SDR (Software Defined Radio) » gr-osmosdr

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= osmocom Gnu Radio Blocks =

While primarily being developed for the OsmoSDR hardware, this block as well supports:

 * [http://tetra.osmocom.org/trac/wiki/Funcube_Dongle FunCube Dongle] through libgnuradio-fcd

 * [http://www.funcubedongle.com/?page_id=1073 FUNcube Dongle Pro+] through [https://github.com/dl1ksv/gr-fcdproplus gr-fcdproplus]

 * [http://sdr.osmocom.org/trac/ sysmocom OsmoSDR] Devices through [http://cgit.osmocom.org/osmo-sdr/ libosmosdr]

 * [http://nuand.com/ Nuand LLC bladeRF] through [https://github.com/Nuand/bladeRF libbladeRF library]

 * [http://greatscottgadgets.com/hackrf/ Great Scott Gadgets HackRF] through [https://github.com/mossmann/hackrf libhackrf]

 * [http://www.ettus.com/product Ettus USRP] Devices through [http://files.ettus.com/uhd_docs/manual/html/build.html Ettus UHD library]

 * [http://umtrx.org Fairwaves UmTRX] through [https://github.com/fairwaves/UHD-Fairwaves Fairwaves' fork of Ettus' UHD library]

 * RFSPACE [http://www.rfspace.com/RFSPACE/SDR-IQ.html SDR-IQ], [http://www.rfspace.com/RFSPACE/SDR-IP.html SDR-IP], [http://rfspace.com/RFSPACE/NetSDR.html NetSDR] [http://www.rfspace.com/RFSPACE/NetSDR-X2.html (incl. X2 option)]

 * RTL2832U based DVB-T dongles through [http://sdr.osmocom.org/trac/wiki/rtl-sdr librtlsdr]

 * RTL-TCP spectrum server (see librtlsdr project)

 * MSi2500 based DVB-T dongles through [http://cgit.osmocom.org/libmirisdr/ libmirisdr]

 * [http://www.airspy.com/ AirSpy R820t] dongles through [https://github.com/airspy/host libairspy]

 * gnuradio .cfile input through libgnuradio-blocks

By using the OsmoSDR block you can take advantage of a common software api in your application(s) independent of the underlying radio hardware.

== Build process ==

'''The Gnu Radio block requires a recent gnuradio (>= v3.7 if building master branch or 3.6.5 when building gr3.6 branch) to be installed.'''

Before building the block you have to make sure that all the dependencies (see list of supported devices above) you are intend to work with are properly installed. The build system of gr-osmosdr will recognize them and enable specific source/sink components thereafter.

Please note: prior pulling a new version from git and compiling it, please do a "make uninstall" first to properly remove the previous version.

Building with cmake:

{{{

git clone git://git.osmocom.org/gr-osmosdr

cd gr-osmosdr/

}}}

If you are building for gnuradio 3.6 series, you have to switch to the gr3.6 branch as follows

{{{

git checkout gr3.6

}}}

then continue with

{{{

mkdir build

cd build/

cmake ../

}}}

Now cmake should print out a summary of enabled/disabled components. You may disable certain components by following guidelines shown by cmake. Make sure the device of your interest is listed here. Check your dependencies and retry otherwise.

{{{

-- ######################################################

-- # gr-osmosdr enabled components                         

-- ######################################################

--   * Python support

--   * Osmocom IQ Imbalance Correction

--   * sysmocom OsmoSDR

--   * FUNcube Dongle

--   * FUNcube Dongle Pro+

--   * IQ File Source

--   * Osmocom RTLSDR

--   * RTLSDR TCP Client

--   * Ettus USRP Devices

--   * Osmocom MiriSDR

--   * HackRF Jawbreaker

--   * nuand bladeRF

--   * RFSPACE Receivers

-- 

-- ######################################################

-- # gr-osmosdr disabled components                        

-- ######################################################

-- 

-- Building for version: v0.1.0-4-g37aba331 / 0.1.1git

-- Using install prefix: /usr/local

}}}

Now build & install

{{{

make

sudo make install

sudo ldconfig

}}}

NOTE: The osmocom source/sink blocks will appear under 'Sources' and 'Sinks' categories in GRC menu.

