a-library is simply that a library. Or more specifically, it is an offline digital library; a localised wifi network that hosts a free and open collection of documents. a-library was developed as a way for us to easily share books and articles with each other, and in the process to collectively develop a local archive of all the publications that are meaningful to us. By us, I mean you and I. even if we have not personally met, we have shared this location, and these texts are now between us.
a-library is currently installed in a number of physical locations. To access a-library visit frontyard.
To install a-library on your own server simply download the code and run the following commands:
npm install
node index.jsa-library is intended to be installed on a raspberry pi, configured as an open wifi access point.
Note: these instructions assume you are using a raspberry pi 3 with a clean install of the default operating system Jesse and have setup a new user named librarian.
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sudo apt-get update sudo apt-get install dnsmasq hostapd nginx git
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cd ~ wget https://nodejs.org/dist/v4.0.0/node-v4.0.0-linux-armv7l.tar.gz tar -xvf node-v4.0.0-linux-armv7l.tar.gz cd node-v4.0.0-linux-armv7l sudo cp -R * /usr/local/ cd .. sudo rm -r node-v4.0.0-linux-armv7l
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git clone https://github.com/e-e-e/a-library cd a-library npm install -
set config.json with your own preferences
{ "server" :{ "port":8080, "admin_path": "/management" }, "database": { "location":"./tmp" } }server.admin_path is the url path used for managing the library. It presents a simple GUI for renaming and deleting documents from within the database. It is recommended that you change this to an obsure key too limit access to administrative features.
location.database is used to set the location of the sqlite3 database. It is recommend that you use an external USB or harddrive for the library as this will limit reading and writing to the system disk.
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We use Forever to keep a-library running on a read only system. Read below for instructions on setting up a-library readonly.
First install forever:
sudo npm install forever -g. Then make a new startup processsudo nano /etc/init.d/nodeupwith the following settings:#!/bin/sh #/etc/init.d/nodeup ### BEGIN INIT INFO # Provides: nodeup # Required-Start: $remote_fs $syslog # Required-Stop: $remote_fs $syslog # Default-Start: 2 3 4 5 # Default-Stop: 0 1 6 # Short-Description: Starts all node apps # Description: Starts all node apps like AAM, AMT,... ### END INIT INFO export PATH=$PATH:/usr/local/bin export NODE_PATH=$NODE_PATH:/usr/local/lib/node_modules start() { forever --sourceDir=/home/librarian/a-library --workingDir=/home/librarian/a-library -a -l /tmp/alibrary.log -e /tmp/alibrary-err.log -o /tmp/alibrary-output.log --pidFile=/tmp/node.pid index.js 2>&1 > /dev/null & return 0 } case "$1" in start) start ;; stop) exec forever stopall ;; *) echo "Usage: /etc/init.d/nodeup {start|stop}" exit 1 ;; esac
Set it's permissions to make it executable:
sudo chmod 755 /etc/init.d/nodeup, And tell Debian to start it on launch via Debian's update-rc.d:update-rc.d nodeup defaults.If you want to stop it automatically starting use
update-rc.d -f nodeup remove.Use pm2 for non-readonly version.
We use PM2 process manager to keep a-library running.
sudo npm install pm2 -g pm2 start index.js sudo pm2 startup systemd -u yourusername # follow instructions provide by pm2 to install startup script. pm2 saveNow a-library will be running automatically on start up, and will be relaunched if there are any problems.
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create new site settings
sudo nano /etc/nginx/sites-available/alibrary
Include the following settings, importantly setting the media folder and port number to match your a-library settings:
server { listen 443 ssl; ssl_certificate /etc/nginx/ssl/nginx.crt; ssl_certificate_key /etc/nginx/ssl/nginx.key; listen 80 default_server; client_body_buffer_size 10M; client_max_body_size 10M; # this is to fake captive portal if ($http_user_agent ~* (CaptiveNetworkSupport)) { return 200; } return 302 http://a.library$request_uri; #$scheme://a-library; } upstream a_library { # Important: listening on the same port as set in config.json server 127.0.0.1:8080; } server { listen 80; server_name a.library; root /var/www/library/public; index index.html index.htm; client_body_buffer_size 10M; client_max_body_size 10M; location / { try_files $uri @node; } # serve documents statically through nginx location ~* ^/!/(.+\.(?:pdf|epub))$ { # Important: alias should be the directory where database is stored alias /media/usb/tmp/; #add_header X-Whom www-a-library; try_files $1 @node; } location @node { # disable caching and buffering for read only system expires off; proxy_cache off; proxy_buffering off; proxy_set_header Host $http_host; proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-For $remote_addr; proxy_pass http://a_library; } }
Generate a self signed certificate for Nginx.
apt-get install openssl sudo mkdir /etc/nginx/ssl sudo openssl req -x509 -nodes -days 365 -newkey rsa:2048 -keyout /etc/nginx/ssl/nginx.key -out /etc/nginx/ssl/nginx.crt
Activate proxy by creating a symbolic link to /etc/nginx/sites-enabled/ and restarting Nginx.
