Urgent need for help with Bela and Beaglebone Wireless

Anderswh

Hello! Im in quite the predicament, with a deadline in 1 day. I cannot for the life of me get the BBW to connect to a WIFI network using the onboard WIFI. I tried following the steps from this (https://learn.bela.io/using-bela/bela-techniques/connecting-to-wifi/) guide, but nothing worked. Is there a different process when using the Wireless Beaglebone? Would love to hear any possible solutions here. The end goal is to send simple sensor information through OSC to a host pc in another room.

If you have any suggestions please dont hesitate to respond! Either here or on discord (Anderswh#4770) where comminication might be a bit faster

Thanks in advance!!

giuliomoro

I am not aware of a different procedure needed for the BBW. If you are using our image it should work as expected. Can you show the results of running ip a on the board, the content of /etc/network/interfaces and of /etc/wpa_supplicant/wpa_supplicant.conf ?

Anderswh

giuliomoro Thank you so much for the fast reply!

Here are the results from the ip a command:

1: lo:  mtu 65536 qdisc noqueue state UNKNOWN group default qlen 1000
    link/loopback 00:00:00:00:00:00 brd 00:00:00:00:00:00
    inet 127.0.0.1/8 scope host lo
       valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever
    inet6 ::1/128 scope host 
       valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever
2: wlan0:  mtu 1500 qdisc noop state DOWN group default qlen 1000
    link/ether 38:d2:69:e0:7f:cf brd ff:ff:ff:ff:ff:ff
3: usb0:  mtu 1500 qdisc pfifo_fast state UP group default qlen 1000
    link/ether be:1a:ab:4a:94:8e brd ff:ff:ff:ff:ff:ff
    inet 192.168.6.2/24 brd 192.168.6.255 scope global usb0
       valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever
    inet6 fe80::bc1a:abff:fe4a:948e/64 scope link 
       valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever
4: usb1:  mtu 1500 qdisc pfifo_fast state UP group default qlen 1000
    link/ether be:1a:ab:4a:94:91 brd ff:ff:ff:ff:ff:ff
    inet 192.168.7.2/24 brd 192.168.7.255 scope global usb1
       valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever
    inet6 fe80::bc1a:abff:fe4a:9491/64 scope link 
       valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever

However, the terminal now has decided to freeze every time i try to SSH onto the bela board, so i cannot post the rest of the info as im unable to get them through the browser IDE (atleast as far as i know). I tried running the keygen command with the boards ip adress but it returns a simple "Host 192.168.7.1 not found in /.ssh/known_hosts".Im planning on using multiple of the BBW & bela combo on the same network, and have therefore been switching between different boards on the same computer. Could this be a source for the issue?

Again, thank you so much for the help

Anderswh

Anderswh Keygen command in question was taken from this page https://learn.bela.io/using-bela/about-bela/troubleshooting-guide/#i-cant-ssh-into-my-board

giuliomoro

you are probably running the wrong ssh-keygen command. Try this one :

ssh-keygen -R 192.168.7.2

or manually edit ~/.ssh/known_hosts and remove the offending line, or remove the file altogether. Btw, in order to avoid being locked out you can/should add these lines to ~/.ssh/config :

Host bbb
Hostname 192.168.7.2
User root
StrictHostKeyChecking no

then you can connect to it with ssh bbb and only be printed a warning if the host key doesn't match (but it will still log you in).

Anderswh

I deleted the known_hosts file and restarted the computer, and that sorted it out. I may have gotten the wifi up and going aswell just by going through everything but im not sure. (Also, there was no config file in the .ssh folder). Anyways! Here are the new versions of the information you requested. Does this look good? And if so, should i be able to simply repeat the process with the others, and then set up the OSC communication using the main networks IP??

