Using Photon for commercial product, How about long-term support, quality, etc

[simmikolon]

Hi,

I working on retrofitting an existing consumer product and have been working with different concepts. One of those is using a Particle.io Photon and the existing cloud ecosystem.

This is by far the most elegant concept since there already is a ecosystem and the work needed for all the other concepts is a lot more compared to the photon-based solution.

There are however some concerns I have when using Photon or Particle.io:

What about security? Is the cloud secure? What kind of security features is Particle.io using?
Is long-term availability of the cloud guaranteed? What will happen if Particle.io will be shut down (I don’t hope that this will happen - not at all)
Are Photon Modules reliable in a consumer product? Does anyone have some feedback on long-term usage in consumer product?
Does anyone have experience on long-term commercial projects or has developed such a product?

Thanks in advance,

Simon

[Alph]

Hi Simon,

I can’t answer all of your questions but what I can tell you is, the whole Particle.io platform is open source! So effectively you can build your own ‘Private’ cloud hosted in your own data centre on your own servers etc

http://spark.github.io

[simmikolon]

Ok. So this means that I am safe if someone decides to shut particle.io down - Good news!

[Moors7]

Some things to consider/read:

@simmikolon

What about security?

Security Of the Spark Cloud

I was running a apache server and it got attacked by someone and they gained root access. Spark says on there website their cloud is secure but how security is it?

How Secure is the Photon?

I have just read some articles online about how some companies store private data on microcontrollers in their products. An example of this would be the supra ibox because it uses a ti msp430. How secure is the Photon and does the Photon have good enough security to be used in this manner? If so how would I be able to access the data on the Photon and what are the Photon’s attack surfaces?

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@simmikolon

Is long-term availability of the cloud guaranteed? What will happen if Particle.io will be shut down (I don't hope that this will happen - not at all)

Is the Photon Really Open Source?

I was looking over Particle’s Particle Source page and I don’t see anything about the Photon in the Firmware section. The Photon uses the Broadcom BCM43362 Wi-Fi chip and that is not open source nor is it open hardware. I know you can download the wiced libraries from broadcom’s website but can you download the schematics for the Broadcom BCM43362? Since you have to download those files from broadcom’s website without a account. Does that make the Particle Photon only partially open source and p…

And there's the open source version of the cloud. It's more limited in features, but will allow basic operation to continue. You can then expand on that as you see fit.

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@simmikolon

Are Photon Modules reliable in a consumer product? Does anyone have some feedback on long-term usage in consumer product?

Durability of a core running 24x7

If properly cared for, I would imagine the USB connector would wear out first… if you prototyped with it continuously. If you built a project and committed a Spark Core to it… the hardware would last “forever”. There are no electrolytic caps on the board to dry out. Even if they did have caps, I have 35 - 45 year old electronics full of electrolytic caps that still power up today and run just like they did back in the day. YMMV with electrolytic based on the quality you start with, but here …

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@simmikolon

Are Photon Modules reliable in a consumer product? Does anyone have some feedback on long-term usage in consumer product?

I've been using a Core ever since they came out 24/7, running my LED lighting, and they're still running fine. That's about ~3 years now?

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@simmikolon

Does anyone have experience on long-term commercial projects or has developed such a product?

There's Nomiku, Cleverpet, Keurig, just to name a few who are using Particle Products. There are some others listed on the homepage as well.

[simmikolon]

Thank you @Moors7 for those detailed informations! I will read through them by the end of the day! All in all my experience so far is that Photon is really reliable - Even the GSM-Connectivity on the Electron is very good. Over here we have some areas which aren’t covered with GSM network and I drove through them, having an Electron with external antenna on a seat - And the connection hasn’t dropped at all! Very very promising!