LibreSpeed is a lightweight web browser-based speed test server running on your Pi. It is implemented in JavaScript using XHR (XMLHttpRequest) that runs in a web browser. No special client application is needed, so you can run this on any device which has a web browser.
Go ahead! Hit that START
button.
Make sure you think carefully about what link is "actually" being measured when you use this tool!
How did we get the extra details on this screen?
LibreSpeed is a service running on the WLAN Pi, and therefore you are testing the link speed between the device (you are viewing the page with) and the WLAN Pi. This particular configuration of LibreSpeed is not measuring the Internet link speed.
Hover over SPEED TEST
in the menu bar and select SPEED TEST (DETAILS)
for the view with extra details.
Welcome to the new WebUI for the WLAN Pi!
If your access device is on the same network segment, the WLAN Pi WebUI is hosted at https://wlanpi-xxx.local
otherwise go to https://<IP>
https://wlanpi-xxx.local swap out xxx to the identifier for your specific WLAN Pi
We use "https" port 443 with a self-signed certificate!
You will be greeted with a "connection is not private" warning
Click Advanced or similar option in your browser
Proceed to wlanpi-xxx.local (unsafe) continue to the new WLAN Pi landing page
On Chromium based browsers you may need to type thisisunsafe
to bypass the security warnings.
If the ".local" address did not resolve, for example if your laptop is on another network segment, you will want to use the IP address of your WLAN Pi.
Navigating around the features of your WLAN Pi is now super easy with the new dynamic menu bar. On larger screens, the menu bar will appear at the top of the web page.
Menu items with a (downwards "⌄"
chevron) have additional options.
While it is not quite bar-o'clock yet, let's discuss the orange strip displaying system stats. We like to keep an eye on microSD card free space, especially if you use your WLAN Pi as an FTP/TFTP server or you're saving large packet captures.
Next, let's take a look at a couple of these WebUI applications.
We will not go through these in the order they appear on your screen. Stick with us as we will come back to some of these later in a lot more detail.
WLAN Pi / Linux terminal commands and a few concepts thrown in for good measure.
Gain experience and confidence using the Terminal to interact with your WLAN Pi.
You do not need to learn these commands, nor do you need to become a wizard with the command line to make good use of your WLAN Pi. But we do want you to become familiar and comfortable executing commands from the terminal.
Use the following shortcuts to quickly move the cursor around the current line while typing a command.
Ctrl+A
or Home
: Go to the beginning of the line
Ctrl+E
or End
: Go to the end of the line
Ctrl+xx
: Move between the beginning of the line and the current position of the cursor. This allows you to press Ctrl+xx
to return to the start of the line, change something, and then press Ctrl+xx
to go back to your original cursor position.
To use this shortcut, hold the Ctrl key and tap the X key twice.
Windows:
Ctrl+ <-
: Go left (back) one word
Ctrl+ ->
: Go right (forward) one word
macOS:
Esc+B
/ Esc+ <-
/ Alt+ <-
: Go left (back) one word
Esc+F
/ Esc+ ->
/ Alt+ ->
: Go right (forward) one word
Check the WLAN Pi OS version and many other stats, internet reachability, current mode, and more.
Let's execute a script created by the WLAN Pi team. A script is a series of commands bundled together into one file. Many tools are just scripts. Scripts can be run with the bash interpreter or other scripting language interpreters such as Python.
Go ahead and try this one:
Unlike Windows, Linux is case sensitive. That means WLPC is different than wlpc, which is different from wLpC. Each of these would represent a different file. If you get a message that says something like "file not found" and you are sure that it does exist, you probably need to check the case.
If you are hungry for more, here is a cheat sheet with common Linux commands.
Discover your network in a single click
The cards in the network page will only be complete if you have an Ethernet connection to a network.
A web-based graphical interface for Linux
What is Cockpit?
It is a web-based graphical interface for Linux machines. It simplifies management, and critically, it allows easy CLI access to the WLAN Pi without requiring a dedicated SSH client.
Click on COCKPIT
from within the menu bar
If you get a connection failure, try again using a different browser.
Login using the default 'first time boot' credentials
username: wlanpi
password: wlanpi
\
You will be prompted to change your password, this is NOT optional. YOU MUST do this to proceed\
The first time you log in to Cockpit, you will be in limited access mode
.\
Now please have a poke around, explore what functionality is exposed by Cockpit UI
The menu option at the bottom of the left side panel is Terminal
For the duration of the Deep Dive, this web-based terminal will be the default (recommended) method for accessing the WLAN Pi terminal. Although if you want, you can SSH into the WLAN Pi.
Execute command reachability
in the Terminal window within Cockpit.
System-level updates will be made occasionally that require re-imaging your microSD card.
If you choose to re-image your SD card with the latest release of WLAN Pi OS, this will come with the latest version of all the default packages found in the package archives enabled by WLAN Pi OS.
To update only WLAN Pi packages to their latest versions, you can use this CLI command:
wlanpi-update
is a wrapper around aptitude which only updates WLAN Pi packages. You can also update WLAN Pi packages by using apt update
and apt upgrade
.
Or you can navigate to the Software Updates section in Cockpit.
If you have not already done so (via FPMS) you can configure / double-check the timezone from Cockpit.
Open Overview
and click on System time 'Feb 5, 2024 6:39 PM' – highlighted in red below**.** You can figure out the rest 😉
wifichannel is a quick reference tool for Wi-Fi channel info lookup, created by .