Unify Matter Bridge User’s Guide

The Unify Matter Bridge is a Unify IoT Service that enables interaction with Unify devices from a Matter fabric. For a more thorough description see the Unify Matter Bridge Overview.

As a prerequisite for the Matter Bridge to work, at least one Unify protocol controller should be set up and running. This guide assumes that you have set up the Z-Wave Protocol Controller (uic-zpc) to run on a Raspberry Pi 4 and connected it to an MQTT broker in your network. Read the Unify Host SDK’s Getting Started Guide for information on how to set this up.

Once a protocol controller is running, the Matter Bridge can be started.

The following documentation assumes that you have built the Unify Matter Bridge application by following the Build Guide and have transferred the unify-matter-bridge to your Raspberry Pi 4 (RPi4) running the 64-bit version of Raspberry Pi OS Bullseye.

Running the Matter Bridge

At start-up, the Matter Bridge needs to connect to the Matter Fabric as well as the MQTT Broker. It is therefore critical that you have access to port 1883, the default MQTT Broker’s port, as well as a network setup that allows mDNS through.

A few important runtime configurations must be considered, along with some other configuration options. A full list of command-line parameters is provided in the Command line arguments section.

Important Configuration Settings

  • Network Interface

    Specify the network interface on which the Matter Fabric runs. In a regular RPi4 setup it would be wlan0 for WiFi and eth0 for ethernet. Specify this with the ‘--interface’ argument, as such:

    ./unify-matter-bridge --interface eth0

  • Key-Value store (KVS)

    The Matter Bridge uses a Key-Value store for persisting various run-time configurations. Make sure to have read/write access to the default path ‘/var/chip_unify_bridge.kvs’ or provide the path to where writing this data is allowed. If this file is deleted before start-up, everything is reset and the bridge will not belong to any Matter Fabric until it has again been commissioned.

    ./unify-matter-bridge --kvs ./matter-bridge.kvs

  • MQTT Host

    If you have followed the Unify Host SDK’s Getting Started Guide, your MQTT Broker should now be running on ‘localhost’. If you have decided to run the MQTT broker on a different host, you can tell the Unify Matter Bridge to connect to a different host.

    ./unify-matter-bridge --mqtt.host 10.0.0.42

  • Vendor and Product ID

    If you have access to the EAP and you want to use the Google Home App, you need to set a specific VID and PID for the Matter Bridge.

    ./unify-matter-bridge --vendor fff1 --product 8001

Starting the Matter Bridge

Once the configuration parameters are set it is time to start the bridge application.

./unify-matter-bridge --interface eth0 --kvs ./matter-bridge.kvs --mqtt.host localhost --mqtt.port 1337

Commissioning the Bridge to a Network

To include the bridge in the Matter network, it must first be commissioned. The first time the bridge starts it will automatically go into commissioning mode. After 10 minutes the bridge will exit commissioning mode. If the bridge has not been commissioned within this window, the application must be restarted to open the commissioning window again or the window can be opened by writing commission in the CLI when running the bridge. The commission command may also be used for multi-fabric commissioning.

The Unify Matter Bridge uses the “On Network” commissioning method. For now, there is no Bluetooth commissioning support.

The commissioning procedure requires use of a pairing code. This pairing code is written to the console when running the Matter Bridge. Look for something similar to ‘MT:-24J029Q00KA0648G00’, used as the pairing code in the following example. This code can be used when commissioning with the CLI commissioning tool chip-tool.

[1659615301.367669][1967:1967] CHIP:SVR: SetupQRCode: [MT:-24J029Q00KA0648G00]

Additionally the pairing code will be published on the MQTT Broker on the topic ucl/SmartStart/CommissionableDevice/MT:-24J029Q00KA0648G00. The Unify Developer GUI has a page which display the QRCodes of all comissionable bridge which are connected to the broker, ready to be scaned with a Google Home App or similar.

Another way to get the QR code is to look for an url in the console log similar to and copy the link into a browser. Note that two codes a printed at startup one for Standard Comissioning flow and one for custom comissioning flow. Be sure to use the standard flow with Eco system devices.

[1659615301.367723][1967:1967] CHIP:SVR: https://dhrishi.github.io/connectedhomeip/qrcode.html?data=MT%3A-24J029Q00KA0648G00

It should be noted that the commissioner must be on the same network as the Raspberry Pi. Note that by default the bridge binds to the eth0 interface. If another interface is to be used, see the description of the command line arguments for setting Network Interface.

