Having installed Pedal is not easy. Having to install firmware on Pedal isn’t exactly something I would describe as “fun” either.

IMPORTANT: This is only needed if you already have Pedal installed in your vehicle and are running v0.5.10+ of Openpilot. For initial USB flashing of Pedal before it is installed, follow my guide below.

Comma Pedal: Flashing the Firmware

Considering I’m constantly working to build tools to make things easier, it’s no question that when Comma requests we update our Pedal firmware to remain compatible in v0.5.10 then I must find a solution to making that as easy as possible as well.

I will detail the “manual” way for the do’ers and go’getters out there. This is the method that is proposed internally by Comma staff (that are smarter than I am, and also I’m not Comma staff).

Connect EON to Vehicle

This type of update only works when Pedal and all other devices have power and are already installed with the network cable and receiving CAN signals.
If you’re in a Toyota / Honda Bosch that requires external power before the vehicle starts, you will need to have the vehicle running. Your vehicle will throw errors, that is normal. It’ll go away once you’ve patched your Pedal.

For my 2017 Honda Pilot, however, I did not need to have the vehicle running as all my devices are powered by the vehicle by default.

Once you’re sure everything has power, continue on.

Connect to EON via SSH

First we need to SSH into our EON with Workbench or via Terminal. When doing this in a vehicle, wifi may not be easily accessible so you will either need to be near WiFi or have both your laptop and EON connected to your personal hotspot.

If you’ve never done this before, checkout my guide on the subject or try your luck with my desktop app known as Workbench that aims to make it a breeze.

Comma EON: Getting Connected with SSH

Update Openpilot to v0.5.10+

We then need to proceed to update our Openpilot version to ensure we’re using the latest version (or a version greater than v0.5.10). If you’re on the release build, you should be updated automatically and are probably here because your car is having a shit about itself right about now.

If you’re not running release, then update with the following or clone a fresh version of Openpilot from commaai/openpilot:

cd /data/openpilot && git pull origin master

I’m not sure if this is required but I do it for good measure if you updated so everything is fresh.

reboot

Flash the Comma Pedal over CAN

Now that your EON is back up and your vehicle dash is full of errors…

We’re going to SSH back in if you rebooted above.

TIP: If you’re using Workbench v0.1.5+ you can run the rest of this guide via the built-in command. Scroll-down to see those instructions.

We need to start by making sure all Openpilot processes are dead.
The way I did this was with the following command:

tmux kill-session -t comma

This terminates a special shell session that was used to run all the Openpilot processes, in turn by terminating this we’re terminating all of it.

Now we need to flash the firmware.
Luckily there is a command for that too.

Let’s change into the pedal directory for clarity's sake.

cd /data/openpilot/panda/board/pedal

Now we run one more command to flash it.

PYTHONPATH=/data/openpilot && make

You should get some positive reinforcement and successful responses from this command.

Shut off Vehicle and Reboot EON

Now that you’ve flashed the Pedal successfully, you will need to turn off your vehicle and reboot EON.

Wait for EON to boot up successfully and then start your vehicle when you see all signs are good on the EON screen.

What to do if things go wrong…

Let’s face it, these guides never go quite as planned for whatever reason… in this case, hopefully one of these will help you.

If you receive No module named panda the following:

Traceback (most recent call last):   File "../../tests/pedal/enter_canloader.py", line 7, in <module>     from panda import Panda ImportError: No module named panda make: *** [Makefile:22: canflash] Error 1

This means that the PYTHONPATH didn’t get set properly.

Ensure you run the command exactly as above with PYTHONPATH=/data/openpilotor optionally you can run it as a separate command with export PYTHONPATH=/data/openpilot and then follow it up with a make while in the/data/openpilot/panda/board/pedal directory.

If you receive CAN: BAD RECV, RETRYING or more specifically the following:

PYTHONPATH=/data/openpilot make ../../tests/pedal/enter_canloader.py obj/comma.bin opening device 07000f800f51363038363036 0xddcc exception LIBUSB_ERROR_BUSY [-6] Traceback (most recent call last):   File "/data/openpilot/panda/python/__init__.py", line 177, in connect     self._handle.claimInterface(0)   File "/usr/local/lib/python2.7/site-packages/usb1.py", line 1162, in claimInterface     libusb1.libusb_claim_interface(self.__handle, interface),   File "/usr/local/lib/python2.7/site-packages/usb1.py", line 121, in mayRaiseUSBError     raiseUSBError(value)   File "/usr/local/lib/python2.7/site-packages/usb1.py", line 117, in raiseUSBError     raise STATUS_TO_EXCEPTION_DICT.get(value, USBError)(value) USBErrorBusy: LIBUSB_ERROR_BUSY [-6] connected 
CAN: BAD RECV, RETRYING 
CAN: BAD RECV, RETRYING 
CAN: BAD RECV, RETRYING 
CAN: BAD RECV, RETRYING 
CAN: BAD RECV, RETRYING 
CAN: BAD RECV, RETRYING 
CAN: BAD RECV, RETRYING

