Re: [core] RSSI in SenML

[Christian Amsüss <[e-mail]>]

On Wed, Mar 22, 2017 at 12:47:12PM -0600, Cullen Jennings wrote:
> I got a request to add RSSI to the table in 12.1 of  of SenML 
> 
> Symbol: RSSI 
> 
> Description: Received signal strength indication
> 
> Type: float 

I've been using signal strengths for some time in SenML, and they were
in those applications provided in dBm, which I converted according to
what the spec says (or rather said back then, this has been operational
since 2014) about falling back to UCUM as UCUM:B[W].

The recommendations w/rt UCUM have been demoted since then, but it is
still common in the other units there to be specific and comparable (dB
being the exception). RSSI with any real unit would not have any meaning
outside of that device's receptor, and could just as well be represented
without any unit. I'd support adding something that has the semantic
meaning of received signal strength (dBm would be more common than the
by-the-letters-of-UCUM B[W] unit), but a plain RSSI would IMO lead to
confusion in any inhomogenous setup.

Best regards
Christian

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