Mainsail Update 05-2023

Welcome to our monthly update! We have some exciting news and developments to share with you.

Firstly, we are thrilled to announce that we have had many contributors join our project in recent times. Their contributions have been invaluable, and we are extremely grateful for their support. It's a true testament to the strength and passion of our community.

Additionally, I had the opportunity to attend the "Chaos Stammtisch" event in Germany. It was a fantastic gathering where I made numerous valuable contacts. The event proved to be an excellent platform for networking and exploring new collaborations. We look forward to the possibilities that these connections will bring to our project.

However, we faced a significant challenge with a bug in Debian 11 related to udev. This issue required extensive debugging and finding a solution for future releases. It has been frustrating that Debian has taken a considerable amount of time to address and fix the problem. Nevertheless, we have dedicated significant effort to overcome this obstacle and ensure a smooth experience for our users.

On another note, we are pleased to highlight the hard work of kwadfan on the upcoming version of Crowsnest. They have been diligently working to finalize the WebRTC support with camera-streamer. This feature will enhance the functionality and capabilities of Crowsnest, providing an improved experience for our users.

Finished Tasks

• Added AHT10 to additionalSensors (contributed by benphelps) [PR #1378]
• Added function to duplicate Gcode file [PR #1321]
• Added jmuxer-streamer webcam client for supporting raw h264 streams (contributed by chrivers) [PR #1342]
• Allows adjustable tab size in file editor (contributed by forgodtosave) [PR #1354]
• Added janus-gateway WebRTC webcam client (contributed by bakatrouble) [PR #1360]
• Allows negative estimate time in slicer status field (contributed by mikebcbc) [PR #1372]
• Added HLS webcam client (contributed by ericderace) [PR #1258]
• Added printer name in browser tab (html title) (contributed by mikebcbc) [PR #1371]
• Made some small bug fixes during this time

Current/Open Tasks

• Added an option for macro groups to auto-collapse [PR #1314]
• Machine logbook/reminders for maintenance work (Contributed by jeremiahvpratt) [PR #1274]

In other news, I had the opportunity to test the new BigTreeTech Pi over the past few weeks, and I must say I am extremely pleased with this product, especially considering its affordable price. It has proven to be incredibly useful, particularly in light of the current Raspberry Pi shortage.

Looking ahead, I am excited to announce my participation in the upcoming "Maker Faire Vienna" event. If any of you happen to be attending, please don't hesitate to reach out to me on the Mainsail Discord or send me a private message. I would love to have a chance to meet up and have a brief chat at the event.

I am currently engaged in the development of a self-hosted GitHub runner solution on an arm64-based platform. This endeavor aims to offer improved and expanded mainsailOS images. However, I must admit that the process has proven to be somewhat intricate due to the unavailability of Proxmox on arm64 at present.

To bring this solution to fruition, I am utilizing the hardware depicted in the attached image. It consists of 2x Rock 5B units dedicated to running VMs with GitHub runners, and 1x Rock 4SE unit serving as a cache server. Once this setup operates smoothly and efficiently, I will share further details in a dedicated Patreon post and provide comprehensive documentation on GitHub outlining the configuration process for such a system.

Once again, we sincerely appreciate your ongoing support. It is your dedication and involvement that have brought us this far. Thank you for being an integral part of our journey, and we eagerly anticipate sharing more updates with you in the future.

Today, we celebrate "Mother's Day" here in Austria. On this special occasion, I would like to extend my warmest wishes to everyone, wishing you a joyful and fulfilling holiday!

Best regards,
Stefan (meteyou)

PS: I would like to inform you that this article was solely created using the notes provided by ChatGPT. Did you notice? If you did, I kindly request that you leave a comment sharing your thoughts on this approach. It is currently 2:15 am, and due to time constraints, I have relied on ChatGPT to assist me with this task. I sincerely hope that I won't have to resort to this method in the near future and that I will have more time to dedicate to providing you with updates personally. Your understanding and feedback are greatly appreciated.