This means that something didn’t kill properly when you ran tmux kill-session -t comma so you will need to try again. I had a problem where running tmux a and then hitting ctrl+c didn’t fully terminate the processes so I had to reboot and try again. I think tmux kill-session -t comma should be more reliable and less destructive than the tmux a and ctrl-c approach.

If something else goes wrong, please connect with the community on Discord in the #hw-pedal channel.

Flashing the Pedal over CAN with Workbench v0.1.5

You can also perform the flashing commands above with Workbench.

Workbench Support: If you experience issues with Workbench, please reach out on the Workbench Discord or report bugs to GitHub Issues

By the time you read this guide, v0.1.5 of Workbench should be up but if it isn’t don’t fret, it’ll be available soon.

You will need the latest version of Workbench or at least v0.1.5+ which you can download below…

jfrux/workbench

If you’ve already downloaded Workbench, ensure you’re running v0.1.5+ when it’s released for your platform. For Workbench support, please connect to Discord and enter the #topic-workbench channel.

Scan and find your EON or add it’s IP manually using the + icon.

Click your EON once it is found.

If you receive the unknown host warning, type Yes in the console and press enter.

Click the Update Pedal Firmware via CAN link on the left…

Read through the notes on the right about the command.

Then press the Run button.

If all goes well, you should see successful messages.

Diving Deeper into Workbench and Openpilot

Preface

So as many of you know, I once wrote an article about Installing a Fork of Openpilot which involved setting up your EON and Computer to connect to it via SSH and jump through hoops anytime you wanted to do any little old thing.

Well that is NO MORE with the release of Workbench.
It doesn’t matter if you’ve setup SSH before, Workbench takes care of it. Even if you’re on a random computer on some random network.

As long as EON is on your network, you can connect to it with Workbench.

IMPORTANT: Your EON needs to have had Openpilot already installed via the Comma install process found here prior to doing this guide.
https://medium.com/@jfrux/comma-eon-initial-setup-with-openpilot-2b5ea58354a

Download Workbench

Grab the latest version of Workbench from https://github.com/jfrux/workbench/releases

jfrux/workbench

Workbench Support

If you experience issues with Workbench, please reach out on the Workbench Discord or report bugs to GitHub Issues

Ensure SSH is enabled on EON

This is required for Workbench to connect successfully and run its commands for you.

Scan for EON with Workbench

If you’re connected to the same network as your EON and your network doesn’t have any real restrictions put in place about device communication, it should detect it really quickly.

If for some reason it doesn’t find it, try closing Workbench and re-opening it. Some have found it fails to find it if you’ve scanned and it failed before. I’ve had mixed experiences as well. If all else fails, close and try again. I’ve found it to be fairly reliable.

EON will show a green checkmark when it has been successfully reached.

Connect to EON

Since the release of Workbench, nobody has to worry about SSH keys, terminals, anymore due to its convenient instant setup of the SSH key, finding EON, and entering commands for you automatically.

If this is a new IP, your computer will still prompt you to add it to Known Hosts by typing in yes in the console.

If all is successful yours should look like the above animation.

Finding Your Fork

Now for the hardest part of the entire guide, don’t worry it’ll be over soon.

Locate the Git URL for the Openpilot fork you would like to use.
For me, this is going to be the great kegman fork which enables better follow distance adjustments for my 2017 Honda Pilot.

So I visit https://github.com/kegman/openpilot and click the clone button to copy the full Git url.

Then, I go back over to Workbench and proceed with the next step.

Install Openpilot

This is where it gets even more fun. Now you don’t have to remember those pesky git commands.

Under Console on the left click on Install Openpilot

A drawer should slide out from the right.

Paste the full Git URL copied from the Clone button on the Github site like above, (it must have the .git) on the end of it. You cannot use just any URL, it must be the one from the animation image above.

Now go back to the Github page, determine the branch you need to install from the Branch list.

You’ll need to type it exactly as it is in this list, or find a place on the Github page to copy it from…

Enter it into the Branch field back inside of the Workbench drawer and then press the blueRun button.

