This version is for the 2019 Tawny Owl nest box:
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| Owlbox 2019... work in progress |
My first attempt at this (Pi v2 no cameras + 2x Pi zero Ws, 1 camera module each) is all powered by one Power over ethernet (PoE connection). The Pi B+ is described as having faster wired network (ethernet) connection, so I theorised that it could better act a video streaming hub for several Pi zero Ws.
Why not buy a commercial wifi access point you ask?
- This build costs the price of a raspberry pi 3B+, case, SD card & power adapter - so not far off buying a commercial Wifi access point.
- The access point will 'double up' to host/stream video for its own webcam and a RaspPi camera module - show me a commercial wifi access point that can do that...
- Its more fun than just buying a commercial one. Really.
- You can re-task it as an arcade table (I made this one), Media server, Kodi box, weather station, etc, etc
My first attempt at this worked. Mostly. The problem was that the method that I used included adding a DHCP server. Every network has a DHCP server on it somewhere. Domestic networks typically have one running on their Internet service provider-provided modem/router (BT/Virgin/Sky etc). A DHCP server ' hands out' network addresses (called IP addresses) to local devices connected to the network (e.g. PC/tablet/smart TV). Think of it as creating a 'map' so that network traffic can be routed between devices.
The presence of a second DHPC server on my Raspberry Pi v2 caused intermittent problems as there were two operating on my network, beavering away and assigning different IP addresses to the same devices. Annoyingly the device they fought over the most was the TV, so understandably that was not well received.
So, plan B (+)
An upfront disclaimer, most of this method is not mine, and is reproduced from parts of this 'how to' , and credit to its author
jamesh
(Paspberry pi Foundation). I re-jigged it a bit to make it flow better and added in my own comments.
The first bit deals with making an a
standalone wifi network... which is what I did first without reading it
properly.... You actually want to follow
the second part of the section that deals with setting it up as an access point
to an existing network.
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One common use of the Raspberry Pi is as an access point is to provide
wireless connections to a wired Ethernet connection, so that anyone logged into
the access point can access the internet, providing of course that the wired
Ethernet on the Pi can connect to the internet via some sort of router.
To do this, a
'bridge' needs to put in place between the wireless device and the Ethernet
device on the access point Raspberry Pi. This bridge will pass all traffic
between the two interfaces.
Use the
following to update your Raspbian installation:
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get upgrade
Install the
following packages to enable the access point setup and bridging:
sudo apt-get install hostapd bridge-utils
Comment:
reboot at this point, or the 'add bridge' bit below wont work.
Since the
configuration files are not ready yet, turn the new software off as follows:
sudo
systemctl stop hostapd
Bridging creates
a higher-level construct over the two ports being bridged. It is the bridge
that is the network device, so we need to stop the eth0 and wlan0 ports being allocated IP addresses by the DHCP client on the Raspberry
Pi.
edit: May
want to save a version of this text on the pi's desktop before doing the following
as you'll lose the internet temporarily
sudo nano /etc/dhcpcd.conf
Add denyinterfaces wlan0 and denyinterfaces eth0 to the end of the file (but above any other
added interface lines) and save the file.
Add a new
bridge, which in this case is called br0.
sudo brctl addbr br0
Connect the
network ports. In this case, connect eth0 to the bridge br0.
sudo brctl addif br0 eth0
Now the
interfaces file needs to be edited to adjust the various devices to work with
bridging.
sudo nano /etc/network/interfaces make the following edits.
Add the bridging
information at the end of the file.
# Bridge setup
auto br0
iface br0 inet manual
bridge_ports eth0 wlan0
edit the hostapd
configuration file, located at /etc/hostapd/hostapd.conf, to add the various parameters for your
wireless network (SSID) and password (wpa_passphrase).
sudo nano /etc/hostapd/hostapd.conf
wpa_passphrase=pwdhere
interface=wlan0
bridge=br0
#driver=nl80211
ssid=NameOfNetwork
hw_mode=g
channel=7
wmm_enabled=0
macaddr_acl=0
auth_algs=1
ignore_broadcast_ssid=0
wpa=2
wpa_passphrase=AardvarkBadgerHedgehog
wpa_key_mgmt=WPA-PSK
wpa_pairwise=TKIP
rsn_pairwise=CCMP
We now need to
tell the system where to find this configuration file.
sudo nano /etc/default/hostapd
Find the line
with #DAEMON_CONF, and replace it with this:
DAEMON_CONF="/etc/hostapd/hostapd.conf"
Now reboot the
Raspberry Pi.
There should now
be a functioning bridge between the wireless LAN and the Ethernet connection on
the Raspberry Pi, and any device associated with the Raspberry Pi access point
will act as if it is connected to the access point's wired Ethernet.
The ifconfig command will show the bridge, which
will have been allocated an IP address via the wired Ethernet's DHCP server.
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A few more observations...
Raspberry Pi v2 has no built in wifi so I added a usb wifi dongle to the original version I did.
The Pi 3B+ has built in Wifi (both have ethernet), so there's no need to add wifi dongle. My Pi v2 version works fine over Power over Ethernet (PoE). The version B+ most definitely does NOT, so 2019 Owl Box will need a better power supply (and better power cable) to the top of its tree than the optimistically planned PoE only solution.
