How To Remote Control Your FxBlox (Mac, Windows, Linux)

The FxBlox is designed to be the backbone of the eminent decentralized personal cloud, FULA. To enable this, owners will want to have as much storage attached to the device as possible to earn more rewards in the process! But what if that owner is new to server administration and they don’t have any open usb ports to plug in a keyboard, mouse, and video?! What if they need to manually restart the Docker containers?

If that is you, we will show you how to:

• Access FxBlox from Mac, Windows, Linux
• Access the Blox’s Terminal
• Access the Blox’s Desktop UI
• Access the Blox from outside your home network

How to Access the Blox’s Terminal

If you know how to access the command line of your Blox, you will be able to configure or do anything you may need to on the Blox.

Mac and Linux

If you have the FxBlox Lite (CM4) model, you can simply open up your Terminal app, and type:

ssh pi@fulatower

It’ll ask you, if you trust the computer you’re connecting to, type yes, then enter your password. The default password is raspberry.

If you have the FxBlox Lite Plus (RK1) model, you can ssh into it with:

ssh pi@fxblox-rk1

password: fxblox

After which you are good to go! While you’re here, update and install your device (if there are any available):

sudo apt update -y
sudo apt upgrade

I suggest googling commands for what you want to do or if you’re completely lost shoot us a DM on Twitter or Discord @legendofmar

For Windows:

If you want to install the ssh command via the Settings menu, you can follow this guide to install the command. We only need to have the OpenSSH Client to be able to run the ssh command! So, we can install it by opening Powershell in Administrator mode, and copy/paste-ing:

Add-WindowsCapability -Online -Name OpenSSH.Client~~~~0.0.1.0

Windows Usage

For FxBlox Lite (CM4), now you can open up the Terminal and type:

ssh pi@fulatower

password: raspberry

For FxBlox Lite Plus (RK1), you can connect with:

ssh pi@fxblox-rk1

password: fxblox

It’ll ask you, if you trust the computer you’re connecting to, type yes, then enter the password. After which you are good to go! While you’re here, update and install your device if there are any available.

sudo apt update -y
sudo apt upgrade

I suggest googling commands for what you want to do or if you’re completely lost on what to do, shoot us a DM on Twitter or Discord @legendofmar

Blox Not Connected to the Internet

If you need to connect to the FxBlox before having completed the setup, you can connect to the Blox wifi (if it is showing). To do this, you can connect directly to the FxBlox hotspot on your computer and ssh into it with:

For FxBlox Lite (CM4):

ssh pi@10.42.0.1

password: raspberry

For FxBlox Lite Plus (RK1):

ssh pi@10.42.0.1

password: fxblox

How to Access the FxBlox’s Desktop UI

To access the FxBlox’s desktop UI, we need to enable the protocol that will allow us to securely login from another computer. That protocol is XRDP. XRDP is an open-source version was originally developed Jay Sorg as a Linux alternative to RDP which is proprietary to Microsoft. To enable XRDP, we will access the quick setup menu with:

sudo armbian-config

You can then use your mouse or keyboard to select on: Software -> RDP

After which it will download the necessary packages and work just fine.

On Mac

1. Download the Microsoft Remote Desktop app from the App Store
2. Click add computer
3. Enter fulatower or the IP Address of the Blox
4. Click connect
5. Enter username and password when prompted
6. Enjoy

XRDP to connect to FxBlox from Mac

On Windows

1. Open the Start menu and or Search and type rdp
2. Enter fulatower or the ip of the Blox & hit enter
3. It’ll ask you if you trust the computer you are connecting to you
4. Then enter the username and password on the screen that pops up
5. Enjoy

XRDP to connect to FxBlox from Windows

On Linux

Install remmina along with the rdp protocol with:

1. sudo apt install remmina remmina-plugin-rdp
2. Now, you can click on the Remmina app in your App list
3. Make sure RDP is selected, and type fulatower or the ip of the Blox
4. Connect and Enjoy

XRDP to connect to Blox from Linux

Access the Blox from outside your home network

This will require a couple steps to enable. Additionally, every router brand has their own Settings layout, so you will have to Google how to enable the specific options listed below, to your router. What we want to enable are:

• Static ip address for the Blox
• DDNS
• Port forwarding to the Blox

Google where to find your routers Static IP options and change the FxBlox’s IP from DHCP to Static and assign it the IP Address it already has, this way you know it doesn’t conflict with any other device.

Now, you’ll want to enable port forwarding. Same thing here, google where to find your router’s Port Forwarding options and add this rule in for XRDP:

• Name = xrdp
• Internal Port = 3389
• External Port = 3389
• Interal IP Address = ip address of Blox or fulatower (if supported)
• External IP Address = This can be left empty

If you want to add ssh to the mix you, add this rule:

• Name = ssh
• Internal Port = 22
• External Port = 22
• Internal IP = ip of Blox or fulatower (if supported)
• External IP = leave empty

Now, the last step is to set up DDNS. I explain in depth what this is and how to enable it in this article:

Getting Server-Ready on FxBlox with DuckDNS

What I didn’t dive into in that article is that many routers will have an option to enable DDNS right from their Settings. What this will do is give you a domain name which can be used to reference your home network. After which, you can either ssh or xrdp into the Blox by just using the domain name! EX:

ssh pi@domain.tld

Or when connecting to the desktop on Mac, Windows, Linux:

These applications know to use the default ports, so you don’t have to specify them after the domain name.

Conclusion

So, in a nutshell, we are your go-to resource for FxBlox magic. Today, we showed how to access your device either within or outside your home network. We’ve kept it simple and friendly, so go ahead, dive in, and enjoy optimizing your FxBlox experience!

Whether you’re diving into server administration for the first time or you’re already a pro, we’ve got you covered with step-by-step instructions. Need help? No worries! You can shoot us a DM on Twitter anytime (@legendofmar).

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