How to Access any node mesh lite network through its IP address

[rbhagwat62]

Hello,

We are using BACnet devices with MSTP interface. As we all know BACnet also supports BACnetIP. We get some sample code for BACnetIP and tested with ESP32 with BACnet explorer. It works fine as per expectation. BACnetIP basically runs UDP server with BACnet stack.

What we want to do is, create mesh lite network with all node under it working as BACnetIP devices, meaning run UDP server on each device. We should able to discover all devices as it works with Ethernet or simple Wi-Fi. We should also able to send BACnet write and read request to any device in the mesh network using its IP.

We have been exploring Wi-Fi mesh from past few days and understand that the root node connected with router is the only device accessible though IP. From root node onward each level parent device starts its own subnetwork and assign IP to child under it. So if we connect laptop to router and try to access any device after root node using IP we would not able to access it meaning we cannot send ping request, neither we can access server running on it.

We also explore the Mesh lite example where each node can connect to TCP server locally running on the laptop connected to same router through root node. What we want to do is opposite of it making each device as server and access it from mesh network using device IP.

So what we are wishing to use BACnetIP with mesh lite, we should able to access any device through its IP, routing through root node. Is it feasible to do? If yes how to implement IP routing in mesh lite network.

Thanks