If you did it successfully, you should see that it’s cloning the repo as normal.

Reboot EON with Workbench

After it looks to be completed with the cloning process, simply click on Reboot under Console on the left and press Run.

Your EON should reboot.

Troubleshooting

error: pathspec ‘<branchname>’ did not match any file(s) known to git.

If you receive the above message, check the name of the branch you used and ensure its typed correctly. It is case-sensitive.

Get Help & Support with Workbench

Feel free to reach out with questions & feedback on GitHub Workbench.

Connecting to EON in Seconds!

With Workbench, you don’t even have to think about connecting. Just open, scan and click EON to jump into a shell in seconds.

Never fuss with installing SSH keys, or finding the IP of your EON again!

Workbench Support

If you experience issues with Workbench, please reach out on the Workbench Discord or report bugs to GitHub Issues

Installing Openpilot with Ease!

You no longer need to worry about how to install a fork, or remember those pesky git commands. Workbench remembers for you!

and reboot to boot!

Why? Because we can of course…

Take a screenshot

Ever wanted to show someone something on your EON screen but holding down all the buttons in the world doesn’t land you a nice clean screenshot?

Now you get screenshots delivered directly to your desktop with 2 clicks.

Tmux for free?

You can see the same messages as with tmux a except without the tmux a

Simply click on Log Messages. And… you can toggle the depth, pause the message and freeze it in place, and press play to pick back up where you left off. (and soon(tm), you’ll be navigating through the messages.

Sample CAN data

So what are you waiting for? Download it today!

jfrux/workbench

Just launched this first version to get us started.
Stay tuned and submit feedback on GitHub issues so we can learn more about how you’re using Workbench and how you might like to use it.

Get Help & Support with Openpilot

Feel free to reach out with questions & feedback on the community Discord.
Join the Discussions

❤ jfrux

I know there is a wealth of information available on the Comma Wiki but there are just some things that seem to be overlooked or misunderstood by some users and I want to hopefully help remedy this by getting this article out there.

Chat with Experts of Openpilot on Discord
Feel free to reach out with questions & feedback on the community Discord.
Join the Discussions

The Problem (but not really)

If you’re like me, you probably didn’t put much initial thought into mounting your EON. You probably mounted it initially without thought or question and then you startup EON and OP and start driving, and for one reason or another the EON is not tracking or is pulling to one side, even after “calibration”.

By the way, the calibration step is mainly a safety feature to keep you from engaging openpilot while the car is not tracking lane lines and cars yet. If you ever move your EON it will need some time to realign and calibrate (without hitting Reset Calibration)

After realizing this, they stop driving and end up on the Community Discord server. And other user’s responses have always been “Well it’s probably the yaw, or pitch or your face … “.

And the truth is, more often than not it’s mounted just fine.
Stop worrying, breathe.

It’s fairly common sense and most people understand that it should be as visually straight as possible… that’s kind of the general idea, but the responses in Discord about “Yaw” and “Pitch” cause people to spend days doubting their purchase, as well as doubting themselves and how straight their EON is.

The Solution

Eyeball it and make it as straight on and as perpendicular as you can under your mirror.

Your vehicle’s stock camera is generally centered but not always, so don’t think that’s the best placement or that you should concern yourself with that.

Things you should NOT to try:

• Do NOT get all technical about it. It’s just not necessary. One way to find out if you’re overthinking it is ask yourself:
  “Do I have a ruler, measuring tape, or some other modern sophisticated measuring device in the palm of my hand?”
  If you answer yes to any of those, you’re overthinking it.
• Do NOT try to park your car in a street somewhere to use the lane lines as a guide. The EON will not always track the lane lines when you first get your openpilot running and you can’t friggin’ mount it and watch the lane lines at the same time. This may have been useful at one point, but it’s just a waste and not safe.
• Do NOT SSH into your device and turn on GRIDDED UI. The grid is so dense that you won’t be able to see anything or make any real judgements on things still. This may also have been useful at one point but it’s just not that important now.
  It’s clear as mud. See below.

Things you SHOULD try:

• Do mount the EON on the correct angled bracket for your windshield. I believe Comma provides a 22deg and a 28deg. The correct mount is the one that makes the EON as vertically level to the ground as possible. As perpendicular to the ground as possible. If you were to put a bubble level on it (if you could fit it on top, as center bubbled as possible).

• Do try to get the EON as perpendicular (or square) with the front of your car as much as possible (eyeball it). You’ll just have to use your best judgement and if things look fairly square then you’re good.

