App Update

Learn how to update an application binary on a remote device using Bytebeam cloud with this comprehensive guide. It covers essential steps such as setting the application path, incorporating the application into systemd, and creating an update tar file. I

This guide talks about how to update an application binary of the remote device from the Bytebeam cloud. App update replaces the existing binary on the system with the binary uploaded on the Bytebeam cloud. We have provided an example application on our Github page. There are four files in the example.

• hello_app - Prints “Hello from Bytebeam” every 3 seconds.
• app_update.sh - This script replaces the old application with new application.
• update.sh - This is a wrapper script for app_update.sh script.
• make_firmware_update.sh - It creates the update tar file.

Step1: Prepare update tar

Firstly on your Linux system, we need to create an update tar file for Raspberry Pi. For that, Download all the files mentioned above from GitHub. Next, we need to change the permissions for all these files using chmod command

chmod a+x hello_app
chmod a+x app_update.sh
chmod a+x update.sh
chmod a+x make_firmware_update.sh 

Next run make_firmware_update.sh to create a tar.gz file.

./make_firmware_update.sh

Step 2: upload update Tar

Next, we need to upload the tar to bytebeam cloud. For that go to device management panel and click on the Firmware Versions tab.

Under the Firmware version tab, you will find an option to create a firmware version number and upload your updated tar file.

Enter the new Firmware version number and click on choose file to upload tar file. Then click on Create.

Step 3: Set the application path

In step 1 we have already assumed that you want to update** the hello_app** that exists on your remote device and we created an update tar accordingly. On the remote device, the app is expected to be in /usr/local/bin location. If it’s not there then create a new hello_app in /usr/local/bin.

#!/bin/bash

while [ 1 ]
        do
                sleep 3
                echo "Hi from Bytebeam"
        done

If the application location and app name are different, set the path in app_update.sh script in Step 1.

APP_NAME=hello_app
APP_BIN_PATH=/usr/local/bin

Step 4: Create systemctl service to debug update changes

To debug your changes after the app update, Let’s create a service that runs hello_app. So, create this service named <App Name>.service and place it in /etc/systemd/system.

[Unit]
Description=Simple Application service
After=network.target auditd.service

[Service]
ExecStart=/usr/bin/bash /usr/local/bin/hello_app
KillMode=process
Restart=on-failure
Type=simple

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

Reload systemctl daemon and start the service.

sudo systemctl daemon-reload 
sudo systemctl enable hello_app.service
sudo systemctl start hello_app  

Step 5: Trigger “update firmware” action from bytebeam cloud

Now let’s proceed with our OTA update. For that, Go to the Device Management panel and select the device

Next, Click on the update firmware

In the next prompt choose the firmware version and click on next

Monitor the progress of firmware updates in the action panel. and on your remote device, you can see updated hello_app

Update uplink

Using these steps we can update the uplink as well.

Steps to follow

Step 1: In the example, replace the hello_app with the uplink binary.

Step 2: Change the uplink path and application name in app_update.sh

Step 3: Run make_firmware_update.sh.

Step 4: Upload the generated update tar file to Bytebeam cloud.