Results from new ip a:

1: lo: <LOOPBACK,UP,LOWER_UP> mtu 65536 qdisc noqueue state UNKNOWN group default qlen 1000
    link/loopback 00:00:00:00:00:00 brd 00:00:00:00:00:00
    inet 127.0.0.1/8 scope host lo
       valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever
    inet6 ::1/128 scope host 
       valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever
2: usb0: <BROADCAST,MULTICAST,UP,LOWER_UP> mtu 1500 qdisc pfifo_fast state UP group default qlen 1000
    link/ether be:1a:ab:4a:94:8e brd ff:ff:ff:ff:ff:ff
    inet 192.168.6.2/24 brd 192.168.6.255 scope global usb0
       valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever
    inet6 fe80::bc1a:abff:fe4a:948e/64 scope link 
       valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever
3: usb1: <BROADCAST,MULTICAST,UP,LOWER_UP> mtu 1500 qdisc pfifo_fast state UP group default qlen 1000
    link/ether be:1a:ab:4a:94:91 brd ff:ff:ff:ff:ff:ff
    inet 192.168.7.2/24 brd 192.168.7.255 scope global usb1
       valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever
    inet6 fe80::bc1a:abff:fe4a:9491/64 scope link 
       valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever
4: wlan0: <BROADCAST,MULTICAST,UP,LOWER_UP> mtu 1500 qdisc mq state UP group default qlen 1000
    link/ether 38:d2:69:e0:7f:cf brd ff:ff:ff:ff:ff:ff
    inet 192.168.0.118/24 brd 192.168.0.255 scope global wlan0
       valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever
    inet6 fe80::3ad2:69ff:fee0:7fcf/64 scope link 
       valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever
root@bela:~# nano /etc/wpa_supplicant/wpa_supplicant.co

Results from /etc/network/interfaces

# This file describes the network interfaces available on your system
# and how to activate them. For more information, see interfaces(5).

# USB RNDIS gadget (Windows / Linux compatible)
auto usb0
iface usb0 inet static
    address 192.168.6.2
    netmask 255.255.255.0
    network 192.168.6.0

#  USB NCM gadget (macOS / Linux compatible)
auto usb1
iface usb1 inet static
    address 192.168.7.2
    netmask 255.255.255.0
    network 192.168.7.0

# The loopback network interface
auto lo
iface lo inet loopback

# Ethernet
allow-hotplug eth0
iface eth0 inet dhcp
# Example to keep MAC address between reboots
#hwaddress ether DE:AD:BE:EF:CA:FE

# WiFi Example
allow-hotplug wlan0
iface wlan0 inet dhcp
wpa-conf /etc/wpa_supplicant/wpa_supplicant.conf
# The lines above should work if you have a wifi interface called wlan0.
# To see the actual name of your interface, run
#   ip a
# and identify it among the ones listed then replace `wlan0` above with the name of your interface
# To provide credentials to your network, run the following at the command line:
#    wpa_passphrase YourNetworkName YourNetworkPassword >>/etc/wpa_supplicant/wpa_supplicant.conf
# then:
#     ifdown wlan0; ifup wlan0
# where `wlan0` is the name of your interface as found above.

Results from /etc/wpa_supplicant/wpa_supplicant.conf

network={
        ssid="Martin_EXT"
        #psk="xxxxxx" # (censored this out)
        psk=20aaddd638b9947aaf1e7e20b15900d556dad7b262316d50366bf9761c402e28
}

giuliomoro

Anderswh (Also, there was no config file in the .ssh folder).

that's the default state, you can create it and those lines in.

Anderswh I may have gotten the wifi up and going aswell just by going through everything but im not sure. (A

well the commands you ran don't actually change the state of the system, but

Anderswh 4: wlan0: <BROADCAST,MULTICAST,UP,LOWER_UP> mtu 1500 qdisc mq state UP group default qlen 1000
link/ether 38:d2:69:e0:7f:cf brd ff:ff:ff:ff:ff:ff
inet 192.168.0.118/24 brd 192.168.0.255 scope global wlan0
valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever
inet6 fe80::3ad2:69ff:fee0:7fcf/64 scope link
valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever

shows that it's indeed working right now.

If a device doesn't connect to wifi, try ifup --force wlan0 and see if you get back an error or success message. Also, if you have an old-ish image on it (pre v0.3.8, / June 2020), then there used to be a known issue (probably with the kernel?) that was preventing properly configured wifi interfaces (which would work with ifup) from reliably connecting to wifi at boot.

Anderswh

Great! Thank you so much for all the help. Sorry if its off topic, i can make a new thread if thats preferable, but im struggling to make sense of the OSC example code. I want to run the Bela standalone with one sensor, and send messages to a host pc through OSC. In other words, i only want the Bela to send OSC data. I cant seem to find any pointers on a simple set up for this. Can you point me in the direction of what classes/functions from the library(c++) i should use ??

Thank you again for the help, you´re a saint!

Anderswh

Should maybe also mention that i plan on receiving the messages using Csound on the host pc (http://www.csounds.com/manual/html/OSClisten.html)

giuliomoro

see here about how to send messages https://github.com/BelaPlatform/Bela/blob/master/examples/Communication/OSC-Pipe/render.cpp

You will need to change remoteIp to match your host's IP address (it's currently set to send messages to the board itself). There should be nothing special about receiving them from Csound

Anderswh

Okay so i´ll mainly use oscSender.newMessage("/someAddress).add(valueIWantToSend).send(); and i should be good? I´ll only be sending ones and zeroes, i wont need to specify the typetag if i only send "1"? Im assuming it automatically becomes an "i" type, not a float. Im only asking because the OSCsend im used to with csound makes you explicitly state the typetag as well as the message.

And again, you´re saving my life her giulimoro, thank you so much!

giuliomoro

Anderswh Im assuming it automatically becomes an "i" type, not a float.

that's right. If you prefer to specify the type tag, use

 oscSender.newMessage("/someAddress);
 oscSender.msg->pushInt32(i); // or pushFloat() or pushStr() or pushBool() or pushBlob()
 oscSender.send();

Anderswh

Okay now im back to the original issue. I got it working on my home network, but i just tried the same method on the location the Belas are actually going to be at, and it doesnt work anymore. Here are the results of the "ifdown wlan0; ifup wlan0;" command:

Killed old client process
Internet Systems Consortium DHCP Client 4.3.5
Copyright 2004-2016 Internet Systems Consortium.
All rights reserved.
For info, please visit https://www.isc.org/software/dhcp/

Listening on LPF/wlan0/38:d2:69:e0:7f:cf
Sending on   LPF/wlan0/38:d2:69:e0:7f:cf
Sending on   Socket/fallback
DHCPRELEASE on wlan0 to 192.168.0.1 port 67
send_packet: Network is unreachable
send_packet: please consult README file regarding broadcast address.
dhclient.c:2733: Failed to send 300 byte long packet over fallback interface.
Internet Systems Consortium DHCP Client 4.3.5
Copyright 2004-2016 Internet Systems Consortium.
All rights reserved.
For info, please visit https://www.isc.org/software/dhcp/

Listening on LPF/wlan0/38:d2:69:e0:7f:cf
Sending on   LPF/wlan0/38:d2:69:e0:7f:cf
Sending on   Socket/fallback
DHCPDISCOVER on wlan0 to 255.255.255.255 port 67 interval 5
DHCPDISCOVER on wlan0 to 255.255.255.255 port 67 interval 9
DHCPDISCOVER on wlan0 to 255.255.255.255 port 67 interval 10
DHCPDISCOVER on wlan0 to 255.255.255.255 port 67 interval 8
DHCPDISCOVER on wlan0 to 255.255.255.255 port 67 interval 15
DHCPDISCOVER on wlan0 to 255.255.255.255 port 67 interval 10
DHCPDISCOVER on wlan0 to 255.255.255.255 port 67 interval 4
No DHCPOFFERS received.
No working leases in persistent database - sleeping.

And here are the results of the "ip a" afterwards

1: lo: <LOOPBACK,UP,LOWER_UP> mtu 65536 qdisc noqueue state UNKNOWN group default qlen 1000
    link/loopback 00:00:00:00:00:00 brd 00:00:00:00:00:00
    inet 127.0.0.1/8 scope host lo
       valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever
    inet6 ::1/128 scope host 
       valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever
2: usb0: <BROADCAST,MULTICAST,UP,LOWER_UP> mtu 1500 qdisc pfifo_fast state UP group default qlen 1000
    link/ether be:1a:ab:4a:94:8e brd ff:ff:ff:ff:ff:ff
    inet 192.168.6.2/24 brd 192.168.6.255 scope global usb0
       valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever
    inet6 fe80::bc1a:abff:fe4a:948e/64 scope link 
       valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever
3: usb1: <BROADCAST,MULTICAST,UP,LOWER_UP> mtu 1500 qdisc pfifo_fast state UP group default qlen 1000
    link/ether be:1a:ab:4a:94:91 brd ff:ff:ff:ff:ff:ff
    inet 192.168.7.2/24 brd 192.168.7.255 scope global usb1
       valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever
    inet6 fe80::bc1a:abff:fe4a:9491/64 scope link 
       valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever
4: wlan0: <NO-CARRIER,BROADCAST,MULTICAST,UP> mtu 1500 qdisc mq state DOWN group default qlen 1000
    link/ether 38:d2:69:e0:7f:cf brd ff:ff:ff:ff:ff:ff

