How to copy SD card image for backup / sizeup

Just need to do as such,

sudo dd if=/dev/disk1 of=/destination.img bs=1m

change the card and then,

diskutil unmountDisk /dev/disk1
sudo dd of=/dev/disk1 if=/destination.img bs=1m

MacBook TrackPad Right Click Emulate

After all, it is quite easy to set up right click motion on mac osx remotely using RaspberryPi via X11 forwarding. Although it took time to find and tried other settings, you just need to set "Emulate three button mouse" in X11 Preferences of XQuartz.

Now you it can recognize right click by cmd+click. You can build up blocks on minecraft of course.

ssh -X instead of vnc

I noticed more direct access to X11 server is to use "ssh -X" instead of vnc. In other words, to be a X11 client to access X11 server on Pi. It reminds me using Xterminal to access SUN workstation 20 years ago. Although I supposed Mac OSX includes X11 modules, Moutain Lion does not and need XQuartz to be installed. http://xquartz.macosforge.org/landing/

After installing Xquartsz, just type
ssh -X ipaddress

Nothing different from normal ssh first, but once you launch mincraft-pi or other window-based program, you could see the window on the max as well as HDTV output. Strange thing is, you can open X application without window manager at HDTV side.

Then test basic movement of Minecraft, now mouse (in fact trackpad) movement is fine and you can see up by scroll  up on the trackpad. However, you cannot place a block. It needs to click right button, but standard "mac way", clicking with option, control key, does not work.

Maybe there should be a solution....

Run Minecraft Pi Edition

The first step to test the potential of Pi, is to run Minecraft on it. Download the module set from http://pi.minecraft.net/ and just extract and execute. All the command is through the remote terminal through vnc.

You may need to type

sudo chmod 777 /dev/vchiq

to access video I/F from the program otherwise the message,

failed to open vchiq instance

would appear.

Now Minecraft is on screen, only on HDTV side, not on the macbook through vnc. You may still control on black window on vnc to see reaction on HDTV monitor. Now the problem is, somehow mouse control always looking down and once you look down, you cannot raise head up anymore...

Maybe there should be a solution...

x11vnc X11 Server

Although it looks like tightVNC is more popular, I installed x11vnc. As the first target is to play minecraft on pi with its monitor, it is meaningless and impossible to let the video output to the remote terminal. Instead, Pi need to connect HDTV monitor with direct signals from video chip. In order to make it possible, I felt x11vnc is necessary and installed as below,

sudo apt-get install x11vnc

and store x11vnc.desktop file in ~/.config/autostart after setting password

[Desktop Entry]
Encoding=UTF-8
Type=Application
Name=X11VNC
Comment=
Exec=x11vnc -forever -usepw -display :0 -ultrafilexfer
StartupNotify=false
Terminal=false
Hidden=false

Then type startx and could be controlled from vnc client on a remote terminal.

Wifi TP-Link WN725N driver install

Once you copy the driver file, it is quite easy to proceed.

gzip -d 8188eu-20130209.tar.gz
tar xvf 8188eu-20130209.tar
sudo install -p -m 644 8188eu.ko /lib/modules/3.6.11+/kernel/driver/net/wireless
sudo depmod -a
sudo modprobe 8188eu

Now reboot and confirmed it works! You can ssh to the Ip address you can see just before the login prompt on the HDTV screen.

Modify Raspberian Image file on mac osx

In order to install the driver for wifi adapter, TP-Link TLWN725N for Raspberry Pi, need to install driver files to the filesystem. Model A's only one USB port is occupied to keyboard and there is no Ethernet connection,  there is no way to connect Pi to another server. 

One of the solutions is to write the file on the rasberian boot image file and reboot.

To do that, the first issue is to access to the image file from mac osx. Though in default osx does not recognize linux file system. You can use fuse software to read and write file on linux filesystem.

1. Install FUSE for OS X

2. Install fuse-ext2

3. make the directory to mount
mkdir /Volumes/linux (or any name)

4. mount
fuse-ext2 -o force /dev/diskXsX /Volumes/linux
*) X : check assigned number with df command

Now you can change the filesystem. 

5. Copy the device file to the linux file system

6. Write to SD media as usual using dd command.

Once you reboot,  you can set up the driver

(To be continued.)

 

Fisrt boot of Raspberry Pi

First, created the file image file using

http://downloads.raspberrypi.org/images/raspbian/2013-05-25-wheezy-raspbian/2013-05-25-wheezy-raspbian.zip

After unzip the file, insert a SD card. I used 2GB media, though 4GB+ is recommended, for challenge. It is easy to write the boot image file to SD media. After confirming the device name by df command,

sudo dd bs=1m if=./2013-05-25-wheezy-raspbian.img of=/dev/rdisk2

<Test With USB Keyboard>
Now insert the SD card to the RaspberryPi,
Insert the keyboard to the USB
Connect HDTV to RPi
Connect PowerUSB

Now I can see the boot screen. Change the account password etc. However, xinit/startx doesn't work as we don't have network connection. Only one single USB port is occupied by the keyboard.

<Edit Wifi Password file>
It needs to be authenticated with password to connect the network. Need this file to be edit,

/etc/wpa_supplicant/wpa_supplicant.conf

ctrl_interface=DIR=/var/run/wpa_supplicant GROUP=netdev
update_config=1 
network={ 
ssid="SSID"
psk="password" 
proto=RSN 
key_mgmt=WPA-PSK 
pairwise=CCMP 
auth_alg=OPEN 
}

(SSID and password need to be modified)


<Change the keyboard with wifi dongle TP-Link TLWN725N>
Although boot process finished, no IP address assigned. No connection SSH from the network.

Now I know that there would need the driver for TP-Link TL-WN725N version 2. It is not compatible with the Raspbian 2013-05-25 at least.

There is a driver module downloadable from the site below.
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/80256631/8188eu-20130209.tar.gz
However, there is no internet connection from my raspberry Pi model A without wifi connection. How can I place this file to the file system.

Still there is a solution... (To be continued)

Got Raspberry Pi Model A

Raspberry Pi Model A has arrived. It came in a tiny box and sent over an usual 1st class mail.

I intentionally chose mode A to challenge it to work wireless environment, rather than saving cost. Although a wifi dongle is similar to the price difference between morel A and B, I bought the most reasonably priced USB wifi TP-Link TLWN725N by 7.6 GBP.

Will see how they work together.