Terms and definitions

Activation by Personalization (ABP) — activation in which personal settings are written to the device before it connects to the network.

Over-the-Air Activation (OTAA) — activation "over the air": the device connects to the LoRaWAN™ network through the operator's network when it is turned on.

AppEUI — globally unique application identifier (8 bytes, EUI64) that the network server (Network Server) uses to route received data to the application server (AppServer).

AppKey — unique encryption key (16 bytes, AES-128) that the application server (AppServer) generates for a specific device.

AppServer — client's application server.

DevEUI — globally unique device identifier (8 bytes, EUI64; End-device identifier). It can be assigned by the device manufacturer (similar to a MAC address), issued in limited quantity from the operator's identifier pool, or acquired by the device owner from the IEEE pool.

DevAddr — 32-bit (four-byte) network address for addressing packets at the network layer; unique within the operator's network. It can be compared to a MAC address, which also provides addressing at layer 2 of the OSI model in Ethernet networks, but with OTAA, DevAddr is assigned the same way as a dynamic IP address from a DHCP server in TCP/IP networks. The upper 7 bits of DevAddr contain the operator's network address, NwkID; this value must be unique for adjacent networks and for networks with overlapping coverage areas. DevAddr is most often written as a sequence of four bytes (for example, 02:D1:D2:01), where the high byte is the NwkID network address.

End-node — user's end device in the LoRaWAN™ network.

LoRa® — physical layer protocol that describes radio communication in LoRaWAN™ networks.

Long Range Wide Area Network (LoRaWAN™) — long-range wide area network that lets you connect devices with a battery life of up to ten years and transfer data over long distances. Unlike mobile networks, LoRaWAN™ networks can be either private or public.

Network ID (NwkID) — 7-bit network identifier that is part of the network address (DevAddr); it distinguishes networks operating in the same territory.

NwkSKey — network session key (128 bits) used to calculate and verify the MIC (message integrity code) field of messages exchanged between the device (end-node) and the network server (Network Server), and to encrypt MAC-layer messages.

AppSKey — application session key (128 bits) used to encrypt data at the application layer (between the device and the application server).

APP_ID — application identifier in the API.

APP_KEY — application token for connecting to the API. Not to be confused with the LoRaWAN AppKey.

operation_id — request field used to unambiguously match a request and its response.

Multicast — simultaneous transmission of data to several devices in the network: the server sends one message and several devices receive it. This saves energy and reduces network load. It is used, for example, for firmware updates or sending commands to several devices at once.