• Do get a small roll of 3M VHB double-sided gray tape with red backing. Or comparable. It’s a foam core based double-sided tape that is very strong and heat resistance and doesn’t gunk up like clear alternatives and doesn’t move or jar when you bump it. It’s also easy to remove later with a metal putty knife. http://a.co/gaQx2rM

• Do try to get the EON as parallel with the Earth as possible. You can even carefully use a small bubble level on the top of the EON to get assurance that it’s level. The perpendicular with the car part, (eyeball it) and as center to the window as possible (maybe even slightly left for the inward facing camera to see you.

You should try to get your EON as perpendicular (or square) with the front of your car as much as possible and as parallel with the Earth as possible. You can even carefully use a small bubble level on the top of the EON to get assurance that it’s level. The perpendicular with the car part, you’ll just have to use your best judgement.

My recommendation for mounting tape for the EON is this stuff, or something extremely similar. The reason I say this is that this stuff doesn’t budge and jar the EON when you hit rough road ways. It holds very strong and doesn’t fall off at all or melt in high temps.

3M Scotch 5952 VHB Tape: 1 in. x 15 ft. (Black)

Calibration

Initial calibration most likely will ever only need to be done one time.
After that, as long as your mount position stays the same — OP should be able to see the lane lines and cars just fine.

Go on a long-ish drive

Sometimes it can take awhile for OP to get good at what it does.
It must run your roadways through its machine learning model to get really good and that usually takes like 20–40 miles of express way driving I’ve found. The more you drive, the better it should get in the end.

I highly recommend express way driving for getting openpilot properly calibrated. Don’t try to run OP on backroads and expect it to stay put upon initial calibration.

After mounting EON, give it a few days of commuting / long driving before considering moving it again. Chances are you probably have it right the first time.

After repositioning EON mount

If you move your mount, you shouldn’t need to recalibrate or reset calibration. Just take a nice drive on an express way and ensure openpilot is seeing lane lines and seeing the cars properly before engaging openpilot.

Keep it up and it’ll get better!

That gave me some ideas and I instantly went to work on conceptualizing what I would want in an interface. Since this is kind of my wheelhouse I figured I’d take a shot at sending the Comma team some love and maybe it will inspire them for their next UI. WHO KNOWS!

Openpilot RFCs

I’ve created a repo for maintaining RFCs related to openpilot. These would be formal community-driven requests for comments on possible or existing PR’s on the commaai/openpilot repo.

You can find the new openpilot-rfcs repo here:

jfrux/openpilot-rfcs

It has information on how to contribute a new RFC. Read the README thoroughly before submitting. It’s easy to do and can be done from the GitHub.com interface without any Git knowledge.

Also, all RFC’s merged will be built into the website version of it found here:

Introduction -

Early Design Comps

My idea was to completely remove the concept of an mobile operating system with apps and things and build the UI as if it’s solely bound to this piece of hardware. No outs or exits, just the experience of holding an authentic openpilot device in your hands.

There will be several screens in Figma as the weeks pass but these would be the 3 most commonly used so I’m sharing early versions of them here. See the Figma link at the end for real-time updates.

Connect Eon to Panda

You get in your vehicle, and your screen looks something like so…

You connect EON to Panda, and boom…

Openpilot is ready

The screen transitions and openpilot is ready. Very obvious and clear that it’s ready, not just a small “paired” bubble, it’s now front and center.

You press the ignition button on your car, it fires up and you drive away…

Uploading your drives

Later on, you get connected to wifi and when you have drives to upload … I like to believe it might look a little something like this…

I have so much more to share but I wanted to throw this out there. I get far too excited about this stuff.

Comma and OpenPilot are doing very inspirational things and they inspire me every day. Would definitely love to give back and share my work with them free and open of course.

Feel free to poke around on my Figma link from this session…

Enjoy!

As you may or may not know, the EON is NOT sold with OpenPilot pre-installed. Comma, Inc. does not currently sell a product to drive your car for you. There are steps you must take to install this software on your EON after you first receive it and it’s not entirely straight forward so that’s why I’m writing this simple but hopefully detailed guide to ease the pain.

Chat with Experts of Openpilot on Discord
Feel free to reach out with questions & feedback on the community Discord.
Join the Discussions

Is my vehicle compatible?

You can check to see what vehicle trims are working, and have been tested over on the openpilot database project below.