Using the chip-tool to Commission

In the following procedure make sure to use the pairing code taken from the console output, as described above. To commission the Matter Bridge with the chip-tool and assign the bridge the Node ID 1:

chip-tool pairing code 1 MT:-24J0AFN00KA0648G00

Using Google Nest Hub

It is possible to use the Google Nest Hub (2nd. Gen) for controlling the Matter devices on the Unify Matter Bridge. Go through the following steps to configure this:

Prerequisites:

  • Android Phone, Android 12 or newer

  • Google Nest Hub, 2nd. Generation

Setup:

  • Create a Google Account or using existing

  • Go to Google Developer Console

  • Click “Create a new project”

  • Next page click “Create project”

  • Input a unique project name

  • Click “+ Add Matter integration”

  • Next: Develop

  • Next: Setup

  • Input following fields:

  • Product name of your choice

  • Device Type: Control Bridge

  • Test VID: default

  • Product ID (PID): 0x8001

  • Save & Continue

  • Save

  • On your Android Phone

  • Configure the phone to use the same Google Account

  • Install Google Home application

  • To add the Nest Hub

  • Click “+” in the Google Home app - Add new device and let the phone search for your hub over BT - make sure hub is in reach

  • To add the Matter Bridge to your Google Home (and Hub)

  • In the console of the Matter Bridge application running on the Raspberry Pi

  • Hit Return, this should present Unify>

  • Type commission, this will show SetupQRCode, either click the link or in the Developer UI go to the “Commissionable Devices” page (note that a new QR code will be created whenever bridge is restarted, make sure to use the latest as identified in the output on the console)

  • In the Google Home app click “+”

  • Google Home should report “Matter-enabled device found”

  • If the bridge is not automatically found, a list of device types will be shown, click the “Matter-device” on the list

  • Google Home will now ask for scanning the QR code - scan the QR code as described above

  • If Google Home is stuck during commissioning, type commission again in the Matter Bridge console while Google Home is waiting

  • All supported Unify devices should now be available for control in both Google Home application as well as the Google Nest Hub

  • On the Nest Hub, swipe down from the top of the display or select “Home Control” to access the devices

Toggle an OnOff device

To send an OnOff cluster Toggle command to a bridged endpoint with id 2, via Matter Fabric Node ID 1:

chip-tool onoff toggle 1 2

For more information on how to use the chip-tool see the chip-tool manual on the Matter website.

Toggle a Group of OnOff Devices

The Matter Bridge has support for forwarding group messages from the Matter Fabric to Unify Nodes. The protocol controllers will send the group messages as actual group cast messages on the destination network (Z-Wave/Zigbee).

To send a group command, first set up the group keys in the bridge. This example assumes the bridge to be Node ID 1, and GroupKeySetID 42 is added to Group ID 1:

chip-tool accesscontrol write acl '[{"fabricIndex": 1, "privilege": 5, "authMode": 2, "subjects": [112233], "targets": null },{"fabricIndex": 1, "privilege": 4, "authMode": 3, "subjects": [1], "targets": null }]' 1 0
chip-tool groupkeymanagement key-set-write '{"groupKeySetID": 42, "groupKeySecurityPolicy": 0, "epochKey0": "d0d1d2d3d4d5d6d7d8d9dadbdcdddedf", "epochStartTime0": 2220000,"epochKey1": "d1d1d2d3d4d5d6d7d8d9dadbdcdddedf", "epochStartTime1": 2220001,"epochKey2": "d2d1d2d3d4d5d6d7d8d9dadbdcdddedf", "epochStartTime2": 2220002 }' 1 0
chip-tool groupkeymanagement write group-key-map '[{"groupId": 1, "groupKeySetID": 42, "fabricIndex": 1}]' 1 0

Next, add bridge endpoint 2 to Group ID 0x0001

chip-tool groups add-group 0x0001 grp1 1 2

Next, program the chip-tool:

chip-tool groupsettings add-group grp1 0x0002
chip-tool groupsettings add-keysets 0x0042 0 0x000000000021dfe0 hex:d0d1d2d3d4d5d6d7d8d9dadbdcdddedf
chip-tool groupsettings bind-keyset 0x0001 0x0042

Finally, a multicast command may be sent using the chip-tool.

// Send actual multicast command
./chip-tool onoff toggle 0xffffffffffff0001 1

Running the matter bridge in strict device mapping mode

By default Unify Matter Bridge tries and map devices that does not necessarily conform to the Matter specificaiton.

To enable a mode where Unify Matter Bridge strictly only maps devices from the Unify Controller Language protocol to the Matter protocol that complies with the Matter specification. You can run the bridge with the command line argument

./unify-matter-bridge --strict_device_mapping true

Command Line Arguments

The Unify Matter Bridge provides the following command line arguments:

Using –help displays the following text.

