jprochazka/adsb-receiver

Create your own ADS-B receiver and web portal.

The ADS-B Receiver Project ✈️

Run ADS-B/UAT/ACARS related applications without the overhead!

This project continues to realize that for some, Docker and premade images are not the most optimal solution.

It would seem as of late the move towards premade as well as Docker and other PaaS images with preinstalled software has become popular within the community. Docker images require additional software and in some cases result in additional overhead when running. Most of these solutions also come with preinstalled software one may never use as part of the image as well. This project offers the ability to choose and install only what you want or need natively across a wide range of devices with minimal command line experience.

Obtaining And Using This Software

Manual installations...

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install git
git clone https://github.com/jprochazka/adsb-receiver
cd ~/adsb-receiver
chmod +x install.sh
./install.sh

Updating existing installations...

Your local repositories master branch will be updated each time install.sh is executed that is unless either the --development or --branch <branch> switch is used. Unless you are testing an upcoming release or wishing to contribute to the project you will generally not need to use either of these switches.

cd ~/adsb-receiver
./install.sh

What Can Be Installed

The following software can be installed using these scripts.

The ADS-B Portal

Included is the option to install the ADS-B Portal which offers the following features.

• Saves all flights seen as well as displays a plot for the flight.
• Saves all ACARS messages received as well as the ability to view these messages.
• Control what is displayed online via a web based administration area.
• A more uniform website site layout that can be easily navigated.
• Web accessible dump1090 and system performance graphs.
• Easy access to live dump1090 and dump978 maps.
• A blog which can be used to share your aircraft tracking experiences with others.
• Visitors can be informed when specific flights are being tracked.
• Administrators can be informed via email when specific flights are being tracked.
• Easily customize the look of your portal using the custom template system.

When setting up the portal you will have to choose between a lite or advanced installation. Advanced features add flight logging and plotting and should only be chosen on devices running a sturdy data storage solution.

It is highly recommended that anyone using a SD card as they storage medium not attempt to use the advanced features.

Decoders

• Dump1090 (FlightAware): https://github.com/flightaware/dump1090
• Dump978 (FlightAware): https://github.com/flightaware/dump978
• ACARSDEC: https://github.com/TLeconte/acarsdec

Feeders

• ADS-B Exchange Feeder Client: https://adsbexchange.com
• Airplanes.live Feeder Client: https://airplanes.live
• FlightAware's PiAware: https://flightaware.com
• Flightradar24 Feeder Client: https://flightradar24.com
• Fly Italy ADS-B Feeder Client: https://flyitalyadsb.com
• OpenSky Feeder Client: https://opensky-network.org
• Plane Finder ADS-B Client: https://planefinder.net

Extras

• Beast-Splitter: https://github.com/flightaware/beast-splitter
• DuckDNS.org Support: https://www.duckdns.org

Supported Operating Systems

The project currently supports the following Linux distributions.

• Armbian (Bookworm, Jammy and Noble)
• Debian (Bookworm and Bullseye)
• DietPi (Bookworm and Bullseye)
• Raspberry PI OS (Bookworm and Bullseye)
• Ubuntu (Jammy Jellyfish, Focal Fossa and Noble Numbat)

Support is available via this repository through the use of the issue tracker or discussions.

Please Note that Ubuntu Noble Numbat support employs an unofficial fix for PiAware.

adsb-receiver's Issues

PiAware will not build on Ubuntu 24.04.

NOTE: This issue affects any release using Python 3.12 or greater not just Nobel.

The PiAware build halts with the following error when trying to build the PiAware package.

  File "/home/joe/adsb-receiver/build/piaware_builder/package-bookworm/debian/venv/lib/python3.12/site-packages/cx_Freeze/finder.py", line 33, in <module>
    IMPORT_STAR = opcode.opmap["IMPORT_STAR"]
                  ~~~~~~~~~~~~^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
KeyError: 'IMPORT_STAR'

It would appear that cx_Freeze does not support Paython 3.12 which is the version of Python installed on Ubuntu Noble Numbat or the Ubuntu team has not yet updated things on their end. A fix for this issue appears to be available from the cx_Freeze developers but at this time the newer release supporting Python 3.12 is not available via the Ubuntu package repositories. I have been trying to implement a fix located in the following post from the cx_Freeze issue tracker using pipx and pip in a venv with no joy.

marcelotduarte/cx_Freeze#2153

Needless to say, the workaround is getting a bit more complicated than I would like it as far as this project is concerned. I am thinking that Noble Numbat support will need to be put on hold until a more permanent and stable solution is found.

