Problems with Wifi Radio Setup

[terrapinflyer25]

After several attempts to resolve this issue I have hit a dead end. I hope someone can help with this.

[murl]

After several attempts to resolve this issue I have hit a dead end. I hope someone can help with this.

Sorry about the delay... It took me a while to figure out how to make mine crash consistently.

So, for the quick-fix, try this and see if it fixes your problem:

cd ~/Python-WiFi-Radio
nano PiPhi.py

On line 27, make sure it says:
HALT_ON_EXIT = True # Set to 'True' to shut down system when exiting

Then, way down around line 285, you should see something like this:
pianobar.expect('Get stations... Ok.\r\n'), timeout=30)

Change the timeout to none:
pianobar.expect('Get stations... Ok.\r\n'), timeout=None)

After you make your change, you have to <CTRL-O> to write your changes, and <CTRL-X> to exit the nano editor.

Now the explanation...
The PiPhi.py script uses a module called pexpect to spawn an instance of pianobar and interact with it. After it logs into Pandora, it expects pianobar to respond with a series of messages that ends with the "Get stations... Ok." phrase. The 'timeout=30' portion of the statement is supposed to give pianobar 30 seconds to do its thing before it figures something went wrong.

For some strange reason, whenever I do a hard-reboot of the WiFi radio, the timeout value seems to get ignored. Pianobar seems to be going through its sequence correctly, but pexpect triggers a timeout error before it's finished. I can set the timeout value to 20 minutes and it still crashes at the same point after the same amount of time. In Googling how the pexpect module works, I've found several other instances where people have had problems with the timeout not working correctly. I'm thinking it's some kind of bug internal to the pexpect module.

Also, I can only get this to crash when I do a hard reboot. That's why I asked you to check the 'HALT_ON_EXIT' to make sure it's true. I suspect when you're shutting yours down, it's only stopping pianobar, and not shutting down the Pi all the way.

So, anyway, setting the timeout time to 'None' seems to do the trick for me. Please give it a try and let us know whether it works for you.

Thanks!

[terrapinflyer25]

Your amazing! I had been reading through that python script looking for what timing out but I was no where near there yet. Thanks for helping with the process. Now to get a power switch and mount this baby and Im in action! Ill keep you posted on the rest of the project.

[murl]

Great! Sorry it took so long to get you back on track.
I learned a lot in the process, though.

[Godzookee]

I had the same problem. Mine had been working, but it started doing what you described. After searching around, I discovered that the problem affects Pianobar 2012.05.06, but not later versions. Unfortunately, the repositories still have the old version, so I had to upgrade it manually.

Here are the steps I took to remove the old version and install the new one with all of it's dependencies:

Code: Select all

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get purge pianobar
sudo apt-get install git pkg-config libevent-pthreads-2.0-5 libao-dev libgnutls28-dev libmad0-dev libfaad-dev libjson0-dev libgcrypt11-dev
cd
sudo git clone git://github.com/prattmic/pianobar.git
cd pianobar
sudo make clean
sudo make
sudo make install

After finishing this and rebooting, it would get to the point where the LCD said "Retrieving station list..." and then crash.
It turns out that Pianobar is able to remember the last played station, so it wasn't sending the list of stations that the script was expecting to see on startup. I fixed it by editing the PiPhi.py script, but I found an easier solution here:

http://forums.adafruit.com/viewtopic.ph ... ar#p205959

Hopefully I remembered all the steps correctly. If you run into problems, please post your results and I'll try to remember which steps I forgot. :D

edit: changed make commands due to permissions issues...

This worked Perfectly for me. Mine was working fine for ages then suddenly just stopped :( all fixed thanks to this post cheers very much

[murl]

Thanks - glad it helped!

[prairietech]

Godzookee,
Thanks for the work around. I'd been getting the TLS handshake error for days. Been trying to install the new pianobar version from the source but I'm still pretty new to all this and the repository still has the old version.
Your code fixed my problem!

[terrapinflyer25]

So this is weird but my radio has been working fine for months now until this week. It will start up just fine and play at least one song, sometime a few in a row. The problem is that after that it does not get the next song on that station. I can change stations and I get one or two songs and the same thing happens.

Edit: After ssh into the pi and runnig pianobar I see that it is spitting out this error:

Code: Select all

ALSA lib pcm.c:2217:(snd_pcm_open_noupdate) Unknown PCM cards.pcm.front
/!\ Cannot access audio file: Unknown HTTP status code.

So I was able to get the ALSA error to go away by:

Code: Select all

pi@raspberrypi ~ $ sudo vi /usr/share/alsa/alsa.conf
change the line "pcm.front cards.pcm.front"
             to "pcm.front cards.pcm.default"

But I dont know about this HTTP error. Any help would be appreciated

[pburgess]

That's a weird one. Wonder if it might be dropping the WiFi connection?

The guide was recently updated, there's some info on disabling WiFi power management to help with this sort of thing:
https://learn.adafruit.com/pi-wifi-radi ... tup-1-of-3

[terrapinflyer25]

That's a weird one. Wonder if it might be dropping the WiFi connection?

The guide was recently updated, there's some info on disabling WiFi power management to help with this sort of thing:
https://learn.adafruit.com/pi-wifi-radi ... tup-1-of-3

Thanks but I already have disabled the WiFi power management to no avail. Last night I had the radio working for about 2 hours without a hick-up. I left it playing when I went to bed and when I got up it was back to acting up again.