Usage: ./unify_matter_bridge [Options]
Options:
--conf arg (=/etc/uic/uic.cfg)        Config file in YAML format. UIC_CONF
                                      env variable can be set to override the
                                      default config file path
--help                                Print this help message and quit
--dump-config                         Dump the current configuration in a
                                      YAML config file format that can be
                                      passed to the --conf option
--version                             Print version information and quit

The following options can also be in a config file. Options and values passed on the command line take precedence over the options and values in the config file.

--log.level arg (=i)                  Log Level (d,i,w,e,c)
--log.tag_level arg                   Tag-based log level
                                      Format: <tag>:<severity>,
                                      <tag>:<severity>, ...
--interface arg (=en0)                Ethernet interface to use
--kvs arg (=/var/chip_unify_bridge.kvs)
                                      Matter key value store path
--vendor arg (=65521)                 Vendor ID
--product arg (=32769)                Product ID
--mqtt.host arg (=localhost)          MQTT broker hostname or IP
--mqtt.port arg (=1883)               MQTT broker port
--mqtt.cafile arg                     Path to file containing the PEM-encoded
                                      CA certificate to connect to Mosquitto
                                      MQTT broker for TLS encryption
--mqtt.certfile arg                   Path to file containing the PEM-encoded
                                      client certificate to connect to
                                      Mosquitto MQTT broker for TLS
                                      encryption
--mqtt.keyfile arg                    Path to a file containing the PEM-
                                      encoded unencrypted private key for
                                      this client
--mqtt.client_id arg (=unify_matter_bridge_71460)
                                      Set the MQTT client ID of the
                                      application.

Running chip-tool tests on Unify Matter Bridge endpoints

For e.g. OnOff Cluster chip-tool test Test_TC_OO_2_3 can be ran on Unify Matter Bridge endpoint 2 for node 1 as follows.

./chip-tool tests Test_TC_OO_2_3 --nodeId 1 --endpoint 2 --delayInMs 1400

Mapping of Matter Endpoint to Unify Node IDs can be seen by giving “epmap” command to Unify matter bridge command prompt as follows

Unify>epmap
Unify Unid |Unify Endpoint |Matter Endpoint
zw-CE7F3772-0008|         |         2

Note: Endpoint 0(Root) and Endpoint 1(Aggregator) are Bridge itself. They are not shown in the epmap. But these endpoints support some clusters as well. For e.g. Identify. Where you might want to run chip-tool tests on those endpoints

For further information on chip-tool tests, refer to the test suite’s README

Troubleshooting

  • Time sensitive chip-tool tests might fail because of the latencies in Unify Matter Bridge. The --delayInMs <number of mili seconds> command line option to chip-tool can be helpful in such cases.

  • The Unify Matter Bridge needs to be commissioned to the Matter fabric before running the tests. Or you will see following message on the chip-tool tests

***** Test Step 0 : 1: Wait for the commissioned device to be retrieved

  • To run all the tests without exiting on a failed one, ‘--continueOnFailure true’ can be used.

  • Every cluster command sent by chip-tool can be seen on Unify Matter bridge as MQTT topic publish as follows

for .e.g if chip-tool sends OnOff On command on zw-CE7F3772-0008 Unify end node(Matter Endpoint 2). Then Unify Matter bridge publishes following MQTT payload and topic

2023-Jan-30 10:36:43.803360 <d> [command_translator_interface] --- send_unify_mqtt_cmd ucl/by-unid/zw-CE7F3772-0008/ep0/OnOff/Commands/On -> {} ---

The above MQTT debug message can also be traced in Unify logs.

  • Every attribute read sent by chip-tool will only get correct value, if Unify Matter Bridge publishes MQTT payload and topic like following, before chip-tool sends the attribute read command.

For e.g. if chip-tool tries to read OnOff attribute of OnOff cluster on zw-CE7F3772-0008 Unify end node(Matter Endpoint 2) Unify Matter Bridge must have received following kind of MQTT message before the correct attribute value will be reflected in Unify Matter Bridge.

2023-Jan-30 10:36:44.515748 <d> [mqtt_client] mqtt_client::on_message: ucl/by-unid/zw-CE7F3772-0008/ep0/OnOff/Attributes/OnOff/Reported, {"value":true}, 0

The above MQTT debug messages can also be traced in Unify logs.

  • Alternatively to disable a particular command or disable reading particular attributes from the test refer to PICS Usage from README