OSPi2.img.zip in the OSPi14 manual

[jayOSPi]

Been a long frustrating four hours and still where I started.

I received my OSPi and RPi a little while ago but knew I wouldn’t be able to put it all together until tonight or this weekend. In preparation of this I went ahead and downloaded the “latest” image according to the 1.4 manual form here: http://rayshobby.net/docs/ospi14_manual.pdf I ordered one of the kits along with my RPi which came with a quality mini SD card because I had read it was important to have a good one. I down loaded Win32DiskImager so I could do it on my desktop but kew if need be I have a Fedora box handy. I have re-imaged the SD card four or five times, downloaded the image twice and tried putting the newly downloaded image on the SD card with no avail. When I put power to the RPi the red light comes on, the green flickers for a second then does nothing. I thought maybe the boot loader was corrupted or something wrong with the SD card itself so I formatted it several times. I have used various tools to format and/or repair the SD card multiple times again to no avail. I though maybe the SD card is corrupted so I put NOOBS back on it to see what happens and it boots right up no problem, even installed raspbain on that same SD card with no boot issue. I even tried a good quality but old class 4 SD card but it did the same thing, red light, green light flicker then nothing. I was at my wits end (and still am) so I took the card with raspbain on it and though maybe I had to image over that but that resulted in the same result. I am starting to think the image on your website is corrupted as I downloaded to two different machines with no luck. I also tried the Fedora box and dd with the same result.

Any ideas on why I cannot get this thing to boot?

[Randy]

It sounds like you are running the RPi independently of the control board (the board accepts 24VAC and provides voltage regulated power to the RPi attached).  If this is the case, I’ve had a few situations on other projects where I could see the LED boot indicator lights activate but not get a good bootup.  I found that the supposed one amp power supply I was using did not provide enough power.  I swapped to a known good unit and was able to boot.  Not sure if this is your exact problem, but something to try in your troubleshooting.  Good luck.

 

PS – the interval program (python based irrigation control app) included in the image from the base documentation is out of date.  Make sure you update it to the latest before investing too much configuration time.

[Sean]

The same thing happens to me, at first. Same exact symptoms.

i have an OSPI version 2.

the fix was to load the ad card with and boot to noobs, then configure everything to connect reliably to the network, then use the command line to get the OSPI app.

i think that the 1.4 image may be incomparable with the new proc on the ver 2 pi.

i can’t find the manual instruction that I used. maybe Samer or Ray could provide it?

[Randy]

Very good point on the RPi ver 2.  I’m using a RPi B+ model with BCM2835 SOC ARM v11 700Mhz CPU.  This will run the Linux distributions that have the ARMv6 kernel support (such as in the base image indicated in the OSPi manual link).  The RPi ver 2 model uses a Cortex-A5 CPU running at an improved 800MHz.  This one requires the ARMv7 kernel to run.  The Raspian image from the RPi website has been modified to include the new kernel.  I believe it will also be backwards compatible with the older RPi models.  Unfortunately the AMRv6 kernel is not forward compatible.

Seems to be a case of loading the new Raspian as Sean suggests.  You can then layer on the needed software components for the OSPi.   A second approach would be to do a little surgery to the current image on your SD card and inject the ARMv7 kernel image and modify the bootloader file.  This would be non-trivial.  And I guess a third approach would be to find a RPi B+ (get the right form factor as the old RPi has to be “tilted” to fit in the case) and use the image as is.  Good luck.

[jayOSPi]

Well, now I feel kind of dumb wasting all that time yesterday messing with all that stuff 🙁

Yes, I have the RPi V2 and it makes sense that the image is built for the other models and is not compatible with V2.

Thanks to Randy and Sean for showing me the way.  If someone could post how to get the OSPi app from the command line that would be awesome.  I’m sure I could figure it out but a guide would definitely help.

 

 

[jayOSPi]

Sean, is this the install you are talking about?

 

http://rayshobby.net/mediawiki/index.php?title=Python_Interval_Program_for_OSPi

 

[Sean]

@jayOSPi

No, I have the  unified C++ version. At the time I got it it was beta. The version number is 2.1.3. I think the current version has the same number so I’m not sure if anything has changed.

I am still looking for the command I used to load it. I remember that it was a terminal command. Does anyone know what it may be?

[Sean]

Found it. I was directed to this post

https://opensprinkler.com/forums/topic/announcing-opensprinkler-unified-firmware-2-1-3-for-avrrpibbblinux/

I misremembered thinking it was a simple apt-get command.

So, here is the recipe I used for my Raspberry Pi version 2 B:

• Format an SD card as Fat32
• Download, unzip and copy the current full Noobs to the SD
  • Follow the instructions here http://www.raspberrypi.org/help/noobs-setup/
• Assuming that you have a monitor and keyboard connected…
• When you get to the point of the Noobs install that asks you what things to install choose ONLY Debian (Raspian?)
• When you get to the point where the text based raspberry config program runs (The config runs automatically on first boot.), remember to…
  • Set your time zone in the Localization section.
  • Enable SSH.
  • Change your default password.
  • Change your Host name (optional)
• Get your network working so you can successfully browse the web
  • Did you notice at this point that this is a rather good personal computer for surfing and stuff?
• Browse to  The First Link in this Post and under the section titled “Upgrade OSPi/OSBo to Firmware 2.1.3” do step 1, 2 and 4.
  • you are skipping step 3 because this is a fresh install.
• DONE.

[jayOSPi]

Just to update and close out on this. I followed what Sean posted above and my OpenSprinkler Pi is up and running! Thank you very much for your assistance!

[Ray]

Sorry about the trouble you encountered. I still haven’t received my RPi 2 so I can’t test. But I am pretty sure the OSPi image (which was made last year) is NOT compatible with RPi 2. We will update the image soon to use the most recent Raspbian. Do keep in mind that you can install Dan’s Python program, or our new Unified OpenSprinkler Firmware directly, without using the pre-configured image. For both of them, the source code is released on Github, and you can follow their specific instructions to clone, install, and run the code.

[smons1]

Hi, I have the same problem with my RasPi2. Is there any forecast when a new image will be available? I was actually counting on the image because I did not want to buy a keyboard, mouse, monitor to set it up.

[Ray]

You don’t need to use a keyboard, mouse and monitor to set it up. You can use a different computer to ssh to your RPi and set it up that way.

Even if you use the pre-configured SD card image, you likely have to set up a few things in the beginning, such as time zone, and WiFi user name/password.

[jayOSPi]

I did what Ray suggested and it worked just fine.

 

I actually had something weird happen on day two of my OSPi running where all communication to the Pi stopped.  I had purchased two RPi’s so I retrieved the sd card from the OSPi, booted up the OSPi sd card in the other RPi, and had to reconfigure the WiFi again.  Not sure what happened there as it was working just fine on day 1 and I had not touched it after confirming all was working on day 1.  On day 11 and all has been functioning well.

[Author]

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