My experiences with GL-AR150

[Leonard Payne]

Hi Guys

Firstly thank you to the kind person who pointed me to the bin for the AR150.

I've started this thread so as to not hijack TP-LINK MR3020 thread

Having bricked a number of original MP2s and one other MR3020, you can understand that I proceed with caution :-)

My AR150's were virgin so they came with GL-Nets standard Web interface.
I set the units back to factory default and flashed it with the latest from Open-WRT - Success
I then took the bins from the VT Directory and 'upgraded' with the AR150 bin.

They both booted up fine and saw each other as mesh nodes.
I changed the IPs from the standard nnn.nnn.nnn.20 to 101 and 102
I turned on DHCP giving an allocation range from 201 to 240

I considered the recommendation of leaving the SSID as VT-SECN-AP for both units
in order to give 'roaming' from unit to unit. I understand the reasons but I decided against this
because my target scenario is a grid down situation and users are likely to be static.
I am therefore adopting a naming convention of "WingMesh-Postcode-HouseNumber-Frequency-Node"
where Wingmesh is the name of my Mesh Network, Postcode is a UK Postcode which defines quite a small area of around one half of one kilometer, The Housenumber is the housenumber within that postcode boundary, the frequency is either 24 or 50 for obvious reasons, and the node number begins at 01, 02 etc within that house.

So I have a proposed "Wingmesh-NR347JE-59-2401" and "Wingmesh-NR347JE-59-2402".
This means each node can be isolated down to a particular geographic location by its SSID.

Attached one of the units WAN port to an Internet Router, (BT Home Hub),  logged on to the other unit via WIFI and was able to get through to the Internet quickly.

I then turned off my Home Hub and connected a spare MR3020 together with a G4 dongle-modem, attached this to an AR150 unit with an ethernet cable, and behold, I got through to the Internet. Success.

Next
I found an unwrapped virgin MP2 so I fired it up but found it couldn't see the AP150 nodes. The SECN version was (I don't know but probably ante-diluvian) so I updated to SECN4 and everything fine. Retested Internet via HomeHub and via the G4 and all good.

I found another MP2 but this had already been configured a couple of years ago during an experiment.
I don't have the user-id or password for the management and I don't have the password for the WIFI AP.
I tried holding a pin into the toggle hole and felt it depress and powered but the expected three flashes didn't come - it just rebooted (pin hole???  It really needs a button like the AR150)

What next for that MP2?   I'm not going to the serial port - that's like unprotected sex if you don't mind that comment !

I've also got stashed away some other truly bricked MP2s - Don't know what to do with these except use them as bricks. It's cheaper at £19.99 each to buy the AR150's. They come with external aerials which are 2dbi. The aerials are free. The aerials are overpriced. I have just bought some 8dbi and will report how these work.

The units don't seem to have a great deal of distance, i.e. I can't see them outside of the house but I'm going to try to put one outside on a fine day.

Question?What effect with increasing the output power from 17 to 20 make?

Questions? Is Asterisk built into the SECN for the AR150? I have Asterisk running on a Raspberry Pi 3
and wondered whether it would be better to connect the Rpi to the AR150 with an ethernet cable? Would that work? Likewise a small webserver based on a Raspberry and connected via ethernet to a Lan port? would that kind of resource work.

Well I've got enough work to do so far. If you find this useful, I'll keep this updated. Long Term, I want to connect a network of nodes to another network of nodes a few miles away with a PTP link using something stronger like Ubiquiti kit but I would be more amused by using old discarded Satellite Dishes.

"Count it all joy brethren ......"


Leonard

[T Gillett]

Hi Leonard

Some comments in-line below.

Regards

Terry

On Thu, Feb 23, 2017 at 9:53 AM, Leonard Payne <rev.leon...@gmail.com> wrote:

Hi Guys

Firstly thank you to the kind person who pointed me to the bin for the AR150.

I've started this thread so as to not hijack TP-LINK MR3020 thread

Having bricked a number of original MP2s and one other MR3020, you can understand that I proceed with caution :-)

They are not really bricked, just sleeping and awaiting rescue!
 

My AR150's were virgin so they came with GL-Nets standard Web interface.
I set the units back to factory default and flashed it with the latest from Open-WRT - Success
I then took the bins from the VT Directory and 'upgraded' with the AR150 bin.

They both booted up fine and saw each other as mesh nodes.

 

Excellent!
 

I changed the IPs from the standard nnn.nnn.nnn.20 to 101 and 102
I turned on DHCP giving an allocation range from 201 to 240

Just one DHCP server running I presume?
 

I considered the recommendation of leaving the SSID as VT-SECN-AP for both units
in order to give 'roaming' from unit to unit. I understand the reasons but I decided against this
because my target scenario is a grid down situation and users are likely to be static.
I am therefore adopting a naming convention of "WingMesh-Postcode-HouseNumber-Frequency-Node"
where Wingmesh is the name of my Mesh Network, Postcode is a UK Postcode which defines quite a small area of around one half of one kilometer, The Housenumber is the housenumber within that postcode boundary, the frequency is either 24 or 50 for obvious reasons, and the node number begins at 01, 02 etc within that house.

So I have a proposed "Wingmesh-NR347JE-59-2401" and "Wingmesh-NR347JE-59-2402".
This means each node can be isolated down to a particular geographic location by its SSID.

Attached one of the units WAN port to an Internet Router, (BT Home Hub),  logged on to the other unit via WIFI and was able to get through to the Internet quickly.

I then turned off my Home Hub and connected a spare MR3020 together with a G4 dongle-modem, attached this to an AR150 unit with an ethernet cable, and behold, I got through to the Internet. Success.

Just too easy!

Next
I found an unwrapped virgin MP2 so I fired it up but found it couldn't see the AP150 nodes. The SECN version was (I don't know but probably ante-diluvian) so I updated to SECN4 and everything fine. Retested Internet via HomeHub and via the G4 and all good.

I found another MP2 but this had already been configured a couple of years ago during an experiment.
I don't have the user-id or password for the management and I don't have the password for the WIFI AP.
I tried holding a pin into the toggle hole and felt it depress and powered but the expected three flashes didn't come - it just rebooted (pin hole???  It really needs a button like the AR150)

Probably an early h/w version that does not have the web UBoot feature.
You can most likely recover it with OpenWrt Failsafe recovery process. 
See:  http://wiki.villagetelco.org/OpenWrt_Failsafe_Mode_and_Flash_Recovery
 

What next for that MP2?   I'm not going to the serial port - that's like unprotected sex if you don't mind that comment !

I've also got stashed away some other truly bricked MP2s - Don't know what to do with these except use them as bricks.

They are not really bricked, just sleeping and awaiting rescue!

See above.

 

It's cheaper at £19.99 each to buy the AR150's. They come with external aerials which are 2dbi. The aerials are free. The aerials are overpriced. I have just bought some 8dbi and will report how these work.

The units don't seem to have a great deal of distance, i.e. I can't see them outside of the house but I'm going to try to put one outside on a fine day.

Question?What effect with increasing the output power from 17 to 20 make?

Max TxPower for these units is 18dBm
 

Questions? Is Asterisk built into the SECN for the AR150?

 

Yes. Primarily for the purpose of running it as a Softphone Master node since there is no FXS hardware to support an analog phone. Ditto for a MP02-Basic and other devices running SECN-4
 

I have Asterisk running on a Raspberry Pi 3
and wondered whether it would be better to connect the Rpi to the AR150 with an ethernet cable?

Would that work?
Likewise a small webserver based on a Raspberry and connected via ethernet to a Lan port? would that kind of resource work.

 

Yes if correctly set up

And you can also use the webserver on the SECN node to serve off line web content.

See   http://wiki.villagetelco.org/RACHEL_on_MP2

The VT-RACHEL firmware  serves the 32GB RACHEL library to a class of 30 students on MP02, AR150 and other devices.

Well I've got enough work to do so far. If you find this useful, I'll keep this updated.

It is certainly good to hear about work being done in real world deployments like this.
It is a great way of sharing knowledge around the VT community and will no doubt inspire others to undertake similar adventures!!

 

Long Term, I want to connect a network of nodes to another network of nodes a few miles away with a PTP link using something stronger like Ubiquiti kit but I would be more amused by using old discarded Satellite Dishes.

You might be interested in the work that Anish Mangal has done recently using Cantennas and satellite dishes for long links with SECN nodes.
 

"Count it all joy brethren ......"


Leonard

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[Leonard Payne]

Terry commented

==== Just one DHCP server running I presume?

Thanks for your notes Terry. I assume the "just one DHCP server"

is meant to avoid digital confusion?

I can understand that if all nodes have the same SSID but in my case

doesn't each node with a seperate SSID need DHCP running?

If not (and my reasoning is flaky, could you describe why so that my techy

understanding gets a little better)

I must get in touch with Anish unless he has published his work on cantennas and satellite dishes

"Onwards and upwards ...."

Leonard

 

[Anish Mangal]

Dear Leonard,

Been following this discussion with interest. Happy to share knowledge on cantennas and wifi dishes and experiences with the AR150. We had great fun installing these at 14000ft altitude villages in the himalayas last year.

https://medium.com/@skynet.admin/things-i-learned-building-skynet-3033a4ce8992#.p88sj1i4t
https://medium.com/@skynet.admin/things-i-learned-building-the-skynet-part-2-how-to-eat-dust-1a0c78a48fc7#.73v2zbuuk

We also were able to form links over 5km (theoretically they should go upto 10km but we havent tested) using cantennas+dishes and the tiny little AR150. Terry has been really amazing at helping us get up on our feet.

We plan to do a bunch of deployments this year as well, and expand on the work from last year.

Looking forward to your reply!

Best,

Anish

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[Leonard Payne]

[Leonard Payne]

Hey Anish

Thank you SO much for your response. It was very helpful and I enjoyed reading about your experiences with David up there in the mountains.

My particular 'target' is a local community network in a 'grid down - no internet' situation.

May I pick your brains with regard to the 5km long haul. You used cantennas and satellite dishes
I understand. How did you put them together, how did you connect the AR150 and what configuration did you use?

Second question? Were you involved with internet in a box?  The provision of something like this in my target situation would be great. RACHEL would be fine and I guess I could get this up and running on a spare Raspberry Pi and just plug it in to the AR150. How would that work? The internet-in-a-box looks far more extensive but I cant find where to download the 700Gb !!

Once again, thanks for getting in touch Anish.

As another thought to the community, I wonder whether its wise to continue development on the TP-LINK stream seeing as they are locking their boxes down (Trying to please the FCC).

The AR range from GL-Net looks far better technically and I understand from other sources that the company owner etc and very accommodating and open to discussion.

"Count it all  joy"

Leonard

[T Gillett]

Hi Leonard

There is really no direct connection between the SSID and the IP addresses provided by the DHCP server.

The SSID is simply a name that allows the wifi client to associate with the Access Point.

How the Access Point is networked is an entirely separate matter.

If you have several nodes in the default configuration (ie the mesh interface bat0 is part of the LAN side bridge, along with the AP interface wlan0 and the Ethernet LAN port), and the nodes are meshed, then in effect to two bridges in the nodes are joined to form one large bridge.

So if I associate my laptop with the AP on one of the nodes, and it issues a DHCP request, then that request will travel across the mesh and be received by any DHCP server running on any node.

In a simple network there is just one DHCP server which provides a consistent set of IP addresses to any requesting device. Don't forget that as well as the IP address that is assigned to the requesting device itself, the DHCP server also tells the device the IP address of the LAN gateway and of the DNS servers that it needs to contact to resolve named network addresses.

If you have more than one DHCP server running, you can't really predict which one will respond.

If the DHCP servers are configured in the same way (ie IP range, gateway and DNS addresses) then it doesn't really matter which one responds - the data received by the requesting device wil be the same.

(That said, you don't really know what is going to happen when there is contention between two DHCP servers attempting to respond to the same request.)

However, unless you have specifically set up the DHCP server configuration on each SECN node, they will each present a different LAN gateway address, which by default is configured as the IP of the node itself.

So in this case if one node is acting as a LAN gateway, then any requesting device that gets a DHCP response from another server will be pointed to the wrong gateway address.

So, at least by convention, in simple networks it is usual to enable only a single DHCP server.

This of course creates a single point of failure in the network, and dealing with that is a whole other can of worms.

Regards

Terry

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[Leonard Payne]

Hey Terry

Thanks for the response re DHCP. It makes sense now. Certainly,  if I look at a single Internet access from just one node that is available to all, then the DHCP service is likewise, running on one and available to all.

Aha - Sounds very  socialist to me   😀

Thanks

Leonard

[Leonard Payne]

OK -So moving on ......

Everying as previously posted still working. One minor problem was when using Windoze and logging on to one of the nodes.
Windoze reports "No Internet Available" which of course was nonsense. Any ideas? It works on my Mac -

What I am now ready to do is to mount some form of web server to serve some files etc
I know there is soimething for the MP02 but my target is the AR150 and there is nothing for that.

I've bult a LibraryBox (See http://librarybox.us) and this has its own AP which serves files nicely as a web server.
However I want to connect this to the mesh via ethernet - use one of the lan or wan ports.

Cant get this working - I dont know in what circumstances and how, the http request gets sent to the librarybox.

If I log onto the librarybox and try anything, the librarybox sends things down to the mesh and onwards to the real internet.

Any ideas?  An aklternative would be to build a http server on a Raspberry Pi but the problem remains, how to serve all this
data to the mesh. Its an important one for me because ina grid down situation, people will need access to resources.

Best
Leonard

[T Gillett]

Hi Leonard

You might be interested in trying VT-RACHEL for the AR150 which you can download here:

   http://download.villagetelco.org/firmware/secn/unstable/ar/ar150/SECN-5-VT-RACHEL/Alpha5-m/

By default it is set to use WAN mode of Ethernet, but you can change this in the Admin screen to use Mesh.

Some information on set up and operation is available here:

    http://wiki.villagetelco.org/RACHEL_on_MP2

Note that this is SECN-5 firmware and so uses meshpoint instead of adhoc for the mesh wifi interface.

As a result it will not mesh with SECN-4 devices which use adhoc interface.

A matching SECN-5 firmware for the MP02 is available here:

     http://download.villagetelco.org/firmware/secn/unstable/mp02/SECN-5/SECN_5/OpenWrtAlpha2/

Please note the Alpha status of these firmwares.
They are intended for testing purposes as we move from OpenWrt 15.05.1 based SECN-4 to  LEDE 17.01 based SECN-5.

I plan to have initial stable releases of SECN-5 available during March.

Regards

Terry

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[Leonard Payne]

Thanks for the pointers to RACHEL

I have performed the following and report my results

Took Virgin AR150 and loaded the bin .

I didnt need to load a factory default first. The factory default flashed the bin ok.

Up came an access point VT-RACHEL-1 together with Public-VT-RACHEL-1    I dont know what this is.

Loaded some data onto a USB Stick and it was good to go. This is basic HTML Structure - anything you load on here
will be served. Stick an index.html and you've got a menu unless you want the RACHEL stuff.

In the System Settings I changed the WAN port from "Ethernet" to "Mesh".

Ensured Mesh settings were OK - had to change Mesh id from vtmesh to vt-mesh. Noticed no password.

Reboot

System came back up but not seen by other AR150s running SECN5.  Also the RACEL Node cannot see any ot THE ar150S

Note that in this configuration, no MP02s are running although I noted that when they WERE running yesterday, running SECN4, they were
able to be seen by the AR150's running SECN5 and vice versa.

I also noted that the IP address on the RACHEL cannot be changed ??  It reverts on reboot.

