rshell 0.0.34

A remote shell for working with MicroPython boards.

rshell

Remote MicroPython shell.

This is a simple shell which runs on the host and uses MicroPython’s raw-REPL to send python snippets to the pyboard in order to get filesystem information, and to copy files to and from MicroPython’s filesystem.

It also has the ability to invoke the regular REPL, so rshell can be used as a terminal emulator as well.

Note: With rshell you can disable USB Mass Storage and still copy files into and out of your pyboard.

When using the commands, the /flash directory, and the /sdcard directory (if an sdcard is inserted) are considered to be on the pyboard, and all other directories are considered to be on the host. For an ESP based board you can only reference its directory by using the board name e.g. /pyboard etc..

NOTE: rshell requires a fairly recent version of the MicroPython firmware, specifically one which contains the ubinascii.unhexlify command which was added May 19, 2015 (v1.4.3-28-ga3a14b9 or newer).

If your version of the firmware isn’t new enough, then you’ll see an error message something like this:

>./rshell.py
rshell needs MicroPython firmware with ubinascii.unhexlify

Installation

You can install rshell using the command:

sudo pip3 install rshell

If you use a virtualenv, then you don’t need the sudo. rshell needs Python3. All of my testing was done using version 3.4.0.

Debian/Ubuntu users can get pip3 using:

sudo apt-get install python3-pip

Serial Port Permissions (linux)

Under linux, the USB serial ports are owned by root and typically have a group of dialout (for ubuntu). Different unix distros may use a slightly different group name. In order for rshell (or any terminal emulator) to access the serial port, you’ll need to ensure that your user account has sufficient priviledge. One way to do this is to ensure that your user is added to the dialout group, using a command like:

sudo usermod -a -G dialout $USER

Another way, is to use udev rules to modify the permissions on the serial port. There are some instructions on the [micropython wiki](https://github.com/micropython/micropython/wiki/Board-STM32F407-Discovery#programming-from-linux-via-dfu) that you can use to setup your udev rules (you don’t need to install dfu-utils just to update the permissions).

Sample Session

This shows a pyboard in its default state, copying a hello.py and then entering the repl and importing it.

>rshell
Welcome to rshell. Use Control-D to exit.
/home/dhylands/Dropbox/micropython/rshell> ls -l /flash
   529 May 21 17:34 README.txt
   286 May 21 17:34 boot.py
    34 May 21 17:34 main.py
  2436 May 21 17:34 pybcdc.inf
/home/dhylands/Dropbox/micropython/rshell> cp hello.py /flash
/home/dhylands/Dropbox/micropython/rshell> ls -l /flash
   529 May 21 17:34 README.txt
   286 May 21 17:34 boot.py
    21 May 21 17:35 hello.py
    34 May 21 17:34 main.py
  2436 May 21 17:34 pybcdc.inf
/home/dhylands/Dropbox/micropython/rshell> cat /flash/hello.py
print('Hello World')
/home/dhylands/Dropbox/micropython/rshell> repl
Entering REPL. Use Control-X to exit.

Micro Python v1.4.3-28-ga3a14b9 on 2015-05-21; PYBv1.0 with STM32F405RG
Type "help()" for more information.
>>>
>>> import hello
Hello World
>>>
/home/dhylands/Dropbox/micropython/rshell>

Command Line Options

-h, –help

Displays a list of the valid options. You should get something like the following displayed:

usage: rshell [options] [command]

Remote Shell for a MicroPython board.

positional arguments:
  cmd                   Optional command to execute

optional arguments:
  -h, --help            show this help message and exit
  -b BAUD, --baud BAUD  Set the baudrate used (default = 115200)
  --buffer-size BUFFER_SIZE
                        Set the buffer size used for transfers (default = 512)
  -p PORT, --port PORT  Set the serial port to use (default '/dev/ttyACM0')
  --rts RTS             Set the RTS state (default '')
  --dtr DTR             Set the DTR state (default '')
  -u USER, --user USER  Set username to use (default 'micro')
  -w PASSWORD, --password PASSWORD
                        Set password to use (default 'python')
  -e EDITOR, --editor EDITOR
                        Set the editor to use (default 'vi')
  -f FILENAME, --file FILENAME
                        Specifies a file of commands to process.
  -d, --debug           Enable debug features
  -n, --nocolor         Turn off colorized output
  --wait                How long to wait for serial port
  --binary              Enable binary file transfer
  --timing              Print timing information about each command
  --quiet               Turns off some output (useful for testing)

You can specify the default serial port using the RSHELL_PORT environment
variable.

