Just About to Give-up on Raspberry Pi 3 B+ and OpenCPN

[bokakob]

I have been toying with RPi for a few months and learned its capabilities, I think. It appears to be a nice toy for desktop use, and maybe, a decent controller for various equipment.



I installed Rasbian desktop on it, added 3x32GB microSD cards in RAID5, purchased extra USB expansion board and custom 4A power supply. Added custom heatsinks and small dangly fan (works silently just fine). Then I installed OpenCPN. First it was older version v.4-something and later on I installed OpenCPN v.5 from scratch after I got mad and reformatted/reinstalled everything. All of US vector and raster maps loaded fine and work hmmm... OK-ish with delayed hiccups.



The reason for reformatting and reinstalling was that OpenCPN just refused to work continuously with UBlox-7 module. After connection of the unit to RPi via extended USB cable, so it it hanging outside of my windows, the UBlox-7 worked like a charm for about a day or so. I tried it in serial mode (out of the box) and in daemon mode (using gps utilities). In both cases the GPS dongle worked just fine for about a day or three, then abruptly it would stop working. No matter what I did the GPS would not show and it remain red.



At the same time after reformatting and reinstalling everything, the same GPS dongle would work again for a day or few, then die on me regardless of what I would do. I am in dire depression that I physically cannot make this little thingy work for more than a week. During that week it works flawlessly! What do I do wrong?! Please help me as I do would like to know what is wrong with this setup.

Otherwise this setup would be sold/discarded/trampled/thrown overboard. Thanks.

[Reefmagnet]

1/. Try another GPS dongle

2/. Try Openplotter as the "OS". It saves a lot of heartache.You can still manually update or add apps as needed.
3/. The RPi is a KISS device, not a CRAY. Don't try to do everything on it. Best used for single purpose applications, I think.



The biggest weakness, IMHO, with USB devices is the way they grab random device (file) names. Most of those cheap USB GPS dongles use the same chip set that supplies the same device ID to the system and the solution is to map to the physical port, not the device itself.

[bokakob]

Originally Posted by Reefmagnet

1/. Try another GPS dongle

I tried two different vendors with the same dongle type. Same results.

Originally Posted by Reefmagnet

2/. Try Openplotter as the "OS". It saves a lot of heartache.You can still manually update or add apps as needed.

I definitely would try OpenPlotter, it is just another micoSD card and couple of days of work. But on the other hand... I have a sailboat, I pay docking fees, I pay for supplies and replacements, I pay for expendables. I think I should stick to ready made devices from Lowrance or Garmin Marine electronics. With all those expenses I should shell out some money for industrial equipment. I think it would be a sane choice. The time saved I would spend on reading.

Originally Posted by Reefmagnet

3/. The RPi is a KISS device, not a CRAY. Don't try to do everything on it. Best used for single purpose applications, I think.

Then I would need a lot of "know-how" to tinker with with these little single board computers. Besides, I would just use separate circuits for depth finder, chart plotter, bilge pumps, weather station, etc. At least I would know it should work out of the box. "Do I want electronics career or do I want just sailing?" That is the question... Enough is that I am a diesel engine know-how person, composites DIY enthusiast, painting affectionado and entry level carpenter...

Originally Posted by Reefmagnet

The biggest weakness, IMHO, with USB devices is the way they grab random device (file) names. Most of those cheap USB GPS dongles use the same chip set that supplies the same device ID to the system and the solution is to map to the physical port, not the device itself.

Out of curiosity would you please draw a cli line to do just that? Than may save my efforts. I would be most appreciative. Thanks.

[RaymondR]

If you are trying for an economic system I put up about 8,000 nm of coastal cruising using a 10" Asus Eee computer running OpenCPN under Windows 7, a BU353 dongle and a digitec USB to RS422/485 converter to an old Raymarine St4000 autopilot. I found it extremely reliable as long as I only had the Win 7 opp system and OpenCPN on it. I'd probably still be using it except the tropical heat killed the battery pack.

