NeTV release 43 notes

Firmware 43 has been pushed. Here is a summary of the changes:


 * Working disaster recovery mode. You can enter this holding the setup button during a reboot. Continue holding it through the reboot until a screen comes up showing you potential wifi networks to join. This mode will support open and WPA networks only. Once you join, it will attempt to download a full new firmware image and reflash the drive. It should be able to recover you from a disastrous failure, i.e. kernel missing and/or root filesystem totally trashed.


 * Migration of web services to lighttpd. This will enable things like CGI scripting and better security.


 * Addition of “LAMP” environment: lighttpd, MySQL, and PHP are now available on NeTV, which helps expand the development environment for apps.


 * fixed an FPGA firmware bug where video sources that used burst mode to read the DDC would get corrupt data. This should fix a host of compatibility problems.


 * modified matchmoded behavior:
 * on failure, it will display a diagnostic screen for a few seconds
 * after the diagnostic screen, it will hide the UI and attempt to pass through video even if the mode is not supported, as opposed to simply showing the black screen.
 * added hooks to allow users to change behavior: /psp/behavior.passthru, /psp/behavior.overlay, /psp/tolerance.strict, /psp/tolerance.loose.
 * if the UI is hidden and the mode is not supported and the unit dwells in that state for longer than a minute, sshd will automatically start to allow users to attempt to fix the problem. A security issue, for sure, but helpful for developers.
 * fixed a bug in clock rate detection
 * will attempt to force video sources that present a 1080p60 signal to 720p only mode before declaring failure


 * added an easter egg. Try this:

fpga_ctl w 0xc 0×32

Yes, that’s really encrypted; and no video was decrypted to do that. As you can see, it almost works. More on how later.


 * changed scanning rate of AP scans. Instead of once every 20 seconds, it scans once every hour when the device is connected. This should reduce the rate of connectivity drops.


 * Newer version of compat-wireless pulled in that should resolve some N-connectivity issues


 * Added a cron job that will attempt to reconnect the unit every half hour as a last-ditch firewall against network dropouts


 * Removed “activation” screen as it’s no longer used


 * Improved/clarified some help text


 * Add ntpd to reduce clock drift over long periods of time


 * Made default twitter searches to be “TheOnion” and “ラメン” (ramen). Because what’s better than negi on your ramen?

IMPORTANT — upgrade takes about 10 minutes to run. The progress bar will hang out at the end for a while because there are a number of cleanup tasks it runs. It will also flash the screen a couple of times and reboot when done.