Wireless display

Hi. how do I display the open flexure images into a tablet via wifi on a browser in realtime?

Thanks

Dan

Are you wanting just the video stream? Not sure how you could do that. You can run the microscope interface directly in a browser if it is connected to the same network as the Pi running the microscope server. Point the browser to it. This should be microscope.local:5000 or <IP address of the microscope PI>:5000 . On my network that does not work, it shows up at microscope:5000 instead.
I find there is quite a delay in the feed to a tablet/phone etc. Not sure if that is the fact that I use a Pi3 for the server, or my network or what.

I am trying to avoid connecting by a monitor to the RPi to show the picture. Every student has a tablet. I want to stream the image to their tablet

Multiple users can access the web interface at microscope.local:5000 (or the other options depending what works in your network). I have tried it with two or three concurrent users, it will be interesting to know how it holds up with a whole class. Are you thinking a class of 12, 30 or 200+?. One possible issue for this use is that it can be a problem getting a Raspberry Pi joined to the network in managed networks like Universities. In that case you could use a local ad-hoc network from a phone hotspot (with data turned off or even an old phone with no SIM. Or you can set up the Pi to serve its own network as in this post. The students would then need to join that network instead of the normal wifi.

This would give every student access to control the microscope as well as to view. They would need to be sensible. In principle it should be very possible to have a version of the web app with only the view and no controls. Not quite in my skill set though.

THANKS! How did I not see that?! I think rasp app is what I need. My OFM works very slow on my university network. I was able to open the web interface but took >5 minutes to connect and it was not displaying the microscope image. I was only able to see the web interface.
I am planning to start with a couple of students and then expand to the whole class (about 30 students). Another idea I have is to use it in our annual show and tell fair. Is easier to carry an iPad than a computer monitor.
I like the idea of having a strip down web interface .Perhaps one view only version and another with minimal controls to just move and focus the slide. Also, adding touch buttons to move the slide around instead of entering the numbers?
Thanks!
Dan

On my network there is only a second or so delay normally. It means you cannot see the action during autofocus, but otherwise it is OK.
With only touch on the web interface you should still be able to do the click-to-move if the camera stage calibration has been run. (currently click-to-move does not work on mine, not sure why). It would be great to have a gesture or button for z-motion.
At a show you could attach a SNES controller to the Pi for the motion control, and just show the view on a phone or tablet.

I installed the rasp-app and followed the instructions. THIS IS SO PERFECT!!!
The OFM is broadcasting to my iPad and Mac

image0.jpeg

2 Likes

I would also suggest that you ask the students (in a web browser, I’ve tried it in Firefox and Chrome) to go to:

http://microscope:5000/api/v2/streams/mjpeg

This will give them a live video stream from the microscope, but without the control interface.

It works!!! This is awesome. Thanks.

1 Like

Well done :slight_smile: We should figure out a neat way to make this easy to enable on OpenFlexure Raspbian images with minimal extra work.

Just in case it saves you some last minute panic, beware relying on WiFi at a big event; my experience is that there’s a critical number of people with smartphones etc. in a room beyond which WiFi gets very painful. A USB ethernet adapter becomes really nice at that point! Failing that, a 5Ghz access point, in “hidden” mode, will work much better than just broadcasting using RaspAP - particularly if said access point is connected to the Pi with a cable. This is based on my experience at a couple of (massive, i.e. thousands of people) trade shows, your mileage may vary!

1 Like