Onboard Nodes Uavtrafficclasses
ADR-0096 · Author: Sybil Melton · Date: 2025-02-07 · Products: uncrew
Originally
Originally
0095-OnBoard-Nodes_UAVTrafficClasses (v3) · Source on Confluence ↗Kinds of UAV Network Traffic
What kinds of traffic does communicating with a UAV entail and how do they differ?
| First Header | Consumption Patterns | Safety Critical | Footprint |
|---|---|---|---|
| Telemetry UAV->Pilot | Stream of independent data frames. Pilot prefers timely delivery over guaranteed delivery => UDP. Operations prefer guaranteed delivery and richer telemetry frames (more sensor readouts). It doesn’t really care all that much about timely - we could download upon return. | Semi | <100kbps |
| Video Feed UAV->Pilot | Stream of semi-independent data frames (Ansur codec). Prefer timely delivery over guaranteed delivery => UDP. | No | 600kbps times no of feeds |
| Command & Control Stick Commands | Stream of constant controller (stick) positions. No guaranteed delivery necessary => UDP. Usage @ DroneUp is heavily discouraged (out of scope for Apollo). | Yes | 30kbps |
| Command & Control Guided Mode Pilot->UAV Interactive commands directed to the flight controller or camera system: go to point, land/takeoff, change speed control gimbal and camera | RPC (request-response) commands requiring guaranteed, ordered and timely delivery. Careful with queuing commands for excessive amounts of time as commands could have become outdated and since pre-empted. Despite needing guaranteed and orderly delivery, it’s message and not stream orientated. Low throughput and sporadic exchange needs no flow control. It’s not necessarily TCP. | Yes | hundreds of bytes at a time, sporadic |
| Command & Control Non-Interactive Commands Pilot->UAV send a new mission to UAV | RPC commands requiring guaranteed, ordered, but not so timely delivery. The drone may be ordered to stop and hover and then receive a new mission and then resume. => TCP | No | kB at a time, sporadic |
| Image download UAV->Pilot | RPC like command: request an image and get it in response (drones typically offer a http GET endpoint). Require guaranteed delivery => TCP. | No | ~5MB/image |
| Map/Geo Data Pilot->UAV | Any map/geo data or change of thereof (e.g.: Airspace, Digital Surface Models) that continuously updates the pre-loaded models and feeds the on-board perception and pathfinding function. A stream of map updates needing guaranteed and ordered delivery => TCP. | Semi | 50kbps, but hard to say |
| Logs/Diagnostics UAV->Pilot | Stream of messages requiring guaranteed and ordered delivery => TCP. | No? | ~200kbps? |
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