I'm just trying to set up a basic patch to test a network connection between a Raspberry pi 2b (running wheezy), and a Macbook pro.

They're both connected to the same network (generated by the RPI), but I can't seem to get messages to flow. I'm using the iemnet objects, but I can't seem to install the mrpeach externals on the rpi. From what I understand, udpsend and udpreceive should work fine without them, is this correct?

I'm using port 9001. In terms of the IP address should I use 'inet' address or the 'Bcast' address?

And last question (for now), udpsend seems to need a message to connect, does udpreceive need a similar message or is it always listening?

@toddak That's a good resume...... as the Germans would say...... al ist clar....

I would recommend a separate router because it will be much easier to set up.
If for any reason it doesn't work you can borrow a spare almost immediately anywhere in the world.
Many of them (like the Linksys wrt54 series) have two aerials (diversity, more likely to get the message) and you can even plug in better aerials if you wish.
You can place it centrally to your performance space, doubling the possible size of the space.
You will be giving the Pi that you had planned to be the router less work.
Also, it might be easier to set up security so that your audience do not access your network during the show.

Yes, it's a big shame about the screens. It's a lot easier (especially when you set up for a performance) to VNC / network / putty (for windows) into them from your laptop..... and easier setting up at home as well. You can even do a remote reboot before a show if you are feeling a bit uncertain.
With vnc you can have all four of your Pi desktops on your laptop screen for control and monitoring. I would recommend setting up a vnc on them anyway for the day when you cannot get through the audience to adjust a Pi. You will need to use the X11 desktop or you will see a different desktop on your laptop from the one on your touch screen, which can be very confusing.
Through a network share you can copy/paste your patches between your laptop and the Pi's.
Through a remote terminal you can reboot / change your config files etc.

Yes, I see no reason not to switch to Jessie. Then I would put Pd-extended on the Pi's even though the extended project is not likely to evolve. There is just more stuff to play with without building externals.

OSC is great for what you want to do, so as Alexandros said, Vanilla will be ok now that osc has been added..........
For them all to receive at the same time you could broadcast to the network so they all receive the same message, or send to each Pi individually. For your current project broadcast is fine...... but if you might develop a more complex system (very likely I think) it is best to talk to them individually from the start through their individual ip addresses.

Osc messages are sent over udp, not tcp, so the sender has no idea whether the message has been received. I have never had a problem starting tracks, even on my system where there can be up to 64 musicians all adjusting their monitoring at the same time (a huge flood of osc messages). If you ever find that a Pi does not play you could set your patch to send the message two of three times in a row. The difference in start time (between Pi's) would still be less that the delays in the room that you will hear depending upon where you are sitting (with the same track on every Pi.).

I don't know the osc objects in vanilla.
In extended the easy objects for osc are...........
To receive......... [dumpOSC xxxx] where xxxx is the port number.
To send............... [packOSC] feeding it's output to [udpsend]

So with extended you would be using [udpsend].......
David.

@whale-av
Incidentally I jumped on ebay and fount a WRT54GL going for AU$10 with 5 minutes to go, and grabbed it just in case. Seems rather serendipitous.

It does make sense to do it that way, and the bonus of adding extra aerials is also a good thing. Shall look forward to trying that, although for the moment I'll test it as a part of one of the packs (I only have four 12v sources at the moment, but they're pretty reasonable).

I never thought of using VNC, off to find some software shortly. Seems like an obvious answer but incredibly useful! What do you use?

Glad you agree on the Jessie front, always good to run these things past someone, the same with OSC (but I think I will set up individual routing for the message so each pi gets a different bang technically speaking, might be useful later on I think).

Thanks for all your help, off to try Jessie!

@toddak So you are in Oz....... that explains the tiny window for communication each day.......
Quoted from the second link below.........
"Don't know if you want to try another VNC, but I use x11vnc and have lxde autostart it. I found x11vnc was better for me as I wanted to access the same session as being displayed via HDMI (console 0). Plus, it supports UVNC and TightVNC file transfer."

https://www.raspberrypi.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=66&t=59285 and then how to solve it....
https://www.raspberrypi.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=108862#p108862
..... that will serve up the desktop.......
..........if you need help then I can post some config stuff.

