Support for arm64 Raspberry Pi

[Soltares]

A few requests have come in requesting to run MeshSense on a Raspberry Pi. This should be possible, in theory, although the webbluetooth library does not have a prebuild currently for arm64. See https://github.com/thegecko/webbluetooth/issues/190

Will need to look to see how a build would be accomplished manually.

[RyanWor]

Subscribed. Thank you Chris!

I guess I should have just said arm, not sure if changes things or matters. I'd be perfectly fine running 32bit OS if possible since it would be the Pis only role to run MeshSense and talk to a rooftop node over IP. Either though way thanks for this awesome application! I am loving it!

[typicalaimster]

I'd love this as well. Especially if it can be headless and running in the background. I'd just simply use the Web portal at that point. See also: https://github.com/Affirmatech/MeshSense/issues/8

[azwirko]

I'll admit this is surely NOT elegant. I'm not using BT to connect to my node, and only access via WiFi IP. To that extent I've hacked a few of the "api" related .ts files to bypass or ignore some of the BT functions. I simply ran the code and commented out sections until I could get a response on http://localhost:5920/ I've not extensively tested MeshSense doing this, but the attached screenshot shows its at least working to an extent on my RPi 4. Maybe a 'diff' export could be made or possible a #ifdef block for "noBT" to accomplish the same.

Aside from having to 'apt-get install' cmake and ninja-build, here are the changes made to some of the MeshSense files prior to starting the api and ui pieces with npm.

in api/packages.json line 55 delete:

   "webbluetooth": "^3.2.1",

in api/src/meshtastic.ts line 26 comment out:

   // import { beginScanning, bluetoothDevices, stopScanning } from './lib/bluetooth'

lines 54-58 rewrite as:

   if (value == 'disconnected' || value == 'searching' || value == 'reconnecting') {
      // beginScanning()
   } else {
      // stopScanning()
   }

in api/src/lib/bluetooth.ts line 1 comment out:

   // import { Bluetooth } from 'webbluetooth'

Happy hacking!

Mesh node K1RA LongFast Slot 9 in Northern Virginia west of Washington D.C.

[Soltares]

That's awesome! I would anticipate MeshSense to largely work without issue. It was originally built with IP-only and bluetooth was added later. Only thing that stands out to me are the lack of traceroute lines in the screenshot, but the connected node is not reporting a position so that could be part of the reason.

This brings up an interesting question of whether or not to provide an official ARM build with bluetooth functionality disabled.

Thanks for sharing! 👏

[azwirko]

Soltares, good catch. My dev node 1RA2 does not have built-in GPS, nor Lat/Lon set. After setting up a fixed position now the map shows as attached:

Hope you can get it running as well.