The details of what signals a SensorGnome acquires and what it does with them are specified by a deployment file, named deployment.txt . Eventually, the web interface will allow users to change these settings in a friendlier way, but for now, changing deployment details requires editing the file and resaving it on the SensorGnome's micro SD card. This page shows how to change the files; their syntax is described here.
How to change deployment.txt
- Download and save on your computer a copy of the default deployment file, which is attached below. There is an internal copy of this file on the SensorGnome which is used if no other deployment file is found.
- Open the file in an editor:
- Windows: use Wordpad (or something like: notepad++ , but not Notepad or Word, as these will mess up formatting.
- Mac OSX: use something like editxt that can highlight javascript syntax to show possible errors. The built-in TextEdit app can also work, but preferences need to be modified, or else punctuation will be automatically changed in the .txt file, and won't be read by the SensorGnome. With the deployment text file open, go to TextEdit>Preferences, and deselect all the "smart" options at the bottom (smart quotes, smart dashes, smart copy/paste, smart links, text replacement).
- Linux: use any editor at all.
- After carefully making changes (all quotation marks, commas, curly braces, and square brackets are significant), resave the file on your computer as deployment_MYSITE.txt (where MYSITE is the short deployment code you have chosen for this unit - see below).
- Access the SensorGnome boot drive. There are two methods:
- Software release of 17 April 2013 or later: connect the USB cable to your SensorGnome and:
Windows Users: open the shared network drive at\\192.168.7.2\boot
Mac users: from the Finder's Go menu, choose Connect to Server... and then enter smb://192.168.7.2/boot
- Earlier software releases: Disconnect power from your SensorGnome, and carefully remove the microSD card from the beaglebone computer by gently pushing it inwards. You'll hear/feel a gentle click, and the card will be partially ejected from the slot. Pull the micro SD card the rest of the way from the slot, slide it into the included SD card adapter, and insert the adapter into your computer's SD card slot. This should open a drive called SENSORGNOME (and on Linux, a second drive called SensorGnomeLinux). After saving files to the micro SD disk, you'll need to carefully push it back into the beaglebone SD card slot, until you hear/feel a gentle click. (The gold contacts on the SD card must go in first, and face toward the beaglebone's circuit board.)
- If there is already a deployment.txt file on the SensorGnome boot drive, delete it. (You can of course save a copy on your computer first).
- Copy the deployment_MYSITE.txt file you saved in step 3 into the folder you accessed in step 4.
- Rename the deployment_MYSITE.txt on the folder from step 4 to simply deployment.txt
The result is that you now have these 3 files:
deployment.txt - your modified deployment file, saved on \\192.168.7.2\boot or on the micro SD card's SENSORGNOME drive
deployment_MYSITE.txt - your modified deployment file (identical to the above), saved on your computer, with a name that is meant to help you organize multiple deployments.
default_deployment.txt - the original default SensorGnome deployment file, saved on your computer.
Where the SensorGnome looks for deployment.txt
The SensorGnome searches for a valid deployment.txt file in three places, using the first file found. The locations, their order (first to last), and how they are represented on the web interface are:
| Order | Actual Location | Path displayed as source of Deployment Plan in web interface |
| 1 | SENSORGNOME drive on micro SD card; also visible as the shared network drive \\192.168.7.2\boot (April 17, 2013 and later releases) when your computer is connected to the SensorGnome. This location can be accessed directly when you put the micro SD card into your computer. | /boot/uboot/deployment.txt |
| 2 | SensorGnomeLinux drive on the micro SD card, in /media/internal_SD_card; also visible as the shared network folder \\192.168.7.2\data\internal_SD_card This location can only be accessed when your computer is attached via USB to a running SensorGnome. | /media/internal_SD_card/deployment.txt |
| 3 | internal default file (/home/bone/proj/bonedongle/master/defaultDeployment.txt) This is intended as a fail-safe in case there are errors or other problems with files from the preceding locations. | ./defaultDeployment.txt |
How do I know whether my deployment.txt file was correct and is being used?
The SensorGnome looks at the 3 locations listed above to find a deployment file, and uses the first one it fines that parses correctly. The web interface will show the source from which the file was read, and the text of the deployment file. If you saved a file to \\192.168.7.2\boot\deployment.txt but it looks different in the web interface, it was probably because your file has a syntax error, and a different deployment file was read (i.e. not /boot/uboot/deployment.txt)
