If you are a beginner or some of these topics are new to you, then you should take some time prior to the Hack-night event to prepare yourself.
The RaspberryPI will be accessed using SSH which is typically run from a UNIX command line. On a Mac, you can simply open a 'Terminal' window which provides you with a UNIX command line. From there you can type 'ssh pi@' to access your RaspberryPI. On a PC, you will need to install a tool like PuTTy (Google "putty download windows") For instructions on how to use PuTTY with the RaspberryPI Youtube.com "how to ssh with putty raspberry pi".
You will be expected to have basic UNIX command line knowledge. If this is going to be a challenge, please let your SE manager and/or Hack-night lead know, so they can pair you up with someone who does have UNIX skills.
The activity requires basic text file editing. The RaspberryPI has the 'nano' and 'vim' editors pre-installed. If you are not familiar with one of these editors, you might want to either install your own favorite UNIX editor or learn one of the provided editors.
In module 1, you will be asked to SSH into the RaspberryPI, take a picture, then copy the picture back to your laptop using SCP. Make sure you know how to use the ssh and scp commands.
If this is your first time using Git or GitHub (or any source control tool for that matter), I recommend watching a Git/GitHub tutorial. There are many good videos on Youtube.com, here is one example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0fKg7e37bQE
The hack-night instructions will ask you to clone a GitHub repository.
You will also be asked to perform basic developer tasks such as:
- Clone a GitHub repository
- Create a feature/change branch
- Implement a new feature or code change (fix a bug) and then commit the change to the branch
- Implement a 'pull' request and sub the change to GitHub for review
Watch the following Youtube.com video to learn about each of these steps.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oFYyTZwMyAg
If you don't know what a RaspberryPI is then you might want to learn a little bit before the hack-night. Here is a couple excellent video overviews.
- What is RaspberryPI: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZYPATphfGY4
- RaspPI Camera Service: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WNKbZsrsKVs The labs will use the following RaspberryPI hardware. If you already have a RaspberryPI you should be able to use an older device as well. The following items were ordered from Amazon.com.
- Raspberry Pi 3 Basic Starter Kit
- Cheap USB Webcam
- Mirco SD Card for storage
You will be asked to install various development tools, libraries and applications on the RaspberryPI. If you are not familiar with tools like 'apt-get', 'yum', 'pip', and 'gem' do a little Google searching to learn how these are used. The hack-night activity will specifically ask you to install Python packages using apt-get and pip. If you don't know how to install packages like 'fswebcam', then you might want to do a little pre-work.
The Hack-night is built on both Python and Ruby coding examples. You are not expected to know these programming languages, or even how to program at all. What you are expected to know is that these are the tools the modern software developer uses so it can't hurt to know a little about them. There are numerous getting started guides and training video on the web for those who are interested in learning.
You will be asked to configure the RaspberryPI web service to upload images to S3. Three key S3 terms should be understood:
- S3 Endpoint - What is a S3 endpoint?
- S3 Bucket - What is a bucket and how do I create a bucket?
- S3 Access Key and Secret Access Key - what are they how, how do you get one?
- S3 Bucket Policies
We will provide a StorageGRID Webscale (SGWS) S3 service for you to load images to. This is a good time to re-familiarize your with using SGWS if it has been a while. You can if you like, setup your own SGWS service and use it during the event, or you can use the one provided by the facilitators.
The web service uses ElasticSearch for collecting data about the uploaded files (who uploaded the image, who is in the image, where the image was located, size and resolution, etc).
Understand how ElasticSearch search data is stored on disk. What is NetApp's value proposition for ElasticSearch? What are similar tools to ElasticSearch?
If you are not familiar with ElasticSearch search the following video is a great introduction to downloading, setting up and using ElasticSearch. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G56aE1kiOZw More on the theory of Search, How works, how it is stored, etc. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PpX7J-G2PEo
To visualize the data uploaded to the ElasticSearch server you can install one of the following tools
- ElasticSearch Toolbox for Chrome
- ElasticSearch Toolbox on GitHub
- Or just use
curl
Consider how you might use the hack-night data, what searches you might apply and what data you might want or need to collect to generate interesting search results.
The second half of the hack-night activity has you use a docker container to run a microservice. If you have not familiar with Docker and containers, it is strongly suggested that you do some pre-work.
There will not be enough time on hack-night to learn Docker from scratch, so it is recommended you come in with some basic Docker knowledge.
There are many Docker tutorials on YouTube. I would recommend setting aside 1-2 hours to go thru the tutorials as well as installing and running Docker on your own laptop.
Docker enjoys only limited support on RaspberryPI. If you are interested in learning more, it is recommended you do your research prior to hack-night.
Ansible is a radically simple IT automation system. It handles configuration-management, application deployment, cloud provisioning, ad-hoc task-execution, and multinode orchestration - including trivializing things like zero downtime rolling updates with load balancers.
Read the installation guide:
- http://docs.ansible.com/ansible/intro_installation.html#latest-releases-via-apt-debian
- If you have a linux machine or a Mac try installing it.
Also read through the getting started guide and try to practice:
And watch the video tutorials: