Getting Started with the Beaglebone

Having used the Arduino platform for quite a while, I reached the memory limit and was looking for a new platform. The Raspberry Pi looked promising, but the Beaglebone looked even better because of the dual pin connectors and the on-board storage for the operating system and code. Eventually , the goal is to build an autonomous robot, a sensor network, etc. The requirements are that it can run off of batteries, has a touchscreen for user interaction and Wifi connectivity. So the first step is to build a - tablet!

I chose a beaglebone revision C with 4GB onboard permanent storage, a battery cape and a 4Dsystems 4.3 inch touchscreen LCD cape and ordered them from Mouser. Even though I had paid for 3-day UPS, the shipment arrived the next day! Thank you, Mouser.

It should be as easy as sticking the boards together, plugging a USB Wifi adapter into the USB port, and power up, right? WRONG!

so let's open the boxes..

unpack the boards..

and plug them together.

 

and put in the batteries, see what happens..

It works! Wow-that was easy. Order the parts and stick them together.
now what about Wifi?

The beaglebone is reported to work with the following USB-dongle Wifi adapters:

http://www.elinux.org/Beagleboard:BeagleBoneBlack#WIFI_Adapters

Let's plug in the WNA 1100 and see what happens.

Nothing.

Not even the blue light on the adapter comes on.

Eventually I figured out that you have to enter the name of the wireless interface in the network manager:

In my case, it was wlan0:




Now it works.

Except you have to reboot the Beaglebone after you plug in the adapter or reset the Wifi service, as described in

https://learn.adafruit.com/setting-up-wifi-with-beaglebone-black/configuration

Is there an easier way?

Yes, by getting a "Compact USB Wi-Fi Adapter for BeagleBone Black" by Logic Supply

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00FA6BLZC

The only complication is that you have to enter ra0 in the network manager or in the file /etc/network/interfaces.

Also, you should probably get a USB extension cable because when the dongle is plugged directly into the Beaglebone, you might not get a strong enough signal.

In any case, it works!

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To connect the beaglebone to Wifi from the command line:

plug in WNA1100 on USB extension cable.

iwconfig

wlan1     IEEE 802.11bgn  ESSID:off/any  

          Mode:Managed  Access Point: Not-Associated   Tx-Power=0 dBm   

          Retry  long limit:7   RTS thr:off   Fragment thr:off

          Encryption key:off

          Power Management:off

ifconfig wlan1 up

the blue light comes on

iwlist wlan1 scan

If the ESSID of the router or hotspot is shown:

iwconfig wlan1 essid NETWORK_ID

(for an open network)

=====================================

Below are some of the debugging steps when things are going wrong.

Let's start with the usual suspects.



ssh into the beaglebone thorugh the USB connection

ssh root@192.168.7.2

lsusb

Bus 001 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0002 Linux Foundation 2.0 root hub

Bus 002 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0002 Linux Foundation 2.0 root hub

dmesg 

no WNA 1100 specific event at all.

power down and up again

now the blue light on the WNA comes on.

dmesg

[  237.613793] usb 1-1: Product: WNA1100

[  237.613823] usb 1-1: Manufacturer: NETGEAR WNA