Make 'vcgencmd' optional

[eidottermihi]

Currently, the app needs vcgencmd to work properly. vcgencmd is part of every Raspberry Pi's firmware and is used to get "hardware" information (cpu speed, temperature etc.).

Making the availablity of vcgencmd optional would open the app for usage with other linux based distributions and boards (BananaPi etc), as all other functionality is based on standard linux utilities.

[Nutomic]

This would be awesome!

[IanWardell]

This would be very useful

[clach04]

Alternative (and would not require developer support initially) is to write a shell script called vcgencmd to fake out a Pi on a non-raspberrry pi system.

[IanWardell]

Alternative (and would not require developer support initially) is to write a shell script called vcgencmd to fake out a Pi on a non-raspberrry pi system.

That is true and not too hard to do...even using real information

[zeevy]

Any progress on this?

[eyduh]

Hi, I got this somewhat working with an RPi4 running Manjaro ARM using the help of the manjaro community. Over on that forum there are some screenshots of the info I managed to parse and also I guess what I didn't. I basically compiled the @raspberrypi /userland source code locally which gave me vcgencmd and then set the appropriate variable. There's apparently precompiled binaries for both ubuntu and archlinux but at least the arch one is only 32bit and Manjaro ARM does not multilib so...

My latest log from raspicheck looks like this:

00:17:01.417 [main] WARN  d.e.r.activity.SettingsActivity - Enabling debug logging. Be warned that the log file can get huge because of this.
00:17:01.423 [main] DEBUG d.e.r.activity.helper.LoggingHelper - Logging was configured, debug logging enabled: true
00:17:13.201 [main] DEBUG d.e.rpicheck.activity.MainActivity - Load average preference: ONE_MINUTE
*bunch of keystore and signature lines omitted*
00:17:13.240 [AsyncTask #26] INFO  d.e.rpicheck.ssh.impl.RaspiQuery - Initialiazed new RaspiQuery for host aurorapi on port 22
00:17:13.240 [AsyncTask #26] INFO  d.e.rpicheck.ssh.impl.RaspiQuery - Connecting to host 'aurorapi' on port '22'.
00:17:13.246 [AsyncTask #26] INFO  d.e.rpicheck.ssh.impl.RaspiQuery - Using no host key verification.
00:17:14.964 [AsyncTask #26] DEBUG d.e.rpicheck.ssh.impl.RaspiQuery - Querying vcgencmd...
00:17:15.277 [AsyncTask #26] DEBUG d.e.rpicheck.ssh.impl.RaspiQuery - Checking vcgencmd location: vcgencmd
00:17:15.305 [AsyncTask #26] DEBUG d.e.rpicheck.ssh.impl.RaspiQuery - Path check output: usage: vcgencmd [-t] command
send a command to the videocore and print the result.

  -t          time how long the command takes to complete
  -h, --help  show this information

use the command 'vcgencmd commands' to get a list of available commands

exit status:
   0    command completed successfully
  -1    problem with vchi
  -2    videocore returned an error

for further documentation please see
https://www.raspberrypi.org/documentation/raspbian/applications/vcgencmd.md


