Newer Orvibo Smart Sockets

[jimbo-83]

Do you know if this plugin will support the newer smart sockets? I think the model is B25, I have been trawling various places for an answer on this and can't find resolution anywhere and as someone who is diffo not a coder I'm struggling but really want to make use of this with my Sockets!

[Grayda]

Hmm, I didn't realise they had a new version of the socket out. I might have to dig one up and see. However the answer is, it depends.

Right now there are two major versions of the Orvibo protocol. The first, which we'll call "legacy", is fully supported by node-orvibo. Almost anything the official Orvibo app can do, node-orvibo can do.

Then there's the newer version, which I'll call "PK" (because the string "PK" (or sometimes "DK") appears towards the start of the packets, and Orvibo refers to it as a "protocol type"). It's somewhat similar to the legacy protocol, but is encrypted and has an entirely different way of transmitting data (uses JSON instead of just tacking the information to the end of the packet).

PK isn't supported yet. A number of months ago I got a Kepler gas detector, but I could barely get it to respond, so I didn't make much progress. About a week ago I received a Coco smart strip (like the socket, but in a power strip) and a Smart Cube (which is a cloud-connected version of the Orvibo AllOne, an IR blaster for controlling TVs and such). Since then I've made some progress. I can encrypt and decrypt the PK messages and I can recreate the packets used to communicate with the device.

However that's as far as I've got. It shouldn't be too hard to start adding in features, but I haven't got there yet.

So to cut a long story short, if the B25 uses the legacy protocol, I'm 95% confident it'll work. My code might need some tweaking to suit, but most things should be there. If it uses the PK protocol, it definitely won't work yet, but I'm working on it. I've got almost a month off from work in about a week's time, so that'll give me a better chance to tackle the issue.

Let me know if you've got any other questions!

[jimbo-83]

Hey David,

I think that it's safe to assume that they will be using the same newer protocol as I have tried the "legacy" stuff as well as the Orvibo Platform. I also think they were released at the same time as the Coco. They run on the HomeMate App rather than the Wiwo one.

I really appreciate your reply as I'm 0% knowledgeable in code but I see so much value in this software! It really is so cool, HomeKit technology is so over priced at this point yet other systems are so much more affordable but clunky. This really is a great answer!

Thanks again

J

[jimbo-83]

Hey David, I think that it's safe to assume that they will be using the same newer protocol as I have tried the "legacy" stuff as well as the Orvibo Platform. I also think they were released at the same time as the Coco. They run on the HomeMate App rather than the Wiwo one. I really appreciate your reply as I'm 0% knowledgeable in code but I see so much value in this software! It really is so cool, HomeKit technology is so over priced at this point yet other systems are so much more affordable but clunky. This really is a great answer! Thanks again J

…

Sent from my iPhone

On 11 Dec 2016, at 09:53, David Gray ***@***.***> wrote: Hmm, I didn't realise they had a new version of the socket out. I might have to dig one up and see. However the answer is, it depends. Right now there are two major versions of the Orvibo protocol. The first, which we'll call "legacy", is fully supported by node-orvibo. Almost anything the official Orvibo app can do, node-orvibo can do. Then there's the newer version, which I'll call "PK" (because the string "PK" (or sometimes "DK") appears towards the start of the packets, and Orvibo refers to it as a "protocol type"). It's somewhat similar to the legacy protocol, but is encrypted and has an entirely different way of transmitting data (uses JSON instead of just tacking the information to the end of the packet). PK isn't supported yet. A number of months ago I got a Kepler gas detector, but I could barely get it to respond, so I didn't make much progress. About a week ago I received a Coco smart strip (like the socket, but in a power strip) and a Smart Cube (which is a cloud-connected version of the Orvibo AllOne, an IR blaster for controlling TVs and such). Since then I've made some progress. I can encrypt and decrypt the PK messages and I can recreate the packets used to communicate with the device. However that's as far as I've got. It shouldn't be too hard to start adding in features, but I haven't got there yet. So to cut a long story short, if the B25 uses the legacy protocol, I'm 95% confident it'll work. My code might need some tweaking to suit, but most things should be there. If it uses the PK protocol, it definitely won't work yet, but I'm working on it. I've got almost a month off from work in about a week's time, so that'll give me a better chance to tackle the issue. Let me know if you've got any other questions! — You are receiving this because you authored the thread. Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub, or mute the thread.

[Grayda]

Yeah, I guessed they were the newer protocol. Watch this space though, as the newer protocol just seems to be the same ol' Orvibo stuff, just packaged into a different format, so it might be rather trivial to implement this stuff.

[karl0ss]

@Grayda I would love for this to work on B25 as well, I can either supply you a B25 for free if you want, or can donate some £ to you if you get it working after if you want?

[Grayda]

@karl0ss: I'd certainly appreciate the donation. I'm in the process of rewriting the library so it's easier to add new products (I'm envisioning a plugin system using architect which I've used before). I've got the new protocol sort of worked out, but right now I can just encode and decode packets, not control things.

Send me an email at grayda@solidinc.org if you want to chat further :)

[karl0ss]

@Grayda I've sent you an email mate.

[karl0ss]

I've ordered David a B25, so hopefully with the actual device, he will be able to get it working for us :)

[JCotton1123]

@Grayda I recently purchased a S25, what I assume to be the american version of the B25. I've done some packet captures and I see the pk/dk string at the start of the packet as you described above. I was wondering if you could provide any info on the decryption/encryption process including how to derive the key so that I can experiment with my socket. I am more then happy to contribute any information or code I am able to put together.

[Grayda]

@JCotton1123: Check out my last commit which added tools to encode and decode packets. The key can be obtained by downloading the Kepler APK then using an APK decompiler (I used an online one, but apktool works great too). Not in front of my computer so I can't remember the path, but I think the key is in an AESCoder jar file as a const. Possibly called "key". The Home mate app doesn't have the key as it's stored server side, but the Kepler APK has it

Not sure if I can legally do it, but I might write a tool that "brute forces" the key so people don't have to decompile APKs to get it. The key is alphanumeric and fairly short, so brute forcing it won't be hard.

I'm almost done rewriting the S20 / Allone code for node-orvibo2, so the base of that should make the DK / PK stuff a cinch to add because node-orvibo2 is modular

[JCotton1123]

@Grayda Thanks. This never occurred to me as an iOS user.

I found the key. For anyone else thats looking, it can be found in com/orvibo/lib/kepler/core/AESCoder.java.

Looking forward to seeing the new node-orvibo2 lib. Hopefully I can contribute some code.

[karl0ss]

Hopefully we can have working B25's soon :)

@Grayda Is the one I sent you working ok?

[Grayda]

@karl0ss: Yep, working fine with the HomeMate app!

I'm just about to start on the "v2" code. While I'm doing that, I'm asking a few people (the EFF, the 'legaladvice' subreddit, maybe a lawyer if necessary) about the legalities of distributing the key. Brute-forcing the whole key would take literally forever (with over 200 trillion combinations), so I'm trying to find out if I can include the whole key (in the name of 'interoperability'), or part of the key, then use a tool to unscramble the rest (which would take ~400ms to unscramble). I can't seem to find any info, so I'm reaching out to a few places, just to protect me, and anyone who uses this library.

In the meantime, you can see the progress over on http://github.com/grayda/node-orvibo2. There's so many changes going on, and so different methods and such, that it was better to start from scratch.

[karl0ss]

Ok cool, thank you so much for looking at this :)