***New Release: Skylark 5.8

Syed · 2020-03-24T13:51:56.138Z

Feel free to purchase directly from the website.

ac8dg · 2020-04-03T08:42:55.530Z

Many users have concerns and questions on the reliability of the SD card as the main drive when running Single Board Computers (SBC) like the Dreamcatcher.

Raspberry pi groups have added this performance test utility that may be of interest… I have not tested in the Dreamcatcher yet… it may work on armbian.
Link—

Raspberry Pi – 4 Mar 20

Raspberry Pi SD Card Speed Test - Raspberry Pi

The read and write speed of your SD card has a big impact on your Raspberry Pi's performance. We've released a new tool to test your SD card's speed.

Estimated reading time: 6 minutes

Matt9876 · 2020-04-06T19:45:10.101Z

Have had good success with SanDisk ultra 32GB and 64GB memory cards in the secondary slot.
Memory cards over 32 GB will need a special format program to get FAT32 access.
Have found read only access to the first or secondary memory cards is fast and reliable.
I use Windows 10 to put files and folders on the secondary memory card.

tylerhoot · 2020-04-12T20:15:42.921Z

Which lnb setting matches the older Maverick lnb?

Syed · 2020-04-12T20:31:32.187Z

It’s the single LO

tylerhoot · 2020-04-13T12:37:11.590Z

Ok thank you

kenbarbi · 2020-06-05T20:36:34.554Z

This past week, my Dreamcatcher v 3.05 has been consistently failing by not being able to power my LNB. Skylark 5.8 runs fine thou.

After changing out the Dreamcatcher v 3.05 with an older Dreamcatcher v 3.03, I have had consistently good reception. The Skylark 5.8 program micro SD card was unchanged during the move, so it is not a software issue.

Has anyone else noticed this problem? Ken

PS That’s me up and running - - the green balloon over Washington.

maxboysdad · 2020-06-06T16:50:06.322Z

That sounds familiar, although my problem turned out to be my old LNB was drawing a bit more current than it should have. When I put a new LNB up, it went back to normal. Perhaps the 3.05 has a bit weaker regulator on the boost circuit for the LNB?

kenbarbi · 2020-06-06T21:32:40.075Z

Well hard to say. The current draw with both Dreamcatcher Boards is the same - - until the DC v3.05 fails. That is to say, it works for awhile, then gives out. The DC v3.03 is rock steady.

Can’t figure this out unless the DC v3.05 is ready for the bone pile. Ken

ac8dg · 2020-06-07T08:48:27.701Z

My 3.05 has ‘failed’ three times in the past two weeks. The green led6 pckt goes solid green. Several reboots brings it back to life… but it might be something causing the lnbf to fail. This reminds me of the lockups with a bad sd card… so I burned a new sd card and will track it… maybe excessive read/writes have used up the sd card…

it is not related to skylark 5.8, I had the same fail… with skylark 5.7 install yesterday.

and yes my 3.03 keeps working as normal.

ac8dg · 2020-06-21T12:23:42.849Z

I would like to increase the font size on the skylark windows (like the what’s new list). I am using firefox and there is a Zoom add-on that works … but not real well… If I zoom to greater then 100% the app window fills the firefox screen and I loose the green and yellow (minimize / maximize) buttons and only have the red (close) button.

The news and wiki apps seems to have some font control for headers/dates and bullets in the content-links box (in wiki).

Could a settings be made available to adjust the font / font size

Gordon_Carlile · 2020-07-16T22:36:45.146Z

Finally someone else that is not thrilled with the limitations of the UI

tylerhoot · 2020-07-18T19:06:56.549Z

well i discovered a new bug with this newer laptop that i got it has a screen res of 3840x2160 with scaling of 250% that the skylark UI thinks its on a phone and wont let me shrink the size of the different windows.

itamblyn · 2020-10-12T16:05:02.778Z

I think the UI for Skylark needs to be reconsidered. While I appreciate the effort that went into this first version, I think it could be much more polished and optimized for a better viewing experience, particularly on mobile. In the current form, it feels more like a remote desktop connection into another device rather than a cached version of the internet. Simple page renders with clean links to stories and some clean graphics would make a big difference. Given the intended use case, mobile viewing should probably be the priority. Who leads the development of the UI?

Matt9876 · 2021-03-29T15:48:16.859Z

You can use the web browser in your device to access the Dream Catcher, a custom HTML script/code can fetch just the data you want. Here is a good example:GitHub - Matt9876453/Othernet3.zip: New version3 of HTML data reader for Othernet dreamcatcher
Also a deluxe version Othernet4.zip that makes a real nice read only home server, requires some address edits to be fully capable.

kenbarbi · 2021-03-29T17:42:23.506Z

Yes Matt - - Alberto in Rome developed this nifty HTML file that will pull data from your Dreamcatcher running Skylark. KenOthernet.html (741 Bytes)

image1340×250 14.1 KB

Where the 98.204.166.71 is, put your Dreamcatcher’s local IP address such as 192.168.1.118. In my case since I am port forwarding my Dreamcatcher, the 98.204.166.71 address is my internet address that I pull from, but I could just as easily pulled data from my local address.

Let me know if this works for you, Ken

By the way, if you run the html program as it is written, you’ll be pulling data off my Dreamcatcher.

kenbarbi · 2021-03-29T19:14:29.155Z

kenbarbi:

By the way, if you run the html program as it is written, you’ll be pulling data off my Dreamcatcher.

To change locations and magnification, try this:
The section at the top pulling Weather data has a set of orthographic numbers -76.56,38.55,3048 which identifies your physical location on Earth (-76.56 is a West Longitude, 38.55 is a North Latitude being Washington, DC) and magnification (3048) of the weather data you’ll see. If you reduce the magnification from 3048 to a lower number, such as 1048, you zoom out. A magnification of 3048 is the closest you can zoom in. If you were in Paris, you would set the orthographic numbers to 2.35,48.86 (Paris’ Longitude of 2.35 East and Latitude of 48.86).

N1YD · 2024-10-16T05:21:30.420Z

Hello Ken, it looks like 98.204.166.71 no longer works. Is there an updated IP address that demonstrates a running system?

Syed · 2024-10-16T16:04:00.494Z

@N1YD The broadcast will be shutting down at the end of this year.

N1YD · 2024-10-17T18:43:49.180Z

Yes, I understand. One last time, I wanted to see that wonderful global weather map with its flowing lines that show the wind. It turns out that the map is very well known and can be downloaded and built for Linux or Raspberry Pi from the source code at github.com under /cambecc/earth Not only that, the same map can be seen without installing anything just by going to this web site: https://earth.nullschool.net/