Free Software

[pragmatist]

Free Wi-Fi Hotspot/Mi-Fi Hotspot - As promised on an earlier thread, there is now free software available for a Raspberry Pi which will turn it into a Boat Wi-Fi Hotspot connecting to a shore-based wireless connection. This is absolutely free and will remain free - released under the terms of the GPL. Under the terms of the GPL, all sources are, of course, available and you are welcome to download them and compile it yourself. Alternatively if you don't want to burn the images yourself and you can find us somewhere around on the Dart we would be happy to install it on your Raspberry and card for nowt - except that you provide the wine for you and us to drink while we do it!

You can download an image to write to an 8Gb SD or micro SD card from the Skipper's Mate website http://www.skippersmate.co.uk. There is also a PDF document which is probably entirely wrong as a mere woman wrote it

We also decided, since it is tricky to get a wireless device which acts as an Access Point (about 90% will work as receivers but not transmitters), that we would offer a package at pretty much cost price to YBW forumites. It includes a ready-prepared SD/micro SD card and a wireless Access Point, all configured - price including VAT and 1st class postage - £15. Since this is not a commercial project, at least at this stage, we need to order in the bits - assuming anyone wants to go this route. So if you want one then please do PM me (see web site for the details we need). We aim to despatch in a week to 10 days.

Penny

 

[Boreades]

Hi Penny

That sounds like a great offer.

Some of us might be confused by what you say on SkippersMate.
i.e.
allows you to use a Raspberry as a Boat WiFi Hotspot so that your single Internet connection can be shared by multiple devices on board allowing you and your family/crew to use tablets, laptops etc. all sharing the same connection.

For the IT-challenged, perhaps you could say why we would need to share the same connection?

 

[nigelmercier]

For the IT-challenged, perhaps you could say why we would need to share the same connection?

Because you can use a high-gain device to receive a weak access point, then share it with lesser devices. I wrote some blurb on how to do it on a PC:

Here is how to share your Wi-Fi signal using a single card, under Windows 7 or 8...

 

[pragmatist]

Hi Penny

That sounds like a great offer.

Some of us might be confused by what you say on SkippersMate.
i.e.
allows you to use a Raspberry as a Boat WiFi Hotspot so that your single Internet connection can be shared by multiple devices on board allowing you and your family/crew to use tablets, laptops etc. all sharing the same connection.

For the IT-challenged, perhaps you could say why we would need to share the same connection?

Hi Boreades


It's like having a wireless router at home - you get a single connection into the house/boat and then you can share it. If you all had to share one PC perhaps you might have a fight on your hands ?

So if you're on the boat with a wireless receiver connected to the marina wifi you don't have to fight over who gets to use the net - or one person log off so that another can log on. The one USB connection is plugged into the Raspberry and then a wireless access point acts like your wireless router at home. Most wifi providers will only allow one connection for one subscription - using this means that you can be browsing the weather forecast while Mrs Boreades is reading the BBC and any junior Boreades there might be are doing what any junior does on the web (don't ask me ! but twittering or Facebooking or such like ...).

Nigel's point is also valid - just another way of sharing.

Since you mention you're not a geek (me neither to be honest - I'm the one that writes all the gumph !) you might be relieved to know that the whole of Skipper's Mate is run from menus in your browser so it looks pretty much like a desktop application and all you have to do is "Search for Wireless Connections" and pick one from the listbox.


Penny

 

[pragmatist]

I think I've responded to all the PMs but if you haven't heard back then please do PM again or post. We hope to send them out into the wide world this week. However it would be useful to know what kind of Raspberry you have. We will send micro SD with an SD adapter but it would be interesting to know.

Penny

 

[laika]

Do you have a link to the source? Couldn't find it on your web site. Interested to know what your UI looks like for selecting remote APs to connect to as something more pretty than command line is missing from my home-brew effort.

Had you thought of integrating some serial/network NMEA-0183 multiplexing? Oddly I can think of some GPL software to do that that's just lacking a GUI....

 

[pragmatist]

Do you have a link to the source? Couldn't find it on your web site. Interested to know what your UI looks like for selecting remote APs to connect to as something more pretty than command line is missing from my home-brew effort.

Had you thought of integrating some serial/network NMEA-0183 multiplexing? Oddly I can think of some GPL software to do that that's just lacking a GUI....

Sorry laika - been a bit of a rush - will upload the sources now. Will also post a screenshot of the screen shortly.

Haven't thought about multiplexing but sounds interesting. What sort of thing would you need in the GUI ?

P

 

[Boreades]

Because you can use a high-gain device to receive a weak access point, then share it with lesser devices. I wrote some blurb on how to do it on a PC:

Nigel - that sounds like the answer to a slightly different question. The Raspberry Pi, as lovely is it is, isn't a PC. Also, a local high-gain device is great, but isn't the bandwidth bottleneck still at the remote access point?

