Bobcat Diagnoser enables you to obtain comprehensive information about your Bobcat Miner 300. This post will introduce the main features of Bobcat Diagnoser.
Table of Contents
Real Time Miner LED Status
LED Status
We’ve added a light bulb icon that reflects your hotspot’s actual LED light status.
When you perform a reset the light bulb color will turn white first, to indicate the progress has successfully started (You will need to refresh the menu in order for the status change to display). During this time, your hotspot’s LED will first turn yellow, before finally turning green – make sure the hotspot does not lose power or internet connectivity.
More information on what all of the Bobcat 300 LED colors mean.
Uptime
Pointing your mouse at the LED Status icon and hovering over it will show the current uptime of your Miner. Note: This feature may not work on mobile devices.
Temperature Display
At the top of the Diagnoser page, you will find a temperature display to show the current temperature of your miner.
Clicking on the temperature reading will change it from Celsius to Fahrenheit and back.
Miner Information
ATTENTION: Select the menu item once and allow it time to load.
Do not click or check this repeatedly, as it will slow down your miner.
The most important information available in section is outlined below:
- “ota_version”: “1.0.3.6” – Shows the Bobber Firmware Version; Check here to check against the latest firmware updates.
- “miner”: { “State”: “running”. “Status”: “Up 13 hours”,– Shows the current state of the Helium Miner software. If the Miner has crashed or not started properly, you will see some other result besides “running”
- “Image”: “…2022.08.17.1_GA” – shows the Helium Firmware Version
- “errors”: “” – Error codes are sometimes listed in this section. If nothing is displayed between the quotes “” this indicates no errors.
- “peerbook”: null, – This will now always display as null due to how the transition to Light Hotspot software has changed how hotspots handle their distributed communication.
Open/Close Status of Ports and Public IP Address
On the Miner page, you will see the open/close status of ports:
- Port 44158– This has been removed from the Diagnoser as hotspots no loner need this port open after the release of Light Hotspot software.
- Port 22– This port should be closed. Only open port 22 if Bobber Technical Support has requested that you open it. This port allows direct remote access to your hotspot. While only Bobber Support agents should have the proper credentials to allow access, it’s always a best practice to disable Port 22 unless it is actively in use. Follow instructions here to open Port 22 if requested by Bobber Support.
- Port 80– This is the port the Diagnoser runs on. This port should be closed, although it’s alright if the status is open as the Diagnoser has disabled external IPs from visiting so it’s not possible for others to attempt to manipulate your hotspot by taking hold of the Diagnoser.
Your public IP address is also displayed in the Miner section of the Diagnoser.
Logs
Downloading the Log File
The Diagnoser now allows you to download and examine the logs from your Miner!
Simply click on “Logs” in the Diagnoser
You will be prompted to save the log file to your device. By default, it will download as a .txt file named console.txt
You can then open the log in any text editor and examine its contents
If searching for something specific, you can typically use CTRL+F to search the document for whatever you’re looking for.
Important Notes About Logs
Helium Miner logs contain thousands of entries and it is natural to see error messages quite often – not every error message indicates an actual issue.
One example of this is when a LoRa sensor that is not registered on the Helium Console and such does not use the Helium Network attempts to attach to your LoRa gateway – the Miner will reject and drop these packets from the sensor as only sensors attached to an account which can pay the Helium Data Credit fees to use the network will be permitted to send data over the Helium Network.
The dropping of these packets (a perfectly normal and expected behavior for the Miner) will be logged in the console log as errors and drops which can appear to signal an issue with the Miner.
Please do not submit tickets for your Miner simply due to error messages seen in the logs. There must be other evidence or symptoms of functionality issues with the device in order for support staff to assist with your miner.
The log files are made available for informational purposes only and as such, we will not be able to assist with what particular log entries mean or how to interpret the log files.
If submitting a ticket for a functional issue or some other symptom, you are welcome to include the log file from your device however this is not required. If a Bobber Support agent can access your device remotely, they will be able to examine these same logs with no issues.