00:17:15.306 [AsyncTask #26] INFO  d.e.rpicheck.ssh.impl.RaspiQuery - Found vcgencmd in path: vcgencmd.
00:17:15.452 [AsyncTask #26] INFO  d.e.rpicheck.ssh.impl.RaspiQuery - Querying core volts...
00:17:15.606 [AsyncTask #26] DEBUG d.e.r.ssh.impl.queries.FirmwareQuery - Querying firmware version, vcgencmd path=vcgencmd
00:17:15.680 [AsyncTask #26] DEBUG d.e.r.ssh.impl.queries.FirmwareQuery - Firmware version: aabb1fb5c19d80db268aeccd67b9f4e0f3d48a2a (clean) (release) (start)
00:17:15.681 [AsyncTask #26] INFO  d.e.r.s.i.queries.LoadAverageQuery - Querying load average for time period ONE_MINUTE
00:17:15.763 [AsyncTask #26] DEBUG d.e.r.s.i.queries.LoadAverageQuery - Checking line: bash: cat: command not found
00:17:15.764 [AsyncTask #26] DEBUG d.e.r.s.i.queries.LoadAverageQuery - Skipping line: bash: cat: command not found
00:17:15.764 [AsyncTask #26] DEBUG d.e.r.s.i.queries.LoadAverageQuery - Skipping line: bash: cat: command not found
00:17:15.764 [AsyncTask #26] DEBUG d.e.r.s.i.queries.LoadAverageQuery - Checking line: bash: cat: command not found
00:17:15.765 [AsyncTask #26] DEBUG d.e.r.s.i.queries.LoadAverageQuery - Skipping line: bash: cat: command not found
00:17:15.765 [AsyncTask #26] DEBUG d.e.r.s.i.queries.LoadAverageQuery - Skipping line: bash: cat: command not found
00:17:15.765 [AsyncTask #26] DEBUG d.e.r.s.i.queries.LoadAverageQuery - Checking line: bash: grep: command not found
00:17:15.765 [AsyncTask #26] DEBUG d.e.r.s.i.queries.LoadAverageQuery - Skipping line: bash: grep: command not found
00:17:15.765 [AsyncTask #26] DEBUG d.e.r.s.i.queries.LoadAverageQuery - Skipping line: bash: grep: command not found
00:17:15.766 [AsyncTask #26] DEBUG d.e.r.s.i.queries.LoadAverageQuery - Checking line: bash: wc: command not found
00:17:15.766 [AsyncTask #26] DEBUG d.e.r.s.i.queries.LoadAverageQuery - Skipping line: bash: wc: command not found
00:17:15.766 [AsyncTask #26] DEBUG d.e.r.s.i.queries.LoadAverageQuery - Skipping line: bash: wc: command not found
00:17:15.766 [AsyncTask #26] ERROR d.e.r.s.i.queries.LoadAverageQuery - Expected a different output of command: cat /proc/loadavg; cat /proc/stat | grep cpu | wc -l
00:17:15.767 [AsyncTask #26] ERROR d.e.r.s.i.queries.LoadAverageQuery - Actual output was: bash: cat: command not found
bash: cat: command not found
bash: grep: command not found
bash: wc: command not found

00:17:15.767 [AsyncTask #26] INFO  d.e.r.ssh.impl.queries.UptimeQuery - Querying uptime...
00:17:15.839 [AsyncTask #26] DEBUG d.e.r.ssh.impl.queries.UptimeQuery - Skipping line: 
00:17:15.839 [AsyncTask #26] ERROR d.e.r.ssh.impl.queries.UptimeQuery - Expected a different output of command: cat /proc/uptime
00:17:15.840 [AsyncTask #26] ERROR d.e.r.ssh.impl.queries.UptimeQuery - Actual output was: 
00:17:15.840 [AsyncTask #26] INFO  d.e.r.ssh.impl.queries.MemoryQuery - Querying memory information...
00:17:15.915 [AsyncTask #26] ERROR d.e.r.ssh.impl.queries.MemoryQuery - Expected a different output of command: cat /proc/meminfo | tr -s " "
00:17:15.915 [AsyncTask #26] ERROR d.e.r.ssh.impl.queries.MemoryQuery - Output was : 
00:17:15.916 [AsyncTask #26] ERROR d.e.r.ssh.impl.queries.MemoryQuery - Expected a different output of command: cat /proc/meminfo | tr -s " "
00:17:15.916 [AsyncTask #26] ERROR d.e.r.ssh.impl.queries.MemoryQuery - Output was : Memory information could not be queried. See the log for details.
00:17:15.916 [AsyncTask #26] INFO  d.e.r.ssh.impl.queries.SerialNoQuery - Querying serial number...
00:17:15.990 [AsyncTask #26] ERROR d.e.r.ssh.impl.queries.SerialNoQuery - Could not query cpu serial number. Expected another output of 'cat /proc/cpuinfo | grep Serial'.
00:17:15.991 [AsyncTask #26] ERROR d.e.r.ssh.impl.queries.SerialNoQuery - Output of 'cat /proc/cpuinfo | grep Serial': 

