Update 2020-04-30: Omada EAP Controller 3.2.10 community version has just been released.

There is now a .deb-package available for easy installation on Debian, Raspbian and any other Debian-based Linux. The steps below are not necessary anymore for the installation of Omada Controller using the dpkg package manager.

 

The following (now obsolete) post is still here for reference only:

 

Hello world!

 

TP-Link just released the latest version of Omada Controller 3.0.2. Thanks to a tip from forum user humor_amarillo I got my hands on it early. So here it is, baked in just no time: The community version of

 

Omada EAP Controller 3.0.2 for Linux

Last update: 2018-08-28 22:40

 

What's new in this version?

• Cloud support. See the official release notes on the TP-Link website.
• Auto-backup, but the Windows-way. See below for the Linux-way to do backups.
• From what I saw so far, the directory structure has been cleaned up. Photoshop file with icons from v2.7.0 has been removed from the images directory. 
• GUI now seems much more cleaner, too. Well done, TP-Link!
• EAP Controller starts ~30% faster compared with v2.7.0.
• All steps in the initial wizard now can be skipped! Finally my feature request was honored, thanks to R&D very much!

 

What's new in the Linux release?

• Logo now shows »Community version« below the TP-Link logo, so you can recognize it better.
• Two new options for tpeap:

1. dump lets you dump the database as well as the maps and keystores.
2. restore lets you restore a database dump including maps and previous keystores.

• A surprise (see below).

 

Update #1: New tpeap 1.4 has been released (see this post for more details).

For your convenience, I have attached the new tpeap script v1.4 to this posting, too. It might be handy for doing a backup of your v2.7.0 installation, which can be easily restored in EAP Controller 3.0.2.

 

Update #2: The tpeap 1.4 just has been added to the TAR archive with Omada Controller 3.0.2. If you download the TAR archive as described below, you will get the new tpeap script already - no need to install it twice.

 

Standard disclaimer, as usual: Use at your own risk.

This community version (cv for short) is neither released nor supported by TP-Link and it still needs some testing.

 

 

Installation of the Linux version

 

— If you want to install the Linux version for the first time, please see this post first, replace the instructions in step 2 there with the instructions in the same step 2 in this post below and proceed with the remaining steps here when you have installed all the pre-requisites (eapc role account, Java JRE, mongodb database).

 

— If you already have installed Omada EAP Controller 2.7.0cv on your Linux system, just read on.

 

 

Step 1: Make a backup

Obviously, to make a backup, the old EAP Controller needs to be running. Download the tpeap script attached to this posting and install it (you can safely overwrite the old tpeap version in the 2.7.0cv Controller):

 

        cp tpeap /opt/tplink/EAPController/bin/

 

Next, create a backup. You need to specify a directory for the database dump (else it uses the directory EAPC_HOME/backup):

 

        tpeap dump /tmp/backup

 

tpeap will create the directory, copy your maps and keystore to it, and then execute mongodump, which dumps the database in binary BSON format into the backup archive. Now you can safely stop the EAP Controller.

 

 

Step 2: Download and extract the software

Download the TAR archive from https://rent-a-guru.de/ftp/eapc-3.0.2.tar.gz

 

Check the SHA256 sum:

 

        $ sha256sum -b eapc-3.0.2.tar.gz 
        2b9c9ce54a3bc698b25901f1234aef79e3d1e51703a9af1dcaa8360c4b407f66 *eapc-3.0.2.tar.gz

        9638bb2ed43d58169a33b52ea2be1d48482fae68a5d93028f162ff66f2b0c4ea *eapc-3.0.2.tar.gz

        $

 

 

Step 3: Set up the EAP Controller

Installation is straight-forward: Extract the TAR archive as root in /opt/tplink, remove the symlink EAPController pointing to version 2.7.0cv and create a new one pointing to the EAPController-3.0.2 directory just extracted from the TAR archive. Easy, isn't it?

 

        cd /opt/tplink

        tar xvzf /your-download-dir/eapc-3.0.2.tar.gz

        rm EAPController

        ln -s EAPController-3.0.2 EAPController

 

Do a quick check wether the permissions and ownership has been set correctly (complete dialog shown here):

 

        # ls -ld /opt/tplink/EAPController-3.0.2

        drwxr-xr-x 13 eapc eapc 4096 Aug 21 05:53 /opt/tplink/EAPController-3.0.2

        # ls -l /opt/tplink/EAPController-3.0.2

        total 12
        drwxr-xr-x 2 root root    6 Aug 21 05:27 backup
        drwxr-xr-x 2 root root   55 Aug 21 02:11 bin
        drwxr-xr-x 6 eapc eapc   55 Aug 21 05:53 data

        drwxr-x--- 2 root eapc   39 Aug 21 01:30 keystore
        drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 4096 Aug 21 01:30 lib
        drwxr-xr-x 2 eapc eapc   58 Aug 21 05:53 logs
        drwxr-xr-x 2 root root   22 Aug 21 03:18 man
        drwxr-x--- 2 root eapc 4096 Aug 21 01:30 properties
        drwxr-xr-x 2 root root   36 Aug 21 05:36 webapps
        drwxr-xr-x 3 eapc eapc   32 Aug 21 05:53 work

        #

 

Two more things: Install the symlink to the Java JRE:

 

        cd /opt/tplink/EAPController

        ln -s /where-your-JRE-lives/ jre

 

and the manpage of tpeap (you find it in the man subdirectory):

 

        cp man/tpeap.man /usr/share/man/man8/tpeap.8

        gzip -v --best /usr/share/man/man8/tpeap.8

 

My JRE resides under /opt/jvm, so it looks like this:

 

        # ls -l jre

        lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 21 Aug 21 05:53 jre -> /opt/jvm/jre1.8.0_181

 

 

Important note for users of Ubuntu and probably other distros, too:

If your mongodb version is >= 3.6 you need to edit the argument list EAPC uses to start the mongod daemon. The option --nohttpinterface, which is set by EAPC, has been removed in mongodb version 3.6 and newer.

 

Find out your mongod version:

 

        mongod --version

 

To get rid of the --nohttpinterface option, you will have to delete it from the file mongodb.properties:

 

        cd /opt/tplink/EAPController/properties

        cp mongod.properties ../mongod.properties.ORIG

        sed -i 's/^\(eap.mongod.args=.*\) --nohttpinterface \(.*\)$/\1 \2/' mongodb.properties

 

Of course, you can use any other editor, too. 

 

 

Last step: fire up the new Controller

 

        tpeap -w start

 

Now restore the database saved in step 1:

 

        tpeap restore /tmp/backup

Enjoy!

 

 

Uh, and if you want to see what probably comes next to a Linux server near you:

 

The color-intense theme awesome with FontAwesome icons - no more image files needed, clean layout for EAPC 2.7.0cv.