I have done that.
There is probably a miscommunication:
The DIY kit - which is the CHIP computer + RTL-SDR dongle + OLNA + Antenna - that itself is a work in progress. Only two of those things are our own products. Hence assembly and disassembly required. In a router or a camera or whatever final product, including a final Outernet Receiver - there wouldn’t be anything to disassemble.
Also - given the limited resources, it is important to prioritize work that gets us closer to the unified receiver, and which will also be useful on the unified receiver, and minimize, as much as possible, the work done on the current setup which won’t translate to the final receiver.
So while it is important that people be able to flash releases right now - hence the work put in to make the flashing as reliable as possible for as many people as possible; making it as fast as possible, or to eliminate the need for disassembly, etc aren’t as critical - they are only “good to have” requirements, and don’t actually get in the way of people trying out new releases. The work required to make them happen is highly disproportionate to the benefit gained. Also, all that work will be wasted as the final receiver won’t be using this mechanism anyway - lets face it, no non-technical person can (or will want to) handle FEL flashing.
So optimizing flashing to the last inch, now, isn’t a priority. Getting the OTAs to work reliably is. Which will also solve the FEL flashing problem for the DIY kit.
CHIP community isn’t really focused on this particular kind of usage of the CHIP. So, yeah, while it would be ideal if we could have leveraged their work, their goals are mostly not aligned to ours. I do wish we had access to their Chrome flasher - it would have simplified things tremendously.
Note also that the CHIP is simply a way-station to the final consumer-ready receiver. CHIP is off-the-shelf hardware that was shockingly well suited for our application. But of course, its still far from perfect - there are disconnects between the needs of our application vs CHIP design - need to FEL flash, power brownouts, wifi issues - esp in AP mode, lack of user buttons (thus requiring the FEL header and Config Wipe header silliness), lack of LED indicators (so I can’t have a “frame lock” indicator, or wifi activity indicator, or wifi mode indicator), etc - all result in user frustration. Not to mention the availability issues.
All this is what I mean when I say its a “work in progress”. In an ideal world, given a large team of people, sure I’d like to dot all the "i"s - but without that, I have to constantly balance the convenience of immediate use, vs progress towards the final product. Note that I am probably the most active user of these receivers - at any point of time I have between 3 to 6 receivers actively running, with others in various state of test. So any irritations that you feel while using, are also probably irritants for me.
I do appreciate all the effort you and the other active users here put in, its a big help in making sure we stay the course. I am just asking that you also have a little trust in me that I am setting my priorities keeping the end goal in mind, while still minimizing current irritants, balancing them as much as possible.
All feedback, suggestions, requests: those are critical to this project and to guide me in the priority setting, and every single one of them I welcome and appreciate.
I admit that sometimes I get miffed by repeated arguments over the same thing - and I apologize for that.
Oh: on the issue of disassembly. The problem is this: In theory, disassembly should not be required. The microusb cable that you use to power the CHIP (while in the receiver), can simply be disconnected from the power adapter and plugged into a PC usb port for FEL flashing. The radio etc don’t necessarily have to be removed. The reason I recommend doing that is cause a lot of PC ports don’t deliver enough power to the CHIP and the setup might brownout while flashing if the radio is still hooked up.
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I experience exactly the same symptoms, no Wifi connection and this time it does not even show up when connected with USB. So I fear I have to through the flashing (first make Virtualbox run…)
Update as of April 1st: after flashing the CHIP (read docs carefully, it worked without issues) the reciver is working fine with Skylark 4.4 for 2 weeks now. It regulary looses the connection to my home Wifi, however. So I usually have to power cycle it.
After the flash, the tuner configuration seems to be empty. Also the custom tap in the tuner app seems to be missing.Can I fix this in the shell and if yes, how?
In the login page did you enter the admin credentials of outernet/outernet?
@Syed I was forced to flash my chip because i had a corruption of the filesystem (librarian). I flashed Skylark 4.4 and it works great! Nice work! It’s way faster so far than librarian at booting and while using (way more snappy).
But i still tihink that the interface of Librarian was better 
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Yes, Librarian’s UI is more polished. We will eventually get Skylark up to that level. What was most important was removing Postgresql and adding a few other features that were difficult to implement with Librarian.
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hi，could you tell me how to solve this error? thanks
You don’t, this means that your chip has disconnected and your browser cant connect to it. Just wait for your chip to reboot and refresh the page.
I’m having problems flashing 4.4.
I’ve previously used my virtualbox plus extension pack to flash the skylark beta.
I’m running it as root on Ubuntu Release 16.10 (Yakkety Yak) 64-bit, Kernel Linux 4.8.0-49-generic x86_64
Virtualbox5
I can run other virtual machines (XP etc) in this configuration.
When running it I get some segfault, some ‘Bad EIP value’ and then a kernel panic…
I’ve downloaded it twice with the same problem.
Any ideas?
Thanks
Sam
OK that’s fixed by running an older kernel on the host system.
Can someone remind me what the lights should do on the chip when in Fel mode?
I’m seeing two solid lights and the script is not finding the chip…
OK it was just a crappy USB cable… Now upgraded.
In case anyone else finds this thread the lights do stay solid in FEL mode…
The lights are on but no one is home…
I’m finding the Wifi exceptionally flakey. It appears and disappears regularly. I can only very occasionally get a lease and when I do it often causes the chip to power down.
Connected to a 2.1amp USB socket.
Is anyone else getting this?
Thanks
Sam
Not here, Sam. I too am puzzled. My system has been running flawlessly here in Annapolis, and as I travel the world. Even losing the Lantern over a balcony didn’t hurt it.
Ken
Yup, my solution was getting it out of the sun. Whenever it was hot and sunny outside the wifi would cutout and then my CHIP would shutdown a few hours later. But then on days that are cloudy it works fine. It seems the wifi chip cant handle the heat.
I am running on a 2.5A supply connected to CHG in.
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uh the image files are missing…
Does this project use the Inmarsat’s satellite?
How about it network security,if commercial?
I am receiving a 404 on the link to the image files as others indicated in this forum. Can someone update the link? Thanks!
Yeah Im getting the 404 still too.
this one is still working
https://archive.outernet.is/images/Dreamcatcher%20Skylark/