In case its relevant, here is the result from wpa_supplicants.conf:

network={
        ssid="Martin_EXT"
        #psk="xxxx"
        psk=20aaddd638b9947aaf1e7e20b15900d556dad7b262316d50366bf9761c402e28
}
network={
        ssid="tkf"
        #psk="xxxx"
        psk=dbecc6ba109fe52aaa0c66f487d0867afabf89f62cbbcdc4d1094e5ef7d58fc7
}

giuliomoro

Is that a 5GHz network or 2.4GHz? It may be that only 2.4GHz networks are supported. Try running

iwlist wlan0 scanning

and see if the desired network shows up there.

Secondarily, is there a DHCP server running on that network?

Anderswh

giuliomoro Here are the results from the scan:

          Cell 01 - Address: 7C:DD:90:F3:CC:BC
                    Channel:6
                    Frequency:2.437 GHz (Channel 6)
                    Quality=38/70  Signal level=-72 dBm  
                    Encryption key:on
                    ESSID:"D1735F088527"
                    Bit Rates:1 Mb/s; 2 Mb/s; 5.5 Mb/s; 11 Mb/s
                    Mode:Master
                    Extra:tsf=00000007d39289ee
                    Extra: Last beacon: 3604ms ago
                    IE: Unknown: 000C443137333546303838353237
                    IE: Unknown: 010482840B16
                    IE: Unknown: 030106
                    IE: Unknown: 2A0104
                    IE: IEEE 802.11i/WPA2 Version 1
                        Group Cipher : TKIP
                        Pairwise Ciphers (1) : CCMP
                        Authentication Suites (1) : 802.1x
                    IE: WPA Version 1
                        Group Cipher : TKIP
                        Pairwise Ciphers (2) : CCMP TKIP
                        Authentication Suites (1) : 802.1x
                    IE: Unknown: DD180050F2020101000003A4000027A4000042435E0062322F00
``` 

As for the DHCP server running, im not quite sure! Its an old art house, so there might not be... Is there a quick way to check? Sorry for my lack of knowledge, im quite new to all this hehe. 
Thank you for the help yet again!

giuliomoro

Anderswh ESSID:"D1735F088527"

is different from what you had in your wpa_supplicant.conf ... is that intended?

Anderswh

giuliomoro No not at all! I just did the same scan command and got some more results, but still no SSID corresponding to the network im supposed to use (which works fine, im using it on my pc now). Im above a cafe so thats the reason behind the other network names.

wlan0 Scan completed : Cell 01 - Address: 7C:DD:90:F3:CC:BC Channel:6 Frequency:2.437 GHz (Channel 6) Quality=34/70 Signal level=-76 dBm Encryption key:on ESSID:"D1735F088527" Bit Rates:1 Mb/s; 2 Mb/s; 5.5 Mb/s; 11 Mb/s Mode:Master Extra:tsf=00000009b591e7ca Extra: Last beacon: 3704ms ago IE: Unknown: 000C443137333546303838353237 IE: Unknown: 010482840B16 IE: Unknown: 030106 IE: Unknown: 2A0104 IE: IEEE 802.11i/WPA2 Version 1 Group Cipher : TKIP Pairwise Ciphers (1) : CCMP Authentication Suites (1) : 802.1x IE: WPA Version 1 Group Cipher : TKIP Pairwise Ciphers (2) : CCMP TKIP Authentication Suites (1) : 802.1x IE: Unknown: DD180050F2020101000003A4000027A4000042435E0062322F00 Cell 02 - Address: 34:21:09:8F:AE:D1 Channel:1 Frequency:2.412 GHz (Channel 1) Quality=40/70 Signal level=-70 dBm Encryption key:on ESSID:"Cafe Ni Muser " Bit Rates:1 Mb/s; 2 Mb/s; 5.5 Mb/s; 11 Mb/s; 6 Mb/s 9 Mb/s; 12 Mb/s; 18 Mb/s Bit Rates:24 Mb/s; 36 Mb/s; 48 Mb/s; 54 Mb/s Mode:Unknown/bug Extra:tsf=000000091441600c Extra: Last beacon: 3832ms ago IE: