Update Camera Troubleshooting Steps

[ranous]

I'm setting up a new Pi 5 with the new allsky release. One snag I ran into when doing the install is that the install script failed due to it not detecting the camera. I figured out the reason was that I setup a new allsky account to install the bits into. The problem was that the new allsky user was not in the video group. It worked fine after I added the allsky user to the video group, but it required me to login again. You should update the Pi camera troubleshooting section to mention this possibility.

[EricClaeys]

Thanks for letting us know. The installer is supposed to add the current user to that group. Please upload ~/allsky/config/logs/install.log so I can figure out why that didn't work.
Did you run the installer as the new login or the old one?

[ranous]

I ran the installer logged into the new allsky account. Here's the install log from that initial failed installation:

Tue Dec 10 03:30:54 PM PST 2024 * STARTING INSTALLATION OF v2024.12.06.

Tue Dec 10 03:30:54 PM PST 2024 * Setting Allsky status to 'Installing...'.
Tue Dec 10 03:30:54 PM PST 2024 * PI_OS = bookworm
Tue Dec 10 03:30:54 PM PST 2024 * uname = Linux pi5 6.6.51+rpt-rpi-2712 #1 SMP PREEMPT Debian 1:6.6.51-1+rpt3 (2024-10-08) aarch64 GNU/Linux
Tue Dec 10 03:30:54 PM PST 2024 * id = uid=1001(allsky) gid=1001(allsky) groups=1001(allsky),27(sudo),100(users)
Tue Dec 10 03:30:54 PM PST 2024 * No prior Allsky found at '/home/allsky/allsky-OLD'.
Tue Dec 10 03:30:54 PM PST 2024 * No prior Allsky Website found.
Tue Dec 10 03:31:01 PM PST 2024 * Installing installer dependencies.
Tue Dec 10 03:31:08 PM PST 2024 * Creating /home/allsky/allsky/config/RPi_cameraInfo.txt with 'all' entries.
Tue Dec 10 03:31:17 PM PST 2024 *** ERROR: 
**********
No connected cameras were detected.
**********

Tue Dec 10 03:31:17 PM PST 2024 * ENDING INSTALLATION.

[EricClaeys]

@ranous, if I understand correctly, you ran the installer as the OLD login, and the NEW login wasn't in the video group? The installation script assumes that whomever is running the script is the user that will run Allsky. If you change users you should remove the old login's allsky directory and reinstall Allsky using the new login.

Please upload ~/allsky/config/logs/install.log so I can figure out why no cameras were detected.
Are you sure a camera was connected to the Pi? Was it ZWO or RPi?

• If ZWO, please run lsusb -verbose
• If RPi, please run libcamera-still --list-cameras.

[ranous]

No, I ran the install logged into the new allsky account. This is a new pi5 that never had allsky installed before. When I created the account, I hadn't added the account to the video group. The camera is a pi HQ camera and was connected when I ran the installer.

You can see in that install log excerpt I attached to the earlier message that it lists the groups the allsky account was in, which was allsky, sudo, and users. There's nothing in the log showing it attempting to add the account to the video group. I'm not at home right now and don't have access to the whole install log, but that fragment I attached to the earlier message is the totality of the install log for the initial attempt.

After a bit of googling, I found mention of needing to be in the video group, so I added the allsky account to the group. I got the same error initially, but I logged out and back in, and then it worked fine. I'll attach the full install log when I get back home.