Thats it for now. It would be good to get it to mesh


Best
Leonard

[T Gillett]

Hi Leonard

By the sound of it you have a mixture of Adhoc and Meshpoint intefaces.

Some early SECN-5 firmware still had adhoc interfaces so you may have one or more of those installed.

The meshpoint firmware should have "-m" in the name.

It's all been a bit experimental up to this point!

You can check what is running on each device by issuing the 'iw   dev' command.

You will see the wifi interfaces - one or more AP interfaces, plus the interface used for the mesh, which will be IBSS (for an adhoc interface), or Meshpoint.

We are currently building a new, consistent set of SECN-5 firmware  that will be available over the next few weeks.

In the VT-RACHEL firmware, there is an Administration screen that allows you to set some basic parameters.

This is intended as a simple interface for use in schools where there is limited technical knowledge.

On this page you can select WAN modes as follows:
-  Ethernet (default) which activates the WAN port so that you can connect to an upstream router

- Mesh which runs a mesh interface on the WAN side to connect to a mesh backbone

- SECN Advanced.

In the first two modes, the only things you can change are those fields shown on the Admin page.

If you make any setting changes on the normal SECN configuration pages they will be ignored, as you have found.

If you select the third option (SECN Advanced) and click Save, then you can make changes on the SECN pages as usual and they wil lbe retained.

The basic idea behind the VT-RACHEL firmware is that it is intended as a classroom based device which acts as a digital library, so that 30 or so students in a classroom can access the stored web content (eg RACHEL library) without needing an Internet connection. The device runs a LAN segment (with DHCP service) on the AP with a private address range, and NAT is running to the WAN interface.

On the VT-RACHEL Admin page you can set the "classroom number" to make each node use a unique combination of IP address range and wifi SSID and channel to minimise contention.

Note that only three non-overlapping channels are used - 1, 6 and 11.

Note also that the LAN Ethernet port is not available by default, to prevent accidental connection into an upstream network and resultant DHCP contention (we learnt the hard way!) The Fallback IP address is running on the LAN port for maintenance access.

Client devices connecting to the AP on a node are given an IP in the private network segment on the LAN side of the VT-RACHEL device by the node's local DHCP server.

If the client is connected to the "Public" AP, then the user is restricted to access only the local content, and not any upstream network (if there is one connected).

If the 'school' has a wired Ethernet backbone network, then the VT-RACHEL device WAN port can be safely plugged in to a port on the school network with an Ethernet cable, where it will get an IP address from the network router and thus make Internet access available to the students as well as the local content.

If there is no wired backbone network in the 'school', then you can set up a mesh as the backbone network.

For a simple mesh backbone network, you can set up one (master) node with the mesh interface running on the LAN side (ie default configuration). Then you can connect this node to an upstream router to provide DHCP service and Internet access to the mesh. You connect the LAN port on this node to the upstream router so that the mesh nodes can connect directly to it.

When a VT-RACHEL classroom node joins the mesh, its WAN interface will request a DHCP address, which will be provided across the mesh from the upstream router.

So the mesh just acts the same way as the wired network.

Note that the private network addresses used by the VT-RACHEL firmware are 10.130.x.y where  x lies in the range 1 - 99 and y is 1 - 255.  The IP address range assigned to the device WAN port over the mesh needs to be something outside this range to allow NAT to operate correctly.

There are many ways to configure a network, with and without mesh. The above is a simple method that we have used to provide simple classroom networking in rural and remote schools where it has to be a 'plug and pray' / Lego style installation.

Hope this helps.

Regards

Terry

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[Leonard Payne]

Hi Terry

Thanks for that -  It started pointing me in the right direction.

I updated the first two AR150s to some "-m" firmware.

The RACHEL node was already on "-m"

They still could not see each other. 

I wondered whether they need to be on the same radio channel

RACHEL was on "6" default --- whilst my others are on "1"

I changed RACHEL to "1", (had to use SECN-ADV setting in order to get the change to "stay".)

reboot and we can now see each other.

