Official project updates

nerves_system_br, v1.16.4
Primarily a bug fix release. Also updates erlinit with beta support for Elixir releases with runtime.exs files.

erlinit, v1.11.0
The experimental support for Elixir Mix releases with a runtime.exs.

qmi, v0.6.1
Build and code cleanup. Also fixes a crash when a response is received after the request has timed out.

nerves_runetime, v0.11.6
Adds support for implementing auto-revert using U-Boot's bootcount/upgrade_available feature.
A fix to something relating to filesystems that I don't quite follow. Credit to Eric Rauer on this one.

nerves v1.7.11
Fix for some filesystem permission errors during extraction that affected some users.

#NervesTips continues
Jon keeps dropping useful tips, check them out :)

Newsletter Archive
Since a few issues back we've been keeping an up-to-date archive of the Nerves newsletters at embedded-elixir.com. Particularly fun for finding talks, projects and tech notes I think.

Community updates

Upcoming Nerves talk at ElixirConf US: My Scenic Companion
Jason Axelson, who we may all recognize at this point because the dude is everywhere, will be giving a talk at ElixirConf in the US about Nerves and Scenic. I know about the project and am curious to see him talk more about it.

Nerves Meetup keeps happening, monthly, online
The Twitter feed may just be the best place to track it. If you know a better one I'm all ears :)

Featured post: Livebook on your Pi with Nerves

by Peter Ullrich

Spurred on by a talk at Elixir Kenya by Frank Hunleth we get this post from Peter Ullrich. In this post he summarizes the steps required to get Livebook running on a Raspberry Pi with Nerves. Well worth trying out.

Blog post: Set up Livebook on your Raspberry Pi with Nerves

Tech note: RingLogger

RingLogger is an Elixir logger backend that records messages to an in-memory circular buffer. It’s useful on embedded systems that either don’t have a place to store log messages or the storage is susceptible to wearing out. The default Nerves project generator includes RingLogger. Functions like RingLogger.next/1 and RingLogger.attach/1 can be used to browse the logs from the IEx prompt. RingLogger also supports “grepping” all log entries and limiting logs to levels or modules.

- Frank

Supporting the Nerves project

We want to encourage everyone to contribute in whatever way works for them. Here are some ways we currently recommend:

Write or port a new hardware library and include it in the Elixir Circuits collection.
Give money to the project via Open Collective.
Get in touch about taking over maintenance duties for some libraries, we might be able to provide you hardware.
Apply for an EEF stipend on something Nerves-related and build it. We can help if you have questions about this.
Send corrections or improvements for documentation wherever it fails to help you.
Write about Nerves, give talks about Nerves. Make videos about Nerves. It is all good.

Finally, if you have questions about the newsletter or want to suggest something you can simply respond to this email it will go directly to me, Lars, who edits this thing. Let me know what you think.

- Lars, Underjord.io