ARCHIE is an acronym for Another Remote Community Hotspot for Instruction and Education for use with the Raspberry Pi.
The ARCHIE Pi implements an offline web server that can be used to deliver educational content in remote locations where no internet access is available. Using a variety of open-source software (such as Linux, nginx, kiwix, and hostapd), this platform provides an "internet in a box" in the form of an open wi-fi access point that can be accessed by locally connected web browsers. This access point uses a local web server to deliver educational content which may include a wide variety of open educational resources like Wikipedia and Project Gutenberg.
The idea behind the ARCHIE Pi is not novel. The word another is included in the acronym to acknowledge that it was inspired by other projects, such as the RACHEL Pi project.
The ARCHIE Pi is compatible with the latest Raspberry Pi operating system and hardware versions. This project includes a script to setup the ARCHIE Pi on a fresh image of Raspberry Pi OS Lite and another script to install selected open education resources.
The ARCHIE Pi runs both a web server (nginx) for delivering general web content as well as a Kiwix server for delivering wiki content stored in ZIM files.
The developers of this project were concerned about robustness. This is crucial since the ARCHIE Pi is intended to be deployed in remote locations without ready access to replacement parts or IT support. Of particular concern is the reliability of the microSD card under conditions in which power may be suddenly lost. Sudden power loss can lead to SD card corruption if it occurs during a write operation on the microSD card. To address this, various adjustments are made to the system configuration to mount the microSD card in read-only mode, eliminating the possibility of any microSD card writes. Consequently, the ARCHIE Pi does not require a formal shutdown procedure and may be simply unplugged.
The ARCHIE Pi platform requires a recent version of Raspberry PI OS Lite (32-bit or 64-bit) and runs on any recent model of the Raspberry Pi that includes a builtin wifi adapter (including the latest Raspberry Pi 4).
A suitably sized microSD card is required, depending on the amount of content you want to install (we have used 64GB and 128GB cards). Note that not all microSD cards are created equal in terms of speed and reliability, so you may want to consult the Raspberry Pi microSD guidelines. It is recommended that you select a high-speed microSD card, such as cards rated for UHS Speed Class 3.
Note that it is possible to use an external USB drive rather than a microSD card. For more information, consult the Raspberry Pi documentation describing USB mass storage devices.
During installation a separate wired Ethernet connection to the internet is temporarily required to download and install content for the ARCHIE Pi. The Wi-Fi connection is not available for internet access since it is configured as a stand-alone access point. If you don't have an Ethernet connection available, consider using another Raspberry Pi as a Wi-Fi to Ethernet bridge (tutorials are available online). Once the installation is complete, the Ethernet connection will no longer be required.
Create a fresh image of the latest Raspberry PI OS Lite on a suitably sized microSD card. Either 32-bit or 64-bit versions of the OS can be used, but the 64-bit version is recommended if you are using a Raspberry Pi model 3 B+ or newer model. We recommend the Lite version of the Raspberry Pi OS since it requires less space on the SD card. Consult the Raspberry Pi documentation for instructions on how to install an image of the OS (using a handy tool called the Raspberry Pi Imager is recommended).
Note that the installation requires an Ethernet connection during setup since the wifi adapter will be configured as an access point during the installation and therefore cannot be used as an internet connection. Once the setup is complete the Ethernet connection is no longer required.
Plug in an ethernet cable with internet access and power up the Raspberry Pi.
Raspberry Pi OS Lite will perform an initial boot requiring you to configure a username, password, and
the keyboard settings. A typical default username for
the Raspberry Pi is pi and you can select a suitable password (for security purposes, avoid using the default
password of raspberry).
Next, install the git package as follows:
sudo apt update
sudo apt -y install git
With git installed, the latest revision of the archie-pi repository can
be installed from the command line as follows:
git clone --depth 1 https://github.com/dschuurman/archie-pi.git
Once this repository is downloaded, enter the project folder as follows:
cd archie-pi
This folder contains two python scripts: one to setup the ARCHIE Pi platform and another to install educational content.
The setup.py script must be run first. It recognizes several command line parameters,
including a parameter to set the SSID of the access point and the
country code for the wi-fi interface.
To learn more about the command line parameters, type:
sudo ./setup.py --help
The only mandatory parameter is the --country parameter.
This should be set to the country code corresponding
to the country where the ARCHIE Pi will be deployed. This setting is essential to ensure
the access point complies with local wi-fi communications regulations and
frequency channels. A list of standard two-letter country codes is available
here.
