Tacho Bridge Application is an open-source application for Windows, Mac OS, or Linux designed to provide remote authentication of a tracker and tachograph via the company card.
Application is installed on the computer (tacho card hotels supported) and provides an interface between cards inserted into the smart card reader and flespi. Whenever the tracker needs to authenticate the tachograph using a company card the application will provide such functionality.
Repository link: Tacho Bridge App. At the moment, the application is available for Windows (x64) and Mac OS (Arm) operating systems. Building for Linux is possible using this instruction.
This article covers only Tacho Bridge Application usage specifics. Consider reading the Tacho Setup guide to enable tacho functionality in your flespi account.
Setting up the Tacho Bridge Application
- Download and install the application on your device. Currently, versions are available for Windows and MacOS. Linux is in the active testing stage.
- After starting the application, you need to configure the company cards for further work. The application supports simultaneous work with several cards. There is no software limitation on the number of cards, but testing was carried out simultaneously with only two connected cards.
In order to configure the card, you must first connect it to the computer and the application screen will display information about the connected card: 'reader name + ATR'. ATR is a unique card key that is used to exchange data with the tachograph. This means that everything is identified correctly.
To configure the card, you need to click on the '+' button and enter the company card number written on the card in the window that opens and saves.
After this, the ATR will disappear and only the company card number will remain visible.
- Next, you need to enter the server settings so that the application can connect to the server. The channel where you connect the app should be configured with the tacho-bridge protocol and you should register in flespi the device of type Tacho Bridge App with the same ident in order to see the application connection status in your flespi account remotely. In server configuration, you configure the "App ident" and "Server address" fields with the appropriate values. You may pick any convenient value for the ident, just ensure that it is unique within your account and that you used the same value in the flespi device and installed the Tacho Bridge App instance.
- Next, you need to create devices with the Tacho Bridge Card type for each company card. The company card number used when configuring the card in the application must be used as the device identifier.
- In order for the tracker to know which company card to contact, the same company card number must be entered into the actual device. For example, as it is done in Ruptela FM-Tco4 HCV.
Configuration file and logs
The application stores data in the user directory Documents/tba. This folder contains the configuration file config.yaml and application logs. The configuration file stores all application settings, including added cards. The application writes a detailed log of its work to the log.txt file. If errors occur in the application, the logs will help to understand the cause of the error.
Troubleshooting
In the Tacho Bridge App device in your flespi account, you may track the status of the application via logs and messages. Each connection and disconnection will be logged as well as each added or removed card will also be logged into the logs to simplify the remote application administration.
When a new company card is added, only ATR will be displayed in the interface and the card icon will be gray. This means that the card is working properly, and is correctly identified, but is not fully configured. In order to fully configure it, you need to add the company card number. After configuration, the card icon will be green, this means that the card is configured, connected to the server, and ready to work.
If the card is removed from the reader, the card icon will be crossed out and will be gray, this means that the card is not connected to the reader and cannot be used.