NFC tag reading in python on raspberry pi

Question

So i bought a cheap mifare NFC chip reader from ebay for 5$. I wanted to play around with chips, and ultimately copy some NFC chips i have here. I have a NFC chip that I use to open my locker with on school, but the card we have is really big and inconvient, so I want to copy it on a smaller NFC chip and put it on my keyring.

So i hooked it up with my raspberry pi, and first off, there is NOTHING on internet about connecting this card with your raspberry pi. Ohwell, a challange, fun.

I found some basic code from a spanish website(im dutch so itwas kinda hard to understand :P) but it can only read the UID of a NFC. So i tried to understand it, and eventually i did, and I added the code to calculateCRC and read some blocks.

However, I have no clue how the NFC data structure actually works, all i did was find some arduino code samples that were in C, translated them to python, and I think it works.

So i setted it up that it reads block 0 to 8 and prints themn all. On all the NFCs i have I can only read block 0, rest is giving an error. And block 0 consists of one byte, that's a 0x04.

If anyone has any clue what is happening, please tell me. And are there any links were NFC data structure is actually explained. I found a bunch of Android stuff, but i dont have a smartphone, and i want to do it with this MFRC522 card. I read somewhere you need to auth a block or something? I saw some code for that too, but how does that work? How do I know the keys?

thanks

Answer 1

There are lots of links on google wherein you can find information on data format used in NFC.

Some of them are

http://learn.adafruit.com/adafruit-pn532-rfid-nfc/ndef

http://developer.nokia.com/Community/Wiki/Understanding_NFC_Data_Exchange_Format_(NDEF)_messages

Answer 2

I built an application on the Raspberry Pi to read and write RFid cards. The easiest way to do it is to use the pcscd library and java. There are good examples on the Oracle website and the pcscd library is broadly supported.

Be aware though. The usb cardreader I used did not seem to work initially. The cardreader uses to much power for the USB ports of the raspberry. When I used a powered usb hub, things worked smoothly.

Fred