[MartinR]

Did you specify the port for the USB dongle? If not, on startup it will probably not be recognised. Especially important when using hubs.

[Reefmagnet]

Originally Posted by bokakob

I tried two different vendors with the same dongle type. Same results.



I definitely would try OpenPlotter, it is just another micoSD card and couple of days of work. But on the other hand... I have a sailboat, I pay docking fees, I pay for supplies and replacements, I pay for expendables. I think I should stick to ready made devices from Lowrance or Garmin Marine electronics. With all those expenses I should shell out some money for industrial equipment. I think it would be a sane choice. The time saved I would spend on reading.



Then I would need a lot of "know-how" to tinker with with these little single board computers. Besides, I would just use separate circuits for depth finder, chart plotter, bilge pumps, weather station, etc. At least I would know it should work out of the box. "Do I want electronics career or do I want just sailing?" That is the question... Enough is that I am a diesel engine know-how person, composites DIY enthusiast, painting affectionado and entry level carpenter...



Out of curiosity would you please draw a cli line to do just that? Than may save my efforts. I would be most appreciative. Thanks.

OpenPlotter installs pretty easily. You will easily spend a few hours tinkering with the finer points like kplex and signalk, but you already have a head start by the sounds of it and you don't need to be tied to the dock to do this.



The fact you have a RAID 5, high Gb and extra USB ports in your setup probably demonstrates your expectations of what a RPi can do exceed that of what an RPi can actually do. They have limited RAM and this will limit how much stuff they can run at any time. You can use 32 Gb without RAID and just clone to a backup every now and again. Not sure how much you know about RAID in general, but using RAID with SD cards has more disadvantage then advantage, imo. The attraction of an RPI is it's low power consumption, small size and inexpensive component price. The latter is especially underrated because you can laterally carry an entire replacement system in your pocket.



"dmesg" is a quick way to see what device/file a recently attached USB device has been assigned. The problem with "USB devices using the same chipset from different manufacturers" is that they probably have the Prolific (sp) chipset and it will likely have the same device id across devices, regardless of brand. If you start swapping out devices this causes problems. Fortunately OpenPlotter lets you simply point and click to associate devices with a USB port instead.



I made a comment in a thread recently that had I known how good a pi was as an MFD, I'd never bothered with the propriety MFD. I originally just cobbled together a pi for use as an AIS receiver and kept going from there. The raspberry pi on my boat does everything the MFD can do plus a little more, including autopilot (which I don't use) and radar (which I do use). And it does it using 1/4 of the power of the MFD. It's speed is comparable to the MFD and I can update it at will and it's economically and practically feasible keep a spare system onboard in standby.


Now having said all that, I also use a NUC onboard which also runs OpenCPN and I use that a lot, but it get's all it's NEMA data via the RPi. Perhaps a NUC or similar would be a better choice? Powerwise they suck a little more than a small screen MFD.And having said all that and having said all that, using an off the shelf MFD is no big deal. Plenty do.

[GrowleyMonster]

I run OCPN on a rooted Note3 with Cyanogenmod OS (I have four of them... GREAT phone!) and also on a Dell laptop with Ubuntu16.04. The phone of course has its own GPS built in. The laptop? Every 3 to 7 days the BU-353 stops working. I unplug it and plug it back into a different USB port, and like magic, in about 10 seconds it is working again. Not a very technical solution, I know. Unplugging and plugging it back in to the same USB port sometimes works, sometimes doesn't. A different one gives instant gratification. Deleting the connection in OCPN and reestablishing it also works quickly, but when you got your hands full of sailboat, simply unplug/replug is a lot more practical.



I have two RPis waiting for me at home, and as soon as I get there I will be playing around with it a Pi Plotter, myself. It will be interesting to see if the same thing happens on the RPI and if a GPS hat works any better than the little black USB cookie.

[conachair]

Originally Posted by bokakob

I /I] Please help me as I do would like to know what is wrong with this setup.

