Networking

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jimc
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Re: Networking

Post by jimc » Mon May 12, 2014 4:13 am

all i can say toby is i have never heard of any security breaches or anything like that with dropbox. i have been using it for 3 years now with no trouble. its a great thing but for large files it is slow obviously since you need to upload to the cloud then download from it. i have read an article recently though that dropbox somehow monitors your acct and can detect copyrighted material. i forgoet how they manage to do this but nothing you need to worry about i guess unless your storing your whole piratebay collection in your dropbox folder lol.

Toby
Posts: 330
Joined: Wed Apr 09, 2014 9:44 pm

Re: Networking

Post by Toby » Mon May 12, 2014 1:04 pm

I just switched to Google Drive. They can also do the desktop thing, which was news to me until I saw how Dropbox did it. I guess I can always re-install Dropbox if it's better, but I figure I'm already in so deep with Google that this won't add any new risks.

markb
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Joined: Tue Apr 15, 2014 11:06 pm

Re: Networking

Post by markb » Mon May 12, 2014 1:37 pm

sprior wrote:I started off using Dropbox - the modeling/slicing machine put the gcode file into Dropbox which was synched to the printing host machine. Then later I switched to a Raspberry Pi running Octopi so I now model/slice on my favorite laptop then upload the gcode via the OctoPrint web interface and that controls the print. I can even use my smartphone browser to check on the print status and with a webcam connected to the Pi it shoots a timelapse video of the print, then emails me when the print is done.
This completely looks like the way to go.
I found a walk through.
http://www.printrbottalk.com/forum/view ... =89&t=4989
what camera are you using? is it working out good?
Do you print from the SC card on the M2?

sprior
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Re: Networking

Post by sprior » Tue May 13, 2014 2:07 am

I'm using a Microsoft Lifecam I happened to have around, but just plug in what you have around and see if it works. I would not recommend the Raspberry Pi camera module because it has a short ribbon cable as well as a lack of close focus which make it a pain in the neck. So far I've been printing off the SD card which provides storage for the Raspberry Pi - I found uploading direct to the SD card in the printer seemed slow and the pi SD card seems to work fine.

I realized that I should clarify a few things about my setup and what you can expect. When I said I check the print from my smartphone I meant that I do so via wifi from my local network, I don't have the Pi accessible via the Internet and wouldn't recommend that since you could get a storm of accesses during a print which could clobber the Pi. I've also got an internal DNS server and use static IPs so I can access the Pi via name instead of numerical IP address - I've actually got a very elaborate networking/server system.

markb
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Joined: Tue Apr 15, 2014 11:06 pm

Re: Networking

Post by markb » Tue May 13, 2014 3:39 am

I ordered my Raspberry Pi and Wi-Fi adapter and power supply today. I have an old web cam I will try to get working. Making it have a fixed IP address is no problem.
What are you using for the email when your print is finished? That is nice add on feature.

I would like to setup up VPN later so I can check on it over the web.
But first things first I need to get it here and get it all configured.
Last edited by markb on Tue May 13, 2014 3:47 am, edited 1 time in total.

sprior
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Re: Networking

Post by sprior » Tue May 13, 2014 3:47 am

I did set it up with wifi, but ended up using wired ethernet - I stopped trusting wifi early on, but that might have been something else. I'd recommend snapping an image of the SD card once you get it the way you want it in case you have a weird problem and just want to restore a known working setup. The config file is in ~pi/.octoprint/config.yaml and after some reimages and renstalls I ended up tracking config changes using git and pushing them to my git server on another machine so I know I wouldn't lose it.

For the email and uploading of timelapse see the wiki page at https://github.com/foosel/OctoPrint/wik ... Eventhooks. Note that if you switch to the devel branch of Octoprint you need to change your event definitions (also on that page) because they changed the placeholder variables.

markb
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Joined: Tue Apr 15, 2014 11:06 pm

Re: Networking

Post by markb » Tue May 13, 2014 3:52 am

Thanks for the info. I am more of a windows guy but I have hack around some and I don’t mind reading and trying new stuff.

sprior
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Joined: Thu Apr 10, 2014 8:37 pm

Re: Networking

Post by sprior » Tue May 13, 2014 3:59 am

In that case I'd really recommend starting off with wired ethernet if you can. Setting up wifi is more complicated.

sprior
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Joined: Thu Apr 10, 2014 8:37 pm

Re: Networking

Post by sprior » Tue May 13, 2014 4:52 am

Also, plug the USB camera into a powered USB hub, not directly into the Raspberry Pi - the Pi by itself doesn't supply enough power. To be on the safe side if you do use a USB wifi dongle plug that into the hub as well.

markb
Posts: 180
Joined: Tue Apr 15, 2014 11:06 pm

Re: Networking

Post by markb » Tue May 13, 2014 2:23 pm

sprior wrote:In that case I'd really recommend starting off with wired ethernet if you can. Setting up wifi is more complicated.
Good suggestion.
Yes my plan is to get wired Ethernet working then save image then get wireless working.
sprior wrote:Also, plug the USB camera into a powered USB hub, not directly into the Raspberry Pi - the Pi by itself doesn't supply enough power. To be on the safe side if you do use a USB wifi dongle plug that into the hub as well.
Thanks for the powered USB info.
What image are you using? Raspbian?

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