Under active development. Breaking changes expected. APIs, installers, and UI may shift between releases.
One command. Paired ground station.
The install script turns a fresh Linux SBC into a working ground station. The captive portal handles first-boot pairing. The Hardware tab in Mission Control handles everything after.
Install
One line. Five minutes.
SSH into the SBC or open a terminal on the device directly. The installer auto-detects the board, installs dependencies, writes systemd units, and picks the right profile.
curl -fsSL https://install.altnautica.com | sudo bash -s -- --pair YOUR_PAIR_KEYSupports Raspberry Pi OS, Ubuntu 22.04 and 24.04, Armbian, and Debian 12 on ARM64. Hardware fingerprint picks the ground-station profile on boards without a flight controller.
First Boot
Five steps. No laptop required.
The captive portal runs on the ground node. You need a phone, the case passphrase, and about two minutes.
1
Power on
Fresh SBC with the image flashed. First boot takes under 60 seconds.
2
AP comes up
SSID ADOS-GS-XXXX with the passphrase printed on the case. Random 10 characters per unit.
3
Phone joins the AP
Captive portal auto-opens on Android, iOS, macOS, Windows. Probes generate_204 and lands on setup.ados.local.
4
Six-page setup
Pair, network, display, radio, advanced, done. One topic per page, skip the ones you do not need.
5
Handoff
Final page links to the local Mission Control build or the cloud-hosted GCS. You are flying.
Pair with the drone
One key on both sides.
The air unit and the ground node share a pair key. Once paired, they share a WFB-ng channel, a session key, and a link.
If you ran the installer with --pair YOUR_PAIR_KEY, the ground node is already paired. If not, enter the key on the captive portal pair page. The portal also accepts a QR scan. After pair, the node writes the WFB-ng session key, sets the channel on both sides, and brings up wfb_rx. The first frame arrives in under ten seconds.
Key rotation is a two-minute task. Long-press B3 on the OLED menu to trigger rotation on the ground node. The air unit receives the new key over the same WFB-ng channel. No cable swap, no re-pair.
Day Two
The Hardware tab in Mission Control.
Eight sub-views, one per topic. Live updates over WebSocket. Every config that is in the setup webapp is also here, plus more.
Overview
Agent version, profile, uptime, CPU, RAM, temp, storage.
Network
AP controls, WiFi client scan, Ethernet, 4G modem, uplink priority, failover events.
WFB-ng Radio
Channel, bitrate, FEC profile, RSSI live, session key rotation.
Physical UI
OLED status mirror, button remap, brightness, screensaver timing.
Storage
Recording files, log archive, free space, retention policy.
Distributed RX
Role selector, relay list, FEC-repair counts, one-click receiver promotion.
Mesh
batman-adv neighbors, TQ metrics, gateway election status, mesh ID, leave mesh.
Peripherals
USB devices, Bluetooth gamepads, HDMI kiosk status, 4G modem device.
The Hardware tab lives in the open-source Mission Control at github.com/altnautica/ADOSMissionControl. Same code, same license.
Factory Reset
Two ways to start fresh.
Both paths clear the pair key, WiFi client profiles, mesh state, and recorded files. The agent binary itself stays installed.
OLED + B4
Hold B4 for ten seconds. OLED shows a confirm screen. Tap B1 to confirm, B4 to cancel. Takes about 20 seconds total.
Mission Control Hardware tab
Hardware tab, Advanced section, Factory reset button. Typed phrase confirm prevents accidents. Same effect as the OLED path.
Install. Pair. Fly.
Installation walkthrough, troubleshooting, and factory-reset procedures all live in public docs.
Installation docs