Where to get an EON Dashcam DevKit

If you don’t already have your very own Comma EON, Giraffe, and Panda visit the all new Comma Shop @ https://comma.ai/shop

Unboxing Your New EON

Oh doesn’t it always feel nice to open something new…

Getting Started

Before we get started, it’s important to note that some of these steps and screens may change as the software updates change so please bare with me as I keep this up to date as quickly as possible. Use your imagination if some things are different.

Plug in the EON

Using the provided USB power adapter and cable plug in the EON to power.
This will trigger the EON to boot up.

Welcome to EON Dashcam (aka Chffrplus)

The initial setup just sets up the initial dashcam software.
We will get to the installation of OpenPilot next.

Tap the ‘Set up your EON’ button to continue.

Review the terms

Read through the terms & conditions by scrolling down with your finger until you get to the bottom.

Then click I agree.

Select your WiFi

This step may not be available in some versions of OpenPilot.
I’ve seen it get skipped in some cases but if it shows for you, feel free to select your WiFi and connect.
If it does automatically skip for some reason, no fear — you can add this later.

Adding a SIM Card

If you have a SIM card with an active data plan, insert it into the slot on the side of the EON. If not, no worries — you can either roll without a SIM card and upload via WiFi (like I do) or you can go get one later.

The EON Dashboard

This is the basic “Home” screen you’ll see whenever EON comes on.

The New Destination and My Drives buttons are for Chffrplus.
If you’re seriously just using the EON for Chffrplus, then you can stop now with this guide and enjoy.

If you’re planning to use OpenPilot, you probably won’t ever use the buttons on this screen very often.

Uninstall Chffrplus

In order to install OpenPilot, we must first uninstall the existing Chffrplus software. In the end, Chffrplus is just OpenPilot minus a basic setting… but this is the friendly installer so we must go through this process.

Tap on Settings on the home screen.

Scroll down the setting screen and tap on Uninstall

Confirm your choice by tapping Uninstall once more.

Your EON will restart.

Now you will be taken through a series of prompts.

Go to settings, tap reboot and allow Base UI if prompted

SIM card prompt

If you did not insert a SIM card earlier, you will probably get prompted again for this. You can just skip it as you could before.

In some versions of OpenPilot there is a prompt like this that temporarily displays. It’ll go away on its own I believe, or just hit Skip.

Select Wi-Fi network

You will be definitely need to connect to Wi-Fi at this point since the next step requires a download from Comma.

Enter that now.

Install NEOS Program

A NEOS Program as of right now is just OpenPilot.
Enter the following address in the box:

https://openpilot.comma.ai

Press Done to continue.

Review the Terms & Conditions and press Accept.

Now you will be taken back to the Dashboard screen where you will press Sign In, which will load a prompt to Google Login.

Go to Settings, tap reboot and allow Base UI if prompted

You will need a Google Login to continue as of today. This may change later I’m sure as Comma’s system matures.

Once logged in, that’s it! You should now be running OpenPilot.

It looks a lot like Chffrplus, the only difference is — when plugged into a Giraffe / Panda, you will enable LKAS / ACC features of OpenPilot when you start your car and it’s plugged in correctly.

Enjoy! Scroll down for more articles and useful next steps.

As always, if I seem to have missed something, or your experiences were different than above — let me know in the comments or hit me up on community Discord. My username is @jfrux.

Go forth and drive!

Checkout some of my other articles now that you’re all setup.
I will be writing another article soon about installing EON in your vehicle.
It’s definitely a subject worth revisiting since we get a lot of questions in community Discord daily about it.

• Comma EON: Getting Connected with SSH
• Comma EON: Installing Tools for Accessing EON via SSH on Windows 10
• Comma EON: Installing a Fork of OpenPilot

This is more of a reference post rather than a tutorial.
The EON is specifically different with normal tmux documentation.

Chat with Experts of Openpilot on Discord
Feel free to reach out with questions & feedback on the community Discord.
Join the Discussions

Although I don’t understand the reasoning just yet, I can tell you the basics of what I’ve learned. I will continue to update this reference as I get more information. I’m also going to give you a cross platform view of different ways to attach tmux in different terminal emulators. From what I’m seeing, they’re all the same.

TLDR;
If you’re just looking to detach from tmux on EON, the hot keys are `+ d

Open Terminal / PowerShell

On Mac: CMD+SPACEBAR and type Terminal and press Return.

On Windows: Press theWINDOWS KEY on your keyboard and type PowerShell and Right click the result and click Run as Administrator or right click the Start Menu icon and go to Power Shell (Admin)

A NOTE ABOUT WINDOWS:
I recommend getting comfortable with PowerShell and using Chocolatey Package Manager + OpenSSH.
Learn how to set this up by following my guide below:

Comma EON: Installing Tools for Accessing EON via SSH on Windows 10

On Ubuntu: CTRL+ALT+T

You will remain in Terminal / PowerShell for the majority of this article series.

Get Connected

Ensure your EON is connected to the same wifi network as you and then connect to it via SSH like so:

ssh root@<IP_ADDRESS_OF_EON> -p 8022 -i ~/.ssh/openpilot_rsa

For additional information on how to SSH into your EON, checkout my article on Connecting to EON via SSH. It also contains information on determining your EON’s IP address, and its Wifi settings.

Comma EON: Getting Connected with SSH

Attaching

You can attach to the tmux session with the standard command:

tmux attach

Detaching

Detaching from the EON tmux session is different than normal…

On Mac: ` + d
On Linux: ` + d
On Windows w/ OpenSSH: ` + d
On Windows w/ PuTTY: ` + d

Chat with Experts of Openpilot on Discord
Feel free to reach out with questions & feedback on the community Discord.
Join the Discussions

UPDATE 11/12/18
I now am fully recommending new folks to use Workbench desktop app to connect and install forks of Openpilot as it requires very little setup.
https://medium.com/@jfrux/installing-a-fork-of-openpilot-with-workbench-de35e9388021

UPDATE 06/27/18
Now includes information about checking out my Comma Pedal branch for testing support of your vehicle, as well as backing up your existing openpilot, and restoring it back if the fork / branch doesn’t work.

If your vehicle is not 100% supported by Comma, Inc. you may find yourself needing to use a slightly different version of OpenPilot rather than the one you initially installed on your EON.

That can be a daunting task for a beginner or someone that is less familiar with SSH and issuing shell commands so my goal with these articles is to help bring light to that and help beginner level tech people do some advanced things.

Prerequisites to this article

UPDATE OCT. 2018: Getting connected via SSH is a huge part of this process.
Thankfully, I’ve been working on a new tool for the community to bypass this step. It’s called Workbench, and it’s available on Windows, Mac and Linux.

Visit https://github.com/jfrux/workbench/releases to download the latest version to quickly find your EON on your network, and configure SSH.
Keep in mind, you do have to enable the SSH switch on your EON settings.

jfrux/workbench

If you haven’t already done so, please follow along with my Getting Connected article before proceeding. You can find it below:

Comma EON: Getting Connected with SSH

Open Terminal / PowerShell

On Mac: CMD+SPACEBAR and type Terminal and press Return.

On Windows: Press theWINDOWS KEY on your keyboard and type PowerShell and Right click the result and click Run as Administrator or right click the Start Menu icon and go to Power Shell (Admin)

On Ubuntu: CTRL+ALT+T

You will remain in Terminal / PowerShell for the majority of this article series.

Get Connected

Ensure your EON is connected to the same wifi network as you and then connect to it via SSH like so:

ssh root@<IP_ADDRESS_OF_EON> -p 8022 -i ~/.ssh/openpilot_rsa

For additional information on how to SSH into your EON, checkout my article on Connecting to EON via SSH. It also contains information on determining your EON’s IP address, and its Wifi settings.

You will be placed in the /system/comma/home directory after connecting.

Change to the data directory

We’re going to move into the /data directory which is the parent directory of openpilot which is the folder we will be changing.

NEOS the Android-based operating system running on your EON expects openpilot to be in /data/openpilot so any openpilot branch, tag, fork, etc. you place in that directory path will be attempted to load upon boot.

Backup OpenPilot Directory

The quickest / cleanest way to back up OpenPilot is to simply rename the folder to something else. You can quickly do this by issuing this command:

mv openpilot openpilot.backup

This mv command is moving the directory openpilot and its contents to the openpilot.backup directory.

To check your work at anytime, you can list the directory on the screen using the command below:

ls -lah

Clone the OpenPilot Fork

Now it’s time to get the new OpenPilot fork you’re wanting to use.

For this demonstration, we will use my fork of OpenPilot found at:

jfrux/openpilot

On the GitHub repository website there is a Clone or download button.

Click that and copy the full address of the repository.

Now go back to your Terminal / PowerShell window and enter the following command:

git clone https://github.com/jfrux/openpilot.git

Using a specific branch of the fork

When we use git clone like above, it will clone the default branch for the repository. Sometimes this is what we’re wanting, sometimes it’s not.

In the case where it’s not, you’ll need to change to the recommended branch for the code you’re testing.

