Getting along without a keyboard

You need a virtual keyboard, a web search for 'pi virtual keyboard' comes up with loads of hits.

There are several in the standard Raspbian repositories:-

apt search "on-screen keyboard"

Thank you, the choice of search terms makes a big difference!

That has led to another puzzle: The Pi2 is on a wifi dongle that reports a connection using 192.168.1.10 and successfully downloads RasPiOS updates. However, turning on ssh using the Raspberry>

Preferences> Raspberry Pi Configuration menu and rebooting doesn't allow ssh login. Indeed, my DHCP server doesn't seem to notice that the Pi2 is connected and ping from my Pi5 to the Pi2 reports "host is unreachable".

It wouldn't be a huge mystery if the WiFi couldn't connect, but the combination of the Pi2 claiming 192.168.1.10 and yet not being visible strikes me as inexplicable unless the software updates are being downloaded vi some non-IP protocol, which seems implausible.

The only clue so far is that traceroute 192.168.1.10 on the Pi5 reports: traceroute to 192.168.1.10 (192.168.1.10), 30 hops max, 60 byte packets 1 192.168.1.11 (192.168.1.11) 3077.790 ms !H 3077.735 ms !H 3077.730 ms !H To clarify, the Pi5 is .11, the router is .254 and I don't know what the traceroute output means but it looks like a complaint about time.

Am I doing something dumb?

Thanks for reading!

bob prohaska

Three possible things to check:-

The first thing I would be doing is to look at the routers's Web GUI to check what it thinks is going on and what is connected to where.

The router (A DI-524) has only one subnet (192.168.1.nnn) for which it is the DHCP server. Both Pi5 and Pi4 use DHCP, with the DHCP range from 192.168.1.10 to 192.168.1.20 .

There's nothing called guest mode in the config pages, but there are "filters", described as "allow or deny LAN users from accessing the Internet". Nothing is listed as enabled, so I don't think that's the problem.

There are three firewall rules active, allow ping to WAN port, allow LAN to LAN for all protocols and deny WAN to LAN for all protocols.

Yes, there is only one router/AP.

The DHCP range is limited to 192.168.1.nnn, with no distinction between wired and wireless connections. There's clearly bridging from wirless to wired devices such as the printer, which works and can be pinged.

Maybe there's a firewall between wireless clients. I've certainly not needed such connections much. I'll poke around on the Web to see if there are any references to Guest Mode online. The internal help pages are close to useless, and the configuration menus are worse.

Thanks for writing, and your patient good counsel!

bob prohaska

Router software does sometimes have bugs. I have a TP-link router that has a symptom a bit like yours, I can't remember the exact details (it's relegated to being an access point now) but I do remember that it was something about the firewall treating WiFi connections differently from wired ones.

Can you temporarily connect the Pi2 using a wired connection and see if it then works as expected?

That's much like what I'm seeing.

The Pi2 has been used on wired ethernet, but under FreeBSD rather than RasPiOS. The "no route to host" message rather suggests the issue resides somewhere in the network.

The original trigger for this investigation was wanting to use ssh to avoid need for a keyboard on the Pi2. With your help I found an accessibility aid called "onboard", using a temporary keyboard. For immediate purposes, the problem is solved.

Thanks very much for all your help!

bob prohaska

Check if your wireless settings for the router have something called "AP Isolation" or very similar and if it is enabled. If it is enabled, devices connected by WiFi will not be able to access each other. Turn it off in this case.

Unfortunately at one location I have to use an externally managed router/AP which bridges wireless and wired networks, but not between

I couldn't talk to a Pi Zero which only uses 2.4GHz from the laptop which had connected to 5GHz. I had to go via another Raspberry Pi which was connected by Ethernet and could see devices both WiFi frequencies.

---druck

Hmm, nothing related that I have seen. The term "access point" doesn't appear in the manual or setup menus, nor "isolation" or anything close to it.

It isn't clear that I've completely searched the Web interface setup options, however. And a few topics I don't recognize. One is "Virtual Server", described as: Virtual Server is used to allow Internet users access to LAN services At face value, that seems not to apply.

