libre-mesh firmware

h1. Compile Manually

Libre-Mesh firmware can be built via OpenWRT build root or via lime-build tool, here both methods are described.

h2. Starting from a new compilation of OpenWrt

*Resources needed:*

Probably a Linux based operating system.

Some tools for the compilation process, on Debian:

<pre>

apt-get install git build-essential libncurses5-dev zlib1g-dev gawk subversion

</pre>

About 9 GB of disk space.

About 3 hours of compilation time.

*Download OpenWrt 14.07*. Using trunk version of OpenWRT is *not* supported currently.

<pre>

git clone git://git.openwrt.org/14.07/openwrt.git

</pre>

*Add our repositories* to the list of the default ones.

<pre>

cd openwrt

cp feeds.conf.default feeds.conf

echo "src-git libremap git://github.com/libremap/libremap-agent-openwrt.git" >> feeds.conf

echo "src-git lime https://github.com/libre-mesh/lime-packages.git" >> feeds.conf

</pre>

If you want to use a specific branch of lime-packages specify it adding ;nameofthebranch at the end of the last line. For example:

<pre>

src-git lime https://github.com/libre-mesh/lime-packages.git;ip_legacy_module

</pre>

Download all these packages and put sources in the right place.

<pre>

scripts/feeds update -a

scripts/feeds install -a

</pre>

Then enter the OpenWrt *configuration* menu.

<pre>

make menuconfig

</pre>

Go in "Base system" and *deselect "dnsmasq"* (this is the IPv4 version which if selected won't support IPv6) then select "dnsmasq-dhcpv6". In the same section *deselect "firewall"* (because some devs say that this can cause problems which are hard to debug).

Exit from "Base system" and enter "Network". Then *deselect "odhcpd"* (don't be confused with "odhcp6c" which is needed, seems that "odhcpd" if installed together with dnsmasq-dhcpv6 will release duplicated leases...).

Exit from "Network" and *enter in "LiMe" section, select what you want*, exit.

If you need to compile images only for one type of devices you could specify the type in the menu "Target system" and "Target profile", otherwise keep the default and images for each profile will be produced. Exit and save.

Launch the *compilation*. 

<pre>

make

</pre>

The produced firmware image files are in bin/ directory.

Flash on your devices, optionally [[Configuration|change the default configuration]], and enjoy!

h3. Updating a previous compilation of Libre-Mesh

Enter the base directory of the previous compiled image, for example

<pre>

cd ~/openwrt

</pre>

Update the OpenWrt source code.

<pre>

git pull

</pre>

Update the Libre-Mesh package source code.

<pre>

scripts/feeds update -a

scripts/feeds install -a

</pre>

Launch the compilation. The make -j [number] makes the compiler use multiple cores. If you have more than 2 cores, change to the appropriate number. 

<pre>

make -j 3

</pre>

If you encounter some errors try compiling without the -j option or cleaning completely the installation environment

<pre>

make clean

make dirclean

rm -rf feeds/*

</pre>

and restart from the top of this section about updating.

h2. Using lime-build

*Resources needed:*

Probably a Linux based operating system.

Some tools for the compilation process, on Debian:

<pre>

apt-get install git build-essential libncurses5-dev zlib1g-dev gawk subversion

</pre>

About 9 GB of disk space.

About 3 hours of compilation time.

*Download* the *lime-build* source:

<pre>

git clone https://github.com/libre-mesh/lime-build.git

</pre>

Have a look at the list of devices supported by lime-build:

<pre>

make list_targets

</pre>

if you see your device you can continue with this guide, otherwise you have to use the instructions in the section "Starting from a new compilation of OpenWrt".

*Compile* specifying the *target device* in T= and roughly the number of CPU cores plus one in J=. That is, for compiling on a dual core computer the image for Ubiquiti NanoStation M5:

<pre>

make J=3 T=nsm5 build

</pre>

You'll find the compiled images in the directory images.

Other options for lime-build are documented here: https://github.com/libre-mesh/lime-build/blob/master/README.md