So it looks like everybody has a smartphone nowadays, however I still use my Nokia 6510 on a daily basis. Like many phones back then, it has an IrDA (Infrared Data Association) interface which permits communication with the phone and I felt like playing with it a bit. For this I used a laptop with integrated IrDA interface, the OpenBSD operating system and the ppp tool that ships with it, the birda package and the smstools package. The ircomm tool that ships with birda lets you initiate an IrDA COMM connection with the phone and lets you attach a pseudo terminal to it:
ircomm -d /dev/tty01 -y /dev/ptypzHere, /dev/tty01 is the actual IrDA interface that ircomm talks to and /dev/ptypz is a pseudo terminal it allocates that lets you talk to the GSM modem inside the device. The modem understands AT style commands. Actually you don’t talk directy to the modem but rather to some restricted modem emulation.
For more information see:
- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hayes_command_set#GSM
- http://wiki.openmoko.org/wiki/Hardware:AT_Commands
- http://wiki.openmoko.org/wiki/Manually_using_GSM
- http://wiki.openmoko.org/wiki/Manually_using_GPRS
I use the ppp(8) tool to talk to the modem but anything else will work. Here’s a first session:
spaceman% sudo ppp
Password:
Working in interactive mode
Using interface: tun0
Warning: No default entry found in config file.
ppp ON spaceman> set device /dev/ttypz
ppp ON spaceman> term
deflink: Entering terminal mode on /dev/ttypz
Type `~?' for help
ATE1
OK
RING
RING
ATA
OK
ATH
OK
ATD0952880000;
OK
NO CARRIER
AT
OK
ppp ON spaceman>Some explanations: “ATE1” enables echoing, which enables you to see what you type, this is not required. The phone responds with “OK” when it correctly processes a command. I then call the phone and the modem shows that a call is incoming with the “RING” signal. You can then accept the call with “ATA” or reject it with “ATH”. I accepted the call, talked a bit and then hung up using “ATH”. Then I called my home phone from the mobile phone using the ATD command. ‘D’ here stands for dialling and the command dials the number that follows the command. I then hung up from the home phone which the modem signals with “NO CARRIER”.
Here’s another session where I try to establish a GPRS connection for tethering. This unfortunately doesn’t work, I don’t really know why, probably the provider forbids it:
ppp ON spaceman> term
AT+CGDCONT=1,"IP","gprs-service-fr.net"
OK
ATD*99#
CONNECT
ppp ON spaceman> Warning: Sending empty PAP authname!
Ppp ON spaceman>
PPp ON spaceman> Warning: ff01:8::: Change route failed: errno: Network is unreachable
Warning: ff02:8::: Change route failed: errno: Network is unreachable
Warning: ff02:8::: Change route failed: errno: Network is unreachable
ppp ON spaceman>So here I first set the APN which is needed for GPRS, using the CGDCONT command, the value depends on your provider. Then I dial the special number *99#. The modem tries to establish the connection, which it signals with “CONNECT”. It then starts talking PPP (Point-to-Point Protocol). The ppp(8) tool detects the fact that PPP is now spoken and takes over to establish a PPP link, which unfortunately fails here. The number of capital ’P’s on the prompt show the state of the connection:
ppp ON awfulhak> # No link has been established
Ppp ON awfulhak> # We've connected & finished LCP
PPp ON awfulhak> # We've authenticated
PPP ON awfulhak> # We've agreed IP numbersSo, as you can see here, authentication is successful but we don’t get an IP address. When it fails, the phone beeps and shows the following error: “Subscribe to GPRS first”.
One final thing I wanted to play with is SMS. Writing SMSes manually using AT style commands is cumbersome, so I used the smstools package which comes with a daemon that does the dirty work of talking to the modem. I set it up to talk to the /dev/ptypz device. Once it runs you can send SMSes using the “sendsms” command line tool, for example:
spaceman% sendsms 33668360000 'Test Message'My phone number actually starts in “0668”. “33” is the international prefix of my country (France), so you get how you have to format the number.
Here is the log of the smsd daemon for this command:
2011-02-07 17:06:58,5, smsd: Moved file /var/spool/sms/outgoing/send_qzxMhS to /var/spool/sms/checked
2011-02-07 17:06:58,6, GSM1: I have to send 1 short message for /var/spool/sms/checked/send_qzxMhS
2011-02-07 17:06:58,6, GSM1: Sending SMS from to 33668360000
2011-02-07 17:06:58,6, GSM1: Checking if modem is ready
2011-02-07 17:06:59,7, GSM1: -> AT
2011-02-07 17:06:59,7, GSM1: Command is sent, waiting for the answer
2011-02-07 17:06:59,7, GSM1: <- OK
2011-02-07 17:06:59,6, GSM1: Pre-initializing modem
2011-02-07 17:06:59,7, GSM1: -> ATE0+CMEE=1;+CREG=2
2011-02-07 17:07:00,7, GSM1: Command is sent, waiting for the answer
2011-02-07 17:07:00,7, GSM1: <- OK
2011-02-07 17:07:01,7, GSM1: -> AT+CSQ
2011-02-07 17:07:01,7, GSM1: Command is sent, waiting for the answer
2011-02-07 17:07:01,7, GSM1: <- +CSQ: 20,99 OK
2011-02-07 17:07:01,6, GSM1: Signal Strength Indicator: (20,99) -73 dBm (Excellent), Bit Error Rate: not known or not detectable
2011-02-07 17:07:01,6, GSM1: Checking if Modem is registered to the network
2011-02-07 17:07:01,7, GSM1: -> AT+CREG?
2011-02-07 17:07:02,7, GSM1: Command is sent, waiting for the answer
2011-02-07 17:07:02,7, GSM1: <- +CREG: 2,1,"00D6","9C99" OK
2011-02-07 17:07:02,6, GSM1: Modem is registered to the network
2011-02-07 17:07:02,6, GSM1: Selecting PDU mode
2011-02-07 17:07:02,7, GSM1: -> AT+CMGF=0
2011-02-07 17:07:03,7, GSM1: Command is sent, waiting for the answer
2011-02-07 17:07:03,7, GSM1: <- OK
2011-02-07 17:07:03,7, GSM1: -> AT+CMGS=18
2011-02-07 17:07:04,7, GSM1: Command is sent, waiting for the answer
2011-02-07 17:07:04,7, GSM1: <- >
2011-02-07 17:07:04,7, GSM1: -> 0011000B913366388639F90000FF04F4F29C0E
2011-02-07 17:07:06,7, GSM1: Command is sent, waiting for the answer
2011-02-07 17:07:10,7, GSM1: <- +CMGS: 214 OK
2011-02-07 17:07:10,5, GSM1: SMS sent, Message_id: 214, To: 33668360000, sending time 12 sec.
2011-02-07 17:07:10,6, GSM1: Deleted file /var/spool/sms/checked/send_qzxMhSThe message got delivered correctly. smsd is also able to receive incoming SMS, however I haven’t tried it and I’m not sure it works since the modem of this phone does not signal anything when it receives a message.
The birda package also includes some tools to use OBEX over IrDA. This lets you send and receive vCards with contacts (what Nokia calls “Business Cards”). For example, to send a vCard with a contact named “John” and phone number 06… to your phone you can use the following command:
mkobextel -n John -t 0668360001 | irobex -d /dev/tty01Receiving vCards sent from the phone also works.
Have fun!
Update: I just add this here for the nostalgia
AT+CGMI
Nokia Mobile Phones
OK
AT+CGMM
Nokia 6510
OK
AT+CGMR
V 04.12
28-08-02
NPM-9
(c) NMP.
OK