Link Status Log Walkthrough Guide (Video)

Link Status Log Utility

The Link Status Log utility is designed to log the radio's link status over time.Aside from downloading the logs, you can also get the latest status from any particular node.

Enabling the Link Status Log in the GUI

The Link Log utility was introduced in the October 2022 firmware release. Each device independently maintains a log of the link status information. The Link Log utility can be configured at Services -> Link Status Log. Fig. 1 shows the configuration page.

Fig. 1 Link Status Log

To enable Link Status Log, click the Enable Link Status Log check box then click Save & Apply. The logs can be downloaded directly from the GUI. Alternatively, the logs are accessible in the folder /tmp/longtermlog.

Viewing the logs

The contents of the Link Log utility are shown here,

root@smartradio:/tmp/longtermlog# ls
22-05-05_13-26-21.log  22-05-05_13-51-09.log  22-05-05_14-14-34.log  ipv6list status.json

The log files are limited to 500 lines, and the file name is the date when the log started. Aside from long term logs, the Link Log utility keeps the latest status line in the file /tmp/longtermlog/status.json. The output of each line is,

'{ 

  "sysinfo": { 

    "cpu_load": [ 

      5088, 

      11072, 

      16800 

    ], 

    "freemem": 14684160, 

    "localtime": 1651760076 

  }, 

  "oper_chan": 12, 

  "oper_freq": 915, 

  "chan_width": "26", 

  "noise": "-98.808556", 

  "activity": 1, 

  "lna_status": "1", 

  "sta_stats": [ 

    { 

      "mac": "00:30:1a:50:3b:a0", 

      "inactive": 30, 

      "rssi": -49, 

      "rssi_ant": [ 

        -51, 

        -54 

      ], 

      "pl_ratio": 0.0804505, 

      "tx_bytes": 1242, 

      "tx_retries": 1, 

      "tx_failed": 0, 

      "mcs": 13 

    }, 

  ], 

  "mesh_stats": [ 

    { 

      "orig_address": "00:30:1a:50:3b:a0", 

      "tq": 255, 

      "hop_status": "direct", 

      "last_seen_msecs": 400 

    }, 

  ] 

}' 

The output is in JSON format with the following sections. 

• cpu_load: CPU load information
• freemem: free memory
• sta_stats: This section shows layer 2 connectivity information to all nodes in the network. It shows the output of the command ubus call iwinfo assoclist '{"device":"wlan0"}'. Some important fields include
  • inactive: time in milliseconds since a packet was received by the wireless interface.
  • rssi: total RSSI of the packets received from that station
  • rssi_ant: RSSI of the packets received from that station in the format "antenna0, antenna1".
  • mcs: MCS rate for latest packets.
  •  
• Wireless Statistic:
  • noise: level of the background noise in dBm
  • activity: measure of network congestion. % usage of the network (out of 100)

lna_status: this indicates if the Low Noise Amplifier is on. this is used for RX.

oper_chan: operating channel

oper_freq: operating frequency

chan_width: operating bandwidth

• Mesh Stats:
• This section details the mesh routing statistics
  • orig_address: The station that this set of statistics covers. Each station in the mesh is called an originator.
  • tq: The Transmit Quality figure of merit out of 255 which is used to calculate the next best hop.

• • last_seen_msecs: Time since the mesh routing layer has seen a packet from this originator.
  • hop_status: directly linked to node or have to go over a hop

• 
  

  First Time Link Status Log Setup and Analysis Video

The Link Status Log Quick Walkthrough Guide Video, shows the initial configuration of the Link Status Log utility, and takes you step-by-step through the detailed analysis of a Link Status Log. This shows the common self-debugging that can be done through careful analysis of your Mesh Rider Radio's logs.