Then you need a client......... for your laptop.
You can open a client for each pi..... (see them all at once).
I use TightVNC on my windows laptop...... free and good (I always go for free and good if possible).
If you are using a mac then I think there is a built-in client, or you will have to google around for a better one.

Its a good idea to set up a password protected samba share as well. That way you can access your Pi just as if it were a nas server. Then you can "just" access any file on your Pi from your laptop and edit / copy paste directly from your laptop without the VNC connected. You cannot overwrite the Pi's own config files though. However, using the VNC you can edit them on the Pi, as you are effectively the local "user"......

David.

@whale-av
Yes, Melbourne Australia. Lucky I don't sleep much as it makes this process easier

The VNC stuff sounds great, as does samba share, wish I'd thought of that in advance, but it does make other additions to the system (and future projects) substantially easier, so will set it up once these are operating with Jessie and PD.

With that in mind, I may post a little later about config stuff!

I just made the mistake of trying to install the wrong version of extended (for wheezy...). I can't seem to find an obvious download link to Extended 0.46.2 deb file... where can I find that? Sorry, not really fluent enough in terminal to find it that way (and would be convenient to have the deb file as I'm doing this a few times).

@toddak This one is for wheezy..... (raspian wheezy)......
https://sourceforge.net/projects/pure-data/files/pd-extended/0.43.4/pd-extended_0.43.4~extended1-1~raspbian_wheezy_armhf.deb/download
I would put a raspian distribution of wheezy or Jessie on the Pi as it is built to work on the Pi.
And that extended deb file should work, as there are almost no changes from wheezy to Jessie.
The development of extended stopped in 2013..........
https://sourceforge.net/projects/pure-data/files/pd-extended/

For Jessie.......... https://www.raspberrypi.org/blog/raspbian-jessie-is-here/ and you will find the download links.
If you have troubles then load wheezy....... it is plenty good enough for what you want to achieve!
David.

Found one, and did that 'upgrade -f' come in handy! All seems to be going ok, will test a basic network shortly.

@whale-av but thanks for the links

Does extended come with the OSC libraries or do you have to install them manually? [dumpOSC] and [packOSC] don't seem to generate objects...

@alexandros and thanks for all your help too, you comments have been great! Just trying the osc objects you recommended now.

@toddak If you have installed extended then it will be a path problem...... or an argument problem....... for some objects Pd needs to be told where they are, and some objects will not create without their "arguments". [dumpOSC] needs its port number, and if the number is already in use it will not create anyway!..... (you would get path problems with vanilla as well, but the following would not solve the problem because the objects would not be there at all!).........

Put [import mrpeach] in your patch first for the [packOSC] object....... or put........
[mrpeach/packOSC]

[dumpOSC 1234] normally works, but you could try..........
[oscx/dumpOSC 1234]......... don't forget the port number..... 1234 or whatever....
David.

@whale-av

Urgh.... feeling the burn about now.

So putting [dumpOSC 9001] does not produce the object, same with [packOSC] or [mrpeach/packOSC]. These were all type in on the RPI running 0.46.2. I have no idea what do now... PD just says '...couldn't create'.

I tried using what @alexandros recommended, the build in [oscformat] and [oscparse], just using the info in the help files and usually port 9001, but nothing was transmitted.

I then tried to simplify it further and just use [netsend] and [netreceive], again using 9001. But nothing. This did have a snippet of information. For testing I'm sending between my Mac and rpi, the send was on the Mac. The PD window states 'netsend: connection refused (61)'.

I then tried using port 3001, and I don't get the error message, but nothing is transmitted to the RPI.

Really at a loss at the moment. Just to clarify, logic behind creating a network connection in PD is: Open the connection, listen to the connection, send the data. This is correct yeah?

As long as they are both connected to the same network, this should work I assume? The only thing that I have read that could be an issue is that you need to make sure that port is unused, but I have no idea to check that. I was working with 9001 as the Floss manual mentions it (and I think says its was PD uses natively, but not sure if I'm right on that... I think max/msp might be the same...).

