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IIAB 6.7 Release Notes

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George Hunt edited this page Apr 25, 2020 · 1 revision

Internet-in-a-Box (IIAB) 6.7 was released February 21, 2019.

Use it to "steal" the Internet's crown jewels and craft your own LIBRARY OF ALEXANDRIA with a $35 Raspberry Pi computer, or any old laptop.

Our HOW-TO videos show you how to customize your Internet-in-a-Box "knowledge hotspot" — for your school, your clinic, your library, your entire region — or your very own family.

Install Internet-in-a-Box (IIAB) 6.7 using its 1-line installer to transform an old laptop into a "learning palace" for a developing world school, that urgently needs this today!

Then drag-and-drop the very best of the World's Free Knowledge (Wikipedia in any language, thousands of Khan Academy videos, zoomable OpenStreetMap, E-Books, WordPress journaling, the new Sugarizer 1.1, Toys from Trash electronics projects, ETC) for those who are burning for learning — but just happen to be offline.

The crown jewels are all free, liberated — and open source too! Internet-in-a-Box is now used in schools, libraries and medical clinics in more than 20 countries. Why not DIY your own LIBRARY OF ALEXANDRIA with a $35 Raspberry Pi computer, starting today?

What's New?

  • Drag & Drop your favorite Content Packs into position to create the best visual menu for your school or medical clinic's Internet-in-a-Box. HOW-TO videos are emerging alongside DIY recipes, so you can make your own Internet-in-a-Box digital library. A WordPress plugin is also emerging, to work with Dynamic Menuing's 2019 additions, so you can integrate all your IIAB Apps and Content Packs into a larger WordPress site. #1393
  • Copy Internet-in-a-Box Content Packs to (and from) USB sticks and portable disks. Look for the Manage Content button under the Install Content tab in IIAB's Admin Console, with URL box/admin
  • Experimental Captive Portal for new users who have trouble typing in http://box, http://box.lan and http://172.18.96.1 — to help everyone get started right away — even if they're not familiar with Latin-based keyboards. Includes dnsmasq by default, to improve DNS and DHCP, instead of named/BIND and dhcpd. Please read Known Issues and help us test this on different smartphones! #1182
  • Asterisk 16 & FreePBX 15 for Voice over IP and rural telephony. Works on Ubuntu 18.04, Debian 9 "Stretch" and experimentally supports Raspberry Pi too! PR #1405
  • Lokole 0.1.38 email for rural communities, students and teachers, with URL box/lokole PR #1305
  • Minetest is a Minecraft-inspired creative/explorational building blocks game, including multiplayer server and additional mods. PR #1471
  • Mosquitto 1.4+ (MQTT) & Node-RED 0.19.5 support for IoT (Internet of Things) electronics projects, with URL box/nodered PR #1398
  • A brand-new visual comparison table helping guide your choice of what services (IIAB Apps) to install.

What's Upgraded?

What might future versions bring?

  1. OpenStreetMap: more vivid regional map packs that are easily installable? #877
    1. Local map visualizations with Magrit for thematic layers/customizations? #1568
    2. Local map editing integrating output from Mapeo on Windows/Mac? #1590
  2. Easily editable descriptions & logos on your community's IIAB home page (http://box)? #1002
    1. Sneakernet-of-Alexandria copying of Content Packs on normal FAT32/exFAT USB sticks? And also Android? #1538 #1541
    2. Teachers' own ZIM files on a USB stick might be hot-pluggable into IIAB? #828
    3. Stronger WordPress integration with above descriptions/logos and Calibre-Web? #1530
  3. Install IIAB over Wi-Fi without confusion, whether Ethernet is also plugged in or not? #1520 #1536
    1. Rapid networking & config changes that can't wait 20-30min for Ansible, starting with iiab-hotspot-on | iiab-hotspot-off in Admin Console? #796
    2. Raspberry Pi's (built-in) hotspot can broadcast and (simultaneously) d/l updates? PR #697, PR #748
  4. Captive Portal UX improvements, that work on many more smartphones? #1182
    1. Check your WhatsApp/similar messaging AND interact w/ IIAB at the same time? #255

Please join us in making this major release happen, Thank You!