To build the API documentation:

{{{

cd build/

cmake ../ -DENABLE_DOXYGEN=1

make -C docs

}}}

== Automated installation ==

Marcus D. Leech has kindly integrated the forementioned build steps into his gnuradio installation script at [http://www.sbrac.org/files/build-gnuradio]. This is the most user-friendly option so far.

== Device specification ==

You can specify the source or sink device using a comma separated string of argument=value pairs. The always-up-to-date block documentation with examples is available [http://cgit.osmocom.org/gr-osmosdr/tree/grc/gen_osmosdr_blocks.py#n100 right here].

=== FCD Source ===

||Argument||Notes||

||fcd=<device-index>|| 0-based device identifier, optional||

||device=hw:2|| overrides the audio device||

||type=2|| selects the dongle type, 1 for Classic, 2 for Pro+||

The "device" argument overrides the audio device used by the underlying driver to access the dongle's IQ sample stream.

The "type" argument selects the dongle type, 1 for Classic, 2 for Pro+.

=== IQ File Source ===

||Argument||Notes||

||file=<path-to-file-name>||||

||freq=<frequency>|| Center frequency in Hz, accepts eng notation||

||rate=<sampling-rate>|| Mandatory, in samples/s, accepts eng notation||

||repeat=true|false|| Default is true||

||throttle=true|false|| Throttle flow of samples, default is true||

=== OsmoSDR Source ===

||Argument||Notes||

||osmosdr=<device-index>|| 0-based device identifier||

||buffers=<number-of-buffers>|| Default is 32||

||buflen=<length-of-buffer>|| Default is 256kB, must be multiple of 512||

=== RTL-SDR Source ===

||Argument||Notes||

||rtl=<device-index>|| 0-based device identifier OR serial number||

||rtl_xtal=<frequency>|| Frequency (Hz) used for the RTL chip, accepts eng notation||

||tuner_xtal=<frequency>|| Frequency (Hz) used for the tuner chip, accepts eng notation||

||buffers=<number-of-buffers>|| Default is 32||

||buflen=<length-of-buffer>|| Default is 256kB, must be multiple of 512||

||direct_samp=0|1|2|| Enable direct sampling mode on the RTL chip. 0: Disable, 1: use I channel, 2: use Q channel||

||offset_tune=0|1|| Enable offset tune mode for E4000 tuners||

NOTE: use rtl_eeprom -s to program your own serial number to the device

NOTE: if you don't specify rtl_xtal/tuner_xtal, the underlying driver will use 28.0MHz

=== RTL-SDR TCP Source ===

||Argument||Notes||

||rtl_tcp=<hostname>:<port>|| hostname defaults to "localhost", port to "1234"||

||psize=<payload-size>|| Default is 16384 bytes||

||direct_samp=0|1|2|| Enable direct sampling mode on the RTL chip 0=Off, 1=I-ADC input enabled, 2=Q-ADC input enabled||

||offset_tune=0|1|| Enable offset tune mode for E4000 tuners||

=== Miri Source ===

||Argument||Notes||

||miri=<device-index>|| 0-based device identifier||

||buffers=<number-of-buffers>|| Default is 32||

=== UHD Source / Sink ===

||Argument||Notes||

||uhd|| Use this argument without a value||

||nchan=<channel-count>|| For multichannel USRP configurations use the subdev parameter to specify stream mapping||

||subdev=<subdev-spec>|| Examples: "A:0", "B:0", "A:0 B:0" when nchan=2. Refer original ettus documentation on this||

||lo_offset=<frequency>|| Offset frequency in Hz, must be within daughterboard bandwidth. Accepts eng notation||

Additional argument/value pairs will be passed to the underlying driver, for more information see

[http://files.ettus.com/uhd_docs/manual/html/general.html#specifying-the-subdevice-to-use specifying the subdevice] and 

[http://files.ettus.com/uhd_docs/manual/html/identification.html#common-device-identifiers common device identifiers] in the Ettus documentation.

