parkrunPortable Installation Instructions - lawrencebillson/parkrun GitHub Wiki

By Lawrence Billson & Dominic Watkins

You will need:

  • A Kingston MLWG2 wireless router
  • A USB memory device
  • A computer with:
    • WiFI
    • Terminal emulation software (e.g. PuTTY) or ‘terminal’ on Mac OSX

PuTTY for Windows is free, awesome and can be downloaded from here. You don't need to install PuTTY - just download putty.exe from the above link and leave it running in the background.

Terminal is already installed as part of Mac OSX. Press F4 and type terminal and it should show up.

The process flow:

  • Prepare a USB flash drive with the parkrunPortable software
  • Install parkrunPortable on the MLWG2 from the USB flash drive
  • Testing

Prepare a USB flash drive with parkrunPortable software

  1. Format your USB memory to be FAT32
  2. Download the USB stick software from github https://github.com/lawrencebillson/parkrun/raw/master/tmp/usbstick.zip
  3. Unzip the files and copy them into the root folder of your USB stick - make sure they're not hidden in a folder, they absolutely must be in the root

Install OpenWRT on your MLWG2

  1. Confirm that your MLWG2 is completely powered off (no LEDs lit)
  2. Confirm that your MLWG2 is NOT connected to a wired network.
  3. Insert the USB memory into the MLWG2.
  4. Hold down the power button on your MLWG2 until the blue lights come on
  5. After waiting for the MLWG2 to boot (the blue light stops flashing), connect to the MLWG2-??? from your WiFi computer. The ??? is based on the MLWG2's serial number and will be different for each person.
  6. Telnet to 192.168.201.254 -
    • On a Windows PC, run PuTTY, in the "Host Name (or IP address)" box, enter 192.168.201.254, select "Telnet" as the connection type, then click "Open"
    • On a Mac, open terminal and type telnet 192.168.201.254 then enter
  7. Login with the username: admin and press return. You will be greeted with a # prompt.
  8. To copy the OpenWRT software onto the MLWG2s flash memory copy and paste each of these commands one at a time. When the (e)/(w) at the end stops switching they are finished:

To paste text in PuTTY - Click inside the window to make it active, then click the right mouse button to paste

mtd_write write /media/USB1/openwrt-15.05.1-ramips-mt7620-mlwg2-squashfs-sysupgrade.bin KernelA

Then copy and paste:

mtd_write -r write /media/USB1/openwrt-15.05.1-ramips-mt7620-mlwg2-squashfs-sysupgrade.bin KernelB

You may see PuTTY or your telnet session error with a 'connection aborted' message. This is because the MLWG2-??? network goes away when the MLWG2 reboots.

After the copy has finished, the MLWG2 will reboot and automatically install the software. This takes about 3-4 minutes. You'll see the blue light flash and go solid. Your MLWG2 is now a parkrunPortable.

Testing

  1. Connect to the parkrunPortable wireless LAN, password: bushypark
  2. You can remove the USB stick and close your terminal/PuTTY session
  3. Copy this address into your web browser: park.run
  4. You should now see the controls for parkrunPortable in your browser window!
  5. Read Bron's Instructions and process some results before using it on a live parkrun; run directors should have access to the test system.
  6. Optional but recommended - Telnet to 192.168.2.1 and run passwd. This will set the root password for the device (not the bushypark wireless key).

Notes