Better way to manage print files?

AstroBox Questions
#1

I’m not happy with the AstroPrint file manager – as far as I can tell there’s no functionality to sort, or delete multiple files simultaneously. I’d prefer to manage print files directly, rather than through the browser interface, however it seems as though I’m locked out of actually getting direct access to the OS. Is there something I’m doing wrong? Ideally, since I have two Pis hooked up to two printers, I’d prefer to have them both just print from files stored on a single network location. I don’t want to use the AstroPrint slicer so I can’t use the cloud, since I can’t upload x3gs for some reason. People at the facility I work at email me print files and I proceed to upload them, but I’d prefer to have them upload the files themselves, utilizing a script to alert me. Is any of this possible?

Any help would be appreciated.

1 Like
#2

Thanks for this!

We’re thinking on various ways to accommodate the growing number of files, high levels of use and new ways of using our product. Our initial design for the AstroBox UI File Manager needs some help, we agree. Please be patient while we work on designing and creating a better product.

#3

I would love to see options for:

Folders/groups to organize files
Delete/move selected/multiple files
Sort by date/name/size/etc
Print count

#4

I somehow just had this thread pop up and thought I would comment…you can sorta manage your print files on the local astrobox…they are located in /AstroBoxFiles/uploads.

If you have some linux mojo you might be able to map that path to a network drive.

Not sure how you could kick off a print of a new file, I have asked about that before but maybe there will be an API at some point though I think that is justifiably low on the priority list…I think you could place a gcode file in that path and go to the web interface and refresh the browser list and print…same kind of thing for deleting and filing. Maybe a bit of scripting could automate capturing and placing and organizing the files but I expect it would be more cumbersome than what you do now.

Disclaimer: I don’t know anything about the inner workings of the astrobox so messing around with it’s files might not be a good idea but it is pretty easy to recover even from the most catastrophic screw up by just re-flashing the disk image.