Sending gps signal over wifi with Opencpn

[MisterTranquill]

Hello all! hope I post this in the proper section.

So I have a opencpn setup with openplotter onto a raspberry pi.
Everything works well there. Right now I have a gps usb connected to it and it shows my location.

I turned openplotter into a wifi access point.

I connected my laptop (which also has opencpn installed and a set of charts) to the wifi I created. I want to receive the gps signal (and later ais) from the raspberry/openplotter.

So to sum up, I want my openplotter/raspberry as my central system that will feed the gps and ais signal to any laptop, device or tablet connected to its network.

I tried creating a connection in my laptop opencpn using the ip adress and port provided by openplotter/pi but to no avail. I tried them all in TCP, UDP. I tried every possible combination possible. the 10.10.10.1 with 10110 port or the 10111 port, tried 4800 port, 5900 port, I tried them all! The Multiplex nmea adresse is 169.254.37.221 and the signal k nmea is the same but with different port. I tried them all it does not work. The gps signal does not make it to my laptop through wifi.

This winter I worked on a ship and the IT officer onboard fed my computer a gps signal through the ships wifi network easily so I know it possible! He created a connection in my laptop's opencpn, punched in an ip adresse and some port and voila.

I just dont know anymore, it seems I try to accomplish simple things, things that have been done before, I follow the rules but still doesn't work!!!

[LoudMusic]

Your last sentence makes it sound like you're losing your tranquility

The problem seems more like the device with the GPS data isn't broadcasting it. It's retrieving the data directly from the USB stick, not from a network service. Your raspberry needs to be an NMEA source, and nothing I'm seeing in your post tells me that it currently is.

[conachair]

Originally Posted by MisterTranquill

I just dont know anymore, it seems I try to accomplish simple things, things that have been done before, I follow the rules but still doesn't work!!!

Hey Mr tranquil, stay tranquil - it works!
Openplotter has its own forums, lots of help there.
OpenMarine
But here, if you have your gps connected in the nmea tab in openplotter then the default is 10.10.10.1 port 10109 tcp. Assuming your laptop is connected to the openplotter WiFi network. You could try looking in the signalk diagnostic window, magnifying glass icon top right of screen, to check it's coming in. Openplotter on the Pi is a fantastic system for little money and power draw - enjoy

Ps what version are you on, have you upgraded to 0.17.1?

[MisterTranquill]

I just checked and I am on version 0.8.0
I should update it to give it a chance.
I tried with 10109 and still doesn't work.
Will update now

[MisterTranquill]

Pardon my ignorance, but how do I update it? I found on github the 0.17.1 version.
I thought I could just copy the line and paste it to my terminal in my pi?
When I do that it says: bash https://github.com/sailoog/openplotter.git no such file or directory.
Not sure what to do next and at the same time I wonder if it really is a problem with an old version, it seems to be a pretty basic thing I want to do, surely version 0.8.0 would allow that in the first place?

Also you mentioned the signalk diagnostic window, I looked in the signalK tab and it is not there of course.

I am going to bed

[hoolie]

I am not a RPi expert, but I think you will find one of the tabs when you open OpenPlotter is to update. Going from 0.8.0 to 0.17.0 will take quite a while, so be patient. I think there is a huge difference in functionality so what you're wanting to do may well work on the later version

[conachair]

Originally Posted by hoolie

I am not a RPi expert, but I think you will find one of the tabs when you open OpenPlotter is to update. Going from 0.8.0 to 0.17.0 will take quite a while, so be patient. I think there is a huge difference in functionality so what you're wanting to do may well work on the later version

Not sure you can go straight from 0.8, probably better downloading and installing 0.10 then there's a menu to upgrade, plus now it checks for upgrades each boot and tells you.

Yes, takes a while, plus people have had problems if trying to update on shaky WiFi, best to have good net access and a good power supply to the Pi. You can do the whole thing headless though, install and upgrade without a monitor or keyboard, just a laptop of tablet with vnc to control the Pi over wifi. If you have a seperate wifi dongle anyway, haven't tried it on a network.

