Difficulty Level

• No Linux or Raspberry Pi knowledge is required

Time to Complete

• This tutorial is limited to demonstrating the app, rather than explaining how it works

Who Should Read This Document

This tutorial is suitable for anyone wishing to demonstrate printing over the web as a basis for Internet of Things and/or Internet of People applications. This document also provides a good grounding for subsequent web printing tutorials.

Warning

Although this is a primitive implementation, it is quick, simple to understand and portable between web hosting companies. This is not necessarily the most robust nor secure implementation, so please be aware of these limitations and DO NOT use this as the basis for anything other than a demonstration system!

Pre-Requisites

• It is expected that you have a fully-working, web-connected Raspberry Pi and Pipsta

• You should have the following settings from your web hosting company by having followed the introductory tutorial Simple Web Printing – Pre-requisites:

  • Username
  • Password
  • Host IP address
  • Database name
  • Port

Additional Configuration Step

• Open LXTerminal
• At the $ prompt, enter:

#!

sudo apt-get install python-mysqldb

to install the library that allows Python to interact with MySQL databases.

Sending Data to Your Database

1) On the Pi, navigate to /home/pi/pipsta/Examples/3_Web_Send

2) In LXTerminal, enter:

#!

nano WebSend.py

3) Locating the following DB_CONFIG block, now enter the you details you collected in the previous tutorial (including the password for the database), e.g.:

4) Save and exit nano in the usual way, i.e. [CTRL]+[X], [Y], [return]

5) Use nano again to create a file called data.txt, in the same folder, with the contents:

#!

Hello from Pipsta over the Web!

with a trailing carriage return.

6) Look on the rear of your printer to determine its serial number. It should start with a G, followed by several digits

7) In LXTerminal, enter:

#!

python WebSend.py “<your serial number>” “data.txt”

8) If all is well, you should see the message “Print job created!” appear on the next line in LXTerminal

9) If all is not well, first check ALL of the details: user, password, host, db and port. Then check your internet connection is okay.

10) Once you have found the success message, go to FreeHostia, log-in, and in phpMyAdmin look at the printdata table by clicking on the printdata hyperlink:

11) Within the table, you should now see a single line, as follows:

12) You should recognise your printer serial number under the printer_id field, however the print_data differs in appearance to the message you entered in data.txt. This is actually ASCII encoded hex, where pairs of characters represent individual characters. To confirm this for yourself:

• Click ‘+Options’ above the record

• Select ‘Full texts’ and click the ‘Go’ button:

• You should now see a full line of ASCII encoded hex under print_data:

• Now, move the mouse pointer to the start of the data under print_data and click and drag the cursor over the full length of the data (from the first ‘4’ to the last ‘a’). Now copy this by pressing [CTRL][C].

• Now, in a browser, go to: http://www.rapidtables.com/convert/number/hex-to-ascii.htm and paste the clipboard contents into the text field as shown below:

• Now click convert and confirm that the data is the same as the contents of the data.txt file.

13) You have now successfully used WebSend.py to send data from your Raspberry Pi to a database on the web, and confirmed the contents of the new record created.

14) In the next tutorial, we will learn how the Raspberry Pi can retrieve this print job, print it, and mark it as printed so it does not print again.

Extending the Tutorial

You can:

• Adjust the text in data.txt,
• Create a new file and pass this filename as a command-line parameter in WebSend.py
• Obtain a friend’s/colleagues serial number and send a message intended to be printed to their Pipsta!
• Discuss the necessity for using ASCII encoded hex to represent characters to access byte values like zero (NULL)

Next Steps

The following tutorial will complete the Web-print system:

• Retrieving a Print-Job from the Web

Shutting Pipsta Down Safely

Whilst the printer is resilient when it comes to powering down, the Raspberry Pi must undergo a strict shutdown process to avoid corrupting the Micro SD card. The most straightforward method of doing this is to double-click the ‘Shutdown’ icon on the desktop.

TIP:
If you are already in LXTerminal, type sudo shutdown –h now to shut-down the Raspberry Pi immediately.

.

TIP:
Always make sure ALL activity on the Raspberry Pi’s green LED (the LED on the right) has stopped before removing the power!

End of Document