---------------------------------------- | |
Little Free Library, part 3 | |
January 15th, 2019 | |
---------------------------------------- | |
The batter test is complete. I picked up a solar powered battery | |
pack off Amazon and plugged in the pi, then left it in the dark to | |
see how long it took to drain. It lasted just over 80 hours with | |
no external charging. That's fantastic! | |
The unit claims that it can fully recharge in about 7 hours of | |
sunlight. Given various seasons and overcast days, rain, etc, that | |
should be plenty of buffer to allow the pi to remain perpetually | |
active. | |
With that, there's only 3 things left to do: | |
- Update the captive portal screen to indicate to users that they | |
should: 1) disable their mobile data, and 2) browse to | |
http://littlefreelibrary. The actual domain doesn't matter, but | |
that one seems easy enough to remember. The mobile data thing | |
came up in testing as a barrier to IP rules running on the Pi | |
that would normally redirect you to 10.0.0.5 and serve the web | |
content. Captive Portal may trigger, but I need a real redirect | |
of a real mobile browser for downloads. If you're reading this | |
and making a project that doesn't need javascript or downloads, | |
just do it IN the captive portal. It's much easier. | |
- Build a weatherproof enclosure. The plan is to 3D print | |
something that can hold the battery and pi, or just the pi glued | |
on the battery, or a big glass box, or whatever. Something that | |
will survive in the woods and not be blocked by snowfall. | |
- Take pictures and "blog" the full build instructions so others | |
can replicate and share it. This is a cool project and I hope | |
others can build upon it. |