Update:

After reading a post by @abcd567a on the FlightAware forums and looking through the bash scripts he kindly offered up to the community I found that it is possible to build PiAware on Nobel but it entails ditching MLAT functionality. IMO this is still a no go and until FlightAware team finds a fix or better yet the Ubuntu team gets on top updating cx_Freeze if it is in fact at a stable stage, Nobel support is still a no go unless anyone else has any ideas.

Update Two:

PiAware's MLAT code is using the asyncore module which was deprecated in version 3.6 and announced for removal in version 3.12 at the time of its release. Until the software is updated to use asyncio which is recommended in the Python documentation or some other solution it appears PiAware with MLAT support installations on systems using Python 3.12+ will not be possible.

https://peps.python.org/pep-0594/#asyncore

The dump1090 max range graph is not being generated.

The dump1090 max range graph which is part of the portal is not being generated. After looking into the issue on a live receiver it would appear that the rrd database is not being created at this time.

Add the ability to install wiedehopf's fork of Readsb.

Add an option to build and install the Readsb fork @wiedehopf is currently maintaining as an additonal Mode-S/ADSB/TIS decoder option.

https://github.com/wiedehopf/readsb

The collectd package might not be a part of Debian Trixie?

@abcd567a made a post in the FlightAware forum pointing out that the collectd package is not currently available as a Debian Trixie package. It should be noted that this could be nothing being Trixie is still at about a year away by my math.

Debian is basically on a once every two years release cycle, so I am guessing we have a bit of time to figure out if a collectd package will be a part of Debian Trixie. Either way, it might be a good idea to get a head start and look for an alternative to collectd. It should be noted that Ubuntu still lists collectd as an available package for Oracular Oriole. I would think this bodes well for the prospects of seeing collectd as part of Debian Trixie. The collectd project is defiantly not one which has been abandoned or unmaintained.

Replacement of the dated 90's slash 00's style MRTG graphs still remain a priority once the new portal at least mimics the current portals functionality. It might be a good time to look into another solution for data collection as well if one exists just in case.

Plane Finder client does not install properly on aarch62.

The armhf Plane Finder client package fails to install reporting it is missing the libc6 package when being installed on systems based on the aarch64 architecture such as what the Raspberry Pi 4 is based on.

PiAware will not build and MySQL setup fails on Ubuntu Focal Fossa

PiAware will not build on Focal Fossa due to the fact that the package python3-build package does not exist. This package needs to be replaced by python3-dev when installing or upgrading on Focal Fossa. Also, the distro for which piaware_builder is instructed to build the package needs to be set to buster in order to build with the proper version of Python.

The portal installation script is unable to log into the MySQL server in order to setup the portal database. To fix this mysql commands must be executed using sudo.

Add option to Install the ADS-B Exchange stats package.

The ability to add the optional ADS-B Exchange stats package should be made available. The stats package allows for an online map that shows only planes received by the receiver it has been installed on. The following commands are supplied on the ADS-B Exchange website which set up the stats package.

curl -L -o /tmp/axstats.sh https://adsbexchange.com/stats.sh

sudo bash /tmp/axstats.sh

The default theme is not utilizing navigation options.

The navigation options being set in the administration section of the portal are not being taken into account when it comes to what is to be shown in the navigation bar. One possible problem may be the fact that the value for each of these are being set to null in settings.xml when they are unchecked and then saved.

It should be noted that this issue is only encountered with lite installs. I am guessing it has to do with XML data not being properly converted to booleans? This issue may be affecting other boolean type options as well.

Multiple instances of flights.py and maintenance.py are started.

When the portal including advanced features is installed multiple instances of both flights.py and maintenance.py are being started by crontab.

PiAware will not build on Jammy Jellyfish.

PiAware will not build on Jammy Jellyfish due to the fact that piaware_builder needs to be instructed to build the package as it would for Debian Bullseye in order to build with the proper version of Python.

Ask if the ADS-B Exchange web interface should be installed.

The ADS-B Exchange install script informs users that they can install a web interface after setup has been completed. The interface appears to be tar1090 which could become a separate install option. If it is decided that it should be installed as part of the ADS-B Exchange setup a dialog offering the option to execute the install script which is made present locally during the installation process might be a welcome addition.

/usr/local/share/adsbexchange/git/install-or-update-interface.sh

The core temperature graph is missing from the system graphs.

The core temperature graph under system graphs is not being generated. While researching the issue it was discovered that CPU temperature data is stored in a different rrd database than in the past. The script using collectd to generate the graphs needs to be modified in order to utilize the proper rrd database when generating these graphs.

The portals plot page displaying a PHP error and failing to load maps.

When loading the portals plot page to view data on a specific flight the following PHP error is displayed along with the Google Maps failing to load.

Warning: Trying to access array offset on value of type bool in <b>/var/www/html/classes/common.class.php on line 101