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else wer

Raspberry Pi (native)

else-wer is a single native binary, so it doesn’t need Docker. On a Raspberry Pi, down to a Pi Zero 2 W, it runs as a cross-compiled arm64 binary under systemd.

What you need

Section titled “What you need”
  • A Raspberry Pi running a 64-bit OS, reachable over key-based ssh
  • A clone of the else-wer-server repo on another machine, with cross installed
  • A drive for your audiobook library, mounted on the Pi

Every command below is a target in the repo’s root Makefile, run from that machine.

Configure

Section titled “Configure”

Copy .deploy.env.example to .deploy.env in the repo root and fill in:

Setting What it is
PI_HOST, PI_USER, PI_HOME How to reach the Pi over ssh, and the user’s home directory
PI_LIBRARY_MOUNT Where the library drive is mounted on the Pi
PI_LIBRARY_UUID The drive’s filesystem UUID, from blkid (optional)

One-time setup

Section titled “One-time setup”
Terminal window
make pi-install-unit   # systemd unit; refuses to run without the library drive mounted
make pi-install-udev   # remounts the library drive after a USB drop (skipped without PI_LIBRARY_UUID)
make pi-env            # seeds the Pi's ~/.env from deploy/pi/.env (or .env.example); never overwrites

deploy/pi/.env is your local, gitignored copy of the Pi’s settings. The Pi reads ~/.env and has no git checkout, so updating the repo never touches its config.

Deploy and update

Section titled “Deploy and update”
Terminal window
make pi-deploy         # builds and ships the server binary and web app, restarts the service
make pi-status         # service status
make pi-logs           # service logs

Run make pi-deploy again whenever you want to update.

Passwordless sudo for the service

Section titled “Passwordless sudo for the service”

The deploy targets run sudo systemctl ... over key-only ssh. If the Pi user needs a password for sudo, they hang waiting for a prompt. To fix it, add a scoped rule on the Pi as root with visudo -f /etc/sudoers.d/else-wer (adjust the user name):

pi ALL=(ALL) NOPASSWD: /usr/bin/systemctl stop else-wer.service, /usr/bin/systemctl start else-wer.service, /usr/bin/systemctl enable else-wer.service, /usr/bin/systemctl daemon-reload

Recovering the library drive

Section titled “Recovering the library drive”

If the drive drops and doesn’t come back, mdr.sh mounts the first USB disk at $MOUNTPOINT (default /home/pi/drv).