Unknown: 000E43616665204E69204D7573657220 IE: Unknown: 010882848B960C121824 IE: Unknown: 030101 IE: Unknown: 050402030000 IE: Unknown: 2A0104 IE: Unknown: 32043048606C IE: Unknown: 0B0502004B0000 IE: Unknown: 2D1AAC191EFFFF000000000000000000000000000000000000000000 IE: Unknown: 3D1601000000000000000000000000000000000000000000 IE: Unknown: C803010001 IE: Unknown: E71033343231303938464145443030313030 IE: Unknown: 711201000FAC00000FAC000D80000000D73FE2F2 IE: WPA Version 1 Group Cipher : CCMP Pairwise Ciphers (1) : CCMP Authentication Suites (1) : PSK IE: IEEE 802.11i/WPA2 Version 1 Group Cipher : CCMP Pairwise Ciphers (1) : CCMP Authentication Suites (1) : PSK IE: Unknown: DD180050F2020101000003A4000027A4000042435E0062322F00 IE: Unknown: DD0600E04C020160 IE: Unknown: DD500050F204104A00011010440001021054000800060050F2040001101100135265616C74656B20576972656C65737320415010080002008610470010112233445566778899AA3421098FAED0103C000103 IE: Unknown: 7F080000000000000000 Cell 03 - Address: 34:21:09:8F:AE:E1 Channel:1 Frequency:2.412 GHz (Channel 1) Quality=40/70 Signal level=-70 dBm Encryption key:on ESSID:"Cafe Ni Muser " Bit Rates:1 Mb/s; 2 Mb/s; 5.5 Mb/s; 11 Mb/s; 6 Mb/s 9 Mb/s; 12 Mb/s; 18 Mb/s Bit Rates:24 Mb/s; 36 Mb/s; 48 Mb/s; 54 Mb/s Mode:Master Extra:tsf=000000090f8732fe Extra: Last beacon: 3856ms ago IE: Unknown: 000E43616665204E69204D7573657220 IE: Unknown: 010882848B960C121824 IE: Unknown: 030101 IE: Unknown: 2A0100 IE: Unknown: 32043048606C IE: Unknown: 0B0506006F0000 IE: Unknown: 2D1AAC191EFFFF000000000000000000000000000000000000000000 IE: Unknown: 3D1601000300000000000000000000000000000000000000 IE: WPA Version 1 Group Cipher : CCMP Pairwise Ciphers (1) : CCMP Authentication Suites (1) : PSK IE: IEEE 802.11i/WPA2 Version 1 Group Cipher : CCMP Pairwise Ciphers (1) : CCMP Authentication Suites (1) : PSK IE: Unknown: DD180050F2020101000003A4000027A4000042435E0062322F00 IE: Unknown: DD0600E04C020160 IE: Unknown: DDA30050F204104A0001101044000102103B00010310470010112233445566778899AA3421098FAEE01021001B5265616C74656B2053656D69636F6E647563746F7220436F72702E1023000752544C387878781024000D45562D323031302D30392D32301042000F3132333435363738393031323334371054000800060050F2040001101100135265616C74656B20576972656C657373204150100800020086103C000103 IE: Unknown: 7F080000000000000000

giuliomoro

so, could it be that the network you are looking for is operating on the 5GHz frequency band? I am not sure the chip and/or drivers on the BBW supports this band.

Anderswh

giuliomoro The network is 2.4GHz, see attached image:
alt text

I´ve already taken up so much of your time, so if its somewhat of a lost cause i´ll just have to accept that and find some other solution! Thank you very very much for your help, i´ve learned a lot!

giuliomoro

I don't know much about this ... maybe it's a question of signal strength? Your screenshot shows it's not particularly strong. Could you try moving closer to the access point's antenna?

Anderswh

giuliomoro I asked the cafe for their wifi and that worked fine!! So issue resolved. Im trying to dumb down the OSC pipe example down, as i only need to send OSC data (either 1s or 0s), and i want it to run on loop from boot as its going to be a standalone sensor. However im getting alot of errors and im not quite sure which parts of the code i can/should remove for this. Any tips?

I know im asking alot of questions, hope its not too big of a hassle!! Thank you for all the help