rpi-geiger-counter: A JavaScript repository from tom-2015

*******************************************************
*USB Geiger counter software for Raspberry Pi / Linux *
*http://radioactivity.dfzone.be/ *
*******************************************************

Use this software to automatically upload data from your
USB geiger counter to a website or Mysql database

Installation:

1. Attach your counter to the USB port of your Raspberry
and turn the power on.

2. Install some required libs and programs:
For running the binary:
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install curl libcurl4-openssl-dev libmysqlclient-dev libudev-dev make libusb-dev
For compiling you need:
sudo apt-get install libcurl4-openssl-dev default-libmysqlclient-dev libudev-dev libusb-dev

on some new Raspbian version libmysqlclient-dev is named default-libmysqlclient-dev

3. Now you can clone and compile the code:
git clone https://github.com/tom-2015/rpi-geiger-counter.git
cd rpi-geiger-counter
make

*The following steps are only needed if you want to automatically upload the
*number of counts measured to our website.

4. Create account and add a counter.
Go to radioactivity.dfzone.be and create an account.
Log in to your account and hover your user name in the navigation bar
you should see a drop down menu item called 'my counters', click it.
Here you click 'Add new counter', provide the needed information and click the save button.
A counter ID will now be displayed at the top of the page (copy it).

5. Edit configuration:
cd bin
nano geiger.conf

6. In the configuration file you fill in the counter id and counter password from
step 4 after http_counter_id=<your id here> and http_counter_password=<your password>
Also enable the http_client: http_upload_enabled=1

If you want the device on https://www.uradmonitor.com/:
Create an account and enter the urad details below [urad_monitor_client]
urad_client_enabled = 1
urad_user_id=
urad_user_key=
The urad_user_id and urad_user_key can be obtained from the uradmonitor site, first create account.
Then login and got to dashboard, API there it shows user-id and user-key.

7. Exit nano (with CTR+X) and type Y, hit enter to save the data

8. Now you can make the program executable and run it:
sudo chmod 777 geiger.elf
sudo ./geiger.elf

you should see something like this on the console:

Automatic USB Geiger counter logger V3.
Loading configuration file geiger.conf.
Hit any key to exit this program.
Connected to device:
USB Geiger Counter
-path: /dev/hidraw0
-vid: 1240
-pid: 12
start polling of data...

after about 10 minutes you should see data uploaded to your account

9. Make the program start automatically when you power on your Raspberry

-If your Raspberry pi boots to desktop you can create a desktop entry for it:
cd ~
cd .config
cd autostart
sudo nano geiger_counter.desktop

Enter the following text:
[Desktop Entry]
Encoding=UTF-8
Type=Application
Name=geiger_counter
Comment=
Exec=sudo <enter path to the geiger.elf executable here>
StartupNotify=false
Terminal=false
Hidden=false

CTRL+X and choose Y to save

-If your Raspberry boots to command line you can create a daemon script like this:
copy the daemon.sh from the directory of this readme file to /etc/init.d:
sudo cp daemon.sh /ect/init.d/geigercounter

edit the the file you copied
sudo nano /etc/init.d/geigercounter

Find text "DAEMON=<place path to geiger.elf executable here>"
Replace it with the location of the geiger.elf file in the bin directory.
For example:
DAEMON=/home/pi/rpi-geiger-counter/bin/geiger.elf
Ctrl+X to close nano and save changes.

Now you update the daemon to auto start:
update-rc.d /etc/init.d/geigercounter defaults 90

*******************************************************
*HTTP Server *
*******************************************************

This options enables an internal web server for easy visualising
the measured 'radiation' in a web browser. Set enable_http_server
to 1 to enable it.

enable_http_server = 1
http_server_port = 79
http_www_dir = www
http_www_enabled = 1

if http_www_enabled pages from the http_www_dir will be served
automatically. If you don't have apache running you can change
the http_server_port to 80.
By default the webserver will display the last packet as json
data on: http://localhost:79/json

*******************************************************
*Saving to MYSQL *
*******************************************************

You can save the measured samples to your MYSQL database.
See the MYSQL section in the geiger.conf file.

[mysql]
mysql_upload_enabled = 0
mysql_host = localhost
mysql_user = root
mysql_password =
mysql_db =
mysql_table =
mysql_insert_query = INSERT INTO %t (`start_time`, `end_time`, `duration`, `counts`) VALUES (FROM_UNIXTIME(%s), FROM_UNIXTIME(%e), %d, %c);

To enable set mysql_upload_enabled=1 and fill in your MYSQL
host, user name, password, database (db), table and query.
In the query you can use the following variables:
%t mysql_table name
%s start time (UTC)
%s stop time
%c number of counts detected in that period.

*******************************************************
*Saving to text files *
*******************************************************

Use this option if you want to save the samples into a text
file. Every 300 seconds a text file will be generated with
the number of counts measured in that period. The period
can be adjusted by changing the 'interval=300' line.
Note: If you want to upload the measured data to our website
please do not change the interval!

You can enable it in the geiger.conf file:
[text]
text_dir=/dev/shm
text_enabled=1
#text_exec_cmd=

Change the directory to save the text files (text_dir). The files
have a name like gc_*.txt where * is an incrementing number for each
file saved. The content of each file will look like this:
start=<timestamp>
stop=<timestamp>
counts=<nr of counts>

Don't forget to set text_enabled=1.

Optional you can enter a command to be executed every time a file
is saved with 'text_exec_cmd='. At the end of this command the
path to the saved file will be added automatically.

*******************************************************
*Command line options *
*******************************************************

-Test the connection to your counter with:
sudo ./geiger.elf -r

This should print something like:
Counts: 22465
Time counting: 262933s
Pulse width: 76µs
Threshold: 65µs
Tube voltage: 424V
ADC cal value: 1000000
DCDC duty cycle: 3158
Watchdog events: 0
Errors: 0

-Read info every second and display in the terminal:
sudo ./geiger.elf -r -c -cls

-Calibrate the measured voltage / ADC
sudo ./geiger.elf -adc <val>

If the measured voltage on the counter tube is not accurate
enough you can save a calibration factor in the EEPROM of
you counter. To do so you should measure the exact value
with a volt meter and calculate a factor the measured ADC
value must be multiplied with. For example if you measure
450V and the software says it's 460V the factor is
450/460 = 0.978260 Multiply this with 1000000, this gives
978260. Execute sudo ./geiger.elf -adc 978260
To save the value in the EEPROM of the counter do:
sudo ./geiger.elf -save

-Set threshold value
sets the threshold value, this is the minimum pulse time
coming out of the tube before the counter will register it as
a 'count'.
sudo ./geiger.elf -thres <threshold in µs>

-Full reset of the counter PIC micro controller
sudo ./geiger.elf -reset

-Reset only the counter value
sudo ./geiger.elf -clear

-Disable internal voltage regulation (do this before using -pwm)
sudo ./geiger.elf -autopwm 0

-Adjust the output voltage on the counter tube by changing the
PWM duty cycle value
sudo ./geiger.elf -pwm <value>
value goes from 0 to 3195 and will change the output voltage

-Read firmware version
sudo ./geiger.elf -sw

-Reset settings to default values
sudo ./geiger.elf -default