Netgate SG-3100 LEDs

wgstarks

@wgstarks It would be great if the lights could serve 2 purposes:
(1) show boot status during a power-on or reboot (like they do now)
(2) show network activity on 3 network segments the rest of the time (WAN, LAN, OPT1)

If #2 was implemented, a glance at the firewall would tell us a lot about what's going on. It would be greatly appreciated.

This isn’t my code. It was provided by @msf2000.

msf2000

@dpasadis

You could install the "ShellCmd" package and have the LED script run on bootup, if you'd like.
Just rotate the device 180 degrees, and you'll see the network traffic. ;)

The script I wrote was more for users to see that the firewall is working, instead of power-cycling the pfsense unnecessarily when their internet is slow.

dpasadis

Thanks msf2000. I appreciate your contribution.

I like your first suggestion (and your second for different reasons).

I've done a lot of work on operating systems, including Unix/Linux, so I might be able to figure out #1 without spending a crazy amount of time on it. If I get a good result, I'll share it here.

Mr_AJ

Cool thread!

z4xh

I wrote some more comprehensive documentation on my blog, which explains the timings in more depth. https://www.zacharyschneider.ca/blog/post/2019/12/customizing-leds-netgate-sg-3100

Hope it helps!

jchonchi

I took some of the information in this article and wrote a script that sets the LED colors based on network interface state and bandwidth usage.

KnowbuddyYuno

@jchonchi Sounds useful. Does the script work as intended?

I'm a complete moron when it comes to coding, so my risk tolerance is near zero.

styxl

@jchonchi i am using the script, works like charm. Thanks

jchonig

Very helpful thread.

I re-wrote msf2000s script as a sh script and generalized it a bit.

I use the left (circult) and middle (square) LEDs to monitor my two WAN connections.

I also toned it down a bit so I don't need sunblock.

You can find it here

bldnightowl

@msf2000 This was working for a long time in 2.4.5 -- but doesn't seem to anymore in 21.02.

wgstarks

@bldnightowl said in Netgate SG-3100 LEDs:

@msf2000 This was working for a long time in 2.4.5 -- but doesn't seem to anymore in 21.02.

After reading the release notes I’m guessing this is the reason-


Several abandoned and deprecated packages have been removed, including:

OpenBGPD (use FRR instead)
Quagga OSPF (use FRR instead)
routed
blinkled
gwled

msf2000

@bldnightowl
What the crap is NetGate doing with version numbers? Breaking their own products? I don't plan to update past 2.4.5. Guess I'll read up on what's going on later.

As for my script, sorry, you are probably on your own if you upgrade to v21.

z4xh

@bldnightowl Check that you're using the right GPIO device:

sysctl dev.gpio | grep .led.

When I upgraded to 21.02/2.5, the GPIO device changed from 0 to 2 on my SG-3100.

@wgstarks The blinkled and gwled packages aren't needed for the SG-3100 LED driver, those are for controlling the LEDs on ALIX and WRAP platforms.

jchonig

@z4xh What is the relationship between the output of that command to the numbers I provide to gpioctl? I'll update my script to make use of that and test it on 2.4.5 while they figure out the issues with 21.02.

Thanks.

Jeff

z4xh

@jchonig This github commit explains it best: https://github.com/justdaniel-gh/sg3100customleds/commit/ddbf412cb1cf3ba32160972e2177c356611ff57f

jimp

The probe order of the GPIO devices changed in the newer version of FreeBSD since more of the on-board devices are supported now. It wasn't intentionally moved or anything.

stephenw10

Yes, it looks like the script doesn't set the gpio device so it defaults to using device 0 which is no longer valid. You need to set gpioctl to use /dev/gpioc2, for example:

/usr/sbin/gpioctl -f /dev/gpioc2 6 duty 0

Steve

jchonig

I've updated my script and put it in a git repo. I'm still only running it on 2.4.5 until 21.02 is stable on the SG-3100.

jchonig

I've updated my script for the gatewaystatus returned by pfSense+ 21.05 and to allow the specification of the gateways to monitor on the command line. It's no longer necessary to edit the script.

In my case the cron command looks like:

/root/gw_leds -v -a WAN_OTTC_DHCP -b WAN_EA_DHCP

Which means that LED a (left-most) monitors WAN_OTTC_DHCP gateway and LED b (middle) monitor WAN_EA_DHCP gateway.

jchonig

I bit more hacking on the script today.

I made it more modular.

I disable PWM mode on any LEDs we are using which disables the slow blink. Maybe I should make that configurable.

I also added -A, -B and -C options to set a fixed color for a given LED give a list of 3 comma-separated numbers. Mostly for testing.

Off to do non-computer stuff on a Saturday.