[Ferrari]

Slightly off topic, but I have one of the earliest Rasberry Pi’s.
I understand they are now up to Version 3 with accompanying improvements.
Also run OpenCPN as back up (along with IPad Pro and various Nav/charts).
Like the idea of Rasberry Pi for Wireless to Open CPN but wonder if best to go straight to the version 3?
Thanks

[conachair]

Originally Posted by Ferrari

Slightly off topic, but I have one of the earliest Rasberry Pi’s.
I understand they are now up to Version 3 with accompanying improvements.
Also run OpenCPN as back up (along with IPad Pro and various Nav/charts).
Like the idea of Rasberry Pi for Wireless to Open CPN but wonder if best to go straight to the version 3?
Thanks

Either a Pi 3b or the brand new 3B+ . Software isn't quite stable yet for the B+ but will be soon, though only a little faster than the 3B and pulls more power, though that might go down a bit once the geekies get the heads round the drivers.
Openplotter & Pi3 is an awesome combination, extremely powerful system for dishing data around the boat and easy hook up of cheap sensors.

[MisterTranquill]

So I installed version 0.10.0 and updated to 0.17.1 stable.

Wifi AP is running, my pc is connected to the openplotter wifi.
I have made a connection in my pc's opencpn and I tried every combinations possible with 10.10.10.1 and port 10109, 10110, 4800, 5556, 3000, 5900, 880, 883. All those ports are mentionned in openplotter in one tab or an other. I tried them all with tcp or udp.
Still not working.

In the nmea183 tab, the gps connection at the bottom is my creation, following conachair comments.

Any idea let me know, I am more than happy to take more photos to help solve this.

The first photo is opencpn on my pc, all the other ones are from the raspberry/openplotter

regards,

[conachair]

Originally Posted by MisterTranquill

So I installed version 0.10.0 and updated to 0.17.1 stable.

Wifi AP is running, my pc is connected to the openplotter wifi.
I have made a connection in my pc's opencpn and I tried every combinations possible with 10.10.10.1 and port 10109, 10110, 4800, 5556, 3000, 5900, 880, 883. All those ports are mentionned in openplotter in one tab or an other. I tried them all with tcp or udp.
Still not working.

In the nmea183 tab, the gps connection at the bottom is my creation, following conachair comments.

Any idea let me know, I am more than happy to take more photos to help solve this.

The first photo is opencpn on my pc, all the other ones are from the raspberry/openplotter

regards,

Don't see your GPS in there? It should be a serial device like ttyUSB0 in the NMEA tab, or do you have it connected to opencpn in openplotter? It shuld be attached in the nmea tab then everything get sent out from there, no need for the 10.10.10.1:10109, that's in there already called opencpn a couple of lines up.

[MisterTranquill]

In openplotter, there is the option to 'set time from nmea'

When I try, I get an error message: failed to connect to localhost 10109. Error time out, unable to retreive date or time from nmea data.

A couple of minute before it was a different error message, error 111

[MisterTranquill]

Originally Posted by conachair

Don't see your GPS in there? It should be a serial device like ttyUSB0 in the NMEA tab, or do you have it connected to opencpn in openplotter? It shuld be attached in the nmea tab then everything get sent out from there, no need for the 10.10.10.1:10109, that's in there already called opencpn a couple of lines up.

that connection exist inside opencpn of my raspberry pi

I just created one into openplotter, see photo, I also deleted the 10.10.10.1:10109 connection (took the photo before)

The opencpn connection shows no port/adress so what should I put for an adress for my connection in my pc's opencpn?

[MisterTranquill]

Holy ****, it finally worked. Not only it works but also I now understand. And I now understand the seperation between opencpn and openplotter.

My main mistake was to treat opencpn on my raspberry differently than the one on my pc. I was sending the gps feed to it as a serial connection and openplotter was getting no gps feed.

The way to do it is to send the serial gps feed to openplotter and then distribute it to opencpn on my raspberry the same way its being sent to opencpn on my pc, via 10.10.10.1:10109 tcp

I feel like Neo in the Matrix at the end when he sees everything in green with code line everywhere on the wals, lol, not quite but still I have been trying this for 2 days.

Thank you everyone for answering, especially conachair.

regards,

[GARY_S]

Openplotter uses Kplex to bring in the NMEA data.

The Magnifying glass icon at the top of the screen will show you what datta is reaching Signalk.

If you don't see GNSS (GPS) data then you need to troubleshoot kplex. There is a lot of documentation on the net.

If you are seeing all the data that you expect including GPS then using a web browser on a machine connected to the Openplotter WiFi access point navigate to the ip address of the Raspberyy pi and to port 3000 e.g. 10.42.0.119:3000

Then go to the menu item "Apps" and select the @signalk/instrumentpanel. You should see the GPS data presented on this page. Note that it is configurable.

That proves that the GPS data is being received properly.

But the easiest way to get the GPS stream into a non-signalk aware app is to get it direct from kplex using tcp/udp.

Again, google for help.