Some time ago, Michael Reeves made a video that went viral, with a Roomba that was modded to scream when it bumps into something. Michael removed many components from the Roomba, and that made the robot really funny but totally useless.
However, the Roborock, better known as Xiaomi Mi Vacuum Cleaner, already has all the components it needs to get the same result without any hardware modification, and without losing any native functionality. So, we made up a Golang application that can be used on a rooted Roborock cleaner.
It has been tested on:
- Xiaomi Mi Vacuum Cleaner gen1
- Xiaomi Mi Vacuum Cleaner gen2
- Roborock S5
- Roborock S6
- Roborock S6 Pure
- Roborock S7
- Roborock Q7 Max+
It should work on any Roborock/Xiaomi Mi Vacuum Cleaner: if you successfully use it on other models please let us know by adding an issue so we can add it to the list. Don't be too scared to try if you don't have a compatible model: the software just reads a log file and doesn't make any modification to the system, so the worst thing that can happen is that Oucher doesn't work, without any damage.
In all of this README I will talk about "Roborock" to mention the robot. This is just for simplicity: the instructions apply to all the compatible models.
First of all, you need to have a rooted Roborock. Please refer to this page or search on the Internet about how to root your device. It's quite easy, but we won't offer support for this, sorry. 🙃
Clone or download this GIT repository to have all the files you need in the following steps.
- Create the
/mnt/data/oucherdirectory on the Roborock - Copy the
oucherfile (the one with no extension) from this repository into the created folder - Make the file executable by running
chmod +x /mnt/data/oucher/oucherinto your SSH session - Create the
soundsdirectory into/mnt/data/oucheron the Roborock - Copy your screams WAV files into it, or copy the three example files that are in the
soundsfolder of the repository - You may need to edit the
/opt/rockrobo/rrlog/rrlog.conffile and set the LOG_LEVEL variable to 8. This is needed only on some firmwares. If you can find the file and it's writable, then perform the change. If you can't, it's probably not needed, so you can ignore this and proceed
You can now do a first test to ensure everything is set up correctly:
- Into your SSH session, run this command:
/mnt/data/oucher/oucher. You'll probably receive a warning about missing configuration file: it's fine, you can ignore it (see the "How can I customize the parameters?" section below for more info). - Keep the software running and don't close your SSH session. Start a clean and hit the bumper: the robot should play one of your screams.
If it works, you can hit CTRL+C to close Oucher and proceed to the next step. If not, ensure you correctly followed the procedure. You also may have a model that Oucher doesn't support yet; please open a issue and we'll sort it out.
Now, up to the hard part: we need to run Oucher as a service when the robot boots.
Unfortunately, the method to do so depends on the robot you have, on the firmware version and on how you rooted it. There's not a single solution.
Here are a few solutions that have been reported to work, from the most common to the least one. You can safely try all of them, they're harmless.
- Solution 1: Using a systemd config file -
Copy the oucher.conf file from this repository into the /etc/init folder of the robot. If the folder is not writable, then this solution is not for you. Reboot the robot by running reboot on the SSH session. Try starting a clean and hit the bumper. If it doesn't work, delete the oucher.conf file from the robot and try the next solution.
- Solution 2: using an init script -
Copy the S12oucher script from this repository into the /etc/init folder of the robot. If the folder is not writable, then this solution is not for you. Mark the file as executable by running chmod +x /etc/init/S12oucher in your SSH session, and reboot the robot by running reboot. Try starting a clean and hit the bumper. If it doesn't work, delete the S12oucher file from the robot and try the next solution.
- Solution 3: use the script in the reserve folder -
This has been reported to work on Roborock S6 Pure with Valetudo.
- Ensure that the
/mnt/reserve/_root.shfile already exists; if it doesn't, this solution is not for you - Copy the
S12oucherscript from this repository into the/mnt/data/oucherfolder of the robot and mark it as executable by runningchmod +x /mnt/data/oucher/S12oucherin your SSH session - Add this snippet of code at the end of the
/mnt/reserve/_root.shfile:
if [[ -f /mnt/data/oucher/S12oucher ]]; then /mnt/data/oucher/S12oucher start; fi
- Reboot the robot by running
rebootin your SSH session - Try starting a clean and hit the bumper
If it doesn't work, delete the /mnt/data/oucher/S12oucher from the robot and remove the snippet of code you added to /mnt/reserve/_root.sh, then proceed to the next solution.
- Solution 4: using cron -
Run EDITOR=nano crontab -e in the SSH session: this will open the crontab editor. Add this line:
@reboot /mnt/data/oucher/oucher
Hit CTRL+O and then Enter to save the file, and then CTRL+X to exit the editor. Reboot the robot by running reboot. Try starting a clean and hit the bumper. If it doesn't work, remove the line you just added to crontab using the same procedure as above.
If none of the solutions worked, please open an issue and we'll sort out another way.
You need to have Golang already installed.
You also need the arm-linux-gnueabihf-gcc compiler, and asound2 library for armhf. You can install them on Debian/Ubuntu by running:
sudo dpkg --add-architecture armhf
sudo apt update
sudo apt install -y gobjc-arm-linux-gnueabihf
sudo apt install -y libasound2-dev:armhf
Now clone the repo, go into the src directory and run ./build.sh. It will create the oucher file in the base project directory.
