Baking Apple Pies

Now that “applepie” (my very first Raspberry Pi) is set up, it is time to have a little fun. The first hacks will be to turn the device into a cheap (but nonetheless quite efficient) AirPlay / AirPrint device, while baking a real Apple Pie…

Setting up AirPlay

First, I hooked up the Raspberry Pi to Altec Lansing powered speakers through the Jack connector.

Next, one has to force audio output to stereo jack (Raspberry PI defaults to HDMI audio output):

1
2
3
4

apt-get update
apt-get upgrade
apt-get install alsa-utils
amixer cset numid=3 1

The result can be easily tested:

1

aplay /usr/share/sounds/alsa/Front_Center.wav

.. and I could hear the phrase “Front, Center” coming out from the speakers.

Then, one has to setup Avahi and Shairport.

Avahi is a free (as in free speech) implementation of Apple zeroconf / bonjour protocol, including a system for multicast DNS/DNS-SD service discovery. It is licensed under the LGPL and included in the Raspbian distribution. Thus, the installation of avahi is quite easy:

1

apt-get install avahi-deamon avahi-utils

Shairport, on the other hand, is not packaged with the Raspbian distribution. It has to be built from sources.

Let’s install all Shairport dependencies:

1
2

apt-get install git libao-dev libssl-dev libcrypt-openssl-rsa-perl libio-socket-inet6-perl libwww-perl  cpanminus make  libavahi-client-dev
cpan Net::SDP

Then get Shairport’s sources

1
2
3
4

cd /opt
mkdir airport
cd airport
git clone https://github.com/albertz/shairport.git shairport

Let’s compile and install Shairport :

1
2
3
4
5

cd shairport
make
make install
cp shairport.init.sample /etc/init.d/shairport
update-rc.d shairport defaults

Edit the default startup configuration file (/etc/init.d/shairport) and define the name of your AirPlay device (change the “NAME” variable):

1

vi /etc/init.d/shairport

I named my AirPlay device “Apple Pie Bureau“. Now, start up avahi-daemon and shairport:

1
2

service avahi-daemon start
service shairport start

And you’re ready to rock, either form an iPhone / iPad:

Cool 😎

Setting up AirPrint

Setting up AirPrint is about the same procedure. The idea is to set up a CUPS server, configure a shared printer and then to broadcast AirPrint stuff via avahi. The bridge between them is built upon the airprint-generate script and a few tweaks.

Let’s install CUPS (and associated printer drivers) and avahi-discover:

1
2
3
4

apt-get install cups cups-filters cups-pdf cups-ppdc python-cups 
apt-get install foomatic-db-gutenprint libgutenprint2 printer-driver-gutenprint foomatic-db-compressed-ppds foomatic-db-engine foomatic-db-gutenprint foomatic-filters 
apt-get install avahi-discover libnss-mdns
usermod -aG lpadmin pi

Next, as usual, one has to edit CUPS configuration file (/etc/cups/cups.conf):

• Comment out the “Listen localhost:631” line
• Add the line “Port 631”. This way, printers can be added throught CUPS web interface from any host
• Add “Allow @Local” right after “Order allow, deny” for <Location /> and <Location /admin>
• start CUPS: service cups start

After connecting my AcuLaser AC1100 printer to the Raspberry Pi (and hunting for hours to get the proper drivers), I was able to access CUPS web administration interface (“https://applepie:631/admin”) and add a new shared printer.

Then comes the tricky part: bridging CUPS and Avahi:

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8

cd /opt
mkdir airprint
wget -O airprint-generate.py --no-check-certificate https://raw.github.com/tjfontaine/airprint-generate/master/airprint-generate.py
chmod +x airprint-generate.py
echo "image/urf urf string(0,UNIRAST)" > /usr/share/cups/mime/airprint.types
echo "image/urf urf (0,UNIRAST)" > /usr/share/cups/mime/apple.types
echo "image/urf application/pdf 100 pdftoraster" > /usr/share/cups/mime/airprint.convs
echo "image/urf application/vnd.cups-postscript 66 pdftops" > /usr/share/cups/mime/local.convs

1
2
3

./airprint-generate.py
cp AirPrint-EPSON-AL-C1100.service /etc/avahi/services
service avahi-daemin restart

The CUPS shared printer, connected to the Raspberry Pi, is now ready to be used, either from GNU/Linux, Mac OSX or iOS devices:

Baking Apple Pies

There we go. Appart from the CUPS GNU/Linux AL-C1100 drivers (which were not easy to find and configure), it was quite easy 🙂

The Raspberry Pi (named ApplePie) is now set up, and ready to meet … the other freashly baked apple Pie: