Book Image

Hands-On MQTT Programming with Python

By : Gaston C. Hillar
Book Image

Hands-On MQTT Programming with Python

By: Gaston C. Hillar

Overview of this book

<p>MQTT is a lightweight messaging protocol for small sensors and mobile devices. This book explores the features of the latest versions of MQTT for IoT and M2M communications, how to use them with Python 3, and allow you to interact with sensors and actuators using Python.</p> <p>The book begins with the specific vocabulary of MQTT and its working modes, followed by installing a Mosquitto MQTT broker. You will use different utilities and diagrams to understand the most important concepts related to MQTT. You will learn to make all the necessary configuration to work with digital certificates for encrypting all data sent between the MQTT clients and the server. You will also work with the different Quality of Service levels and later analyze and compare their overheads.</p> <p>You will write Python 3.x code to control a vehicle with MQTT messages delivered through encrypted connections (TLS 1.2), and learn how leverage your knowledge of the MQTT protocol to build a solution based on requirements. Towards the end, you will write Python code to use the PubNub cloud-based real-time MQTT provider to monitor a surfing competition.</p> <p>In the end, you will have a solution that was built from scratch by analyzing the requirements and then write Python code that will run on water-proof IoT boards connected to multiple sensors in surfboards.</p>
Table of Contents (9 chapters)

Connecting a client to the secured MQTT server with paho-mqtt

First, we will use paho-mqtt to create an MQTT client that connects to the Mosquitto MQTT server. We will write a few lines of Python code to establish a secured connection and subscribe to a topic.

In Chapter 3, Securing an MQTT 3.1.1 Mosquitto Server, we secured our Mosquitto server, and therefore, we will use the digital certificates we created to authenticate the client. Most of the time, we will work with an MQTT server that uses TLS, and therefore, it is a good idea to learn how to establish a connection with TLS and TLS authentication. It is easier to establish an unsecured connection with an MQTT server, but it won't be the most common scenario we will face when developing applications that work with MQTT.

First, we need to copy the following files, which we created in Chapter 3, Securing an MQTT 3.1.1...