We still have a problem as follows:

When I log into the WIFI on RACHEL and url to http://rachel/     it's all foine

When I log into any other node - it doesn't work. 

Apart from the browser wanting to go to www.rachel.com, how does to node know WHERE to go?

It is usually going to get some form of DNS -- how does it know to push this request across the MESH

Thanks

Leonard

[T Gillett]

Hi Leonard

The VT-RACHEL firmware is intended to be used as a self contained 'classroom' device where client devices connect directly to it and join its LAN where the web server is running.

The mesh interface is configured to be on the WAN interface to allow use as a backbone network.

When you connect to another node, you can't 'see' into the private network on the LAN side of the VT-RACHEL node.

This is exactly the same as someone trying to look into your home network LAN - it is prevented by the security in the NAT firewall that allows requests from the LAN to the Internet, but not the other way.

It seems that what you are trying to set up is a node with a web server that will be visible from any client device connected to any node on the mesh network.

Is that correct?

If so, then you will need to do a little network design so that you know how to configure the various routers before starting to set them up.

Some questions:

How many nodes will you have on the mesh network (at least initially)?

What type of device do you plan to use for each of the nodes?

Will one of the nodes will be a gateway to an upstream network which will provide Internet access?

Or will it be a completely isolated network?

If you want to set up a simple mesh network where client devices can connect to the AP on any node and will be connected in effect to one big, distributed LAN with a single gateway to an upstream network, then that will be fairly easy to do.

A simple approach would be to use the VT-RACHEL node as the gateway node, and that runs the DHCP service for the network.

But before starting to work out how to set that up, let's hear what you want the network to achieve.

Regards

Terry

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[T Gillett]

And one more question - do you want to provide any telephony support and/or softphone support?

[Leonard Payne]

Hey Terry

Thanks for your comments. I'll try and answer inline and make comments

and answer questions as appropriate

The VT-RACHEL firmware is intended to be used as a self contained 'classroom' device where client devices connect directly to it and join its LAN where the web server is running.

The mesh interface is configured to be on the WAN interface to allow use as a backbone network.

Aha. One of the problems that my brain is having is the concept of a web-server (or indeed any other service) running "on the LAN" or embedded within it. From my classical comms background I can see that a node is part of a LAN, but the rest of the LAN is "out there" on other boxes usually with wire between them. A WAN, in my mind, was just 'out there'. In the instance you note above of the mesh interface is on the WAN interface to allow use as a backbone network, what do you see as the 'backbone'.

 

When you connect to another node, you can't 'see' into the private network on the LAN side of the VT-RACHEL node.

This is exactly the same as someone trying to look into your home network LAN - it is prevented by the security in the NAT firewall that allows requests from the LAN to the Internet, but not the other way.

Understood.

 

It seems that what you are trying to set up is a node with a web server that will be visible from any client device connected to any node on the mesh network.

Is that correct?

Yes thats correct.

 

If so, then you will need to do a little network design so that you know how to configure the various routers before starting to set them up.

Some questions:

How many nodes will you have on the mesh network (at least initially)?

What type of device do you plan to use for each of the nodes?

Will one of the nodes will be a gateway to an upstream network which will provide Internet access?

Or will it be a completely isolated network?

OK - so here's the meat. Assume a 10 node network to get the proof of concept.

I'm looking at the AR150s as the device for a number of reasons including cost per unit but also the question of providing power. Providing 5v at 1amp is fairly easy from battery or solar.

I will also use a couple of spare MP02s although provision of 9-12v is, for me, a little more problematical.

Whilst we have internet access, one of the nodes will act as gateway, either directly to ISP router, or via 4G modem (dongle) on a MR3020 (Both these are known to work). However, the plan is for a grid-down situation where there is no power and no internet.

 

If you want to set up a simple mesh network where client devices can connect to the AP on any node and will be connected in effect to one big, distributed LAN with a single gateway to an upstream network, then that will be fairly easy to do.

