UC UDP API

UC UDP API enables to call API action and update functions by sending a simple UDP packet.

Basics

As there is no feedback in UDP, it is not recommended to use UDP API in cases where reliability is critical, but its usability for programmable microcontrollers sometimes takes advantage.

To update the status of the item send the following UDP packet to API port:

<ID> u <status> [value]

(ID - item id, value - optional parameter).

To send action for the unit send the following UDP packet to API port:

<ID> <status> [value] [priority]

(value and priority** optional parameters).

If you needs to skip the parameter, set it to ‘None’. For example:

sensor1 u None 29.55

will keep sensor1 status and set value 29.55;

or

unit1 1 None 50

will run the action for unit1 for changing its status to 1, without changing the value, with priority 50.

Batch commands

You can specify multiple commands in one packet separating them with NL (n) symbol. Example:

sensor1 u 1 29.55
sensor2 u 1 26
sensor3 u 1 38

Encryption and authentication

You can specify in controller configuration to accept only encrypted packets from the specified hosts or networks. By default it’s recommended to accept unencrypted packets without authentication only in trusted networks. The packet is encrypted and signed with API key and can not be decrypted and used without having it, so API key acts both for encryption and authentication.

Encrypted packet format is:

|KEY_ID|ENCRYPTED_DATA

Where KEY_ID is API key ID and ENCRYPTED_DATA - UDP API packet (which may contain either single or multiple commands at once). The data is encrypted using Fernet - a symmetric encryption method which uses 128-bit AES in CBC mode and PKCS7 padding, with HMAC using SHA256 for authentication.

Fernet requires 32-bit base64-encoded key, so before data encryption, API key should be converted with the following: base64encode(sha256sum(api_key)).

Python example:

import hashlib
import base64

from cryptography.fernet import Fernet

api_key = 'mysecretapikey'
data = 'sensor1 u 1 29.55'

encryption_key = base64.b64encode(hashlib.sha256(api_key.encode()).digest())
ce = Fernet(encryption_key)

result = ce.encrypt(data.encode())

Fernet implementation is simple and pre-made libraries are available for all major programming languages.

Custom packets

You can send a custom packet to let it be parsed by loaded PHI.

Custom packet format is (\x = hex):

\x01 HANDLER_ID \x01 DATA

DATA is always transmitted to handler in binary format. Encryption, authentication and batch commands in custom packets are not supported.