-b BAUD, –baud BAUD

Sets the baud rate to use when talking to the pyboard over a serial port. If no baud is specified, then the baudrate from the RSHELL_BAUD environment variable is used. If the RSHELL_BAUD environment variable is not defined then the default baudrate of 115200 is used.

–buffer-size

Sets the buffer size used when transferring files between the host and the pyboard. If no buffer size is specified, then the value from the RSHELL_BUFFER_SIZE environment variable is used. If the RSHELL_BUFFER_SIZE environment variable is not defined, then the default of 512 is used.

-d, –debug

Turns on debugging. This allows you to see the script which is sent over the raw REPL and the response received.

-e EDITOR, –editor

Specifies the editor to use with the edit command. If no editor is specified, then the following environment variables will be searched: RSHELL_EDITOR, VISUAL, and EDITOR. If none of those environment variables is set then vi will be used.

-f FILENAME, –file FILENAME

Specifies a file of rshell commands to process. This allows you to create a script which executes any valid rshell commands.

-n, –nocolor

By default, rshell uses ANSI color escape codes when displaying the prompt and ls output. This option allows colorized output to be disabled.

-a –ascii

On certain platforms the raw REPL mode is unreliable with particular sequences of binary characters. Specifying –ascii enables the transfer of binary files to such platforms. It does this by encoding the data as ASCII hex.

–wait

If a port is specified defines how long rshell will wait for the port to exist and for a connection to be established. The default is 0 seconds specifying an immediate return.

-p PORT, –port PORT

Specifies the serial port which should be used to talk to the MicroPython board. You can set the RSHELL_PORT environment variable to specify the default port to be used, if –port is not specified on the command line.

–dtr [0|1|True|False]

Sets the state of the DTR line when opening the serial port. This may also be defaulted from the RSHELL_DTR environment variable.

–rts [0|1|True|False]

Sets the state of the RTS line when opening the serial port. This may also be defaulted from the RSHELL_RTS environment variable.

–quiet

This option causes the Connecting messages printed when rshell starts to be suppressed. This is mostly useful for the test scripts.

–timing

If the timing option is specified then rshell will print the amount of time that each command takes to execute.

-u USER, –user USER

Specifies the username to use when logging into a WiPy over telnet. If no username is specified, then the username from the RSHELL_USER environment variable is used. If the RSHELL_USER environment variable doesn’t exist then the default username ‘micro’ is used.

-w PASSWORD, –password PASSWORD

Specified the password to use when logging into a WiPy over telnet. If no password is specified, then the password from the RSHELL_PASSWORD environment variable is used. If the RSHELL_PASSWORD environment variable doesn’t exist then the default password ‘python’ is used.

cmd

If a command is specified, then that command will be executed and rshell will exit. Examples:

rshell cp somefile.py /flash
rshell repl ~ pyb.bootloader() ~

File System

rshell can be connected to multiple pyboards simultaneously. If the board module exists on the pyboard (i.e. a file named board.py somewhere in the module search path) and it contains an attribute called name (e.g. name = "myboard") then the pyboard will use that name. If the board module can’t be imported then the board will be named, pyboard or wipy. Names will have -1 (or some other number) to make the board name unique.

You can access the internal flash on the first board connected using /flash and the sd card on the first board connected can be accessed using /sd.

For all other connected pyboards, you can use /board-name/flash or /board-name/sd (you can see the board names using the boards command).

The boards command will show all of the connected pyboards, along with all of the directories which map onto that pyboard.

Commands

args

args [arguments...]

Debug function for verifying argument parsing. This function just prints out each argument that it receives.

boards

boards

Lists all of the boards that rshell is currently connected to, their names, and the connection.

You can give a custom name to a board with either copying over a board.py file or using the echo command, e.g.

echo 'name="myboard"' > /pyboard/board.py

(Remember to exit rshell and re-enter to see the change).

cat

cat FILENAME...

Concatenates files and sends to stdout.

cd

cd DIRECTORY

Changes the current directory. ~ expansion is supported, and cd - goes to the previous directory.

connect

connect TYPE TYPE_PARAMS
connect serial port [baud]
connect telnet ip-address-or-name

Connects a pyboard to rshell. rshell can be connected to multiple pyboards simultaneously.

cp

usage: cp SOURCE DEST
cp SOURCE... DIRECTORY
cp [-r|--recursive] [SOURCE|SRC_DIR]... DIRECTORY
cp [-r|--recursive] PATTERN DIRECTORY

positional arguments:
  DEST             A destination file
  SOURCE           File to copy
  SRC_DIR          Directory to copy
  PATTERN          File or directory pattern match string e.g. foo/*.py

optional arguments:
  -h, --help       show this help message and exit
  -r, --recursive  copy directories recursively

Copies the SOURCE file to DEST. DEST may be a filename or a directory name. If more than one source file is specified, then the destination should be a directory.