The slightly more technical question I'd like to put to Penny is - how does a Raspberry Pi with a micro-Wifi adaptor have a higher gain than a smart phone, tablet or portable computer? Are you/we able to adjust the power levels of the Pi's WiFi via software to give it a higher gain?

 

[pragmatist]

Just a view of the screen to Connect to a Wireless Signal :

http://www.skippersmate.co.uk/skippersmate/gallery/connect.png

 

[pragmatist]

Sorry laika - been a bit of a rush - will upload the sources now. Will also post a screenshot of the screen shortly.

Haven't thought about multiplexing but sounds interesting. What sort of thing would you need in the GUI ?

P

Laika - source download now available from the Downloads page. doc/readme.txt is the v limited documentation - we do do do documentation but wanted to get this up ASAP.

P

 

[sarabande]

after 'Asbo' and 'Gaia', this little beaut must surely have a name ?

 

[pessimist]

How about Pelsinoe?

 

[demonboy]

Nigel - that sounds like the answer to a slightly different question. The Raspberry Pi, as lovely is it is, isn't a PC. Also, a local high-gain device is great, but isn't the bandwidth bottleneck still at the remote access point?

The slightly more technical question I'd like to put to Penny is - how does a Raspberry Pi with a micro-Wifi adaptor have a higher gain than a smart phone, tablet or portable computer? Are you/we able to adjust the power levels of the Pi's WiFi via software to give it a higher gain?

The RPi is a pc. It can do pretty much anything a seven year old pc can do... unless I've misunderstood your point.

I do agree with your other point though. Surely the only way of creating an effective hotspot is to use a high-gain, omni-directional antenna mounted outside the boat. Since these cost around £50 and require a 5-12v input, I'd like to know how this solution cost only £15. A micro wi-fi adaptor installed on a RPi inside the boat is only as powerful as a laptop or smartphone, as Boreades suggests.

Aside from that, kudos to you guys for opening your project up to the rest of us.

 

[laika]

Laika - source download now available from the Downloads page.

Thanks: will check it out

Surely the only way of creating an effective hotspot is to use a high-gain, omni-directional antenna mounted outside the boat. Since these cost around £50 and require a 5-12v input, I'd like to know how this solution cost only £15. A micro wi-fi adaptor installed on a RPi inside the boat is only as powerful as a laptop or smartphone, as Boreades suggests.

I don't know for certain what they're doing here but I'll guess from my set-up.

The "solution" here is in two parts. Firstly the pi creates an access point. This is what you will connect your wireless devices to. The radio for this doesn't have to be very powerful because in the context of a boat anything connecting to it will be only a few metres away with nothing but GRP or wood in the way. So at this point you can connect your ithing to the pi and view the user interface, but not contact the Internet. To do that you need another device to connect the pi to the outside world, at which point the pi acts as a router, forwarding traffic between your laptop/ithing and the Internet. Now that "device" can be a 3G dongle or, as we're talking about here, a big powerful wifi device. In my case I use a mailasail "wifi bat". At this point then your other wifi devices connect to the access point created by the micro wifi device (doesn't need to be powerful) but then the hard part of connecting to the outside world is taken care of by the expensive hardware. As well has being more "powerful", the advantage of my "external" wifi device is that I can hoist it up on a halyard to get a better line of sight to a remote access point. Of course I could get out the bosun's chair and go up with the macbook, but I don't like doing that when it's raining.

That's what I do and from the hardware diagram on their site I suspect the skippersmate thingy does the same...

 

[pragmatist]

Thanks: will check it out



I don't know for certain what they're doing here but I'll guess from my set-up.

The "solution" here is in two parts. Firstly the pi creates an access point. This is what you will connect your wireless devices to. The radio for this doesn't have to be very powerful because in the context of a boat anything connecting to it will be only a few metres away with nothing but GRP or wood in the way. So at this point you can connect your ithing to the pi and view the user interface, but not contact the Internet. To do that you need another device to connect the pi to the outside world, at which point the pi acts as a router, forwarding traffic between your laptop/ithing and the Internet. Now that "device" can be a 3G dongle or, as we're talking about here, a big powerful wifi device. In my case I use a mailasail "wifi bat". At this point then your other wifi devices connect to the access point created by the micro wifi device (doesn't need to be powerful) but then the hard part of connecting to the outside world is taken care of by the expensive hardware. As well has being more "powerful", the advantage of my "external" wifi device is that I can hoist it up on a halyard to get a better line of sight to a remote access point. Of course I could get out the bosun's chair and go up with the macbook, but I don't like doing that when it's raining.

That's what I do and from the hardware diagram on their site I suspect the skippersmate thingy does the same...