Even easier: if you have Docker, you can go into the project directory and run ./src/build-docker.sh to generate the binary.
Please ensure you're using the latest binary available on the repository, and that you've set LOG_LEVEL to 8 in the /opt/rockrobo/rrlog/rrlog.conf file.
Oucher does not need a configuration file to work, since all the parameters have a default.
However, if you need to, a oucher.yml file is present into the repository with the default configuration parameters.
You can edit it and then copy it to the Roborock, in the /mnt/data/oucher folder. From a shell:
scp oucher.yml [email protected]:/mnt/data/oucherJust replace 192.168.1.33 with your Roborock IP.
Remember to restart the service (or reboot the robot) each time you make changes to the configuration, because the file is read on startup only.
Yes! You can copy them into the /mnt/data/oucher/sounds folder (no MP3, just WAV).
If you prefer to put the files in a different folder, you can customize the soundsPath parameter in the config file.
Remember to restart the service (or reboot the robot) each time you add or remove a WAV file, because the list is loaded on startup only.
We're grouping some funny sound packs on this page: they're made by Oucher users with samples found on the Internet. If you own copyright for some of the files and you don't like them to be there, please open an issue and we'll remove them.
You can set a delay in the configuration file. This way, the software will make sure that, after a scream is played, another one won't be played in the next N seconds. Set, for example, delay: 10 and it will feel much better!
A firmware upgrade will remove the Oucher startup scripts, and you will lose root access. However, the /mnt/data/oucher folder is not deleted, so your configuration and custom sounds (if you put them here) are safe. You can root the device again and install Oucher back following the setup procedure above. Everything will work as before.
However, if you spent hours looking for the perfect sounds, we strongly recommend you to backup the config and WAV files, so you won't have to worry if for some reason you need to perform a factory reset.
If you just want to disable the software but be able to enable it back easily, you can just set enabled: false in the configuration. This way, the software does absolutely nothing: after loading the configuration, it just sleeps, without reading the log file or anything else.
If you want to totally remove the software, just delete the /mnt/data/oucher folder and revert the changes you made to run it as a service, depending on the solution you used to do so.
The Roborock service logs everything that happens while cleaning in a file: /run/shm/PLAYER_fprintf.log (or other files, depending on the model and firmware version). This includes bumps into obstacles. The software just follows the log file and, everytime a bump occurs, plays a random WAV file. A semaphore avoids overlapped screams if multiple bumps occurr in a rapid sequence.
You're not forced to move it: the configuration file is also looked up from the /etc folder, like in previous versions. Anyway, we strongly suggest to put it in /mnt/data/oucher, so you won't lose it in case of firmware upgrade (see above).
I used an old version that used a text-to-speech to play phrases, why am I forced to use WAV files now?
The old version used to require many dependencies (espeak, aplay, sox, ...) that were quite heavy considering the limited disk space, and they were not really trivial to install on some firmwares without APT.
The current version now uses the beep Golang library, that uses asound under the hood. This is statically linked inside the executable, so that there's no need to install any dependency anymore.
Unfortunately, this isn't as easy with espeak, that was previously used for text-to-speech. Moreover, it wasn't that good, really.
So I decided, at least for now, to drop support for it and to let Oucher just play WAV files.
However, you can still generate WAV files using your favorite text-to-speech software and use it.
Fox example, this is how files in the sounds folder of this repo were generated:
espeak -w argh.wav "Argh!"
espeak -w ouch.wav "Ouch!"
espeak -w hey-it-hurts.wav "Hey, it hurts!"
You can set a language to espeak with the -v parameter, for example:
espeak -v it -w italian-voice.wav "This will be an Italian voice."
If you really need the old version, there's still the old-espeak-and-aplay branch of this repository with it.
Sorry for your loss :) Seriously: we're pretty confident it's not an issue with our software, since it really doesn't touch anything on the system. Most probably, you had some trouble with the root procedure. It's really hard to brick a Roborock, so maybe you'll find a solution if you search carefully on the dedicated channels. As said above, we're not giving support about the root procedure.
I followed the procedure but the robot doesn't ouch / ouches at the wrong moment / woke me up at 3am by screaming for no reason.
In this case, we're really happy to help! Just open an issue about it with as many details as you can, and we'll sort it out. If you can, please copy the following files from the robot immediately after the unexpected behaviour occurrs, and attach them to the issue:
- /run/shm/PLAYER_fprintf.log
- /run/shm/NAV_normal.log
- /run/shm/NAV_TRAP_normal.log
Wow, thanks! You can drop some Bitcoin to 35J2dPDFHweeB87LiYcHbhVmtgBsNrP4eH
- The dustcloud project for all the work on rooting the devices and documenting the procedure, nothing of this would be possible without their work.
- ZVLDZ for having added Oucher to his firmware builder, and for making those well-made startup scripts I included here.
- Everyone who provided feedback on his specific model/firmware version, Oucher has improved a lot thanks to this.
Did I forget to mention you? Sorry! Just open a issue :)