Directories will only be copied if -r is specified.

A single pattern may be specified, in which case the destination should be a directory. Pattern matching is performed according to a subset of the Unix rules (see below).

Recursive copying uses rsync (see below): where a file exists on source and destination, it will only be copied if the source is newer than the destination.

df

usage: df [-b|-h|-H]

Report file system space usage

optional arguments:
--help                show this help message and exit
-b, --bytes           Prints sizes in bytes
-h, --human-readable  Prints sizes in a human-readable format using power of 1024
-H, --si              Prints sizes in a human-readable format using power of 1000

Gets filesystem available space based on statvfs. Granularity is limited to filesystem block size.

echo

echo TEXT...

Display a line of text.

edit

edit filename

If the file is on a pyboard, it copies the file to host, invokes an editor and if any changes were made to the file, it copies it back to the pyboard.

The editor which is used defaults to vi, but can be overridden using either the –editor command line option when rshell.py is invoked, or by using the RSHELL_EDITOR, VISUAL or EDITOR environment variables (they are tried in the order listed).

filesize

filesize FILE

Prints the size of the file, in bytes. This function is primarily testing.

filetype

filetype FILE

Prints the type of file (dir or file). This function is primarily for testing.

help

help [COMMAND]

List available commands with no arguments, or detailed help when a command is provided.

ls

usage: ls [-a] [-l] [FILE|DIRECTORY|PATTERN]...

List directory contents.

positional arguments:
  FILE        File to list (show absolute path)
  DIRECTORY   Directory (list contents)
  PATTERN     File or directory pattern match string e.g. foo/*.py

optional arguments:
  -h, --help  show this help message and exit
  -a, --all   do not ignore hidden files
  -l, --long  use a long listing format

Pattern matching is performed according to a subset of the Unix rules (see below).

mkdir

mkdir DIRECTORY...

Creates one or more directories.

repl

repl [board-name] [~ line][ ~]

Enters into the regular REPL with the MicroPython board. Use Control-X to exit REPL mode and return the shell. It may take a second or two before the REPL exits.

If you provide a board-name then rshell will connect to that board, otherwise it will connect to the default board (first connected board).

If you provide a tilde followed by a space (~ ) then anything after the tilde will be entered as if you typed it on the command line.

If you want the repl to exit, end the line with the ~ character.

For example, you could use:

rshell.py repl ~ pyb.bootloader()~

and it will boot the pyboard into DFU.

If you want to execute multiple Python commands these should be separated by the ~ character (not the ; character):

rshell.py repl ~ import mymodule ~ mymodule.run()

rm

usage: rm [-f|--force] FILE...
rm [-f|--force] PATTERN
rm -r [-f|--force] PATTERN
rm -r [-f|--force] [FILE|DIRECTORY]...

Removes files or directories (including their contents).

positional arguments:
  FILE             File to remove
  DIRECTORY        Directory to remove (-r required)
  PATTERN          File matching pattern e.g. *.py

optional arguments:
  -h, --help       show this help message and exit
  -r, --recursive  remove directories and their contents recursively
  -f, --force      ignore nonexistent files and arguments

A single pattern may be specified. Pattern matching is performed according to a subset of the Unix rules (see below). Directories can only be removed if the recursive argument is provided.

Beware of rm -r * or worse.

rsync

usage: rsync [-m|--mirror] [-n|--dry-run] [-q|--quiet] SRC_DIR DEST_DIR

Recursively synchronises a source directory to a destination.
Directories must exist.

positional arguments:
  SRC_DIR          Directory containing source files.
  DEST_DIR         Directory for destination

optional arguments:
  -h, --help       show this help message and exit
  -m, --mirror     remove files or directories from destination if
                   absent from source.
  -n, --dry-run    make no changes but report what would be done. Implies -v
  -q, --quiet      don't report changes made.

Synchronisation is performed by comparing the date and time of source and destination files. Files are copied if the source is newer than the destination.

shell

The shell command can also be abbreviated using the exclamation point.

shell some-command
!some-command

This will invoke a command, and return back to rshell. Example:

!make deploy

will flash the pyboard.

Pattern Matching

This is performed according to a subset of the Unix rules. The limitations are that wildcards are only allowed in the rightmost directory of a path and curly bracket {} syntax is unsupported:

*.py Match files in current directory with a .py extension
temp/x[0-9]a.* Match temp/x1a.bmp but not temp/x00a.bmp

t*/*.bmp Invalid: will produce an error message
{*.doc,*.pdf} Invalid: will produce an error message