fonosfera

You’ve been waiting on this release for a while (and again it took longer than expected, partly because the orange page turned out to be hard to debug, partly because the method of building the firmware was made a bit more reliable, partly because of the holiday season), but it’s finally here: Gari jr. (or, less poetically, 2.3.6.1). It fixes the most important bugs that had snuck into 2.3.6.0 (so this release is still just for the 2.0n).

Here’s the (exhaustive) list of changes:

• The “Your internet is misconfigured” page will not show up so quickly anymore. With 2.3.6.0 a lot of people were seeing this “orange page”, even when their internet was configured just fine. This happened in particular when their internet connection was loaded and some packets got lost. Now, the Fonera rechecks a few times if the connection is really broken before showing the orange page (so it might still show up when (over)loading the internet connection occasionally. In the future, we might remove the orange page altogether. See ticket #669 for more details.
• Friends & Family accounts and configuration on fon.com has been fixed. To get existing F&F accounts working again, you’ll have to go to the F&F page on fon.com and click the save button (no need to make actual changes, but it could take a bit more than 2 minutes to take effect). See ticket #620 for details.
• Registration should work again. In 2.3.6.0, the registration link on the dashboard was wrong, but this has been corrected. If you have bought your new Fonera and updated the firmware before registering, you should now update it again so you can register it. See ticket #830 for details.
• WPS was disabled. It seems it got broken in 2.3.6.0, and in its broken state it caused problems with some Android and Blackberry phones not detecting the private signal. See ticket #540 for details.
• Rapidshare premium accounts are working again in the download manager. Rapidshare had changed their login procedure, so the downloadmanager needed an update as well. Note that the firmware upgrade (still) does not preserve your login details, so you’ll have to re-add both your Megaupload and Rapidshare account after the upgrade. See ticket #872 for details.
• The default (and only) SSL library is now openssl. Previously, some parts of luci still used cyassl, but having both caused build failures. This shouldn’t have any visible changes, though.
• In DEV mode, the Fonera no longer forgets the password strength on upgrades. Previously, this would cause SSH WAN access to become disabled in an undetectable way. Note that the upgrade still forgets the application firewall settings, so you’ll still have to re-enable all services to allow access on the WAN side. See ticket #633 for details.

Note that this update does not fix ticket #874, which causes the public signal to flicker off and on for some people. This issue can also prevent registration from working! If our diagnosis about this issue is correct, we should be able to fix this on the server side somewhere in the coming week.

Due to changes in the buildprocess, most of the lua code has been precompiled as well (which somehow didn’t happen with 2.3.6.0). This might cause the web interface to respond a bit faster as well.

Overall, we recommend all users to install this update.

To install the new firmware, download the web upgrade tarball here (NO NEED to extract them, just upload them to the Settings->System page). If you don’t know which version to pick, you’ll want the Enduser version.

• Enduser version
• Developer’s version (with ssh access)
• All versions

Note that the above download locations are not yet the final locations. Next week, when someone with access to download.fonosfera.org is in the office again, the images will be moved there (but I didn’t want to keep people waiting even longer).

For me personally, preparing this release has allowed me to find out how things work exactly at Fon and in the firmware itself. Turns out things are pretty complicated ;-) Anyway, the firmware release process has been improved a bit already and documented, but we will probably automate it even further for the next release. Hopefully all of this means the next firmware release will be smoother than this one.

Speaking about that next release, it will be versioned 2.3.7.0. The major release goal for that release is to support 2.0g again: In the past we’ve been hard pressed to get the 2.0n firmware stable (especially the wifi driver side), but we hadn’t got the time to give 2.0g the proper attention. Now we’ll try to make up for that and have a release for both 2.0g and 2.0n again, which should include some extra updates and bugfixes as well. I’ll try to publish a bit more detailed post about this in the coming weeks.

Update: We’ve found the first minor regression in 2.3.6.1. When you do a factory reset and go through the welcome wizard, you’ll get a lua error: “attempt to index field ’spot’ (a nil value)”. For more info and a workaround, see ticket #894. We’ll probably not release a separate fix for this, but instead make sure this is fixed in 2.3.7.0.

Update: There’s a second minor regression in 2.3.6.1. Again in the wizard, you can enter your Rapidshare account details. However, the code that processes those details has not been updated to reflect the new Rapidshare login method, so entering your details in the wizard will (silently) fail. Entering your details in the download manager settings normally should work.

Since the release of firmware 2.3.6.0 two months ago, we’ve received reports of a number of new problems. A few of these are quite serious and really need to be fixed soon. We’re considering releasing a very small update (which will probably be 2.3.6.1), containing just a handful of bugfixes, to get these issues fixed. After that, we’ll focus on getting a bigger release out, which should also be available for 2.0g again.