For my example, I’d like to use my latest pull request for the Comma Pedal modification you can use to achieve stop-and-go in car’s that don’t currently support stop-and-go which allows your vehicle to slow all the way to a stop in traffic and start going again on it’s own without touching the pedals. Most car’s do not allow this, for whatever reason (most likely manufacturer liability) and limit your vehicle to not use ACC / LKAS below 25 mph or so. Some are as high as 40 mph!

Learn more about Comma Pedal on the Wiki or read up on how to build your own in my how to guide.

• Comma Pedal - comma wiki
• Comma Pedal: Building with MacroFab

Anyway, wow tangent city…

You can checkout any branch by using this the following command within the directory of openpilot at /data/openpilot

git checkout <branch_name>

In our case, let’s checkout my Pedal branch if you have a Comma Pedal installed and the PR hasn’t been merged into the primary repo yet.

git checkout feature/support-for-comma-pedal

Now on to rebooting and trying it out!

Reboot EON

This is necessary to have EON use the new code-base. It has a compile process it runs upon boot.

PLEASE NOTE: This could take awhile, you might see this loading openpilot screen for 15 to 30 minutes in some cases if you are using fresh new clone / fork.

reboot

Monitoring the compilation process

If you’re really curious what is happening underneath while it’s loading… you can monitor this with tmux attach. Use my handy tmux cheatsheet for EON below:

Comma EON: tmux cheatsheet for NEOS

Updating Your New Fork

If the maintainer of the fork updates the codebase, it’s simple to grab the fresh code.

cd /data/openpilot; git pull; reboot

Restoring From Your Backup

If the fork you tried failed for any reason, or isn’t offering you the correct functionality. You may quickly restore your backup that we created earlier in the article by following theses quick steps.

Repeat the first steps about connecting to SSH if you aren’t already.

Once connected, change into the /data directory

cd /data

Now, as long as you named your backup openpilot.backup as stated earlier in the article…

Run the following command to move the fork to a new backup.

mv openpilot openpilot-fork.backup

And then move your previous backup to it’s new home…

mv openpilot.backup openpilot

Always remember, EON looks for openpilot to be in the /data/openpilot folder so as long as you place it in there, you’re good.

Now just reboot again and you’ll be running your previous version before the fork.

reboot

On most unix-based platforms, including MacOS and Ubuntu you will have the tools you need to connect to your Comma EON such as openssh and vim already installed and are ready to go.

Chat with Experts of Openpilot on Discord
Feel free to reach out with questions & feedback on the community Discord.
Join the Discussions

If you’re on one of these platforms, you may skip to the Getting Connected with SSH article.

On Windows, it’s not as straight forward. In order for my other articles to make the most sense possible, I recommend you follow my conventions below on what and how to install these things on Windows 10.

Without further ado…

Open up PowerShell with Administrative Privileges by right clicking the Windows Logo or Start Menu generally found in the bottom left.

Alternatively, you can Search Windows for PowerShell then right click the result and click Run as Administrator.

Disabling Quick Edit on PowerShell

Start by disabling Quick Edit in PowerShell to prevent any confusion while running installs.

Why do I need to disable Quick Edit:
With Quick Edit enabled, PowerShell can “pause” a running process by simply clicking the shell window. This can cause much confusion and frustration.

Disable it by Right Clicking the icon at top left of the PowerShell window and clicking Properties. Uncheck Quick Edit and press OK.

Install Chocolatey Package Manager

Install Chocolatey Package Manager by pasting / typing the following command into your freshly opened PowerShell:

Why do I need Chocolatey?
Well you don’t NEED anything in life. Some things just make life a little easier.
Chocolatey is “the package manager for Windows”.
Basically, it makes installing ANY application (especially command-line based tools) much easier.

Set-ExecutionPolicy Bypass -Scope Process -Force; iex ((New-Object System.Net.WebClient).DownloadString(‘https://chocolatey.org/install.ps1'))

For more information or troubleshooting this process, visit the Chocolatey guide.

NOTE: For good measure, after installing Chocolatey close PowerShell and re-open it.

Now, most articles relating to Windows + SSH and even the Comma Wiki itself, recommend using a tool known as PuTTY which is okay in some cases but for the sake of this article and the fact that you’re on a modern Windows operating system (Windows 10) AND for my own personal sanity let’s stick with the open standard known as openssh.

Install OpenSSH with Chocolatey Package Manager

Install OpenSSH Client with Chocolatey by pasting / typing the following command into your newly opened PowerShell:

choco install openssh -y

This tells Chocolatey to install the openssh package. The -y parameter just tells it to answer Yes for the standard install prompts to make things smoother.