How do I try it?

TL;DR! Try our 1-line installer for Raspberry Pi 3 (or 3 B+), Ubuntu 18.04 LTS or Debian 9/10. IIAB's 1-line installer lets you quickly choose how much to install: (MIN-sized, MEDIUM-sized or BIG-sized)

 curl d.iiab.io/6.7/install.txt | sudo bash

On Raspberry Pi, you'll want the latest Raspbian Stretch OS (2018-11-13 or higher) installed onto a microSD card large enough for all your content. Installation usually completes within 1-to-3 hours, if your Internet speed is fast. An actual Ethernet cable greatly helps avoid Wi-Fi glitches! See download.iiab.io for speed and security tips to hit the ground running.

Finally if you're adventurous, try installing onto another Linux, using our Do Everything from Scratch install instructions — getting you to the most important step — where you can add content!

Credits

Thank you e-v-e-r-y-o-n-e for building your own DIY Library of Alexandria. To serve One & All. Building on this software and designs contributed by T.K. Kang, Eric Nitschke, César López-Natarén, Joshua Kanani, Josh Dennis, Arky R., Matt Johnson, James Heilman, Sam Zidovetzki, Reno McKenzie, Anish Mangal, Avni Khatri, Blondel Mondésir, George Hunt, Tim Moody, Jerry Vonau, Adam Holt — among many others!

Not just in your own community — but by keeping in touch with our global volunteer community network (http://OFF.NETWORK) each of you are providing the lifeblood "fieldback" — that keeps us motivated enabling Internet-in-a-Box's quality content collaborations across ALL communities!

Join our Thursday calls if you too can help: MINUTES.IIAB.IO

Frequently Asked Questions: FAQ.IIAB.IO

Known Issues

  • Captive Portal currently doesn't work if IIAB is installed on OS's other than Raspbian. Caution: this prototype functionality might not work at all, if an Ethernet cable is not simultaneously in use at bootup especially. #1366 #1504
  • If installing IIAB on Debian 10 ("Buster") pre-releases, a few manual steps may be required. #1387
  • dnsmasq may not start reliably on Ubuntu 16.04 — please use Ubuntu 18.04 instead. #1469
  • Kolibri's systemd service sometimes times out (fails to start) during the 1st reboot of IIAB especially, on Ubuntu 18.04 and possible other OS's too. As of 2019-02-21, the workaround appears to be to run "systemctl start kolibri" — or simply reboot. #1489
  • FreePBX (for Asterisk) fails to (re)start intermittently, on Raspberry Pi especially. #1493
  • Node.js applications like Asterisk/FreePBX, Node-RED and Sugarizer won't work on Raspberry Pi Zero W (ARM6) if you installed Node.js while on RPi 3 or 3 B+ (ARM7). If necessary, run apt remove nodejs then cd /opt/iiab/iiab then ./runrole nodejs on the Raspberry Pi Zero W itself — before proceeding to install Asterisk/FreePBX, Node-RED and/or Sugarizer.
  • IIAB's home page (http://box) will not display in Windows 7's Internet Explorer 11. Please install a modern browser e.g. Firefox or Chrome (js-menu requires a more recent version of JavaScript). #1517
  • Installing IIAB over Wi-Fi is complicated by a DNS/dnsmasq failure en route. Workaround: when screen output freezes or you see DNS errors like "Could not resolve 'raspbian.raspberrypi.org' " (an hour or more after install begins) you will need to reboot, then re-run sudo iiab. Finally, after it auto-reboots (typically within an hour, indicating IIAB software install completed) don't forget to then run iiab-hotspot-on to enable your "knowledge hotspot" — as Admin Console's equivalent functions are not yet working. Or: avoid these issues entirely by (a) using Ethernet instead of WiFi to install IIAB 6.7, or (b) installing an IIAB 7.0 pre-release. #1519 #1520
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