Wireless programming with the Arduino XBee Shield and XBee Explorer

Question

I am trying to enable wireless programming of an Arduino via the XBee Shield and an XBee Explorer. I've seen two tutorials online, XBee radios and Wireless Bootloading for ATmega168/ATmega328 that show you how do it.

However, both tutorials talk about using components to connect the receiver XBee to the Arduino. Well the XBee Shield handles the communication between the receiver XBee and the Arduino, so the extra components aren't necessary (or are they). They talk about using a capacitor or transistor to be able to wirelessly reset the Arduino. Is this already possible with the XBee Shield, or is there some modification I can make to it to make it possible?

How can I use the existing Arduino IDE to program my Arduino wirelessly?

Answer 1

You are correct in the fact that the extra components are needed to reset the Arduino wirelessly and you do need them even if you are using the Xbee shield. I'll assume that one of the tutorials that you were reading was this one. What you are going to want to do is read over the tutorial and build the transistor/capacitor/resistor circuit into a little ball (similar to this) or on a piece of prototyping board with the three signal wires coming out. You need to solder the "Reset signal from XBee" to the D3 pin on the shield which should be labeled (or it can be found on the Datasheet). Then you will have to figure out a way to connect the reset to the reset pin on your Arduino, and the ground to either device (because they should be connected by the shield). This can be as simple as sticking the wire into the sockets on the Arduino. After you do this and setup the environment as per the previously mentioned tutorial, you should be good to go!

If you do have any questions, feel free to ask, I should be able to help.