As a Raspberry Pi hacker, one of the first things I looked at for my RIOTBoard was VNC, or Virtual Network Computing. Basically, the principle of VNC is to let you use one set of peripherals for multiple computers/microcomputers, with the extra computers being displayed as windows on the main system. This way you can control a device using your mouse/keyboard, and then flick back to your main computer to do debugging on an app, for example. Similar to SSH, where you have access to a device's commandline interface, but with the graphics displayed and updated as well, so you're seeing the same display as you would see if you plugged in a monitor.
I'll note at this point that though this works like a dream on the Pi, on the RIOTBoard, the lag became unbareable so I gave up with VNC, but if you'd like to try it anyway, here's the tutorial:
You'll need:
- A rooted riotboard
- Laptop of some variety
- internet connection on your laptop
- a screen/mouse
Step 1: Download a VNC server APK to your PC - I used Droid VNC server. Next, open up a terminal: if you're using Windows, it may be a better idea to open up Eclipse or Android studio project and flick to the "console" tab at the bottom of your window. In here type "adb install <APKLocation>" with your device plugged in via USB.
Step 2: Now plug your RIOTBoard into your peripherals and open up the app, which should now be in your applications. Inside settings, there should be an option to make this run on boot - on droid vnc server click the 3 dots on the bottom right, and then click settings > run on boot:
Step 3: Install a VNC viewer on your laptop: on Ubuntu there's one preinstalled called "Remote Desktop Viewer". Here's a windows option, if you search for "VNC viewer" you should find plenty.
Step 4: Plug your RIOTboard in to your computer via USB. Open up the app and make sure it's running, and then open your terminal window on your computer. Type in:
adb forward tcp:5801 tcp:5901
Step 5: Open up your vnc viewer and find your board: should be localhost:5901 or localhost:5801. You should now see on your computer the same as is on your screen!
