OpenNova with Raspberry Pi from Scratch for Dummies (FritzBox and Android)

[stempfle]

Here my manual for dummies what i´ve done to set it up running.

NovaBotV4.pptx

I used:
HW:
Raspberry Pi 3 with 8GB SD-Card
FritzBox as Router

SW:
Raspberry Pi Imager

Hope this helps! Feel free to reuse it and share and help others!

[waltervl]

Thanks! Some review comments:
I have it already running So I did not understand why you do step5 Config your DMS on the Raspberry as you do.
You only have to enable dns in your docker-compose.linux.yaml by removing the # before line 50: # ENABLE_DNS: "true"
Also change line 41 TARGET_IP: ${TARGET_IP:?TARGET_IP must be set — your LAN IP} into eg TARGET_IP: "192.168.178.8"

[stempfle]

Hey Walter,
in the slides i´ve posted my docker-compose.linux.yml and you can see that it is already corrected with your two hints - but DNS was not doing its job on my system. So i tried a couple of things and as it was running I did the whole story again so see if my instruction is correct and also on the second try - DNS was not redirecting to my Raspberry, so I hat to add Step 5.
But happy if you find a bug in my compose that causes the issue, than we can delete #5 in the powerpoint.
Have a great day!

[dir26738]

Thanks for creating this help. It will help new comers.

As you advice it to me for my pb with official app, the problem could be that when you create the rasperry by , the dns was not set up. So the pi will not get the correct dns information ? Did you try to deconnect and reconnect from wifi to get the correct dns configuration from your Box ?

Personnaly, I edited this file on the Pi : /etc/resolv.conf and added my dns ip on 1st line which was missing :

nameserver 192.168.X.X

As in mode network_mode: host, the docker get the network config from the host.
After that, nslookup app.lfitbot.com worked fine.

Maybe to complete your doc, I have created some "management" scripts for the docker, to start/stop/update it, connect to db, connect to docker, show logs :
scripts.tar.gz

The only problem is have is that the path to opennova data is hardcoded in goto_datadir.sh & connect_to_db.sh. Replace "/opt/opennova/novabot-data" by our data dir.

[stempfle]

alright - so i tried it again, now I managed it to not manually change DNS.
This time i did a
sudo reboot
after starting Docker - this was enouth... so I updated the slides!
But still the issue with the NovaBot-App.
By the way - where do i get the OpenNovaApp?
Thanks ;)

[dir26738]

From here : https://downloads.ramonvanbruggen.nl/files?source=folder

[waltervl]

On your phone you have to reset your wifi connection (switch wifi off/on) so the phone also gets the DNS redirect.
You can test this by going to app.lfibot.com It should go the the Opennova dashboard. Then logout the Novabot app(menu profile settings sign out), close the app to be sure and start the app again. It should login now.

[stempfle]

Logout, close the App and login again solved my problem! DNS was already correct.
Great! Thanks! I´ll update the slides again :)

[waltervl]

Another comment to make things easier for new users: You do not need to install Putty on a windows machine (Windows 11).
Just open a command box (search for cmd, terminal or powershell) and type ssh <username>@RPi-IP eg ssh pi@192.168.178.8

[stempfle]

great! I´ve changed the slides!

[dir26738]

When you shut down your raspberry you will no longer have access to the internet! Because your DNS-Server is offline

I don't know how works your box, but generally, you can specify secondary DNS servers if the primary fails, so you can still have access to internet.
I set up my dns list like that on my network, from 1st to n :

1. ip of local dns server for novabot redirection (opennovaadmin, pihole, ...)
2. ip of my internet box (freebox in France), default one
3. 8.8.8.8 (google dns) in case of failure of the freebox dns
4. 1.1.1.1 (cloudfare), if google fails, should never happens

[stempfle]

Hey. Thanks for your hint! But i´m not sure if this is working that way (at least with FritzBox).
-> DNS in the Internet-Connection-Options is different than the DNS-Server of your Home-Network - isn´t it?
-> The DNS from the Internet-Connection is - in my case - from my internet-provider provided - or i can select a manual one like 8.8.8.8 (google)
-> then there is the local DNS-Server in the DHCP-Settings - and there you usualy change to your Raspberry (opennova/pihole..) and there is no fallback (in my FritzBox).

but i checked your suggestion on my setup - but even when i set the DSN in my internet-options to my local Raspberry it will not redirect http://app.lfibot.com/ to my local server but to the official. ChatGPT says there is an internal logic in the FritzBox that can cause my problem. so for me not possible so far. but happy if it works on your end! thats great!

am I wrong?

well easiest would be to manually select the IP/Gateway/DNS on the NovaBot and the Base. Then you can leave DSN in your network as it is and only change it for the NovaBot and its Base.... Feature Request? ;)

[dir26738]

maybe, don't know how Fritzbox is working. I do not have this kind of option.
For me it was like a failback. If 1 is unavailable, it will ask to server 2, then 3...
So if you rasberry is down where you host the dns, you will still have access to internet if you configure a secondary dns.

As You mention in the ppt that you have no internet connection when the rasberry is down, why the "DNS in the Internet-Connection-Options" is not used when local dns is down ?