how frustrating to right off the bat not even know where to plug in your ethernet!

Kinda like the confusion that people have run into thinking they could simply reuse the cable they've been using between the serial PLM and ISY994...  Those ports must be for some future expansion?

[apostolakisl]

46 minutes ago, Bumbershoot said:

Kinda like the confusion that people have run into thinking they could simply reuse the cable they've been using between the serial PLM and ISY994...  Those ports must be for some future expansion?

It appears they are network ethernet ports.  On PG2 you can go into configuration and turn those ports on.  At least it looks like you can, I haven't actually done it.  But just playing with the settings and not saving them, each of the 3 ports has its own MAC address and can be configured with their own IP addresses.  But I can't imagine a use case for multiple networks.  

[MrBill]

1 hour ago, apostolakisl said:

Back to my question, what is the ultimate purpose of having 3 network adapters (plus wifi)?

I don't know whether @Michel Kohanim will weigh in on this or not. 

Usually however computers with multiple Ethernet ports are used for bridging different networks.  In residential installations this doesn't happen often, but it could.   In commercial installations it's somewhat common for secured networks where one jack is the internet connection and the others have to route traffic through the device with multiple networks so that that device can limit traffic and/or inspect packets in some way.

Perhaps the thinking for Polisy having multiple networks was so multiple networks for iot devices could exist.  For example if someone had 230 wifi lightbulbs (say in a church maybe ?.. someplace with lots of chandlers) one of those ports might be used to plug in a separate wifi network that doesn't really need direct access to anything but the ISY.

I suspect the real reason they exist was the network card interface was chosen for other reason and happened to have multiple network capability and the design decision was made: "why limit capability? it might be useful someday"  Check back in 2026 and see if there's software implementing any of them ?

It would be nice if they would have been labeled Primary Ethernet, Expansion Ethernet port B, Expansion Ethernet Port C

[vbPhil]

2 minutes ago, apostolakisl said:

On PG2 you can go into configuration and turn those ports on

For some reason they dropped that configuration from PG3, also any of the WiFi settings. It's all secret stuff now.

[Bumbershoot]

17 minutes ago, vbphil said:

For some reason they dropped that configuration from PG3, also any of the WiFi settings. It's all secret stuff now.

I'll bet the the 'udx' service is used to modify the network settings.  UDI has indicated that they want to get rid of PG2, and this stuff hasn't made an appearance in PG3, so I'm betting that this ability will wind up in the ISY configuration tab at some point.

[apostolakisl]

21 minutes ago, MrBill said:

I don't know whether @Michel Kohanim will weigh in on this or not. 

Usually however computers with multiple Ethernet ports are used for bridging different networks.  In residential installations this doesn't happen often, but it could.   In commercial installations it's somewhat common for secured networks where one jack is the internet connection and the others have to route traffic through the device with multiple networks so that that device can limit traffic and/or inspect packets in some way.

Perhaps the thinking for Polisy having multiple networks was so multiple networks for iot devices could exist.  For example if someone had 230 wifi lightbulbs (say in a church maybe ?.. someplace with lots of chandlers) one of those ports might be used to plug in a separate wifi network that doesn't really need direct access to anything but the ISY.

I suspect the real reason they exist was the network card interface was chosen for other reason and happened to have multiple network capability and the design decision was made: "why limit capability? it might be useful someday"  Check back in 2026 and see if there's software implementing any of them ?

It would be nice if they would have been labeled Primary Ethernet, Expansion Ethernet port B, Expansion Ethernet Port C

Networking bridging, but I wouldn't think you would want to have polisy be in charge of that.  But in my world I do all of that using vlan's and poking holes in the firewalls where something needs access to multiple vlan's.  

And yes!  Why not label the stinkin ports.  I had unplugged my polisy for some reason a while back and was like, damn, which one was it again. 

[vbPhil]

2 minutes ago, apostolakisl said:

And yes!  Why not label the stinkin ports. 

I've been adding my own labels and writing my own manual. Resurrecting some of my technical writing skills of a past life.

[Bumbershoot]

25 minutes ago, apostolakisl said:

It appears they are network ethernet ports.  On PG2 you can go into configuration and turn those ports on.  At least it looks like you can, I haven't actually done it.  But just playing with the settings and not saving them, each of the 3 ports has its own MAC address and can be configured with their own IP addresses.  But I can't imagine a use case for multiple networks.  

They clearly are network ports.  I poked around in '/etc/rc.conf' on my Polisy, and it appears they aren't enabled.  Since we don't have a 'root' login, I don't think we can fiddle around with the networking outside of using what functionality UDI chooses to provide.  I think that's smart, given the support headaches that providing 'root' access to the box would cause.

[larryllix]

Networking bridging, but I wouldn't think you would want to have polisy be in charge of that.  But in my world I do all of that using vlan's and poking holes in the firewalls where something needs access to multiple vlan's.  
And yes!  Why not label the stinkin ports.  I had unplugged my polisy for some reason a while back and was like, damn, which one was it again. 

Geesh. Mine came with a white sticker marking the port to use.

IIRC the label has a personal signature of the polisy artist, Michel Kohanim hand written on the label. This will be a valuable collectors item some day.


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[MrBill]

30 minutes ago, apostolakisl said:

And yes!  Why not label the stinkin ports.  I had unplugged my polisy for some reason a while back and was like, damn, which one was it again. 

I labeled the one in use, but didn't label the others.

I suspect the reason they have jacks on the back was a thought "it might be good for something, why not?"

28 minutes ago, Bumbershoot said:

They clearly are network ports.  I poked around in '/etc/rc.conf' on my Polisy, and it appears they aren't enabled.  Since we don't have a 'root' login, I don't think we can fiddle around with the networking outside of using what functionality UDI chooses to provide.  I think that's smart, given the support headaches that providing 'root' access to the box would cause.

You don't login as root in FreeBSD... you login as a user, admin in our case and use sudo, which admin does have permission to use.  You can also 'sudo su' which will start a shell with the login name root, but that's not commonly used, mostly 'sudo ____' is used for commands that require elevated permissions.   The concept is to eliminate accounts named root, which tend to be targets for hacks..

that said... i think the button pushing updates will undo most changes you could make with sudo... the idea being ease of support... they can tell you push the button X times to return the machine to a known state.

21 minutes ago, larryllix said:

Geesh. Mine came with a white sticker marking the port to use.

You must have a later model! ??

[stillwater]

I am sure this won't be helpful to current participants in this thread but it might be to any onlookers...  Maybe a month ago I set up a new Polisy using the wiki as a guide and there was zero ambiguity about which RJ-45 port to use for ethernet.