=== bladeRF Source / Sink ===

Arguments that affect both the source & sink (i.e., the underlying device), when applied to either are marked '''bold'''.

||Argument||Notes||

||bladerf[=0]||Device instance (optional). Currently, this is a 0-based device index. In the future, additional device attributes such as (a subset of) the serial number or desired backend would be desirable attributes to consider for this argument.||

||'''fpga'''=<'/path/to/the/bitstream.rbf'>||Load the FPGA bitstream from the specified file. This is required only once after powering the bladeRF on. If the FPGA is already loaded, this argument is ignored, unless 'fpga-reload=1' is specified.||

||'''fpga-reload'''=1||Force the FPGA to be reloaded. Requires fpga=<bitrstream> to be provided to have any effect.||

||buffers=<count>||Number of sample buffers to use. Increasing this value may alleviate transient timeouts, with the trade-off of added latency. This must be greater than the 'transfers' parameter. Default=32||

||buflen=<count>||Length of a sample buffer, in *samples* (not bytes). This must be a multiple of 1024. Default=4096||

||transfers=<count>||Number of in-flight sample buffer transfers. Defaults to one half of the 'buffers' count.||

||stream_timeout_ms=<timeout>||Specifies the timeout for the underlying sample stream. Default=3000.||

||'''loopback'''=<mode>||Configure the device for the specified loopback mode (disabled, baseband, or RF). See the libbladeRF documentation for descriptions of these available options: none, bb_txlpf_rxvga2, bb_txlpfk_rxlpf, bb_txvga1_rxvga2, bb_txvga1_rxlpf, rf_lna1, rf_lna2, rf_lna3. The default mode is 'none'.

||'''verbosity'''=<level>||Controls the verbosity of output written to stderr from libbladeRF. The available options, from least to most verbose are: silent, critical, error, warning, info, debug, verbose. The default level is determined by libbladeRF.||

=== HackRF Source / Sink ===

||Argument||Notes||

||hackrf|| Use this argument without a value||

||buffers=<number-of-buffers>|| Default is 32||

Only the first device found may be used at the moment because of libhackrf limitation.

Transmit support has been verified by using the [http://sdr.osmocom.org/trac/attachment/wiki/GrOsmoSDR/hackrf-dab.jpg crc-mmbTools DAB sdr transmitter].

=== RFSPACE Source ===

||Argument||Notes||

||sdr-iq[=<serial-port>]|| Optional parameter, serial-port defaults to the serial port (like /dev/ttyUSB0) used by first detected SDR-IQ||

||sdr-ip[=<hostname>][:<port>]|| Optional parameters, hostname defaults to "localhost", port to "50000" or the first detected SDR-IP||

||netsdr[=<hostname>][:<port>]|| Optional parameters, hostname defaults to "localhost", port to "50000" or the first detected NetSDR||

||nchan=<channel-count>|| Optional parameter for NetSDR, must be 1 or 2||

The SDR-IP/NetSDR discovery protocol (UDP broadcast) is implemented, thus specifying the ip & port should not be neccessary. Note: for the receiver to operate properly it is required that the UDP packets (port 50000) carrying the sample data can reach your PC, therefore configure your firewall/router/etc. accordingly...

The ftdi_sio driver is being used for SDR-IQ. It creates a character device of the form:

crw-rw---- 1 root dialout 188, 0 Dec 19 22:14 /dev/ttyUSB0

To be able to open the device without root permissions add yourself to the "dialout" group or do a "chmod 666 /dev/ttyUSB0" after pluggin in.

=== AirSpy Source ===

||airspy|| Use this argument without a value||

== Included Apps ==

=== Spectrum Browser ===

[[Image(fft-lte.png)]]

RTSA-like spectrum visualization is available through [https://sdr.osmocom.org/trac/wiki/fosphor fosphor] component. Call osmocom_fft with -F switch to enable it (a graphics card supporting OpenCL/OpenGL interop is a requirement).

[[Image(fosphor.png)]]

[[Image(fosphor2.png)]]

usage examples:

{{{

osmocom_fft -a rtl=0 -v -f 100e6 -s 2.4e6 -g 15

osmocom_fft -a rfspace -v

osmocom_fft -a bladerf -v

osmocom_fft -a hackrf -v

osmocom_fft -a uhd -v

osmocom_fft -a airspy -v

}}}

DC offset and IQ imbalance correction controls may be enabled using --dc-offset-mode=0 and --iq-balance-mode=0 command line switches respectively.

