I want to see if this system is a good solution for remote management of a fleet of Raspberry Pis.

So I created an account and a server "tnky".

I downloaded the Windows version of the Server to a Windows box I never turn off. I port-forwarded 32976 to this box. The port test came back OK/Green.

I then went crazy trying to install the NR Pro client on a Raspi 2. Pi Store lets me click the download link, says I now "own" the project. But nothing downloads, and my "project" list stays blank!

Instead, I downloaded the .deb file from NR and installed it. I can see nrservice.sh is running. Have not found nrclient. I did find the XML config file, in which I put in "tnky" as the server. And then restarted the service.

Back in windows, I clicked on "Configuration Explorer" and I can view my server setup and the single user it made me create when I installed the server. But I don't see anything listed in the "computers" group.

When I run "Network Explorer", enter my user name, password and "tnky" it never connects. Just says "Connecting to NR client" forever.

I must be missing a config step here someplace?

EDIT:


Thanks in advance!


Richard Cooke

Hi rcooke,

On linux/unix, the client CLI is nrclientcmd. On windows , the CLI command is nrclientcmd.exe. (there is no nrclient command)

The computer/device must join to NR server , so that you can see them in the computer list. To join/register a new computer, simply sign in from either nrclientcmd or NR client UI. The first time sign in successfully, the device gets registered to the server and will be access remotely.

There are various factors causing NR client fail to sign in with NR domain name. You can try to sign in with private IP +port of your server. If it works, something wrong with the name resolution. In Dashboard , you can see if your NR domain name is mapping to your NR server's public IP.

Thanks,
KevinZ - Neorouter team

Just to complete this thread, there were a number of problems with my setup. I fixed them by:
1. Fresh NOOBS install. This dumped a number of outdated and even conflicting hardware settings I had collected in my SD image.

2. I changed my NR Mesh Server IP setup to 10.10.0.0 - this is to avoid conflict with one office network that uses 10.0.0.0! Not sure what I will do if I run into site using 10.10.x.x......

3. Switched to Mesh from Pro. My network router does not allow "hairpin" use, and I don't have time to figure it out.

4. Over-reliance on the Web-based version of NR Network Explorer (client). It is not as full featured (especially copy and paste) than the one built in to the "native" NRNE programs. And especially if you use the PuTTY plugin.

Now that I'm using a clean install all the NR stuff works fine. I had a fight getting WiFi to work. There are a lot of outdated posts from a few years ago that are very un-helpful. The best post I found for getting it working was here:

http://www.ronnutter.com/raspberry-pi-adding-wifi-wpawpa2-using-wpa_cli/

Which boils down to:

1. Use "lsusb", "lsmod", "iwconfig", and "ifconfig -a" to ensure your adapter is recognized and has a driver loaded.
2. The first command to use is "wpa_cli".
3. When you get to the command prompt, type "scan" and press enter.
- This will get the Wifi USB adapter to scan all the 2.4Ghz channels to see what SSIDS’s are being broadcast. After about a minute, you will see a prompt on the screen that indicates that the channel scan is complete.
4. Type "scan_results" and press Enter.
- You will see a list of the SSID’s that were “heard”. If you see your SSID, you are ready to proceed to the next step.
5. Type "add_network" and press enter.
- The system will display the assigned network number (0, 1, 2, ...). Use this number in place of x for the remainder of these instructions.
6. Type "set_network x ssid" followed by your SSID name enclosed in quotes and press enter.
- For example: set_network 1 said "GNV Tech"
7. Type "set_network x psk" followed by your passphrase encased in quotes.
- For example: set_network psk "OurPwd"
8. Type enable_network x and press the Enter key.
- Within a few seconds, you should see several lines appear on the screen as the raspi connects to the AP. It might take multiple tries but should end with CTRL-EVENT-CONNECTED.
9. Type "save_config x"