Next, run the setup script specifying the correct country code. The country code for the US is shown below, but it is your responsibility to substitute the correct country code for your region:
sudo ./setup.py --country US
Once the setup script has completed successfully, an open wi-fi access point should
be advertised from the Raspberry Pi with an SSID of ARCHIE-Pi (unless a different SSID was selected
using the --ssid command line argument). Using another device (such as a laptop or smartphone) connect
to this access point. You should now be able to view the default ARCHIE Pi webpage by pointing your browser
to the address:
http://10.10.10.10
Note that you will still need to install content for the ARCHIE Pi, a process described in the section that follows.
Note: The
setup.pyscript requires a fresh install of the Raspberry Pi OS. If thesetup.pyscript fails for some reason you will need to correct the problem and start the installation again from a fresh installation of Raspberry Pi OS. Attempting to run thesetup.pyscript a second time will result in duplicate configuration modifications which will fail or cause problems.
Once the ARCHIE Pi is successfully installed, you are ready to add some web content.
To add web content, another script is provided named install-modules.py.
This script provides a friendly interface from which you can select various
Open Education Resources (OERs), like those available from kiwix.org
and worldpossible.org, and install them on your ARCHIE Pi.
Before running the installer, ensure an ethernet cable is plugged in with access
to the internet and that you are in the archie-pi folder.
Next, run the module installer as follows:
sudo ./install-modules.py
A menu will appear allowing you to select and install various modules.
The installer will allow you to select multiple modules at once by pressing
the key association with each module.
Depending on size of the modules selected and your internet spped, the installation may take a long time to complete and may be left unattended during the install.
Once the script completes, the new content should be visible at: http://10.10.10.10.
Note that some content requires substantial storage space, so it is important to ensure that you select an adequately sized microSD card (or USB drive).
Another script is included module removal. To remove a module, type:
sudo ./remove-modules.py
An enumerated list of all installed modules will appear. Note that it may take a few moments for the complete
list to appear since the file storage size is computed as the the list is displayed.
Enter the number corresponding to the module you wish to remove and it will be removed.
Repeat to remove additional modules or type q to exit the script.
After the setup and installation scripts have run successfully, the Ethernet cable is no longer needed and may be removed. At this point you should also reboot the Raspberry Pi so that the new configuration settings can take effect. This can be accomplished by typing the following from the command line:
sudo reboot
The ACRHIE Pi can now be run headless without a screen, keyboard, or mouse
attached. After the Raspberry Pi reboots, ensure that the Wi-Fi access point is visible
on a client computer and that you can connect.
If you are connecting from a smartphone, be sure to turn off your cellular data
access to ensure that all traffic is routed to the ARCHIE Pi.
Navigate a browser to the URL http://10.10.10.10 and ensure that
you see the main webpage for the ARCHI Pi.
Confirm that you are able to access all the web content as expected.
While the install-modules provides a convenient way to add existing content,
you can also curate your own content and manually add it to your ARCHIE Pi.
The content may include PHP code and any file formats viewable by a standard
web browser (PDF, HTML, MP4, JPG, etc.).
Before any content can be written (or any updates applied), the root partition
on the SD card must first be changed from read-only mode to read-write mode as follows:
sudo mount -o remount,rw /
Web content should be placed in its own folder in the /var/www/modules folder
with file ownerships set to the web server user (www-data).
A file named index.htmlf must be placed in the content folder which will be automatically
imported and listed on the main page of the ARCHIE Pi. The content of the file should be
nested within a <div class="indexmodule"> tag which will apply the appropriate formatting
from an existing CSS file. The index.htmlf file should include the module name,
an optional icon, and a short description of the module with hyperlinks to the content.
It is also possible to add content in the form of ZIM files.
The ARCHIE Pi runs a kiwix server on port 81 and new ZIM
files can be included. It is recommended that new ZIM files should go in a subfolder of /var/www/modules
along with an appropriate index.htmlf file. ZIM files should be added to the kiwix library using
the kiwix-manage tool which can be found, along with the XML library file, in /home/pi/kiwix.
Note that some ZIM files are extremely large and so they should be chosen such that they fit the
memory limitations of the Raspberry Pi (since the SD card is mounted read-only there
is no swap space, thus programs must fit in the available RAM).
Once new content is installed, the ownership for all the web files and folders in /var/www/modules
should be set as follows:
sudo chown -R www-data.www-data /var/www/modules
This may take a moment to complete. Once it is finished, the SD card root partition should be returned back to read-only mode by rebooting the ARCHIE Pi by typing:
sudo mount -o remount,ro /
Note that the install-modules.py script performs all of these steps automatically;
these steps are only required when installing custom content.
At any point after the initial setup is complete, you can modify the Wi-Fi country code using
the set-country.py utility as follows:
sudo ./set-country.py