Bringing Your Scooter Online

1. Reactivate or replace the SIM

The MDB has a soldered MFF2 SIM chip. You can reactivate a compatible onboard SIM through Sunshine, or replace it with an adapter for your own SIM.

Reactivate the onboard SIM

Sunshine is the connectivity provider for reactivated onboard SIMs. Sign in, add your scooter and open its connectivity setup to check compatibility and choose a paid plan. This keeps the existing SIM chip in place.

Use your own nano-SIM

The nano-SIM adapter in the Librescoot shop replaces the MFF2 chip and accepts a nano-SIM (4FF). The illustrated hardware guide shows the chip and solder pads. The procedure is:

• Open the footwell, remove the main batteries, disconnect CB then AUX, and remove the MDB. The full procedure is in the installation guide.
• Open the MDB case (Torx T10) and locate the soldered MFF2 SIM chip.
• Desolder the MFF2 chip and solder the nano-SIM adapter onto its pads as shown in the hardware guide.
• Insert your SIM, close the case, reinstall the MDB, reconnect batteries (AUX first, then CB, then main).

Use an activated nano-SIM with a data plan from your provider. Since Librescoot 1.2 the scooter can also send and receive SMS; choose a plan that includes SMS if you want to use that.

While parked, open the SMS inbox under Menu → Info → SMS. Select a message to read it directly. Tap the left brake to scroll down, hold the right brake to scroll up, and hold the left brake to return. Tap the right brake to open the deletion confirmation, where Cancel is selected first. Bonded phones with a compatible app can also read it. Messages and read state are shared, so treat bonded devices accordingly. The inbox retains up to 100 messages for at most 30 days.

Optional forwarding is off by default. It requires a valid international mobile or landline number and forwards only new text messages while registered on the home network. A daily limit of ten SMS segments and a 24-hour queue expiry apply; carrier charges may apply. Set the destination with sms.forward-to in the web interface Settings with Advanced mode enabled; the dashboard can disable active forwarding.

2. Set the APN

For your own SIM, enter your provider's APN on lsd's Settings page or over SSH with lsc. For a reactivated onboard SIM, follow Sunshine's connectivity setup.

lsc set cellular.apn internet

Replace internet with your provider's APN. Common ones in Germany:

• internet — Telefónica o2 (all current tariffs), Telekom (incl. Congstar contract)
• internet.telekom — Congstar prepaid
• web.vodafone.de — Vodafone (incl. CallYa prepaid)

Your provider's onboarding email or website lists it.

APN authentication (Congstar prepaid, some MVNOs)

Most German carriers don't require APN authentication. A few do — notably Congstar prepaid, which needs username congstar / password cs with PAP auth:

lsc set \
  cellular.apn internet.telekom \
  cellular.username congstar \
  cellular.password cs \
  cellular.auth pap

cellular.auth takes none (default), pap, or chap. If you don't know which your provider uses, try pap first — it's by far the most common.

How it takes effect

modem-service checks these settings against NetworkManager's GSM profile and the modem's actual LTE attach context (CID1). To apply a change, it disconnects and deregisters first, writes and reads back the settings, then reconnects and checks CID1 again. Cellular access, including remote SSH, is briefly interrupted. You can watch the result with:

redis-cli HGET modem apn-action

Values include applied (change verified and reconnected), ok (already correct), unconfigured (operator defaults), iccid-changed-cleared (SIM swap detected, see below), or error. Failed changes attempt to restore the previous configuration. Apply attempts are limited to three, with delays between retries; correct the settings before retrying. A secondary PIN2/PUK2 indication does not block APN reconciliation.

SIM swap behavior

When the SIM's ICCID changes while the scooter is running, modem-service clears the APN in NetworkManager and the modem. Set cellular.apn and any credentials for the new SIM with lsc set to resume reconciliation.

3. Set the SIM PIN (if required)

If your SIM has a PIN lock, store the PIN so the modem can unlock it on boot:

lsc set cellular.sim-pin 1234

Skip this step if your SIM is not PIN-locked. Setting an empty value leaves the SIM as-is. The PIN is stored in the local Redis settings hash.

Verify the modem comes up with:

lsc status

When Sunshine requests logs through radio-gaga with a duration such as 1h, the bundle also includes available early entries from the current boot if its uptime fits that duration. Earlier boots use the requested wall-clock filter. Collection does not wake the dashboard; log bundles can contain sensitive data.

4. Configure OTA updates

Once the scooter is online, updates are configured on the display under Menu → Settings → System → Updates: check frequency, update type (delta or full — delta is the default and the right choice on a metered SIM), and release channel (stable, testing, nightly). A Check for Updates Now entry triggers an immediate check. Once configured, updates run automatically in the background whenever a connection is available.

See the Handbook's Updates page for release channels, update progress and recovery. The display writes channel, method and interval settings to both boards. Check for Updates Now pushes check-now onto scooter:update:mdb and scooter:update:dbc. The commands below provide the same controls over SSH.

In lsd, the Updates page provides channel selection, update checks and installation progress for both boards. The commands below are the SSH alternative.

Channel

stable for production, testing for early access, nightly for development builds. Use the shortcut to set both at once:

lsc ota channel stable

Method

delta downloads changed blocks and is the default. Use it on metered connections. full downloads the entire image.

lsc set updates.mdb.method delta updates.dbc.method delta

Check interval

How often the scooter polls for new releases. Go duration string — 24h for daily, 6h for the default, 0 to disable auto-checks. Note that 1d is not a valid Go duration; use 24h.

lsc set updates.mdb.check-interval 24h updates.dbc.check-interval 24h

MDB orchestrates DBC

The DBC (dashboard) is powered off most of the time, so it can't check for updates on its own. With orchestration on, the MDB powers the DBC on when a newer DBC release is available and triggers an update check there.

lsc set updates.mdb.orchestrate-dbc true

Recommended defaults

For most riders:

lsc ota channel stable
lsc set \
  updates.mdb.method delta \
  updates.dbc.method delta \
  updates.mdb.check-interval 24h \
  updates.dbc.check-interval 24h \
  updates.mdb.orchestrate-dbc true

5. Verify it works

Choose Check for Updates Now under Menu → Settings → System → Updates. From a shell, check modem and OTA status:

lsc status        # cellular registration, signal, IP
lsc ota status    # current OTA config and last check time
lsc ota check     # force an update check now

If lsc ota check reports the current channel and a last-check timestamp, the scooter is talking to the release server.

Cloud uplink (optional)

For remote status, location and battery monitoring from a phone or browser, register the scooter with a cloud:

• Sunshine Cloud: cloud use is free. Connectivity through the reactivated onboard SIM is a separate paid service.
• Self-host with uplink-server.