Read Xbee serial number with Arduino

Question

I plan to have several Arduino boards connected to XBee series 2 radios in the same network performing the same operation. They are to transmit data to another board that will upload all of the data at once using a cellular connection. I would like to uniquely identify each board in some way. I realize I can hardcode a serial number into the EEPROM memory of the Arduino board. However that will not scale very well for what I am trying to do. Is there a way to read the XBee's serial number using Arduino code, so that I can transmit it along with my data?

string serialnumber
volatile int IRQcount1;
volatile int IRQcount2;
int pin2 = 2;
int pin3 = 3;
int pin_irq1 = 0; //IRQ that matches to pin 2
int pin_irq2 = 1; //IRQ that matches to pin 3

void setup() {
  Serial.begin (9600);
}

void IRQcounter1() {
  IRQcount1++;
}

void IRQcounter2() {
  IRQcount2++;
}

// I would like some function to get the serial number here

void get_xbee_serial() {
}

void loop() {
  attachInterrupt(pin_irq1, IRQcounter1, RISING);
  attachInterrupt(pin_irq2, IRQcounter2, RISING);
  delay(25);
  detachInterrupt(pin2);
  detachInterrupt(pin3);
  Serial.print(F("Xbee Serial Number = "));
  Serial.print(serialnumber);
  Serial.print(F("     Counter 1 = "));      
  Serial.print(IRQcount1);
  Serial.print(F("     Counter 2 = "));   
  Serial.println(IRQcount2);
}

Answer 1

You can retrieve the serial number using the AT commands ATSH and ATSL (serial number high/low). You can do that by going into command mode, sending those sequences followed by a return, and parsing the responses.

To get into command mode, you need to wait 1 second without sending anything, send the escape sequence +++, and then wait another second. The XBee module should respond with OK\r indicating that it's ready to receive commands.

Send ATSH\r and you should get a hex string representing the top four bytes of the serial number. Repeat with ATSL\r for the bottom four bytes.

And know that if you use a destination address of 0, the XBee module will automatically send data to the coordinator on your network. If the coordinator is running in API mode, it can retrieve the sender's 64-bit MAC address from the frame header of the received data.