Otherwise this setup would be sold/discarded/trampled/thrown overboard. Thanks.

Start again with openplotter. Then you have a software image which is known to work very well and if there are still issues you can start to investigate what it is about your system which is causing problems. Common problem sources are not enough power so the voltage drops during spikes and cheap slow SD cards can be another.
If the problems persist then the community will help and the authors will be interested for find any bugs at OpenMarine - OpenPlotter

I definitely would try OpenPlotter, it is just another micoSD card and couple of days of work. ..

Shouldn't be. Copy you existing image o to a laptop and install openplotter. The img should boot straight away whhile the noobs might take and hour max to install.

[AedanC]

If installing OpenPlotter headless give it 30-45 minutes before giving up. You should see a WiFi network appear that you can connect to. Details in the OpenPlotter docs.

[Bill O]

Bokakob,
We originally attempted to put in OCPN from source and eventually had issues w/the PPA and the plugins not being able to install. As described by others, save frustration and download/run OPlotter. It is a much easier solution.
We are not computer people, but could figure out how to set up the RPi. Here's a write up that you may find helpful on how we set up our nav. station Pi. We also run the Pypilot as our autopilot that is also embedded in OPlotter (another article describing that set up).
We have GPS, AIS, speed, depth and wind all coming into our nav Pi and it works well. As discussed by MartinR, you should designate what port is being used for GPS, AIS etc. so it can find/recognize them easily.
Did you check your GPS dongles if you have NMEA sentences coming in? If so, then your dongle is working and need to designate a port. If the GPS dongles are not working, go w/a suggested brand on the OCPN page that are known to work. Again saves a lot of frustration.


Bill O.

[conachair]

Originally Posted by AedanC

If installing OpenPlotter headless give it 30-45 minutes before giving up. You should see a WiFi network appear that you can connect to. Details in the OpenPlotter docs.

Just tried the v1.0.0 img as opposed to the noobs, about 10 minutes or less to write to the car with win32diskimager then booted straight away on a Pi3b. Took a couple of reboots for it to see a wifi network for web access though, or maybe I was just impatient..

[AedanC]

Originally Posted by conachair

Just tried the v1.0.0 img as opposed to the noobs, about 10 minutes or less to write to the car with win32diskimager then booted straight away on a Pi3b. Took a couple of reboots for it to see a wifi network for web access though, or maybe I was just impatient..

I forgot there were images available, I installed via the noobs and headless, so I had to wait for the WiFi to become available so I could VNC in to complete the setup. I’ll try and use an image next time.

[conachair]

Originally Posted by AedanC

I forgot there were images available, I installed via the noobs and headless, so I had to wait for the WiFi to become available so I could VNC in to complete the setup. I’ll try and use an image next time.

Roll on V2 where we can make our own images

OpenPlotter v2.x.x is coming!!

[Lake-Effect]

Originally Posted by RaymondR

If you are trying for an economic system I put up about 8,000 nm of coastal cruising using a 10" Asus Eee computer running OpenCPN under Windows 7, a BU353 dongle and a digitec USB to RS422/485 converter to an old Raymarine St4000 autopilot. I found it extremely reliable as long as I only had the Win 7 opp system and OpenCPN on it. I'd probably still be using it except the tropical heat killed the battery pack.

Good to hear! I also have a 10" eee and a GPS dongle; I ditched Win7 for a lightweight Linux (Lubuntu; other options here). I also used the marine-purpose distro Xinutop on a bootable SD card.

(I also have 2 of the original 7" eee's; one we brought with us to Europe in 2008)

I've only played with it, not put many sea miles on it. The non-waterproof laptop format is a bit of a handful in a small cockpit, and the display was poor in direct sunlight. And my battery pack also quit .

From what I've read to date, it seems that the most useful combo is a RPi 3 as headless central processor, and a decent tablet as display/control.

I'm surprised to hear that the OP's fob seems to pack it in after a day. Maybe I'll set up something similar and let it run to see if it also fails for me.