Device Connectivity

📡 Device Connectivity & Supported Protocols

🛰️ Overview

MAPS Messaging supports a wide range of connectivity options for integrating IoT devices, gateways, and external systems. The server is protocol-agnostic and offers interfaces over TCP, UDP, DTLS, SSL/TLS, and various IoT protocols like MQTT, MQTT-SN, AMQP, CoAP, STOMP, and LoRa.

Devices can connect over:

• TCP/UDP (raw or protocol-specific)
• Encrypted TLS/SSL interfaces
• DTLS support for UDP protocols such as CoAP and MQTT-SN
• Application-layer protocols like:
  • MQTT (3.1, 5.0)
  • MQTT-SN (for constrained devices)
  • AMQP
  • CoAP
  • STOMP
  • LoRa (with radio throttling)

These interfaces are configured via the NetworkManager.yaml, NetworkManagerDocker.yaml, and NetworkConnectionManager.yaml files.

---

🔌 Supported Protocol Interfaces

Each interface is defined by:

• url – the binding (IP + port + transport)
• protocol – what protocol is served
• auth – the authentication mechanism (e.g., usernamePassword, anon, or default)
• map / virtualHost – optional protocol-specific routing

Protocol	Transport	Encrypted	Config Files	Example URL
MQTT	TCP	❌	NetworkManager.yaml	tcp://:::1883/
MQTT	SSL/TLS	✅	NetworkManager.yaml	ssl://:::1884/
MQTT-SN	UDP/DTLS	✅	NetworkManagerDocker.yaml	udp://0.0.0.0:1884/
AMQP	TCP	❌	NetworkManager.yaml	tcp://:::5672/
AMQP	SSL/TLS	✅	NetworkManager.yaml	ssl://:::5671/
CoAP	UDP/DTLS	✅	NetworkManagerDocker.yaml	udp://0.0.0.0:5683/
STOMP	TCP	❌	NetworkManager.yaml	tcp://:::61613/
STOMP	SSL/TLS	✅	NetworkManager.yaml	ssl://:::61614/
LoRa	Radio (UDP)	❌	NetworkManager.yaml	N/A

ℹ️ Note: CoAP and MQTT-SN protocols also support DTLS (Datagram Transport Layer Security) for securing communications over UDP. DTLS settings can be defined in the NetworkManager.yaml under the security.dtls section.

---

📄 Sample Interface Configuration

- name: "TCP MQTT Interface"
  url: tcp://:::1883/
  protocol: mqtt
  auth: usernamePassword

This exposes a plain TCP MQTT listener on port 1883, using username/password authentication.

- name: "CoAP Interface"
  url: udp://0.0.0.0:5683/
  protocol: coap
  maxBlockSize: 512
  idleTimePeriod: 120

A CoAP endpoint for constrained devices. No authentication defined (could be anonymous or managed elsewhere).

- name: "AMQP Interface"
  url: tcp://:::5672/
  protocol: amqp
  sasl:
    mechanism: "SCRAM-SHA-512"
    identityProvider: system
  map: "/{{virtualHostName}}"

AMQP interface using SASL authentication and optional virtual host mappings.

---

🧠 Device Types Supported

Device Type	Connectivity Method	Protocols Used	Example Use Case
IoT Sensors (Low Power)	UDP	MQTT-SN, CoAP	Battery-powered GPS trackers, NMEA receivers
Gateways / Edge Devices	TCP or UDP	MQTT, AMQP	Forwarding messages from local sensors
Browsers / Web Clients	HTTPS (via REST API)	REST/WebSocket (UI)	Access admin dashboards, publish data
LoRa Gateways	Radio + Backhaul (UDP)	LoRa	Long-range, low-bandwidth environmental monitors
Enterprise Apps	TCP + TLS	AMQP, MQTT	Real-time messaging with secure encryption
STOMP Clients	TCP or TLS	STOMP	Legacy messaging integration

---

✅ Best Practices

• Use TLS/SSL wherever possible for external-facing services (ssl:// and secure keystores).
• Use DTLS for securing UDP-based protocols like CoAP and MQTT-SN.
• Enable virtual hosts for tenant-aware routing (see map: "/{{virtualHostName}}").
• Use MQTT-SN or CoAP for lightweight embedded devices that can't handle TCP.
• Enable discoverable: true for dynamic service registration via mDNS (e.g. for LAN discovery).
• Set protocol-specific limits such as maxInFlightEvents, eventQueueTimeout, or LoRaMaxTransmissionRate to manage resources efficiently.

---