Reboot
The Diagnoser contains a Reboot feature to allow for gracefully rebooting the hotspot. Rebooting through the Diagnoser is always preferable to simply turning off and on power to the hotspot and should be used whenever possible.
Step 1
Click the Reboot button in the Diagnoser
Step 2
In the pop-up, click OK to reboot the hotspot
Step 3
You will see a message informing you that you will lose connection to the Diagnoser page. After clicking the OK button, you will simply see a “Rebooting hotspot” message. The lights on the hotspot will turn off and will likely display cyan briefly, red, yellow, then green again. Once the light is green again, you can refresh the page.
Step 4
Once the reboot is complete and you have refreshed the page, you will be back at the main Diagnoser menu
Speed Test
ATTENTION: The test takes about 30 seconds to complete and you should not test it repeatedly.
You can test your network speed by selecting this menu item. Doing so will slow down your internet speed, which in turn will slow down your miner.
Reset Miner
Bobcat Diagnoser can also reset Bobcat Miner 300.
Consider this a system-wide wipe over. This action will stop the Docker process, delete the Miner and log files and delete the Helium Miner software before downloading a fresh copy of the latest Miner software and starting the Docker process and Miner process up again.
Step 1
Click the “Reset Miner” option in the Diagnoser
Step 2
You will receive a warning message asking you to confirm you want to perform the reset. Click OK.
Step 3
You will be asked to enter I Agree and hit OK once more to start the reset.
Step 4
You will receive a confirmation message stating the Miner is resetting. During the reset, you may see your LED colors change to white, yellow, red, back to yellow, and then finally green. Click OK on the confirmation. If the reset is still taking place after clicking OK, you may see an error message on the page or the page may be blank/not load correctly. This is normal behavior.
Step 5
Wait 5 minutes, then access the Diagnoser again and click on the Miner option to check status. If prompted for the username and password, use the username bobcat and password miner.
You should see the Miner state as running and the Image should show a recent date.
Dig (Domain Information Groper)
Dig is used for retrieving information about DNS name servers and is commonly used by network administrators to verify and troubleshoot DNS problems and perform DNS lookups.
In this json file, you will see the IP addresses for the 24 Helium seed nodes, as well as your hotspot’s connect status to the seed nodes. Your hotspot needs at least 1 successful dial to connect to the blockchain and mine. If all 24 dials ‘failed’, then you have a network issue. In this scenario, you should follow the article Bobcat Miner 300 Troubleshooting: Networking Issues to resolve networking issues.
Knowledge Center
The Diagnoser contains a link to this Knowledge Center to assist with finding more information for any issues you have.
The link will lead to the homepage of the Knowledge Center
Explorer
The Diagnoser contains a link to your particular hotspot on the Helium Explorer
This will allow you to easily view your hotspot’s activity and other information such as antenna details
Helium API
The Diagnoser contains a link to the Helium API for information on your particular miner
The Helium API will show all of the pieces of information the blockchain has recorded about your miner such as GPS location, online status, reward scale, owner wallet address, hotspot name, location information, antenna gain and elevation, and more.
Read more: Switching APIs With Bobber App
Onboarding
If you are trying to onboard a Hotspot and are receiving a “This Hotspot already has an owner” error, refer to this article on the subject.
The Diagnoser contains a link to the Dewi onboarding server showing your Hotspot’s onboarding information.
This information can be helpful if you have tried to onboard a Hotspot and the onboarding transaction is failing.
All information should be filled out on the onboarding server – if Onboarding displays an error such as “key not found” you will need to submit a ticket to have the issue addressed.
Blockchain Height
The Diagnoser shows the current blockchain height of the Helium blockchain.
This number is pulled from information from the currently connected Validator, as hotspots no longer sync the blockchain after the Light Hotspot transition.
OTA Version Display
The Bobber OTA version is now displayed at the bottom of the Diagnoser menu