OK - thats fine

 

A simple approach would be to use the VT-RACHEL node as the gateway node, and that runs the DHCP service for the network.

But before starting to work out how to set that up, let's hear what you want the network to achieve.

OK - So here's my vision.

Assume no power and no internet (although we will plug it in - just in case it comes back  but assume we are isolated).  I see the mesh network as the comms network as such, and that computing resources such as a virtual library (RACHEL) and PBX (Asterix-softphone) are accessible by all people connected to all nodes. These computing resources can be 'embedded' which the nodes can already do, or by 'plugging in', other computers such as Raspberrys running discrete applications.

Consider that a single network.

Now duplicate that, and connect the two by long distance wifi with disk/cantenna

I hope that answers it all. From your earlier comments - one big LAN connected to other big LANS by a bridge of some kind.

Thanks

Leonard

[T Gillett]

Hi Leonard

The term LAN is a little overloaded so I will explain what I mean by the term in the context of the SECN router firmware.

A basic router typically operates in two networks which, by convention, are called LAN and WAN.

So you can say that the router has a LAN side and a WAN side. In between these two there is a firewall that regulates the data that can flow between the two networks, and a NAT service that translates addresses of data packets flowing between the two networks.

In a simple network with just one router and a number of client devices, the router typically operates the DHCP service that in effect defines the LAN network since it assigns IP addresses to the clients and points them to the gateway and DNS server.

In a SECN mesh network there are typically lots of nodes based on router hardware, but they are mostly just acting as connectors to the mesh network and as a host for an AP and an Ethernet port which are joined into the LAN bridge across the mesh. They are not acting as routers in the sense that they are connected to only one network on the LAN side.

In a simple SECN mesh network, one node has an active WAN port and is acting as a gateway router to an upstream network. For simplicity, the same node usually runs the DHCP service, so all the LAN functions are executed in one piece of hardware.

Moving on to your network, you could assemble the basic network as follows:

1. Set up a VT-RACHEL node in its default configuration to serve the web content and act as the DHCP server for the whole network.

This node will have an IP address of 10.130.1.254 by default and issue IP addresses via DHCP in this subnet address range.

You can connect the WAN Ethernet port of this node to an upstream network for Internet access.

2. Change its WAN mode to SECN advanced so you can set some additional parameters.

3. Enable the mesh on this node. Note that this is not the WAN mesh mode, it is simply ticking the Enable Mesh checkbox on the SECN Advanced page.

This will run a mesh interface on the LAN bridge so that other nodes can join the mesh and be bridged to this node.

4. Set up other SECN nodes in the default configuration ie with AP and Mesh both enabled. As long as you have the same wifi channel and Mesh ID set up, you should see them all meshed.

5. Set up one of the nodes as a Softphone Master. This will set its IP address to 10.130.1.252 and it will continue to be part of the mesh.

Set the LAN Gateway IP address (SECN Basic page) to point to the VT-RACHEL node.

Set up the required Softphone accounts on this node.

Now if you connect a client device to the AP on any node it will be assigned an IP address from the VT-RACHEL node and will be able to access the Internet via that node. It will also be able to access the local web content by entering the IP address of the VT-RACHEL node as the URL.

If a client device has a Softphone application, it should be configured to point to the Softphone Master node.

Then it will be able to make calls to other Softphone or MP2-FXS devices on the mesh.

Does this make sense?

Once you have a basic network running, then we can look at running a second network and connecting the two via a P2P link.

Regards

Terry

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[Leonard Payne]

Hi there

An exhausting day but we made substantial progress. I took your advice and instructions
and here are my results.

I took the spare MP02 and flashed with

openwrt-SECN-5.0-MP02-RACHEL-Alpha2-m-MP02-squashfs-sysupgrade.bin

This fired up fine with an IP address of 10.130.1.254
and connected with a cable in the WAN port for my ISP router (HomeHub)
Turned on Mesh with id of "vtmesh" and turned on DHCP server giving the default address range
AP Turned on
Reboot - all works fine - connects to Internet fine

I then took 3 x AR150s and flashed with

openwrt-SECN-5.0-AR150-Alpha5B-m-AR150-ar150-squashfs-sysupgrade.bin

Gave them IPs of 10.130.1.101,102 and 103
Turned on Mesh as above, Turned off DHCP
Reboot all works fine.

