wifi monitor to troubleshoot Yun wifi - Results

RESTART_... = true,
sketch: simple LED blink
2014-07-25 08:11 : wifi OK, uptime=6:59:04.868013, ok/nok: 2310/3
no particular pattern

wifi monitor to troubleshoot Yun wifi

My Yun's wifi seems to be very unstable.

I created a python script to monitor the Yun's wifi connection.

This script can be downloaded here.

The main script is wifiMonitor.py

There are 4 things that are supposed to be configured (see wifiMonitor.py):

LOGFILE="/tmp/wifiMonitor"
LOGFILESD="/mnt/sda1/arduino/wifiMonitor_"
RESTART_WIFI_WHEN_LOST = True
TO_PING = "192.168.1.1"

The first 2 give the location of where the logs are stored: LOGFILE is the main destination, with now and then a backup to LOGFILESD.
When it sees the wifi coonection is lost, it will either:
- do nothing (just wait and hope it gets restored)
- restart the Yun's wifi
This is configured by the RESTART_WIFI_WHEN_LOST option.
To determine if the Wifi is ok, it will ping a particular site or IP address. This is set by the TO_PING option. In my case I just ping my router.

In short the script will now and then ping to TO_PING site to determine if Wifi is ok and do the appropriate action if not. It logs the ratio of ok/not_ok and the current uptime.

Arduino Yun Wifi stuff (reset, access point mode, ...)

The Yun has 3 reset buttons: one of those is a Wifi reset button (WLAN Rst)

Depending on how long you press the button the following will happen (I think):

• Pressing the WLAN Rst button for <5 sec does not do any reset at all, correct (it just lets a LED blink)
• Pressing the Wifi Rst button for >=5 but <30 sec will run the wifi-reset-and-reboot script. This script will return the Yun in access point (AP) mode and will reboot the Yun. The Yun should then present its network SSID.
• Pressing for >= 30 sec will restore some factory settings

If you just want to reset the Wifi, you can do this with the wifi script (should be in /sbin):

    root@Arduino:/tmp# wifi down && sleep 5 && wifi
    Successfully initialized wpa_supplicant

You probably can also do:

    ifconfig wlan0 down; ifconfig wlan0 up

Note that rc.local contains by default the entry wifi-live-or-reset. After the Yun boots, it will check for the configured Wifi network. If it is not found within 60sec, the Yun will go into access point mode.

git stuff

general:

git add .
git commit .
git push origin master
git reset .
git rm
vi .gitignore

to remove local changes from (uncommitted) file:

git checkout filename

when creating a new project on gitHub, get it on PC:

mkdir wifiMonitor
cd wifiMonitor/
git init
git remote add origin https://github.com/NicoLugil/wifiMonitor
git remote -v
git fetch origin
git merge origin/master

After creating gh-pages (project page) using website, get it on local copy:
https://help.github.com/articles/creating-pages-with-the-automatic-generator
in essence:

cd repository
git fetch origin
# remote: Counting objects: 92, done.
# remote: Compressing objects: 100% (63/63), done.
# remote: Total 68 (delta 41), reused 0 (delta 0)
# Unpacking objects: 100% (68/68), done.
# From https://github.com/user/repo.git
#  * [new branch]      gh-pages     -> origin/gh-pages

git checkout gh-pages
# Branch gh-pages set up to track remote branch gh-pages from origin.
# Switched to a new branch 'gh-pages'

Moving the linux filesystem OpenWrt to the SD card

Standard the OS is on the flash of the Yun. It is possible to move (most) to the SD card.

Advantages are:
- much more space, allowing to install many more packages
- the flash can be written only a limited amount of times. If you move the OS to the SD card, this is no longer an issue. The SD card also has a limited amount of writes, but typically more than the flash, and it is much easier to replace the SD card than the flash.

Before starting, create at least one ext4 partition on the SD card (see e.g. http://myyafa.blogspot.be/2014/05/create-and-format-partitions-on-yun-sd.html)

On the Yun do (pivot root option):

opkg update
opkg install block-mount

cd /
mkdir -p /tmp/cproot
mount --bind / /tmp/cproot
tar -C /tmp/cproot -cvf - . | tar -C /mnt/sda1 -xf -
umount /tmp/cproot

edit the file /etc/config/fstab and add:

config mount
        option target        /
        option device        /dev/sda1
        option fstype        ext4
        option options       rw,sync
        option enabled       1
        option enabled_fsck  0

That's it. Reboot and the OS should now reside on the SD. If you still want to access the old filesystem on the flash (this is still used at boot for example) you can do

cd /
mkdir original-boot

and add

config mount
        option target   /original-boot
        option device   /dev/mtdblock3
        option fstype   jffs2
        option options  rw,sync
        option enabled  1
        option enabled_fsck     0

to the /etc/config/fstab file (see also http://forum.arduino.cc/index.php?topic=289215.0) (the one on the SD card)

create and format partitions on the Yun SD card

I have an 8GB SD card, I want to make a 4GB and a 3GB partition (it currently has only 1 8GB parition). With the SD card in the Yun:

fdisk /dev/sda

delete my existing partition:

Command (m for help): d
Selected partition 1
Partition 1 is deleted

create the 2 new ones:

Command (m for help): n
Partition type:
   p   primary (0 primary, 0 extended, 4 free)
   e   extended
Select (default p): p
Partition number (1-4, default 1): 
Using default value 1
First sector (2048-15523839, default 2048): 
Using default value 2048
Last sector, +sectors or +size{K,M,G} (2048-15523839, default 15523839): +4G
Partition 1 of type Linux and of size 4 GiB is set

Command (m for help): n   
Partition type:
   p   primary (1 primary, 0 extended, 3 free)
   e   extended
Select (default p): 
Using default response p
Partition number (1-4, default 2): 
Using default value 2
First sector (8390656-15523839, default 8390656): 
Using default value 8390656
Last sector, +sectors or +size{K,M,G} (8390656-15523839, default 15523839): +3G
Partition 2 of type Linux and of size 3 GiB is set

save:

Command (m for help): w
The partition table has been altered!

Calling ioctl() to re-read partition table.

WARNING: Re-reading the partition table failed with error 16: Device or resource busy.
The kernel still uses the old table. The new table will be used at
the next reboot or after you run partprobe(8) or kpartx(8)
Syncing disks.

reboot:

reboot

format the new paritions:

opkg update
opkg install mtd-utils
opkg install e2fsprogs

mkfs.ext4 -L YunSD1 /dev/sda1
mkfs.ext4 -L YunSD2 /dev/sda2

update: when I tried this again in 2015, I had to do:

umount /dev/sda1

umount /dev/sda2

prior to the mkfs commands

Upgrade Yun with new image (OpenWrt-Yun 1.0)

There is a new image for the Yun with important fixes, and better link to OpenWrt.
More info and detailed installation guidelines can be found on http://forum.arduino.cc/index.php?topic=235360.msg1693350#msg1693350 Before doing the procedure I saved the installed packages to a file:

opkg list-installed

Next I formatted my SD card(not needed, but I want a clean start). First I did this on my Ubuntu PC but this gave issues with user groups and permissions. So I did the formatting on my Yun directly:

df
umount /mnt/sda1
mkfs.ext4 -L YunSD /dev/sda1

note the /dev/sda1 iso /mnt/sda1 for the mkfs command.

mkdir /mnt/sda1/arduino

Next, extract the zip file for the update into the root folder of the SD card.

ssh to the Yun and execute:

run-sysupgrade /mnt/sda1/openwrt-ar71xx-generic-yun-16M-squashfs-sysupgrade.bin

result is (nothing needs to be done when it looks like there is a prompt with the Writing from ...:

Sending TERM to remaining processes ... uhttpd dbus-daemon dnsmasq thd ntpd uSDaemon sftp-server sleep syslogd klogd hotplug2 procd ubusd netifd 
Sending KILL to remaining processes ... 
Switching to ramdisk...
Performing system upgrade...
Unlocking firmware ...

Writing from  to firmware ...     
Upgrade completed
Rebooting system...

Rebooting didnt seem to happen automatically. Power cycled and after a while I saw the USB led on, a sign of the new image. The Yun is completely fresh, so you need to start all over, connecting to the Yun wireless network, enter default password arduino, etc...