Welcome to AControl, the first of its kind, open-source model train track switching application. AControl is based on a advanced client-server architecture, which enables you to control your track from multiple devices at the same time. Hardware-side, we use custom control boards (also open-source) based on the infamous Arduino eco-system.

• It is easy to install
• It is easy to use
• It is free
• It is open-source
• It works cross-platform (Almost every Linux-derivative, OS X, Windows, most *NIX systems)
• It is awesome

We plan on creating packages for Ubuntu (therefore all other Debian based systems) and Arch Linux. You will unfortunately have to install AControl manually on every other system (for now) - but even then, if you already have npm and grunt installed, it is easy as pie.

NOT YET

On Arch Linux we recommend using yaourt or your favorite AUR management tool:

yaourt -S acontrol

If you rather want to install it manually from the AUR, download the tarball and:

tar xvzf acontrol.tar.gz
cd acontrol
makepkg -s
pacman -U acontrol*.xz

Download the source from GitHub:

git clone https://github.com/Arial7/AControl
cd AControl
npm install
grunt build

Note: You must have nodejs, ruby, sass, grunt-cli and coffee-script installed

We plan on creating app launchers, but for now, you will have to AControl manually. But even that is quite simple.

Switch to the AControl directory (where you downloaded and built it).

cd server && node server.js

This starts the server. It should give you a message like Listening at http://<IP>:3030

If AControl recognizes any serial devices connected to your computer, it will also list them out.

To stop the server, just press ctrl+c in the terminal you started the server in.

To connect any client, just open your browser of choice and browse to http://<IP of server>:3030. If you run the client on the same computer as the server is running, this would be http://localhost:3030 or http://127.0.0.1:3030

For now, you have to connect ADevices like the ASwitch before the server is started (or just restart the server after connecting). This will be tackled in a future release.

Please note that you have to connect your accessories to the computer running the server. Connecting them to any other client doesn't do much at all.