The following issues have been found and will (hopefully) be fixed in the bugfix release.

• Configuration changes made through fon.com and Family & Friends accounts are not working. Due to an issue with the changed MAC addresses in the last update, the Fonera does not identify correctly with fon.com and no longer receives any configuration updates. We have found a fix for this issue, see ticket #620 for details and a preview of the fix.
• Registration is broken. When you click the “Register” button in the dashboard, registration will not work. This issue is also caused by the changed MAC address. We have found a fix for this issue, see ticket #830 for details and a preview of the fix.
• The message “Your internet is misconfigured” frequently appears when browsing the internet. Quite some users have been reporting this problem, but it is unclear what is causing it right now. We haven’t been able to reliably reproduce this problem, so we haven’t been able to fix this one either. If you are seeing this problem as well and want to help out debugging it, see ticket #669 for the latest status and instructions. Especially if you can (somewhat) reliably trigger the problem (by using some application, changing a setting, etc.) we would like to know.

In my previous post, I promised to say a bit more about the policy regarding blog comments. In the past, we’ve seen a lot of blog comments that were either spam (no relevant content and links to other sites), off-topic (questions or statements related to the Fonera, but not relevant to the particular post) or simply inappropriate (containing swearing or insults).

As of now, the Fon policy regarding user feedback is the following:

• Stay on-topic. The blog is not a place for general questions or remarks, so please only respond with comments relevant to the post in question. Off-topic comments might be deleted.
• Stay polite. It is ok to criticize in a constructive way, it is not ok to use inappropriate language or make derogatory remarks. Inappropriate comments will be deleted without exception.

In short, don’t be a troll!

When you post a comment, it will be spamchecked using Akismet, spam is deleted right away. If it is your first post to the blog, it will be held for moderation. We’ll try to frequently approve posts, but it might take a few days. After your first comment is approved, any subsequent comment should be published right away.

Where do I post my off-topic questions, then?
A lot of users have been using the blog to ask a myriad of questions about the Fonera and its development. Since the blog isn’t quite the right place for this, here’s a few places you can ask your questions instead:

• The forums are appropriate for most questions. Here you will get answers for other users, FON support staff and sometimes developers.
  The forums are good for questions like “Has someone tried installing jdownloader on his Fonera?”, or “What’s the difference between the Fonera firmware and OpenWRT?”
• FON support has some FAQs, a knowledge base and you can contact them in case you’re having problems with your Fonera, your various Fon accounts or accessing the FON wifi networks (use the “Contact Us” link at the top right).
  FON support is good for questions like “How do I register my router?”, or “What ports do I need to open to use torrent downloads?”.
• The IRC channel is appropriate for short development questions or to get help collecting information for a bug report. Here you will get answers from other users and developers. You can also try to ask more general questions, but remember that we’re busy with developing the firmware as well!
  If you use the IRC channel, don’t wait for someone to show up first, just ask the question you have and be patient (rule #1 on IRC: don’t ask to ask, just ask!). Don’t be surprised if it takes a few hours or even a day or two to get an answer: We’re not online 24/7, but do usually read back what we’ve missed.
  The IRC channel is good for questions like “What file handles the 3G connection setup” or “I think that DDNS is not working in bridge mode, what info do you need?”
• The Fonosfera development mailing list is a good place for (longer) development questions. This list is read by the developers and the more advanced users, so there’s a good chance you get an answer to your complicated questions here. This is probably also the best place to ask about the development roadmap.
  The mailing list is good for questions like “I tried to create a plugin to do [something], but I’ve encountered three problems: [long description]“, or “Would anybody be interested in having a plugin for [some program]?”
• The fonosfera Trac is the place to report bugs or request features. Do take care to search for existing reports first. Please read this wiki page before reporting a bug.

And finally, whenever you ask a question be sure to think about it and phrase it properly!

Update: Added a paragraph explaining how the moderation system works.

Hi all,

Well, here it is: Gari the Hummingbird firmware version 2.3.6.0 for the Fonera 2.0n.

I have not much time to make a long post and I’m sure you all want to just flash it and test it, better than reading my silly comments. Just let me point out the changes we’ve made and what is missing yet. And please, have in mind that only the router functionalities have been improved; the web 2.0 and torrent and downloader applications remain the same (hoping to update soon).