I would think the only other issue could be the data I was sending, and how it is received, but I'm just using the installed help patches, which by the looks of things should just print the integers sent.

General question, but I assume I used 'localhost' as they are on the same wireless network, is that correct? When do you use an IP address instead?

@toddak Hmm, I can't help you with Vanilla (for OSC).... I have never used it.... sorry.

I assume you have fixed the ip of the pi so you know it and it will not change.
You have given [netsend 1] the message [connect 192.168.1.20 9001( which will connect to that address (change it to your Pi address of course) and port over udp? (Of course it will not "connect" because it is not TCP, but it will "send"!.)
And you have created [netreceive 9001] on the Pi (or the other way around?
That should work........ they are vanilla objects....
Have you checked that you can see the computer and the Pi on your network.......... install the App "Network Analyzer Lite" (free of course) on your Ipad............
David.

@whale-av
And I think we have found the problem, I have never assigned an IP address on my pi. Well, I have never assigned an IP address ever.

So that's what I need?

(And unfortunately I can't install network analyzer lite as I refuse to upgrade the iOS on my older ipad, it seems to be like a form of [programmed obsolescence' to slow things down...'

@toddak Ok......... I have never tried those objects before........ and [netsend 1] I cannot make work for the moment..........
However are two test patches that I now know will work..........
test.zip ((UPDATED))
........ ok........ ip address stuff arriving here asap.........
..... but if you have put Jessie on the Pi I think you can just configure it through a friendly config window......... Give it a fixed address........ then you will always know which one of the four it is when you talk to it.......
Here are some notes about setting up the Ip but if there is actually a wireless setup menu in the desktop menu......... use that........
text.zip
David.

@whale-av Thanks for the test patches! Will try them out once this IP address process is sorted.

It does make sense, again, excuse my ignorence as I I've basically never done networking before (apart form connecting an ipad/lemur to max/msp). But it would also make sense that you need this for VNC.

Started on a tutorial but will wait for your instructions instead!

@whale-av I used the network preferences tab and assigned an IP address of 10.50.50.1 to the Wlan0 interface, thought it might be easier as you said to use the GUI at this point in time (easier to reverse). I then tried to connect to it using [connect 10.50.50.1 3001], but I got the same error message.

I downloaded another network scanning app, and ran it out of curiousity, and the pi did not show up. Thinking I may have done something wrong, I cleared the settings in the network preferences tab, then ran 'sudo ifconfig' and checked the assigned IP address for Wlan0, which was 10.1.1.8.

I then ran the network app again, and it found the other devices in my house (conveniently all apple), and double checked to see if any had the IP address of 10.1.1.8, and none did.

The pi can connect to the internet via network its connected to, but weirdly can't be seen. Any ideas?

@toddak Yes, it is not on the same subnet (maybe).........
What are the addresses of the other computers in the house?
They have fixed addresses?....... unlikely.... probably been assigned by dhcp...
David.

They are:

10.1.1.2
10.1.1.3
10.1.1.5
10.1.1.9

The only one that may have been fixed is my laptop, but I can't honestly remember.

@toddak Ok....... I just booted in to osx for a moment to check that I can see my Pi from there. It didn't pop up straight away but I could ping it and then it showed up in finder/go/ smb//:
(because I have a samba share/nas running on it).

So the 10.1.1.8 address would be fine, but if you can fix it then maybe make it 10.1.1.101 (for later) and the others 102, 103, 104........... easy to remember!

The 10.50.50.x is a different subnet and your router will think it is somewhere that it can't talk to.....

So leave it as 10.1.1.8 for now and try to ping it from terminal..........
In Utilities / terminal on your mac..
ping 10.1.1.8
and you should see numbers coming in for how long the pi takes to respond?
David.
Run............. sudo chmod 4755 /usr/bin/pd-extended ............again in case it is a permissions thing...
BUT its not extended is it......... you will have to google that!
Reboot it maybe ( sudo reboot will do that "softly"...... better than unplugging)...
sorry, off to bed now.