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Verify Install

After the post-install reboot, run through these checks. Total time: 2 minutes.

Services

All five ConsolePi services should be active:

for svc in ssh ser2net consolepi-api consolepi-mdnsreg consolepi-mdnsbrowse; do
    printf '  %-25s %s\n' "$svc" "$(systemctl is-active $svc)"
done

Expected output:

  ssh                       active
  ser2net                   active
  consolepi-api             active
  consolepi-mdnsreg         active
  consolepi-mdnsbrowse      active

If anything is inactive or failed, jump to Troubleshooting.

Listening ports

sudo ss -tlnp | grep -E 'ser2net|consolepi-api|sshd' | sort -k4

Expected — port 22 (SSH), 5000 (API), 8001-8008 (ttyUSB* if adapters attached), 9000-9007 (ttyACM* if adapters attached).

ser2net opens the tty ports even when no adapter is attached — they just don't have anything to talk to yet.

mDNS advertising

From your workstation (not the Pi):

avahi-resolve -n ConsolePi.local
# or
getent hosts ConsolePi.local

Expected: returns the Pi's LAN IP.

mDNS advertised IP quirk

On Trixie, consolepi-mdnsreg sometimes advertises the internal hotspot IP (10.110.0.1) in the A record instead of the real eth0 IP. The real IP is still in the TXT record's rem_ip field. Details: Trixie Gotchas.

consolepi-details

Log in as the consolepi user (or use sudo -u consolepi) and run:

consolepi-details

This shows attached serial adapters, their ser2net ports, and mDNS state. If you haven't plugged anything in yet, adapters will be empty.

Attach a serial adapter and see it detected

Plug a USB console cable (FTDI or USB-C-to-Cisco) into any Pi USB port.

Check enumeration:

lsusb | grep -iE 'cisco|ftdi|prolific|silabs|serial'
ls /dev/ttyUSB* /dev/ttyACM* 2>/dev/null

You should see something like:

Bus 001 Device 005: ID 05a6:0009 Cisco Systems, Inc. Console
/dev/ttyACM0

(For an FTDI cable it'd be a different VID/PID and /dev/ttyUSB0.)

First console session

If the adapter is at /dev/ttyACM0, telnet to the ser2net port:

telnet ConsolePi.local 9000

You should see the ser2net banner and then whatever the connected device's console shows. Hit Enter to elicit a prompt.

Exit: Ctrl-] then quit.

Health check summary

If all of these are green, you're done — the ConsolePi is fully operational:

  • [x] All 5 services active
  • [x] Port 22 + 5000 + 9000-9007 or 8001-8008 listening
  • [x] ConsolePi.local resolves
  • [x] consolepi-details runs (as consolepi user)
  • [x] Plugged-in adapter appears in lsusb + ls /dev/tty*
  • [x] Telnet to the ser2net port shows the target's console

Next

Head to the connection guides: