FreeBSD on the go...

Phishfry

Phishfry

Are you running FreeBSD in any vehicle hardmounted ?

I am considering creating a mobile LAN. Starting with a mobility device.

I have an older vehicle without screen or GPS. So my first thought is Tablet on a VESA mount hanging off the dash. 4G module for GPS.

What about navigation? How can I display my location on a map?

What is the land equal of astro/opencpn ??
 
In fact this idea brings to mind the safecast project that ran when fukushima blew up. They had car mounted geiger counters that they were driving around the area capturing data, and that got plotted on a map. I wonder if any of their software is freely available, AFAIK their whole project was open source, they published the circuits for the geiger counter, etc. Anyhow might give you some ideas.

www.makery.info

Safecast’s DIY Geiger counter for Fukushima

Launched in Tokyo after the Fukushima disaster in 2011, Safecast measures nuclear radiation with a DIY device and shares the data on an open map. Makery met the core team behind the project.
www.makery.info www.makery.info
 
Jose said:
Maybe Organic Maps in Virtualbox? I run it on my phone. It's just ok.
organicmaps.app

Organic Maps: Offline Hike, Bike, Trails and Navigation

Fast detailed offline maps for travelers, tourists, drivers, hikers and cyclists created by MapsWithMe (Maps.Me) app founders.
organicmaps.app

VirtualBox HowTo | Android-x86

www.android-x86.org www.android-x86.org
Click to expand...
I don't think that there is a phone in existence that is powerful enough to host a VirtualBox appliance, esp. if that appliance is also supposed to be running something. Not even the vaunted iPhone can do that.

Ah, now I get it - have a machine run FreeBSD on metal, then install emulators/virtualbox-ose-70, use that to emulate Android, and then use Obtainium to gets Organic Maps like that...

I think this will drain the car's battery in a hurry due to the computing power required.

Let's get this going on the Loong Arch, while we're at it.
 
How about a standard cellphone, attached to the dashboard with one of the standard cellphone mounts that are available everywhere? Seems like a much easier solution.
 
Just out of interest I did a bit more digging on the safecast stuff. It turns out their mapping software is open source on github.

Safecast Map

map.safecast.org map.safecast.org
github.com

GitHub - Safecast/Tilemap: Safecast web map

Safecast web map. Contribute to Safecast/Tilemap development by creating an account on GitHub.
github.com github.com

Apps – Safecast

safecast.org safecast.org

Maybe there is something there that could be adapted, or that might give you some ideas

They also have some information on their geiger counters... they built a gps receiver into them. The geiger counters were car mounted and driven around the country, logging radiation readings and gps coordinates as they went. Presumably some kind of store and forward algo to update the central map. They had some good engineeers who designed all the electronics and wrote the software. AFAIK all the software and electronics circuits are open source and available. This was/is a very interesting project, IMHO. MIT media lab were involved in it apparantly, and it had some silicon valley financial backing.

bGeigie Nano – Safecast

safecast.org safecast.org

Of course in principle the sensor could be anything, it doesn't have to be looking at radiation. Atmospheric smoke concentration, and solar flux density at ground level, might be two things of current interest, for example.
 
gisgeography.com

13 Free GIS Software Options: Map the World in Open Source - GIS Geography

There's a bucket load of free GIS software packages available for you to map the world. Manage, visualize and edit GIS data with open source GIS software.
gisgeography.com gisgeography.com

Perhaps some of these open source GIS projects would be of interest too. This is an interesting area... I did some work on remote sensing software many years ago, so I've always retained some interest in this kind of stuff :)
 
ralphbsz said:
How about a standard cellphone,
Click to expand...
I have a standard flipphone. How do I get GPS from that?

Really though, I want to track myself, Not have others track me and make money off it...

You know when people laugh at me for using a flipphone it really don't bother me a bit. To me a phone is just that.
Smartphones seem like a spy device. Cellular modems are not a panacea but I feel I can control them to a degree.
 
I am planning on using a 10" Touch Screen for Meeting Rooms. It seems rugged enough for auto use. I am working on a mount now.

www.visix.com

Touch Digital Meeting Room Signs

Schedule meeting rooms at the room itself with touchscreen Meeting Room Signs and Visix's digital signage software! Click for a demo!
www.visix.com www.visix.com
With E3845 and I have the touchscreen working.

I thought of using one of my Dell tablets but they are not worthy. I like the VESA 75 mount of this device.
 
hey presto..

hackaday.com

A Simple, DIY GPS Tracker

Today, there are dozens of off-the-shelf solutions for a GPS tracking device. Most of them use GSM, some of them use satellites, and all of them are astonishingly inexpensive. If you want to track …
hackaday.com hackaday.com

hackaday.com

Open Hardware GPS Tracker Works On Your Terms

These days, there’s plenty of options if you want to get a GPS tracker for your vehicle. Unfortunately, they come with the sort of baggage that’s becoming increasingly common with consu…
hackaday.com hackaday.com
 
I used the NEO-7m for a personal project:

Dead easy, its just reading from the serial port (i.e with a USB <-> UART dongle). It gives you the Lat/Lon.

Works at 3.3V or 5V so you can even power it with the VCC line.

As for flip phone. I use the Nokia 2660 flip. Great little thing. I do have the sneaking suspicion it is designed for very, very old people... Extra large buttons and an emergency sim card slot for keeping contact with a nurse in case I fall and break a hip ;)
 
OK lets get back on topic. FreeBSD Infotaiment system. Phone is different topic.

I want not only a GPS mapping system but perhaps a Lojack like feature, along with Radio and many other features.
I considered just using a HDMI screen with touch and mount computer behind seat. I have pleanty of room.
cartft and liliput.

AIO is not much thicker than a monitor. I already own it. Doing nothing useful with it. It has aluminum frame that is solid.

So beyond GPS nobody is running FreeBSD mobile? I have a laptop Jotto desk but I am ready to commit to hardwire in a system.
 
What about "Pop-Up" onscreen keyboard for X desktops ? What are my options.

Can I pull that off ? Touch-Only System after I do the setup.

Heck I think we have support for 2.4ghz wireless keyboard/mouse media center stuff. I need to do some digging.
 
Aliexpress has several types of portable monitors with touchscreens, some but not all with vesa mounts, for example


However, whether there are any drivers available for the touch sensor on freebsd... I don't know.

They also have fanless mini pcs running very low power draw cpus like this one


Or you could look at something smaller like a rpi, but then you start to get a bit limited by hardware. Low power draw is a must in any mobile application. I would prototype it on a pc first and then think about something more embedded if that is desirable. A beagle board would be another possible target. Of course you will need to sort out the power supply from the car's battery.

Prototyping the thing on an aliexpress mini pc/touchscreen or even a laptop would be a low cost and easy way to get the project going before thinking about anything more embedded. You can always engineer it down for a particular target once you have developed some overall ideas of what it's going to do and how it will work.
 
Phishfry said:
Are you running FreeBSD in any vehicle hardmounted ?

I am considering creating a mobile LAN. Starting with a mobility device.

I have an older vehicle without screen or GPS. So my first thought is Tablet on a VESA mount hanging off the dash. 4G module for GPS.

What about navigation? How can I display my location on a map?

What is the land equal of astro/opencpn ??
Click to expand...

What about just driving around, getting to know your environment? Nothing beats memory after you've learned all backroads. Not even my iPhone + SkyNet Maps.
 
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