I have several remote sites with openwrt routers (using WRT32X routers.)
It's very difficult to remotely update these routers, especially for the 21.02 release, where the config files had to be reset.
What I'd like is to build a version of openWRT that allows me remote access, so I can set up wireguard and other config.
https://chef.libremesh.org/ has a very nice online openwrt builder, and which allow a "Custom script to run on first boot".
Has anyone use this to allow openwrt to start with remote access (either password ssh or wireguard?)
I can't speak to this specific means of creating your own images for remote deployment, but they should be similar to, but not the same as using the image builder (which you would run on your own system rather than via a website).
The beauty of the image builder is that you can not only select the packages you want to install, but also directly include the config files. This means that there isn't a need for a post-install script to get things up and running since the known good working configs can be embedded directly in your own image.
That said, a post-install script could work well if your scripts are robust and self contained. I would suggest that whatever method you use, test on the same model hardware locally so that you can verify the functionality of the entire image before rolling it out to remote locations.
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If you're bold (and doing this remotely might be bold, at least with the current prototype), you could install the Attended Sysupgrade package (luci-app-attendedsysupgrade).
This is an astonishingly cool enhancement to the ImageBuilder. It is a LuCI package that sends a list of your local packages to the ImageBuilder which builds an image with everything you have installed, then ships the firmware back to your browser, which then automatically installs it.
I have used it several times, with complete success. But to date, I have only used it on devices I can walk to in a few minutes. If you're curious, you can watch how it works: https://youtu.be/H7xcmhbYsX8 - 4 minutes and 53 seconds to an updated router.
So definitely test this locally before upgrading remote devices. Cheers!
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At first look, this seems perfect. I'll try it on some local routers first.
Thanks.
Wow, that really is so cool!