sudo ln -s /etc/nginx/sites-available/alibrary /etc/nginx/sites-enabled/ #remove default site settings rm /etc/nginx/sites-enabled/default sudo service nginx restart -
add the following lines to
/etc/dhcpcd.confto set static ip addresses for bothwan0andeth0.interface wlan0 static ip_address=172.24.1.1/24 interface eth0 static ip_address=192.168.3.10/24 static routers=192.168.3.1 static domain_name_servers=192.168.3.1Stop
wpa_supplicantfrom messing around with setting up wlan0 as an access point. Open/etc/network/interfacesand comment out the line containingwpa-confin thewlan0section, so that it looks like this:allow-hotplug wlan0 iface wlan0 inet manual # wpa-conf /etc/wpa_supplicant/wpa_supplicant.confRestart dhcpcd
sudo service dhcpcd restartto assign static addresses. -
Make a new config file
sudo nano /etc/hostapd/hostapd.confwith the following settings.# This is the name of the WiFi interface we configured above interface=wlan0 # Use the nl80211 driver with the brcmfmac driver driver=nl80211 # This is the name of the network ssid=a-library # Use the 2.4GHz band hw_mode=g # Use channel 6 channel=6 # Enable 802.11n ieee80211n=1 # Enable WMM wmm_enabled=1 # Enable 40MHz channels with 20ns guard interval ht_capab=[HT40][SHORT-GI-20][DSSS_CCK-40] # Accept all MAC addresses macaddr_acl=0 # Require clients to know the network name ignore_broadcast_ssid=0
You can check if this works by running
sudo /usr/sbin/hostapd /etc/hostapd/hostapd.conf. If you look for wifi networks now you should see 'a-library' available. CTRL-C to kill the process.Tell hostapd to use this config file to use this config file by opening up the default configuration file -
sudo nano /etc/default/hostapd. Replace the line#DAEMON_CONF=""withDAEMON_CONF="/etc/hostapd/hostapd.conf". -
Replace the default settings with a clean copy:
sudo mv /etc/dnsmasq.conf /etc/dnsmasq.conf.orig sudo nano /etc/dnsmasq.conf
Use the following settings:
interface=wlan0 # Use interface wlan0 bind-interfaces # Bind to the interface to make sure we aren't sending things elsewhere #server=8.8.8.8 # Forward DNS requests to Google DNS domain-needed # Don't forward short names bogus-priv # Never forward addresses in the non-routed address spaces. dhcp-range=172.24.1.50,172.24.1.150,12h # Assign IP addresses between 172.24.1.50 and 172.24.1.150 with a 12 hour lease time
To redirect all traffic to the address a.library you need to set up a custom dnsmasq rule.
sudo echo address=/#/172.24.1.1 > /etc/dnsmasq.d/a-libraryThis will automatically assign the ip 172.24.1.1 to all domain names. Nginx listens to all traffic and directs the requests to a.library. This only partially works for https traffic, as browsers with strong security will reject the self-signed certificate that nginx serves.
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Start hostapd and dnsmasq to make a-library discoverable via wifi.
sudo service hostapd start
sudo service dnsmasq start -
There is an issue with dnsmasq starting before hostapd on startup. A dirty fix is to restart dnsmasq by adding
service dnsmasq restartto rc.local.The rc.local should look something like this:
#!/bin/sh -e # # rc.local # # This script is executed at the end of each multiuser runlevel. # Make sure that the script will "exit 0" on success or any other # value on error. # Print the IP address _IP=$(hostname -I) || true if [ "$_IP" ]; then printf "My IP address is %s\n" "$_IP" fi printf "Configuring DNSMasq\n" sudo service dnsmasq restart exit 0
Back up fstab sudo cp /etc/fstab /etc/fstab.original.
Then change /etc/fstab file to:
proc /proc proc defaults 0 0
/dev/mmcblk0p6 /boot vfat ro 0 2
/dev/mmcblk0p7 / ext4 ro 0 1
tmpfs /tmp tmpfs defaults,noatime,mode=1777 0 0
tmpfs /var/log tmpfs defaults,noatime,mode=0755 0 0
tmpfs /var/log/nginx tmpfs defaults,noatime,mode=0755 0 0
tmpfs /var/lib/systemd tmpfs defaults,noatime,mode=0755 0 0
tmpfs /run tmpfs defaults,noatime,mode=0755 0 0
/dev/sda1 /media/usb/ vfat auto,users,rw,uid=1001,gid=1001,umask=0002 0 0
/dev/sdb1 /media/backup/ vfat auto,users,rw,uid=1001,gid=1001,umask=0002 0 0
these lines automatically mount usb drives
/dev/sda1 /media/usb/ vfat auto,users,rw,uid=1001,gid=1001,umask=0002 0 0
/dev/sdb1 /media/backup/ vfat auto,users,rw,uid=1001,gid=1001,umask=0002 0 0
for this to work you need to make the directorys /media/usb and /media/backup.
To test fstab run mount -a.
Disable nginx logs by setting logs in \etc\nginx\nginx.config:
access_log /dev/null;
error_log /dev/null;
Note: you need to make user that nginx log folder exists.
DHCP and DNSMasq will fail to start in a readonly system because they need to write information to their lease files. This is easily fixed by creating symbolic links to the tmp directory.
# for dhcp.leases
rm -rf /var/lib/dhcp/
ln -s /tmp /var/lib/dhcp
# for dnsmasq.leases
sudo rm -rf /var/lib/misc/
sudo ln -s /tmp /var/lib/miscThese instructions are an amalgamation from these sources:
- http://www.matteomattei.com/web-kiosk-with-raspberry-pi-and-read-only-sd/
- http://blog.gegg.us/2014/03/a-raspbian-read-only-root-fs-howto/
- https://wiki.debian.org/ReadonlyRoot
Raspberry pi:
- nothing urgent
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