[Tutorial] Installing MinimServer on FreeNAS or FreeBSD

[airflow]

(14-09-2019 11:34)simoncn Wrote:  Thanks very much for working through this and uploading a FreeBSD version of the current MinimServer ohNet zip file.

I tthink the current installation procedure for overwriting the ohNet zip file should be OK for FreeBSD users, thanks to your detailed instructions. The only problem would be if an online MinimServer update were to change the version of ohNet, as the new downloaded ohNet library would not work on FreeBSD. I don't think there is likely to be an online update to ohNet in the near term but it is something that I will consider for a possible future solution.

Fine so we leave it as it is.

Now another question came up when checking the latest lib-zip-files you provide. I saw that now these contain not just libohNet.so and libohNetJni.so like in the past, but .32 & .64 versions. Do you by any chance know by heart the command/option for gmake to create those variants? If not I'll find out, just let me know please.

[simoncn]

PM sent.

[airflow]

(14-09-2019 12:56)simoncn Wrote:  PM sent.

I'm afraid the PM function of this forum is broken. I assume this because I didn't get any PM, and I wrote you an PM to inform you about that, and it seems you didn't get this neither. :-) I suggest classic email?

[simoncn]

It was my mistake. You should have the PM now.

[imush]

Followed instructions, minimserver server works on a new FreeNAS in a jail. Sort of, there are a couple issues:

1. The startup script does not work for some reason at restart of jail. If I run it manually (either startd or the script itself, e.g. service minimserver start), it does, but when the jail is just starting up the server dies, and I could not find any useful diagnostic information. The script is, of course, not very compliant as it does not take stop or restart args

2. Should it be really running as [jail] r[/code]oot?

3. For some reason it becomes invisible to clients / control points after an hour or two of being idle. The server is alive, and the URL is working, but the bubbleDS and hi-fi cast apps show it "offline" and cannot reconnect. Also my Oppo BDB-105 player does not see it. If I restart it manually, it works again (but not "reload" or "rescan" from the web interface).

[airflow]

(29-01-2020 04:17)imush Wrote:  Followed instructions, minimserver server works on a new FreeNAS in a jail. Sort of, there are a couple issues:

1. The startup script does not work for some reason at restart of jail. If I run it manually (either startd or the script itself, e.g. service minimserver start), it does, but when the jail is just starting up the server dies, and I could not find any useful diagnostic information. The script is, of course, not very compliant as it does not take stop or restart args

2. Should it be really running as [jail] r[/code]oot?

3. For some reason it becomes invisible to clients / control points after an hour or two of being idle. The server is alive, and the URL is working, but the bubbleDS and hi-fi cast apps show it "offline" and cannot reconnect. Also my Oppo BDB-105 player does not see it. If I restart it manually, it works again (but not "reload" or "rescan" from the web interface).

1. The startup script really is very primitive and not taking arguments, that's correct - usually for me it is sufficient, because I never have the need to stop the server. I could/should improve this in the future...

2. Yes it does, as the software is confined in a jail (with no other software/data installed in the same jail), to my mind that's OK.

3. This is a pity and should not be the case. I cannot confirm this behaviour. Which version of FreeNAS do you use? These days 11.3 STABLE was released, it's brand-new. I have used the RC for the last two weeks to migrate my jails to 11.3 kernel, and had no problem so far. You could start minimserver manually and check the logs if you see anything suspicious.

[imush]

(29-01-2020 11:07)airflow Wrote:  

(29-01-2020 04:17)imush Wrote:  Followed instructions, minimserver server works on a new FreeNAS in a jail. Sort of, there are a couple issues:

1. The startup script does not work for some reason at restart of jail. If I run it manually (either startd or the script itself, e.g. service minimserver start), it does, but when the jail is just starting up the server dies, and I could not find any useful diagnostic information. The script is, of course, not very compliant as it does not take stop or restart args

2. Should it be really running as [jail] r[/code]oot?

3. For some reason it becomes invisible to clients / control points after an hour or two of being idle. The server is alive, and the URL is working, but the bubbleDS and hi-fi cast apps show it "offline" and cannot reconnect. Also my Oppo BDB-105 player does not see it. If I restart it manually, it works again (but not "reload" or "rescan" from the web interface).

1. The startup script really is very primitive and not taking arguments, that's correct - usually for me it is sufficient, because I never have the need to stop the server. I could/should improve this in the future...

2. Yes it does, as the software is confined in a jail (with no other software/data installed in the same jail), to my mind that's OK.

3. This is a pity and should not be the case. I cannot confirm this behaviour. Which version of FreeNAS do you use? These days 11.3 STABLE was released, it's brand-new. I have used the RC for the last two weeks to migrate my jails to 11.3 kernel, and had no problem so far. You could start minimserver manually and check the logs if you see anything suspicious.

Yeah, I am fine with [jail] root too, I just thought that maybe that has something to do with the rc.conf problem.

For some reason, it fails to start up on its own, and I see no error in logs. rc.conf and your script seem to be correct (well, at least to start the service), especially since if I later run 'service minimserver start', it works.

I have a brand new FreeNAS mini with 11.3 jails. I have other services in jails (dns, ldap) and they all seem to be working fine. I also tried a miniDLNA server, and it also runs with no issues; but, of course, I have a large classical collection, so minimserver seems to be the only good option.

I'll look into my networking setup further and report if I find the problem.

[imush]

I think I found the culprit. Looks like the fault is with the router IGMP/multicast handling (Eero). I have an eero wifi system. FreeNAS is on physical ethernet, of course, connected to eero via a dumb hub.

I am not an expert on IGMP, but my understanding from router forums is that IGMP group membership expires after some time (probably 30 min), and the router just drops it. It may have started after some eero software update.

If I drop the jail from the router and then readmit it, minimserver is visible again. So it is not the fault of FreeNAS and its vnet config.

Question is, what to do. Eero but has no interface to configure anything about multicast packet handling. I would hate to replace the eeros or add more hardware with yet another router behind them, because they are otherwise working well for me.

Perhaps I can make a cron script with some upnp query over the network to run every few minutes and keep it alive this way? Any such command line tool?

Another question is why other DLNA/UPnP servers seem to work (e.g. MiniDLNA or my old Synology's media server). Maybe they do something that minimserver does not do to re-announce themselves periodically?

[airflow]

(30-01-2020 17:53)imush Wrote:  I think I found the culprit. Looks like the fault is with the router IGMP/multicast handling (Eero). I have an eero wifi system. FreeNAS is on physical ethernet, of course, connected to eero via a dumb hub.

That's a great find, congratulations, and makes sense. I had a similar problem in the past which was also caused by a faulty IGMP implementation of a wireless Accesspoint. I fixed it but I'm not sure what the solution was. One possible solution could be to turn off the faulty implementation of multicast/IGMP on that devices alltogether. That normally leads to simple flooding of multicast-packets (instead of more sophisticated, scalable methods), but that should at least work. If that is not feasible (you write that there is no management interface whatsoever), perhaps you can move the player also on wired LAN? I'm not sure if that would improve the situation, given the fact that the control-points are still on WLAN. Perhaps you might also check if software-updates for your wireless router is available.

[simoncn]

Some UPnP servers send very frequent UPnP announcements to compensate for network faults with UPnP/IGMP discovery. MinimServer uses the ohNet stack for UPnP communication. The ohNet developers do not believe that "flooding" the network in this way is good practice and therefore don't provide any way to do this.