DreamCatcher
Setting up the OS
There are two OSs that you can use on the DreamCatcher.
- Armbian
- Standard ARM Linux OS based on Debian, Highly supported but does NOT have build in support for Outernet. This OS requires lots of tweaking to up and going...
Armbian for DreamCatcher, V5.27
- Skylark
- Os based on Busybox is read only and has the full Outernet system ready to go. This is the one to use if you want to play with outernet with no tweaking
- Skylark, for the Passive Antenna, Released May 14, 2017
- Skylark, for the Active Antenna, Released June 22, 2017
Burning the image to an SD Card
A microSD greater than 4GB in size is required.
Extract the image
It is compressed using "gzip.", many common Unzipping tools on your chosen OS can un-compress these.
- Linux / OSx
- gunzip [filename.gz]
- Windows
- use 7Zip
Write the image to the SD card
the best way to burn the SD card is by using etcher here---> https://etcher.io/
Startup the DreamCatcher with Armbian Distro
1) Insert SD card into Dreamcatcher board slot marked "SD0_OS," next to LED array.
2) insert the USB Wifi Dongle, or other USB network device if you have it.
3) Optionally - connect the USB Cable to your PC with a terminal application open.
4) connect power to a USB port, or alternatively the USB cable to PC can provide power
after the bootup process you should see a "Dreamcatcher Login:" prompt
- Default Username
- root
- Default Password
- 1234
Configure Wifi
To connect to wifi network, use command line:
nmcli d wifi connect your_ssid password your_password
or using the text UI:
nmtui
to check assigned ip use:
/sbin/ifconfig
SSID/password, once configured, will be stored, and should be applied automatically at next boot.
Install The RTL-SDR Libraires and Utilities
To install librtlsdr and sdr utilities like rtl_fm etc, use:
apt update; apt install rtl-sdr
(you will need to have already connected to network for this to work)
Shutting Down
Unlike Skylark, the root filesystem here is modified and is writeable, so it is important you shut this down properly:
sudo poweroff
BOARD LEDS
| LED12 / USBH | |
|---|---|
| Description | USB Hub Indicator Light, Green when active |
| Color | {{{COLOR}}} |
| Default at Boot | ON |
| SysFs Device | /sys/class/leds/usbhuben/brightness |
| Usage | |
| Notes | Turning this off, will disable all USB ports. |
| LED1 / Pckts | |
|---|---|
| Description | Flashes with Outernet Packets are Received |
| Color | {{{COLOR}}} |
| Default at Boot | OFF |
| SysFs Device | |
| Usage | |
| Notes | Unused in Armbian |
| LED2 / Flock | |
|---|---|
| Description | Satellite Lock Indicator on when satellite signal is locked |
| Color | {{{COLOR}}} |
| Default at Boot | OFF |
| SysFs Device | |
| Usage | |
| Notes | Unused in Armbian |
| LED3 / SNR1 | |
|---|---|
| Description | SNR indicator |
| Color | {{{COLOR}}} |
| Default at Boot | OFF |
| SysFs Device | |
| Usage | |
| Notes | Unused in Armbian |
| LED4 / SNR2 | |
|---|---|
| Description | SNR indicator |
| Color | {{{COLOR}}} |
| Default at Boot | OFF |
| SysFs Device | |
| Usage | |
| Notes | Unused in Armbian |
| LED5 / SNR3 | |
|---|---|
| Description | SNR indicator |
| Color | {{{COLOR}}} |
| Default at Boot | OFF |
| SysFs Device | |
| Usage | |
| Notes | Unused in Armbian |
| LED6 / SNR4 | |
|---|---|
| Description | SNR indicator |
| Color | {{{COLOR}}} |
| Default at Boot | OFF |
| SysFs Device | |
| Usage | |
| Notes | Unused in Armbian |
| LED7 / USR1 | |
|---|---|
| Description | sdcard activity indicator. equivalent of the HDD activity light |
| Color | {{{COLOR}}} |
| Default at Boot | OFF |
| SysFs Device | |
| Usage | |
| Notes | |
| LED8 / USR2 | |
|---|---|
| Description | heartbeat: flashes when kernel is booted and working normally. |
| Color | {{{COLOR}}} |
| Default at Boot | OFF |
| SysFs Device | |
| Usage | |
| Notes | long off, N short flashes, long off, repeat, where N = 2 * Load_Average |
| LED9 / PWR | |
|---|---|
| Description | Power: White LED, on when board is powered. |
| Color | {{{COLOR}}} |
| Default at Boot | ON |
| SysFs Device | |
| Usage | |
| Notes | |
RF Ports
11. The default armbian image enables the "LNA bypass" RF input port, to allow usage as a normal, unfiltered RTLSDR. to switch to the Outernet LNA (L Band) RF input:
echo 0 | sudo tee /sys/class/leds/rfswitch1/brightness echo 1 | sudo tee /sys/class/leds/rfswitch2/brightness
ONDD Setup
- FTP to a DreamCatcher, copy the following files off of the system... be SURE to FORCE binary transfer.
- /usr/sbin/ondd (md5:207723be33f4da57bd64a6549e11e95d)
- /usr/sbin/ontimeout (md5:5092f17f0152ca352799290999ba7a6c)
- Create an empty conf file
- /etc/ondd/ondd.conf
- Create a place to place downloads
- /home/downloads (or wherever)
- Create a place for download cache
- /home/download_cache
- Run ondd with the following command:
- /usr/sbin/ondd -d --pid_file /var/run/ondd.pid --cfg-gile [empty cfg file you created] -c [location for download cache] -o [location for completed downloads] -D /var/run/ondd.data --sdr-timeout-handler /usr/sbin/ontimeout
Command Help
[Skylark][outernet@outernet:/usr/sbin]$ /usr/sbin/ondd -h
- 00:11:21.099 [main] Unable to load config: /etc/ondd.conf (null)
- Usage: ondd
- --cfg-file CONFIG_FILE override default config file location
- --pid-file PID_FILE override default pid file location
- --ctrl-sock SOCK_FILE override default control socket path used for ipc
- --status-sock SOCK_FILE override default status report socket path - status e
- --cert-file CERT_FILE override default ceritificate file location
- -D SOCK_FILE data socket path to which the demodulator sends raw s
- --sdr-timeout-handler script to execute if no data arrives through the date
- -o PATH path to output directory where downloaded files are d
- -c PATH path to cache directory where partially downloaded fd
- -O PATH if specified, files which path does not begin with td
- -b N set the maximum number of download completion eventsy
- -d start ondd in daemon mode
- -i print to stdout the current signal strength and snr,d
- -V enable verbose mode
- -v display ondd version info
- -h display this helptext