Thanks laika ! Absolutely - saves me a lot of typing ! The "package" is simply a card and AP - we assumed that most people would already have an outdoor wireless receiver to connect to the local wifi. And any USB wireless receiver should be fine - it is the ability to act as an access point that is not available on many wireless devices - that's why we offered it with the card. So you provide the rest - RPi, wireless receiver, power to the RPi (we use a 4-port USB stepdown to 5V but you could use mains or other methods). And off you go !

We've just ordered one of these for testing - http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Signal-Ki...88875190&tpos=top&ttype=price&talgo=undefined probably nowhere near as good as a wifi bat but about 5% of the price so we thought it was worth a try. It's directional which is useful when you know where the signal's coming from (e.g. your berth) - perhaps less useful when you're off cruising. Will report back when we've had a chance to test it. To date, we've used an ordinary USB wireless receiver and replaced its antenna with a 9dB version (omni) - get over 3 km with that with clear line of sight. However, it isn't waterproof so requires a plastic bag when we hang it off the boom

Think laika has answered Boreades' question too. Thanks !

P

 

[demonboy]

Thanks: will check it out



I don't know for certain what they're doing here but I'll guess from my set-up.

The "solution" here is in two parts. Firstly the pi creates an access point. This is what you will connect your wireless devices to. The radio for this doesn't have to be very powerful because in the context of a boat anything connecting to it will be only a few metres away with nothing but GRP or wood in the way. So at this point you can connect your ithing to the pi and view the user interface, but not contact the Internet. To do that you need another device to connect the pi to the outside world, at which point the pi acts as a router, forwarding traffic between your laptop/ithing and the Internet. Now that "device" can be a 3G dongle or, as we're talking about here, a big powerful wifi device. In my case I use a mailasail "wifi bat". At this point then your other wifi devices connect to the access point created by the micro wifi device (doesn't need to be powerful) but then the hard part of connecting to the outside world is taken care of by the expensive hardware. As well has being more "powerful", the advantage of my "external" wifi device is that I can hoist it up on a halyard to get a better line of sight to a remote access point. Of course I could get out the bosun's chair and go up with the macbook, but I don't like doing that when it's raining.

That's what I do and from the hardware diagram on their site I suspect the skippersmate thingy does the same...

Yep, we're saying the same thing. Small dongle to create the hotspot and a more powerful, external antenna to create the access point by bridging the wifi network to the RPi. Still can't see how that second part of the equation can be done for £15 though, and that was the question Boreades and I were asking.

 

[KellysEye]

We are in a marina that has wifi Jane and I logon to it on different machines, as could anybody else on the boat. Why would we need a hotspot on the boat? We had a high gain antenna.

 

[demonboy]

I should add that I'm not trying to be awkward, I'm speaking from my own experience of trying to pick up networks in large, busy marinas or at anchor in a bay. The only solution is to use a powered, weatherproof omni antenna, and a good one does cost a few quid. I've not used a Bat so I can't comment, but they do seem overpriced. Lots of good antennas available on RV/camper van websites that get rated.

 

[pragmatist]

We are in a marina that has wifi Jane and I logon to it on different machines, as could anybody else on the boat. Why would we need a hotspot on the boat? We had a high gain antenna.

Did you both log on through the same high gain antenna ? In which case you must have some kind of intermediate routing - this is what the Raspberry does. If you don't you may well find that in other locations only one connection will be allowed from one account.

In the first case you have no need of the Raspberry hotspot. In the second, you may find you would. Perhaps I should also mention that this is only a small part of the system - released early as a courtesy to YBW members since it seemed to be of particular interest at the moment.

 

[pragmatist]

Yep, we're saying the same thing. Small dongle to create the hotspot and a more powerful, external antenna to create the access point by bridging the wifi network to the RPi. Still can't see how that second part of the equation can be done for £15 though, and that was the question Boreades and I were asking.

No, the second part can't be done entirely for £15. The £15 is to cover the cost of the card and boat access point. It doesn't include the Raspberry or the external receiver/antenna. You could almost certainly buy the card and the access point cheaper by hunting around and you can then load the image onto the card for nowt. It's available as a free download. We offer the package simply because we know these bits work and there are plenty of people who don't fancy burning their own image. It's not a difficult operation but does take 30 to 45 minutes per card. The final option is to download the sources, compile and configure them yourself.

Didn't think you were being awkward at all ! Obviously what seems clear when I write it, seems a bit mud-like to others

BTW to get to the download page you click on the FREE WiFi Hotspot Software red button - then the Download image red button. You will be asked a simple question to prove you're a human being not a bot and then the download page has the image, a pdf document and now the GPL-ed sources. I think I had better make that less muddy too ! However we are off to see Colin's mother who is 91 this week so we will not be about to update the web site or answer questions for the next few hours.

Do keep the questions coming though and we'll answer them as soon as we can.