Took another MP02 and flashed with
openwrt-SECN-5.0-MP02-Alpha2-m-MP02-squashfs-sysupgrade.bin

Turned on mesh, turned off DHCP but the node could not be seen
nor could it see. I treble checked the radio was all set to chan 1
and the mesh name was the same but nothing.

I decided to reflash with the MP02 RACHEL software as above
and that worked. Turned off DHCP so we only still have one supplier
as per your recommendations. (We still need to talk about single point of failure but lets leave it for another day)

So have a total of 5 nodes up and running which is enough for our testbed.

I'll start looking at the softphone tomorrow - I read your instructions. The softphone client
I am using is Zoiper. One on an iPhone, and one on an Android phone.

If anyone has ideas about configuration of the Zoiper, then please add your 2c worth.

There seem to be a lot of fields in the config section. Hopefully I can just add my telephone number 300, 301 etc and hook up to the nearest node.

Thanks for all your help. We have made splendid progress today

Best
Leonard

[T Gillett]

Sounds like good progress.

I have used Zoiper successfully in the past so you should be OK with it.

To get started it might be easier to install CSipSimple on the Android and set it up as per the instructions in the User Guide (Ref: http://wiki.villagetelco.org/SECN_4_User_Guide    Sect 5.5)

That will give you a good idea of the fields you need to set up on Zoiper.

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[Leonard Payne]

Hi Guys

Well today was spent in looking at the Softphone on the AR150.

Targets for test was 1 iPhone running Zoiper and designated as extension 300
and 1 Android running CSipSimple and designated as extension 301

Took a fresh AR150 and flashed it successfully

Went in to 10.130.1.20 and configured as follows:

Basic Page - Sip has been enabled even though I have no external service.

Advanced -- Asterisk turned on / Softphone Support = MASTER

DHCP = OFF

Softphone Configuration = 2 entries
300 - Leonard-iPhone
301 - Leonard-Android

Both with password set the same

IP changes automagically as expected to 10.130.1.252

Reboot -- Everything fine

Now for the phones

 I tried the Android First

Account Name   Leonard-Android
User 301
Server 10.130.1.252
Password as set

Tried to register and get back the response "Error whilst registering - Forbidden"

Similar with the iPhone although we get a result code of "Error 403 - Forbidden"


Any pointers please?

BTW I havent configured any of the other nodes as there are only two options
available on the Asterisk Software parameters   "MASTER/OFF"
There is no client mode.

I tried todays work by using the AP on the Master node at nn.nn.nn.252

Thanks
Leonard

[Anish Mangal]

The usernames are not 301, 302 etc. rather they are softph301, softph302, soft3xx

However, when you are doing the voip call, you need to dial the extension numbers normally, like 301, 302 etc.

Hope that helps.

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Anish

[davidfra...@gmail.com]

Hi Guys

 

Perhaps the software is trying to register the non-existent Sip account. I got the same message from my Android phone when I misconfigured my VOIP account and tried to use it

 

Hope you sort it out!!

 

David Lindsay

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[Keith Williamson]

Hi,

Anish is correct. The default user names are softph3NN vs 3NN. That would explain the registration failure.

Cheers,

Keith

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[Leonard Payne]

Hi Guys

Yes Anish was correct. softph3nn does the trick.

So --   end of phase 1

We have six nodes mostly with AR150's including a Rachel node
and the softphone ability.

I now want to take a day or two to properly document the steps
to make it blond-proof ("Let the listener understand")

Phase 2 will be the interconnection of 2 discrete networks together via
long distance wifi (Anish we need to talk please) although it would also be interesting
to try and hook them up via the Internet.

Thats it for now - Thank you everyone for your support.

Once Ive documented - I'll be back

Leonard