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Refs #17, Mod the README to reflect support for Raspberry Pi
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stdevPavelmc committed Mar 5, 2021
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# Fully Automatic Amateur Satellite Ground Station

A setup to build a satellite ground stations that can tune, record and generate images for FM and APT weather satellites.
A setup to build an amateur satellite ground stations that can tune, record and generate images for APT weather satellites and record audio from Amateur ones.

This is the software recipe, in the hardware part I used an [Orange Pi Prime Board](http://www.orangepi.org/OrangePiPrime/) but you can use any [Single Board Computer](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Single-board_computer), including Raspberry Pis (Note: see section "Installation note in Raspberry Pi OS"), O-droids and even a normal PC or Server.
This is the software recipe, in the hardware part I used an [Orange Pi Prime Board](http://www.orangepi.org/OrangePiPrime/) (Similar to Raspi 3B+) with [Armbian](https://www.armbian.com/) but you can use any [Single Board Computer](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Single-board_computer), including Raspberry Pis, O-droids and even a normal PC or Server.

The only advice is to use one with a multiple cores and at least 1GB of RAM as some task are resource intensive.

I used [Armbian](https://www.armbian.com/) as OS, but you can manage it to make it work with [RaspiOS](https://www.raspberrypi.org/software/) or any other linux distro with a little of work.

A sample of the main view:

![Main view of the page](images/main.png)
Expand All @@ -27,22 +25,21 @@ This project is inspired and heavily based on the work of [Luick Klippel](https:
## Features

- Web interface to see the next passes, the recorded ones, and details for it.
- Receive any satellite in FM mode *(SSB is possible but there is no doppler control yet, so no SSB by now)*
- Receive any satellite in FM mode *(no SSB by now, as we can't do doppler correction yet)*
- Record the satellite pass and keep the audio for later.
- APT WX audio is preserved in wav format and 22050 hz of sampling *(the format [wximage](https://wxtoimgrestored.xyz/) needs to work with)*
- FM audio satellites is preserved in .mp3 mode but with high quality settings, and other tricks.
- FM audio satellites is preserved in .mp3 mode but with high quality settings, and other tricks:
- The spectrogram of the audio is embedded as album art *(see below)*.
- The pass details and receiving station data are stored in the mp3 tags.
- Automatic decode APT images from WX sats (NOAA 15, 18 and 19)
- For the voice FM sats we craft a spectrogram and embedd the metadata of the pass on the image.
- For the voice FM sats we craft a spectrogram and embed the metadata of the pass on the image.
- **NEW** selection for audio processing schema: streamed or step by step (first is good on fast or dedicated systems, the former on slow or multitasking ones) see users.conf while installing for more details.

## Future features?

- Migrate to python3 for the main processing (doppler adjust, aka SSB tracking/recording?)
- Control a rotor via [Hamlib](https://hamlib.github.io/).
- Craft a solution to allow for doppler corrections while receiving *(will allow to receive SSB signals, at least for CW beacons)*
- Improve the mobile experience (responsive web) WiP...
- Rotor control via [Hamlib](https://hamlib.github.io/).
- Doppler control to allow for SSB/CW.
- New UI (web) to allow for user authentication, etc.

## Installation steps

Expand All @@ -56,7 +53,7 @@ As this tool relies on many tools I will not explain how to setup each one, but

You need a web server with php installed (at least version 7.x, no MySQL or MariaDB support needed), google has a lot of guides indexed, just google for "install nginx and php in [your-operating-system]"

**RaspiOS users**: If the web server works but does not process php files (try to download the index.php file instead of process & show) you must take a peek on this [tutorial](https://www.raspberrypi.org/documentation/remote-access/web-server/nginx.md) about how to enable php support for nginx.
**RaspiOS/Raspbian users**: If the web server works but does not process php files (try to download the index.php file instead of process & show) you must take a peek on this [tutorial](https://www.raspberrypi.org/documentation/remote-access/web-server/nginx.md) about how to enable php support for nginx.

- **Predict**

Expand All @@ -70,7 +67,7 @@ sudo apt install predict

For Armbian you need to compile it from source, you can get it from the [Predict home page](https://www.qsl.net/kd2bd/predict.html).

After installing predict you need to do this aditional step to make it run properly (install some files):
After installing predict you need to do this additional steps to make it run properly (install some files):

```sh
sudo -i
Expand All @@ -89,7 +86,7 @@ This wonderful piece of software was deprecated by the original authors but a gr

Just download it here: [WXtoImage deb package for ARM](https://www.wxtoimgrestored.xyz/beta/wxtoimg-armhf-2.11.2-beta.deb) or browse the site for other architectures.

To install it copy it to your SBC computer and run (Debian based distros):
To install it copy it to your SBC computer and run (Debian based distribution):

```sh
sudo dpkg -i wxtoimg-armhf-2.11.2-beta.deb
Expand All @@ -98,7 +95,7 @@ sudo aptitude install -f
# [this will fix any dependency error listed above]
```

As I mention this software is abandonware and if you search on the site you will find a generic register credentials.
As I mention this software is abandon-ware and if you search on the site you will find a generic register credentials.

To register the software in the SBC you need to install it on a linux box with an GUI (can be another SBC or a real linux box); run xwximage and fill your coordinates and settings, register with the credentials and just then locate a hidden file under your home directory called `.wxtoimgrc` and copy it to `/root/.wxtoimgrc` in the SBC. You are done.

Expand All @@ -110,10 +107,6 @@ You need at least `git` and `make`, in most linux (including SBCs) you are set b
sudo apt install git make
```

- **Installation note in Raspberry Pi OS**

For some unknown reason the `rtl_fm` tool lacks the `-E wav` option as @takagiwa found, the solution is to compile the rtl-fm from upstream, see [this comment](https://github.com/stdevPavelmc/FAASGS/issues/13#issuecomment-774592768) for details.

## Real install

- Login in your into SBC and clone this repository `git clone https://github.com/stdevPavelmc/FAASGS`.
Expand All @@ -136,7 +129,7 @@ You will find a proxy setting there to, if you don't use a proxy just leave it a

Next step is to select the satellites you want to monitor, the file is named `sats.json` and it has a very common web format, you can add or remove sats as your need.

Use `sudo nano sats.json` to edit the file, it came by default with all the working NOAA satellites and the working VHF ones, but if you have a dualband antenna you can introduce some UHF sats also.
Use `sudo nano sats.json` to edit the file, it came by default with all the working NOAA satellites and the working VHF ones, but if you have a dual-band antenna you can introduce some UHF sats also.

Please note that the satellites has a name and a nickname, the name refers to the one that appears in the TLE file and the nickname is a friendly name for us (and must not contain spaces, parenthesis, slashes, etc)

Expand Down Expand Up @@ -194,4 +187,4 @@ If this is software is of any utility to you; please consider to make a donation

You can improve the software, appoint bugs or fails, donate equipment or money, top up my cell phone, or just share your impressions on social media; details for all of that in the [Contributing](Contributing.md) file.

Any contribution is welcomed.
Any kind of contribution is welcomed.

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