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technical:openwrt-overview [2022/09/16 19:49] admin [OpenWrt with MESHdesk and APdesk] |
technical:openwrt-overview [2023/10/14 19:56] (current) admin |
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| ====== OpenWrt Overview ====== | ====== OpenWrt Overview ====== | ||
| ===== Introduction ===== | ===== Introduction ===== | ||
| + | * The intended audience of this page is someone who is familiar with Linux but new to the OpenWrt world. | ||
| * OpenWrt is a very popular project that allows you to build your own Linux based firmware which you can use on embedded devices. | * OpenWrt is a very popular project that allows you to build your own Linux based firmware which you can use on embedded devices. | ||
| - | * There are pre-built firmware available for many hardware models. | + | * They have pre-built firmware |
| - | * Without duplicating existing documentation you can visit the project' | + | * You can also compile your own custom firmware using the OpenWrt SDK (Software Development Kit) |
| + | * Without duplicating existing documentation you can visit the project' | ||
| ===== OpenWrt with MESHdesk and APdesk ===== | ===== OpenWrt with MESHdesk and APdesk ===== | ||
| - | * MESHdesk and APdesk makes use of standard | + | * MESHdesk and APdesk makes use of OpenWrt. |
| * It simply adds three additional items to it. | * It simply adds three additional items to it. | ||
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| - | | + | |
| - | * Although we will cover these items later again when we do hands-on compiling | + | * Although we will cover these items later again when we do hands-on compiling, going through them in the overview will make things a bit more familiar |
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| + | ===== MESHdesk package ===== | ||
| + | * OpenWrt follows the same pattern as most other Linux distributions where it has a package manager (opkg) that is used to install software onto the device. | ||
| + | * This package manager also takes care of dependencies. | ||
| + | * Packages can be installed after the device is flashed and running with OpenWrt or it can included during compile time to be part of the firmware image. | ||
| + | * We will compile our own OpenWrt firmware that have the MESHdesk package included later on. | ||
| + | * To build your own OpenWrt firmware you make use of the OpenWrt SDK (Software Developer Kit). | ||
| + | * The OpenWrt SDK allows you to: | ||
| + | - Select the specific device you want to build firmware for. | ||
| + | - Select the packages you want to include with the firmware. | ||
| + | - Include your own additional files with the firmware. | ||
| + | * This is exactly what we will be doing later on. | ||
| + | |||
| + | ===== MESHdesk Luci package ===== | ||
| + | * OpenWrt can work fine without any web interface. | ||
| + | * There is however a web interface available called Luci which is an add-on to plain OpenWrt. | ||
| + | * The firmware which you can download from the OpenWrt website has it included by default. | ||
| + | * The nightly builts of the development branch however do not have it included. | ||
| + | * Luci has various sub items e.g. modules, applications, | ||
| + | * We will add an application to Luci (the MESHdesk Luci Application) | ||
| + | * This application will allow someone to enable or disable central management of the OpenWrt device using the Luci web interface. | ||
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| + | {{: | ||
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| + | ===== Include your own files ===== | ||
| + | * When building your own OpenWrt firmware using the SDK it makes provisioning to also include additional files. | ||
| + | * These files are ad-hoc and include those not part of a package but those that you still want to have included as part of the firmware. | ||
| + | * We will later show how you can include for instance your own logo and a custom banner for the SSH and terminal login screens. | ||
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| + | This brings us to the end of the introduction to OpenWrt. | ||
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| + | Next will be getting the environment ready for the OpenWrt SDK. | ||
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| + | [[technical: | ||