Another is "Special Application", described as: Special Application is used to run applications that require multiple connections. But, the "special applications" list refers to games.

The firewall rules dangled an option to allow LAN-to-LAN traffic, but when I tried to set a rule using the DHCP addresses a dialog box saying: Allow/Deny traffic from WAN to WAN or LAN to LAN does not support! (sic)

There's no distinction between WiFi and wired LAN that I can find.

Thanks for writing!

bob prohaska

Was there any mention of this fact in the router docs? Perhaps an explanation of why it's done? That would at least grant some mental peace....

Thanks for writing,

bob prohaska

It's possible it is always enabled. The router has been obsolete for 14 years, maybe time for a new one?

No route to host is probably 'I did an ARP request, and nobody answered'

Mmm. It would irk me not to have ssh though. Everything here is sshe'd together. Or NFS. Or webbed!

I loved my old D-Link router. A thunderstorm got it years ago.

Since then I had a netgear POS and a CISCO SOHO router - a rebadged linksys I think - that was good but the Draytek I now have is even better.

Unlike many feature rich routers, the draytek has a sanely organised user interface and the advanced features actually work...

I have a friend who is computer illiterate and cannot understand why his BT supplied router needs power cycling every few weeks.

My Draytek has never needed it. Neither did the Cisco. Moral. Get a decent router so at least you can eliminate it from your problems

That truly sucks.

I think the rationale is that 'guest' additions to the network especially in public places may legitimately access the network's internet connection and any servers on it, but shouldn't be allowed to 'see' each other for security reasons.

I cant say that exists as a possibility on any wifi routers I ahve or access pints, but I have seen it I think on some other peoles kit.

If I wanted that level of access here, I would configure a second LAN attached to a different SSID and put it on an entirely different IP network

That's AP Isolation at work. It stops Wifi devices communicating with each. The idea is if you have lots of guest devices connecting, AP Isolation stops them talking direct to each other and is meant to limit a rogue guest device ability to do bad things to other guests.

Another recommendation: Look for something that can run OpenWRT, so you're not stuck with whatever firmware the router manufacturer provides.

A third recommendation: a Raspberry Pi Compute Module 4 and a carrier board that adds a second Ethernet port make a pretty good platform to run OpenWRT. The CPU and memory on the CM4 will blow the doors off of most of the routers you'd likely buy for home use, and I suspect they're competitive with nearly anything short of rack-mountable enterprise-grade routers. The onboard WiFi (on models so equipped) probably isn't so hot, but it's a solid option for wired connections up to at least gigabit speeds and WiFi can be provided with a separate access point or a USB dongle.

Why a compute module especially? Wouldn't e.g. a Pi4 be just as good?

But once again, these are 'hobbyist' choices. Sometimes I like to spend money rather than time and buy really solid solutions.

In fact my motto is 'dont build what you can buy'. My custom hardware solutions exist because they cannot be bought satisfactorally.

I have just replaced my router after 12 years fine continuous service. It was TP-Link model bought because it could run OpenWRT. But it turned out the OpenWRT 5GHz driver performance was poor so I locked down the TP-Link software as much as I could. I regularly tried various ways of breaking in but never could. It was good and fast enough. It was an AC1300 class router.

Earlier this year it started locking up... Wifi would fail then the UI would fail. A power cycle restored it and it would run for another week or so. Then Wifi range started dropping and the lock ups became more frequent. I'm assuming there are some electro lytic caps that have dried out. After 12+ years I bought a new one, another TP-Link Wifi6 unit as the last had worked well. The unit had a number of decent reviews. Throughput is noticeably better than the old, especially if say there are 2 TVs accessing Netflix plus wired computers and assorted Wifi devices. The 5GHz signal is significantly stronger about the house. I should look at the old one sometime but I had won an Amazon voucher so this was a quick fix at effectively no cost. The software seems to have fewer features than the old one but it does what it claims very well.

I did think of the CM4 route and OpenWRT but when I was last minded to faff about lockdown was on and there were no Pis for love nor money.