00:17:15.991 [AsyncTask #26] INFO  d.e.rpicheck.ssh.impl.RaspiQuery - Querying running processes...
00:17:16.066 [AsyncTask #26] INFO  d.e.r.s.i.q.NetworkInformationQuery - Querying network interfaces...
00:17:16.143 [AsyncTask #26] DEBUG d.e.r.s.i.q.NetworkInformationQuery - Found interface .
00:17:16.144 [AsyncTask #26] INFO  d.e.r.s.i.q.NetworkInformationQuery - Available interfaces: []
00:17:16.144 [AsyncTask #26] INFO  d.e.r.s.i.q.NetworkInformationQuery - Checking carrier of ...
00:17:16.220 [AsyncTask #26] DEBUG d.e.r.s.i.q.NetworkInformationQuery -  has no carrier.
00:17:16.222 [AsyncTask #26] INFO  d.e.rpicheck.ssh.impl.RaspiQuery - Querying disk usage...
00:17:16.296 [AsyncTask #26] WARN  d.e.rpicheck.ssh.impl.RaspiQuery - Expected another output of df -h. Skipping line: 
00:17:16.297 [AsyncTask #26] DEBUG d.e.rpicheck.ssh.impl.RaspiQuery - Disks: []
00:17:16.297 [AsyncTask #26] INFO  d.e.rpicheck.ssh.impl.RaspiQuery - Querying distribution name...
00:17:16.373 [AsyncTask #26] ERROR d.e.rpicheck.ssh.impl.RaspiQuery - Could not parse distribution. Make sure 'cat /etc/*-release' works on your distribution.
00:17:16.374 [AsyncTask #26] ERROR d.e.rpicheck.ssh.impl.RaspiQuery - Output of cat /etc/*-release | grep PRETTY_NAME: 

00:17:16.374 [AsyncTask #26] DEBUG d.e.r.ssh.impl.queries.FirmwareQuery - Querying system time via 'date --rfc-2822'.
00:17:16.453 [AsyncTask #26] DEBUG d.e.r.ssh.impl.queries.FirmwareQuery - System time: 
00:17:16.454 [AsyncTask #26] INFO  d.e.rpicheck.ssh.impl.RaspiQuery - Disconnecting from host a.

I know this doesn't help directly with ppl running different boards but at least ppl running other distros might find this useful. Cheers.

[clach04]

@emma-goldman interesting, based on:

bash: cat: command not found
bash: grep: command not found
bash: wc: command not found

It looks like porting to another platform needs:

• vcgencmd
• bash
• cat
• grep
• wc

[IanWardell]

I haven't had time to look into this, life gets in the way of all dreams, but the whole point of this is to get a similar way to get device data as vcgencmd, which can be built and installed on many alternative systems, but not on ALL systems. @emma-goldman is running into a similar issue to the one I was having .

It looks like porting to another platform needs: vcgencmd bash cat grep wc

"bash,cat,grep,wc" should be on at least the vast majority of systems, especially bash..otherwise most of what is being worked on here would not work. This is less of the problem.

What would be something would be to make it optional and have another way to get the information for the app, it is heavily reliant currently on using the vcgencmd to query information about the device. Which is 100% understandable given its for RPI's which by default use vcgencmd .

I'm glad there are still people interested in this.

[clach04]

So I ended up have a need (well, maybe want is more accurate :-p) for this on a rock64 SBC. It runs linux so everything works great, other than the top part of the stats. This is what I came up with.

Create /usr/bin/vcgencmd and chmod a+x it.