=== Signal generator ===

[[Image(siggen-gsm.png)]]   [[Image(gsm-hackrf-8M.png, 500px)]]

usage examples:

{{{

osmocom_siggen -a hackrf -f 100e6 --sine

osmocom_siggen -a hackrf -f 100e6 --sweep -x 2M -y 1 -c34

osmocom_siggen_nogui -a hackrf -f 100e6 --sweep -x 2e6 -y 10 -v

osmocom_siggen_nogui -a uhd,subdev=A:0 -f 100e6 --sweep -x 2e6 -y 10 -s 4e6 -v

osmocom_siggen -a bladerf -f 1G --sweep -x 4M -y 1 -s 4M

}}}

=== Spectrum sensing ===

TODO: document

== Known Apps ==

The following 3rd party applications are successfully using gr-osmosdr:

||'''Name'''||'''Type'''||'''Author'''||'''URL'''||

||gr-pocsag||GRC Flowgraph||Marcus Leech||[https://www.cgran.org/browser/projects/gr-pocsag/trunk]||

||multimode RX||GRC Flowgraph||Marcus Leech||[https://www.cgran.org/browser/projects/multimode/trunk]||

||simple_fm_rvc||GRC Flowgraph||Marcus Leech||[https://www.cgran.org/browser/projects/simple_fm_rcv/trunk]||

||Wireless Temp. Sensor RX||Gnuradio App||Kevin Mehall||[https://github.com/kevinmehall/rtlsdr-433m-sensor]||

||gqrx||SDR GUI||Alexandru Csete||[https://github.com/csete/gqrx]||

||tetra_demod_fft||Trunking RX||osmocom team||[http://cgit.osmocom.org/cgit/osmo-tetra/tree/src/demod/python/osmosdr-tetra_demod_fft.py osmosdr-tetra_demod_fft.py] and the [http://tetra.osmocom.org/trac/wiki/osmo-tetra#Quickexample HOWTO] ||

||airprobe||GSM sniffer||osmocom team et al||[http://git.gnumonks.org/cgi-bin/gitweb.cgi?p=airprobe.git]||

||gr-smartnet (WIP)||Trunking RX||Nick Foster||[http://www.reddit.com/r/RTLSDR/comments/us3yo/rtlsdr_smartnet/][[br]][http://www.reddit.com/r/RTLSDR/comments/vbxl0/attention_grsmartnet_users_or_attempted_users/ Notes from the author]||

||gr-air-modes||ADS-B RX||Nick Foster||[https://www.cgran.org/wiki/gr-air-modes] call with --rtlsdr option||

||gr-ais (fork)||AIS RX||Nick Foster[[br]]Antoine Sirinelli[[br]]Christian Gagneraud||[https://github.com/chgans/gr-ais]||

||GNSS-SDR ||GPS RX (Realtime!)||Centre Tecnològic de[[br]]Telecomunicacions de Catalunya||[http://www.gnss-sdr.org/documentation/gnss-sdr-operation-realtek-rtl2832u-usb-dongle-dvb-t-receiver Documentation] and [http://www.gnss-sdr.org]||

||gr-scan ||Scanner||techmeology||[http://www.techmeology.co.uk/gr-scan/]||

||pocsag-mrt||Multichannel Realtime[[br]]Decoder||iZsh||[https://github.com/iZsh/pocsag-mrt]||

||osmo-gmr-rtl||GMR1 RX||Dimitri Stolnikov||[http://gmr.osmocom.org/trac/wiki/GettingStarted#RTLSDRdongles]||

||simple_ra||Radio Astronomy App||Marcus Leech||[https://cgran.org/wiki/simple_ra]||

||FS20_decode||FS20 Decoder||Thomas Frisch||[https://github.com/eT0M/rtl_sdr_FS20_decoder]||

||OpenLTE '''(NEW)'''||LTE Toolkit||Ben Wojtowicz||[http://sourceforge.net/p/openlte/home/Home/]||

||sdrangelove '''(NEW)'''||SDR GUI||Christian Daniel||[http://sdrangelove.org]||

||gr-dvbt '''(NEW)'''||DVB-T Transmitter & Receiver||Bogdan Diaconescu||[https://github.com/BogdanDIA/gr-dvbt] [http://yo3iiu.ro/blog/?p=1191 Blog Post] [http://nuand.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=3499#p5124 bladeRF transmit flowgraph]||

== Credits ==

gr-osmosdr is developed by Dimitri Stolnikov with contributions from Hoernchen, Steve Markgraf, Sylvain Munaut and Nuand LLC folks.