teslausb/headless-scripts/Readme.md

Flashable image to get started more quickly

This is a WORK IN PROGRESS, SHOULD CURRENTLY BE WORKING.

Notes

• Assumes your Pi has access to Wifi, with internet access (during setup). (But all setup methods do currently.) USB networking is still enabled for troubleshooting or manual setup
• This image will work for either headless (tested) or manual (tested less) setup.
• Currently not tested with the RSYNC/SFTP method when using headless setup.

Configure the SD card before first boot of the Pi

1. Flash the latest image release using Etcher or similar.

For headless (automatic) setup

1. Mount the card again, and in the boot directory create a teslausb_setup_variables.conf file to export the same environment varibles normally needed for manual setup (including archive info, Wifi, and push notifications (if desired).) A sample conf file is located in the boot folder on the SD card.

   The file should contain the entries below at a minimum, but replace with your own values:

   export archiveserver=Nautilus
   export sharename=SailfishCam
   export shareuser=sailfish
   export sharepassword=pa$$w0rd
   export campercent=100
   export SSID=your_ssid
   export WIFIPASS=your_wifi_password
   export HEADLESS_SETUP=true
   export REPO=rtgoodwin
   export BRANCH=headless-patch
   # Currently set to track this repo/branch while under development.
   
   # export pushover_enabled=false
   # export pushover_user_key=user_key
   # export pushover_app_key=app_key
   

   (For now, please leave the REPO and BRANCH set to the settings above.)

• Boot it in your Pi, give it a bit, watching for a series of flashes (2, 3, 4, 5) and then a reboot and/or the CAM to become available on your PC/Mac. The LED flash stages are:

Stage (number of flashes)	Activity
2	Verify setup variables
3	Grab scripts to start/continue setup
4	Create partition and files to store camera clips/music)
5	Setup completed; remounting filesystems as read-only and rebooting

• The Pi should be available for ssh at pi@teslausb.local, over Wifi (if automatic setup works) or USB networking (if it doesn't). It takes about 5 minutes, or more depending on network speed, etc.
• If plugged into just a power source, or your car, give it a few minutes until the LED starts pulsing steadily which means the archive loop is running and you're good to go.
• You should see in /boot the TESLAUSB_SETUP_FINISHED and WIFI_ENABLED files as markers of success as well.

For manual setup

1. After flashing the image, boot it in your Pi and:

   • connect via USB networking at ssh pi@teslausb.local. (The Pi must be connected to your PC and plugged into the port labeled USB on the Pi. Or...
   • You can also automate only the Wifi portion of setup by creating the boot/teslausb_setup_variables.conf file and populating it with the SSID and WIFIPASS variables:

   export SSID=your_ssid
   export WIFIPASS=your_wifi_pass
   

2. Once you have an ssh session, follow the steps starting at Set up the USB storage functionality in the main guide.

Troubleshooting

Headless (full or Wifi) setup

• ssh to pi@teslausb.local (assuming Wifi came up, or your Pi is connected to your computer via USB) and look at the /boot/teslausb-headless-setup.log.
• Try sudo -i and then run /etc/rc.local. The scripts are fairly resilient to restarting and not re-running previous steps, and will tell you about progress/failure.
• If Wifi didn't come up:
  • Double-check the SSID and WIFIPASS variables in teslausb_setup_variables.conf, and remove /boot/WIFI_ENABLED, then booting the SD in your Pi to retry automatic Wifi setup.
  • If still no go, re-run /etc/rc.local
  • If all else fails, copy /boot/wpa_supplicant.conf.sample to /boot/wpa_supplicant.conf and edit out the TEMP variables to your desired settings.
  • (Note: if you get an error about read-only filesystem, you may have to sudo -i and run /root/bin/remountfs_rw.

Background information

What happens under the covers

When the Pi boots the first time:

• A /boot/teslausb-headless-setup.log file will be created and stages logged.
• Marker files will be created in boot like TESLA_USB_SETUP_STARTED and TESLA_USB_SETUP_FINISHED to track progress.
• Wifi is detected by looking for /boot/WIFI_ENABLED and if not, creates the wpa_supplicant.conf file in place, using SSID and WIFIPASS from teslausb_setup_varibles.conf and reboots.
• The Pi LED will flash patterns (2, 3, 4, 5) as it gets to each stage (labeled in the setup-teslausb-headless script).
  • 10 flashes means setup failed!
  • After the final stage and reboot the LED will go back to normal. Remember, the step to remount the filesystem takes a few minutes.

At this point the next boot should start the Dashcam/music drives like normal. If you're watching the LED it will start flashing every 1 second, which is the archive loop running.

NOTE: Don't delete the TESLAUSB_SETUP_FINISHED or WIFI_ENABLED files. This is how the system knows setup is complete.

Image builder source and patches

For now the image creation work is at:

• Modified pi-gen rtgoodwin's fork of pi-gen in (whatever current branch I'm working at the time).
• headless-patch branch of rtgoodwin fork https://github.com/rtgoodwin/teslausb/tree/headless-patch/headless-scripts

Image refinement TODOs

1. Patch the hostname to teslausb
2. Make it so if someone deletes the TESLAUSB_SETUP_FINISHED file it's handled gracefully. (Right now it will try to re-run setup which should be fine.)
3. Cache the remount packages? Might mess with first boot like rsyslog
4. Aspirational TODO: Remove more packages and set services to stopped to make the boot process faster?
5. At this point, it's designed to pull the setup scripts dynamically, since development is still ongoing. If/when we reach a good frozen state, we can generate an image that is essentially ready to run. I think it'll also be pretty tricky to do some of the remounting and creating the backing files etc. on the image creation side. Open to suggestions/contributions there though!

Modifications to pi-gen builder from master

The image is built on a Raspberry Pi 3B running Stretch, for maximum Pi-ception.

This is the basic configuration, but it's helpful to just look at the code itself and the Readme for Pi-gen which explains this all in much greater detail:

1. Added SKIP and SKIP_IMAGES files to stage3, 4, and 5 (if present). We want to build the default image up to stage2, then add our own stage for tweaks we want.

2. Added a stage6 (or 7, just something beyond stage5). (There are stages 0-4 in the main repo by default, but may be a stage5 in some cases. This will help keep a clean merge later.)

3. Copy the prerun.sh from stage2. Be SURE to chmod +x it.

4. Remove or rename the EXPORT_NOOBS files in all stages. We don't need a NOOBS image built.

5. In stage6, create a 00-tweaks folder, with a 00-patches folder and patches inside. Currently patched:

   File	Change
   cmdline.txt	Add the dwc2,g_ether modules
   config.txt	Add the dwc2 module
   hosts	Change hostname to teslausb
   hostname	Change hostname to teslausb

   • The build process uses quilt for patching
   • The path for any patching you do at this stage is stage6/rootfs/FILEPATH where rootfs represents the Pi's /. So, cmdline.txt is stage6/rootfs/boot/cmdline.txt.

6. Added a file called series in the patches directory with the name of each .diff file in the order you want them applied.

7. Added a files folder in stage6 with modified rc.local, and whatever else you want copied into the image. The modified rc.local will handle pulling down the setup-teslausb-headless file the first time.

8. Added a script to flash the Pi LED

9. Files are moved into final locations using the 00-run.sh script using the install command. See the script for details. I also touch /boot/ssh here so SSH is ready out of the box.

10. Run sudo ./build.sh from the pi-gen directory.

11. If you get a failure, it's almost certainly after stage2, so you can add SKIP files in all successful stages and rerun sudo CLEAN=1 ./build.sh