#!/bin/sh
# try and keep this pure bourne shell
# minimal clone of raspberry tool vcgencmd - for use with Android rpicheck and rock64 SBC

command=$1
case ${1} in
        measure_clock)
                case ${2} in
                        arm)
                                # awk is probably overkill....
                                /usr/local/sbin/rock64_health.sh | awk '/CPU freq/{print "frequency(45)=" $4 * 1000000}'
                                #value=`/usr/local/sbin/rock64_health.sh | awk '/CPU freq/{print $4 * 1000000}'`
                                #echo 'frequency(45)='${value}
                                exit
                        ;;
                        core)
                                value=0  # TODO / FIXME
                                echo 'frequency(1)='${value}
                                exit
                        ;;
                # TODO anything else thrown an error/debug
                esac
                exit
                ;;
        measure_temp)
                # awk is probably overkill....
                #/usr/local/sbin/rock64_health.sh | awk '/SoC Temp/{print $4 "\\\'C"}'
                value=`/usr/local/sbin/rock64_health.sh | awk '/SoC Temp/{print $4}'`
                echo 'temp='${value}"'C"
                exit
                ;;
        measure_volts)
                case ${2} in
                        core)
                                value=0  # TODO / FIXME
                                echo 'volt='${value}'.0000V'
                                exit
                        ;;
                # TODO anything else thrown an error/debug
                esac
                ;;
        version)
                echo 'Nov  4 2018 16:31:07'
                echo 'Copyright (c) 2012 rock64'
                echo 'version rock64_TODO (clean) (release)'
                exit
                ;;
esac


#!/bin/sh
# try and keep this pure bourne shell
# vcgencmd - clone

# on this device /var/log is ramfs folder2ram
LOG=/var/log/vcgencmd.log


date >> ${LOG}
echo ${*} >> ${LOG}
echo '=============' >> ${LOG}

The last few lines are to debug when unhandled parameters are requested.

[clach04]

Posted a version to https://github.com/clach04/rock64_vcgencmd

[Thatoo]

Would this script work on a x86 server?

[clach04]

@Thatoo I just renamed the project to https://github.com/clach04/fake_vcgencmd

It works for me under Ubuntu x86, as well as Rock64 legacy, and Armbian. There is a chance small tweaks are needed but for most platforms that expose the typical:

• /sys/devices/system/cpu/cpu0/cpufreq/scaling_cur_freq
• /sys/class/thermal/thermal_zone0/temp

devices for lookup it should work, and its easy tune to specific hardware.

[clach04]

@eidottermihi I don't have an Android SDK /enthusiasm to work on a code change for this support :-p. I can think of three possible directions for this ticket:

1. remove hard dependency - most amount of work
2. add a check to RasPiCheck for presence of vcgencmd and if missing "do something" (which could be a host of things, including generating an almost empty shell script that would return 0 for all the things RasPiCheck current checks for)
3. Document what RasPiCheck expects so people can implement their own vcgencmd replacement (for example use https://github.com/clach04/fake_vcgencmd) - no code changes, hopefully minor doc work (perhaps add an FAQ?)

I do have energy for number 3 above if that's something you are open to? I could knock something up in https://github.com/eidottermihi/rpicheck/tree/gh-pages and open a PR (I could attempt #228 at the same time)

[mepanko91]

Modified clach04 script https://github.com/clach04/fake_vcgencmd little bit to get highest core temp instead of motherboard temp

        measure_temp)
                # awk is probably overkill....
                value=`cat /sys/devices/platform/coretemp.0/hwmon/hwmon*/temp*_input | sort -n | tail -1 | awk '{printf "%.3f\n", $1 / 1000}'`

Got info from here https://askubuntu.com/a/538246

Many thanks for script. Cheers

[PanderMusubi]

I think this can be closed as using fake_vcgencmd solves it.

[PanderMusubi]

This app can now also be used on non-Raspberry Pi boards with Armbian operating system.

[eidottermihi]

Thanks @PanderMusubi , @clach04 and @mepanko91 for pointing out solutions using a fake vcgencmd.

As already suggested it would probaby be best to provide any sort of a FAQ - so @clach04 if you're up to it for creating something like that on gh-pages I would definitely appreciate a PR for this.

[PanderMusubi]

I will make a PR for it.

[PanderMusubi]

Link to vcgencmd has been added to the README and website, so I think this issue can be closed.