Install VIM Editor with Chocolatey Package Manager

Install vim with Chocolatey by pasting / typing the following command into PowerShell:

choco install vim -y

VIM is a popular text editor for your shell that is used across different operating systems and it’ll help the rest of my articles go smooth for you.

Once both installs have completed successfully, I’d close and reopen PowerShell once more for good measure.

Now with a fresh PowerShell screen up in front of you, let’s move on to the fun stuff.

Your next step is most likely going to be the article below…

Comma EON: Getting Connected with SSH

Enjoy and thank you for reading.

Chat with Experts of Openpilot on Discord
Feel free to reach out with questions & feedback on the community Discord.
Join the Discussions

UPDATE OCT. 2018: To help out with this process, I’ve been building a new tool I’d like you to all try… it’s called Workbench and it’s specifically for finding EON on your network and connecting to it via SSH.

It sets up EON just like this article but it does it all for you.
It’s being tested on Windows, Mac, and Linux.

Fork and contribute to the project by following the link below.

jfrux/workbench

Recently I’ve noticed loads of requests for a simpler guide to getting connected to EON. The “dashcam” device that is capable of running OpenPilot giving supported vehicles the ability to drive semi-autonomously.

Let’s get started.

WINDOWS USERS START HERE!

Yes, I added those really lame 90’s internet gifs to get your attention. If you’re on Windows, please follow my guide on installing the tools needed.
I use pretty specific tools in the rest of this article that you may not have installed on your system.

Comma EON: Installing Tools for Accessing EON via SSH on Windows 10

Open Terminal / PowerShell

On Mac: CMD+SPACEBAR and type Terminal and press Return.

On Windows: Press theWINDOWS KEY on your keyboard and type PowerShell and Right click the result and click Run as Administrator or right click the Start Menu icon and go to Power Shell (Admin)

On Ubuntu: CTRL+ALT+T

You will remain in Terminal / PowerShell for the majority of this article series.

Installing the EON SSH Developer Key

Visit the Configuring OpenPilot page on the Comma Wiki.

Select and Copy the entire key from the page and return back here. I’ll wait.

Now that you’ve copied the key, let’s add it to a file on your computer.

Type in the following command to create the .ssh directory if it isn’t already created.

# Mac / Linux
mkdir -p ~/.ssh/

# Windows
md ~/.ssh/

By the way…
~/ is just a shortcut for your user directory.
On Windows: C:\Users\<username>\
On Mac: /Users/<Username>
On Linux: /home/<Username>

Now we need to put the key we copied from the Wiki into a new file.

We can use the following command to open a new blank file for us to paste our key into:

vim ~/.ssh/openpilot_rsa

Paste (CMD+V / CTRL+V) the entire contents of the PRIVATE KEY just like the animation below.

After pasting it, press ESC on your keyboard, then type :wq! to save.

The file should be saved and closed and you should now see the prompt again.

Special note:
Mac & Linux: you may have to run the following command so the machine knows the key is safe.
chmod 600 ~/.ssh/openpilot_rsa

Connecting EON to WiFi

To continue on, we must ensure your EON is connected to the same wifi network as your computer. We also need to obtain the EON’s IP address so let’s do this.

With your EON in hand, (and hopefully within the comfort of your own home or office… no need to be in the car for this one…) tap the Settings button and scroll down to WiFi Settings.

If you aren’t connected to the same Wifi, now is the time to go through the standard WiFi process. You know the drill… RIGHT?

If you find you are connected to the same network, click the ellipsis dots in the top right corner and click Advanced.

Scroll to the bottom of that screen to find the EON’s IP address.

Now, back in the shell window on your computer. (PowerShell on Windows, Terminal on Mac / Linux).

Type the following command to test that you are able to connect to your EON:

ping <IP_ADDRESS_OF_EON>

If your ping appears successful, hit CTRL+C after about 4 pings (if on Mac). I believe Windows only pings 4 times by default.

If the pings were successful, proceed to connect to your EON by typing the following command:

ssh root@<IP_ADDRESS_OF_EON> -p 8022 -i ~/.ssh/openpilot_rsa

After entering this command for the first time, you will likely receive a prompt for adding the unknown host to the known hosts file. Simply type yes and press enter to proceed. See an example in the animation below.

If you have any troubles with any of the steps above, feel free to leave a comment below or hit me up on the Community Discord. My username is @jfrux.

What’s next?

Now that you’re connected to SSH, you can do many different tasks within your EON.

Comma EON: Installing a Fork of OpenPilot