📡 JayCamp — Offline Knowledge & File Station

Turn a Raspberry Pi Zero 2 W into a portable offline WiFi hotspot serving Wikipedia, medical guides, cooking recipes, TED talks, repair manuals and more — straight to any phone or laptop browser. No internet required. No apps. No subscriptions.

Built for campers, travellers, and anyone who wants knowledge without connectivity.

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What You Get

Tool	URL	Description
BASE CAMP	192.168.4.1	Offline knowledge portal powered by Kiwix
DEPOT	192.168.4.1:81	File manager with USB drive support

Connect any phone or laptop to the JayCamp WiFi hotspot, open a browser, and everything works. No setup needed on the client device.

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Hardware Required

• Raspberry Pi Zero 2 W (~$15)
• 64GB micro SD card (recommended — ~15GB for a solid ZIM library, rest for files)
• Micro USB OTG adapter (for USB drives with DEPOT)
• Power bank or 5V USB power supply

Total cost: ~$25 one time. Zero ongoing costs.

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Default Library

These are the ZIM content packs included in the default portal UI. Download from library.kiwix.org:

Content	Size	Category
Wikipedia Top (100k articles)	~7GB	Encyclopedia
MedlinePlus	~500MB	Health & Medicine
Military Field Medicine	~200MB	Survival & First Aid
FOSS Cooking	~200MB	Recipes
Anonymous Planet	~100MB	Privacy & Security
Restarters Wiki	~300MB	Repair Guides
FreeCodeCamp	~8MB	Coding
WikiVoyage (no pics)	~230MB	Travel Guides
TED Talks (7 categories)	~300MB each	Ideas

All stored directly on the SD card. A 64GB card comfortably holds all of the above with plenty of room to spare.

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Quick Start

Requirements: Raspberry Pi Zero 2 W with Raspberry Pi OS Lite 32-bit (Bookworm) installed.

# SSH into your Pi, then clone the repo
git clone https://github.com/SanjayKotabagi/jaycamp.git
cd jaycamp

# Run the one-command installer
chmod +x scripts/install.sh
sudo ./scripts/install.sh

The installer will:

• Install all dependencies (nginx, kiwix, flask, dnsmasq)
• Set up the WiFi hotspot with a password you choose
• Deploy the BASE CAMP portal and DEPOT file manager
• Configure all services to auto-start on boot
• Set up USB drive auto-mounting

After install, copy your ZIM files to /home/pi/library/, run sudo ./scripts/add-zim.sh to index them, then reboot.

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Adding ZIM Files

Download ZIM files on your computer from library.kiwix.org, copy to the Pi via SCP:

# From your computer:
scp yourfile.zim pi@basecamp.local:/home/pi/library/

# Then on the Pi — index and restart:
sudo ./scripts/add-zim.sh

After adding new ZIMs, add a card in portal/index.html and a location block in nginx/basecamp.conf, then:

sudo ./scripts/deploy-portal.sh
sudo systemctl reload nginx

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OS Compatibility

Tested on: Raspberry Pi OS Lite 32-bit (Bookworm) on Pi Zero 2 W.

⚠️ Bookworm uses NetworkManager instead of dhcpcd. The installer handles this correctly. Do not follow older tutorials that use hostapd or dhcpcd — they will not work on Bookworm.

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Project Structure

jaycamp/
├── README.md
├── depot_server.py         ← DEPOT Flask backend
├── portal/
│   ├── index.html          ← BASE CAMP portal UI
│   └── files.html          ← DEPOT file manager UI
├── nginx/
│   └── basecamp.conf       ← Nginx config (add ZIM locations here)
├── systemd/
│   ├── kiwix.service
│   ├── depot.service
│   └── usb-mount@.service
├── scripts/
│   ├── install.sh          ← Full one-command installer
│   ├── add-zim.sh          ← Index ZIM files after copying them
│   └── deploy-portal.sh    ← Push portal UI updates
└── docs/
    └── MANUAL_SETUP.md     ← Step-by-step manual setup guide

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Customising the Portal

Edit portal/index.html to add or remove library cards matching your ZIM files. Each card just needs the ZIM book ID (filename without .zim) in the href pointing to http://192.168.4.1:8080/YOUR_ZIM_ID.

Add a matching location block in nginx/basecamp.conf:

location /your_zim_id_here {
    proxy_pass http://127.0.0.1:8080;
}

Then deploy:

sudo ./scripts/deploy-portal.sh
sudo systemctl reload nginx

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Maintenance Cheat Sheet

Task	Command
Add new ZIM files	Copy to /home/pi/library/ then sudo ./scripts/add-zim.sh
Update portal UI	sudo ./scripts/deploy-portal.sh
Restart Kiwix	sudo systemctl restart kiwix
Restart DEPOT	sudo systemctl restart depot
Check Kiwix logs	journalctl -u kiwix -n 50
Check disk space	df -h
List drives	lsblk

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Manual Setup

Prefer doing it step by step? See docs/MANUAL_SETUP.md for the full detailed guide.

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License

MIT — free to use, modify, and share.

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Built With

Kiwix · Flask · Nginx · NetworkManager

ZIM content from Kiwix Library