# AltOS

AltOS is the name of Keith's firmware "operating system" for 
[TeleMetrum](../TeleMetrum/) and [TeleDongle](../TeleDongle/).

In addition to the firmware for [TeleMetrum](../TeleMetrum) and 
[TeleDongle](../TeleDongle) boards, the AltOS source tree also includes a
number of utilities useful for monitoring and logging telemetry during flight,
post-processing flight data for analysis, and utilities for updating firmware,
and developing and debugging new functionality.  The first generation of these
utilities were Linux-only, but our current second-generation software written
largely in [Java](http://java.com) with a small platform-specific library 
works identically on Windows, Mac, and Linux systems!

## Features ##

### User View ###

More documentation is coming soon, but in the meantime, 
most operations in the second-generation GUI are pretty easy to figure out.

### Developer View ###

* The firmware and associated software are licensed [GPL version 2](http://www.gnu.org/licenses/old-licenses/gpl-2.0.html)

## Artifacts ##

The source is available from [git.gag.com](http://git.gag.com) in the project 
[fw/altos](http://git.gag.com/?p=fw/altos;a=summary).  

### Pre-Built Binary Packages by Platform ###

#### Linux ####

If you use [Debian](http://www.debian.org), then a pre-built package for 
32-bit x86 is currently available here:

	wget -O - http://altusmetrum.org/apt/altusmetrum.key | apt-key add -
	wget -O /etc/apt/sources.list.d/altos.list http://altusmetrum.org/apt/altos.list
	apt-get update
	apt-get install altos

If you use some other distribution of Linux, then 
a [Linux package](releases/current/Altos-Linux.tgz) of our 
second-generation Java bits that 
should run on any distribution with a modern Java version is also 
available.  Unlike the Debian pacakge, which depends on various libraries
already part of the Debian distribution, this package includes a "fat" jar
file with all of the Java libraries that aren't part of the basic Java runtime
environment included, so it should "just work" on any system with 
Java 6.  Development and testing is done with OpenJDK 6, but current 
downloads from [java.com](http://java.com) should be fine too.

If you'd rather build from source, our source tree includes documentation on 
how to build packages for various
Linux systems such as [Arch Linux](http://www.archlinux.org), and the 
debian/ directory contains all the control
files for building the Debian packages on other architectures or derivatives
such as [Ubuntu](http://ubuntu.com).

Bdale has also created a theme for 
[GDM](http://projects.gnome.org/gdm/) that he uses on his primary notebook,
and the 
[Simple Login Manager](http://slim.berlios.de/) that he uses on all of his
other machines and which is ideally suited for machines dedicated to AltOS 
ground station use.  It includes a photo of a drag-race between 
nearly-identical rockets
built by Keith and Bdale, that was the first time either of us gave TeleMetrum
complete control of a rocket flight without some other backup!  See the themes/
directory in the source tree (the themes are included in the Debian package).

### Mac ###

A [Mac OS X package](releases/current/Altos-Mac.zip) that is compatible with 
versions 10.5 "Leopard" and later (including 10.6 "Snow Leopard") is now 
available.  The Mac operating system includes Java, and all Altus Metrum
products show up as simple USB serial ports, so this should just work
with no additional drivers or other dependency issues.  Older versions of 
the Mac operating system come with Java versions that are too old for use 
with Altus Metrum software, and we know of no way to update the Java version
other than upgrading to a newer operating system.

### Windows ###

Our [Windows package](releases/current/Altos-Windows.zip) is 
known to work on XP and 
32-bit Windows 7 Enterprise.  If you don't already have Java installed, 
download and install a current Java 6 version from [java.com](http://java.com)
first.  Then download our zip and extract the files.  Windows already has 
the required USB serial device driver, but you will probably need to manually
point to the telemetrum.inf file included in the download when you first plug 
in an Altus Metrum device to "train" Windows to know that it's ok to use the 
existing driver to support our products.  Once that's taken care of, just
clicking on the 'altosui' program should work to launch the user interface.
Reports of success or failure with other versions of Windows would be 
appreciated!

### Available Versions ###

- 0.7.1
	- [Windows Installer](releases/0.7.1/Altos-Windows.exe)
	- [Mac OS X Package](releases/0.7.1/Altos-Mac.zip)
	- [Linux](releases/0.7.1/Altos-Linux.tgz)
	- [Source Snapshot](http://git.gag.com/?p=fw/altos;a=snapshot;h=refs/tags/0.7.1;sf=tgz)

- old
	- [Windows Installer](releases/old/Altos-Windows.exe)
	- [Mac OS X Package](releases/old/Altos-Mac.zip)
	- [Linux](releases/old/Altos-Linux.tgz)