With what technology to make a simple beacon?

Question

Arduino

My arduino robot requires beacons to navigate them locally. Their coordinates are known and they must transmit their number.
I am faced with a choice - do it on the Arduino Pro mini or solder it myself.
For a change, of course, I want to do it manually, but I don’t have practice in circuitry and electronics, will it be difficult for me to make 4 beacons that will continuously transmit a signal 4 characters long like 0101 (that is, the maximum number of beacons is 16). Can you tell me how and what these things are made of.
The transmission must be in the infrared range. There is an algorithm for signal recognition in the robot. Reformulated, probably, so closer to the essence of my question.

Answer 1

As already mentioned, creating such a navigation system is a rather difficult task, and the choice between Arduino and "Solder by yourself" is far from the biggest problem. The task boils down to the following:
1. The choice of transmission medium (sound \ light \ radio, etc.), most likely the simplest and most reliable radio is all the same, so it is better not to use neutrinos and others
2. Select radio transmitters and receiver , determine the frequency . The range and accuracy will depend on the frequency , at a high frequency the accuracy will be higher, but the range will be lower and the noise immunity will be worse, at a low frequency the noise immunity will be higher, but the accuracy will be high only at a great distance from the beacons, that is, it is not suitable for a room. In choosing a receiverthe ability of the receiver to determine the signal strength (RSSI) is important , because without a level of sense, it will be 0, no triangulation can be done without it, this moment is important because not every receiver supports RSSI.
3. Having all this: transmitters with no matter what microprocessor sending a certain code, a receiver understanding RSSI and the coordinates of each receiver, you can try to solve the following problem: collisions , that is, oversaturation of the radio air due to a large number of transmitters. In fact, any signals received simultaneously from more than 1 transmitter can be thrown away, so you need to make sure that they do not transmit simultaneously , there are options , cheap and expensive:
Cheap: transmit signals from beacons with a random time interval , the probability of a collision is an order of magnitude less than with constant intervals, the less often data is sent, the less collisions, this is how some data transfer protocols work.
Expensive : use carrier frequency, that is, in addition to the transmitter at the main frequency, each beacon is equipped with another pair of an analog receiver and a transmitter operating at a completely different frequency, and it is better to choose a lower frequency here. In this case, before the main transmitter starts transmitting a signal on the main frequency, it first checks whether there is a constant signal on the secondary receiver, if not, it creates a constant signal on the secondary receiver (thereby saying that now the main channel will be busy and it’s not good to talk into it) and transmits the signal on the main frequency (where no one will interfere, because they wait until the channel is free) and after the transmission jams the signal on the secondary channel, thereby "freeing" the main channel for transmission. Such a scheme can give an order of magnitude higher frequency of signal transmission from beacons and thereby improve the quality of navigation,
If, after reading this, the desire to try to implement it has not yet disappeared, then you can start studying, for example, from this article .

Answer 2

I would make these beacons on the 555 timer.

Answer 3

I myself have no "practice in circuitry and radio electronics", so looking at it from about the same position as you - it seems to me that it will be much easier with arduino.

Answer 4

Arduino costs a penny and you need to solder at least. One thing is bad, to wait a long time for the parcel.
It can be done in several ways: a microcontroller, logic-microcircuits, you can even try to assemble it on loose pieces. Or completely vyrviglaz options, like a hurdy-gurdy - a motor that sets the code for a disk with a slider, like on variable resistors.
On arduino it will be as fast as possible and, most likely, as cheaply as possible