Changelog (mixture from previous stable version Elan 2.3.0.0 and beta version Rudolph 2.3.5.0):

• WiFi driver fixed: we have updated to the latest WiFi driver from RaLink. This fixes most, if not all, the WiFi issues we had. Especially those affecting Broadcom chipsets (some iPhones, iPods, iMacs etc)
• WiFi Country region selection: the WiFi is configured for Spain, but some MAC OS X devices seem to have trouble with this, so now you can chose your country in the WiFi configuration menu.
• Many fixes in the 3G support:
  • added support for many more devices (anything on THIS list should be supported or ‘almost’, many others not in the list should also work)
  • improved the controls.
  • Japanese networks should work now.
  • Fixed the 3G / GPRS mode selection
• The FONSpot feature has been fixed (it didn’t work on the beta Rudolph 2.3.5.0)
• WiFi-WAN mode (WiFi repeater) has been removed for sanity (sorry for those who used it, but it was not very stable yet).
• Easier upgrade process: only one click from your “Applications” interface.
• Bridge mode has been added: this means the fonera can work as an AP on your network and you can use your main ADSL router to give IPs, so anything connected to the LAN or WAN of the Fonera will be in the same network. The only limitation is you need to set a static IP address on the Fonera so you know how to reach it. IMPORTANT: when you set bridged mode, you need to reboot so the private WiFi (MyPlace) works. (thanks blathijs)
• Many other fixes that I can’t even remember now, but many can be seen in the tickets we’ve closed on trac.fonosfera.org

New release,

Fixes:

• The addon supports passwords with non-ascii characters. (ticket  477)
• Update the UI whenever a link is sent to the fonera.
• Update the UI whenever a download is manipulated from the download manager.
• Update the download manager window on the last item manipulated when dealing with multiple items

As usual, grab it from here or here.

Thanks,

javier

Hi

This new release brings multiple selection in the main download window. You can right click on various downloads and trigger an action on all selected downloads.

We hope you find this feature usefull. You can get it from the addon website and here.

Enjoy!

Hi

We have moved the firefox extension to addons.mozilla.org. We may continue to post updates here but basically we want to add it to the place it belongs.
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/51665

New stuff:

• more bugfixes.
• new menu to access common tasks from the download window.

Enjoy ;-)

P.S: You can still grab it from here.

Hi there!

New release with small improvements:

- Firefox 3.6 support, in case you’re running the bleeding edge. This has been tested with beta 3.
- Bug fixes mainly discovered during 3.6 testing
- New: Quick add links feature.

If you right click on the statusbar a new window will pop-up.

The new window will show a textbox where you can add text urls and send them to the fonera.

That’s all,

Grab it from here.

Hi

Another small update to the Firefox addon. Since errors happen and you want to know about them we’ve included some UI updates to show the last error occurred in the course of your downloading activities.

When a file cannot be downloaded by the fonera, for instance you tried to send a megaupload/rapishare link without having an account configured or you tried to download a non-existing file the firefox addon will change the status icon to a warning message icon with a tooltip showing the error description (the best we can make of it ;).

You can right click on the status icon to clear the error and continue.

The error message will also appear on the download manager window as well as a link to the fonera dashboard to quick access the control panel in case you might want to investigate further the error. If not, you can click on the X button and the error message will dissapear.

That’s it. The plugin was heavily tested with the latest firmware of the Fonera as well as Firefox 3.5 but if you have any trouble using it, please report your bugs on the fonosfera tracker or Fon’s support forums including the firmware version of your Fonera as well as the Firefox version and operating system you are using. Remeber you can see all features of the addon in the addon wiki page.

Get it from here

Thanks,
Javier

Hi all,

New relase of the firefox addon. Since there’s been quite a few releases so far and the plugin seem stable enough we’re bumping the versioning number ;)

In this release we’ve tweaked the way the plugin connects to the fonera so it’s a bit more gentle. This will make the plugin behave better, specially when you’re using the plugin from the WAN which appears to be most of you. We’ve also fixed a bug in which some of the downloads weren’t cleared from the manager window when clear completed button was used. Another fix was to be more consistent between the fonera’s downloads status and transmission’s so both use the same wording, hence a more unified UI.

There’s a new feature for massive downloaders, the new list view:

In this view the download manager will show the list of downloads in a simplified list so you can have a better view of more downloads in the same window without the need to keep scrolling down. The start/pause/cancel actions are available when you right click on an item from the list as well as the information tooltips when you hover over a item from the list, so don’t worry there no loss of functionality. :)

Both the view and sorting options are now stored as user preferences so your choice will be preserved when you close your browser. You can toggle between the icon and list view by using the right hand side buttons in the toolbar of the downloader manager window.

The plugin was heavily tested with the latest firmware of the Fonera as well as Firefox 3.5 but if you have any trouble using it, please report your bugs on the fonosfera tracker or Fon’s support forums including the firmware version of your Fonera as well as the Firefox version and operating system you are using.

Get it here,
Javier