Archived - Beta test MLAT software for Raspberry Pi

[patrick1501]

I made a Cron Job to restart the Feeder daily

Would you mind sharing the script you wrote?

[bhaal]

Finding that the Receiver part of the feeder tends to stop or go into an error condition.

[FAIL] Receiver: down ... failed!

Stopping it, waiting a few seconds then a start, tends to solve the issue.
Anyone seeing the same issues?
Any automation or watchdog that can do a stop/start every x hours?

Is it fr24 that's failing or dump1090 ? If dump1090 is failing maybe there is a debug mode you could run it in to find out *why* it's failing?

[equi]

Would you mind sharing the script you wrote?

Bonjour,

sure

#!/bin/sh
service fr24feed restart

e.g.

I created a script named "fr24cron.sh" with above content. To make a .sh file run, use

chmod a+x fr24cron.sh

. Then I added the Script to my Cron tasks and so it restart my feed every day at 00:01 .

Regards

[patrick1501]

Thanks for sharing. I was expecting something more complex, that would first detect if the process was still running or not. But if it does what it is supposed to do, that's perfect!

For example, here is the script I used in my previous configuration, as dump1090 had a bad tendency to crash from time to time:

#!/bin/sh
ps auxw | grep dump1090 | grep -v grep > /dev/null
if [ $? != 0 ]
then
       echo "$(date) Restarting dump1090" >> ~/monitorDump1090/log.txt
       sudo /etc/init.d/dump1090-mutability start > /dev/null
fi

This script was running every 2 minutes.

Regards,
Patrick

[equi]

I had no time to check the mutability fork yet. However,Robb's Fork and the original dump1090 are working fine for several days without any crash on my Banana.

[NorthObserver]

This is very interesting! Just wondering, how you achieve the common timebase for MLAT calculations without a GPS time source? Or are you comparing the relative timestamps and positions of known ADS-B targets to generate a local time reference, provided that the exact location and latitude of the RPI receiver is known? The math here is quite clever..

[bhaal]

I had no time to check the mutability fork yet. However,Robb's Fork and the original dump1090 are working fine for several days without any crash on my Banana.

It's weird, admittedly I've only been doing this since Janurary this year so I have no idea how unstable the dump1090 (any fork) code base was... But I've never once had it crash on my Pi? I feed my Pi with 5V - 5.1V via a DC-DC Buck converter from a 12V power source via Power-over-Ethernet, I feed the power straight into the GPIO 5V and Ground pins. I and there is more than enough amps going in as well.

If people are having troubles with the most recent versions of dump1090 crashing on their Raspberry Pi's (I cannot comment on Banana Pi's never used them, but a good chance the same problem can occur) then maybe you need to look beyond the software. If you don't feed enough AMPS into the Pi for the Pi itself + the RTL-SDR dongle, then there is a good chance the dongle won't get enough power and it itself will disconnect or definitely will cause spurious errors to be generated which is probably crashing dump1090.. Check what is displayed in the kernel log after a crash, you can do this by typing "dmesg" at the command prompt (no need to sudo) .. If you see lines at the bottom to do with USB and disconnecting and then redetecting the dongle, then that is what's happening.. Low power... This will cause the rtl-sdr kernel modules to unload and then load again and therefore causing dump1090 to terminate...

[dstreufert]

So, can someone tell me how to load the new version of fr24feed _without_ the FR24 version of dump1090? I want to retain the Flightaware version, and pass info to fr24.

[bhaal]

So, can someone tell me how to load the new version of fr24feed _without_ the FR24 version of dump1090? I want to retain the Flightaware version, and pass info to fr24.

sudo mv /usr/lib/fr24/dump1090 /usr/lib/fr24/dump1090-fr24

Then if you are using FA's dump1090:

sudo ln -s /usr/bin/dump1090 /usr/lib/fr24/dump1090

Or if you are using mutability's dump1090 installed from .deb:

sudo ln -s /usr/bin/dump1090-mutability /usr/lib/fr24/dump1090

If you are using the mutability compiled manually then I am not sure it installs as "dump1090" or "dump1090-mutability" ... But I think you get the idea...

And in /etc/fr24feed.ini

change the mlat settings to:

mlat="no"
mlat-without-gps="no"


If that doesn't work let me know..

[rodeo]

If you don't feed enough AMPS into the Pi for the Pi itself + the RTL-SDR dongle, then there is a good chance the dongle won't get enough power and it itself will disconnect or definitely will cause spurious errors to be generated which is probably crashing dump1090.

Valid point - interesting to note that some suppliers only supply a wall wart capable of 1-1.2A with their Pi's. I bought my Pi from Wiltronics, they supply a 2A wall wart. I've got the dongle feeding straight from one of the Pi's USB ports via a 1m extension cable and its never missed a beat, yet I see others saying you have to feed them via a powered USB hub.

[Kpin]

Question for Vinnyspb: What is the difference between MLAT6 and MLAT7?

[equi]

Valid point - interesting to note that some suppliers only supply a wall wart capable of 1-1.2A with their Pi's. I bought my Pi from Wiltronics, they supply a 2A wall wart. I've got the dongle feeding straight from one of the Pi's USB ports via a 1m extension cable and its never missed a beat, yet I see others saying you have to feed them via a powered USB hub.

It's always a good idea to use an active USB Hub on those kind of computers because they may lack in power supply to the SDR which causes a software crash.

[rodeo]

It's always a good idea to use an active USB Hub on those kind of computers because they may lack in power supply to the SDR which causes a software crash.

...only because they are being fed with incapable wall warts (as I said) - feed it with a big enough one, no problems. Mines been running for over 4 months now without an issue.

[equi]

Yes, but sometimes you want to connect extra Hardware (e.g. a mass storage stick).

[bhaal]

Valid point - interesting to note that some suppliers only supply a wall wart capable of 1-1.2A with their Pi's. I bought my Pi from Wiltronics, they supply a 2A wall wart. I've got the dongle feeding straight from one of the Pi's USB ports via a 1m extension cable and its never missed a beat, yet I see others saying you have to feed them via a powered USB hub.

Hmmm, I buy my Pi's from Element14, one of the main distributers ... and unless I order extra stuff, (which I don't) all I get is the Pi, nothing else, no case/psu/sd cards etc... *shrug* I have many Pi's in/on this house, so running them all off individual PSUs is not practical, most run of 4 port passive PoE injectors...