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I am running Raspbian, and I am trying to setup a "kiosk mode" box. I have successfully done this with midori, but midori does not support html5. so I wanted to try the new beta "web browser" (seems to run epiphany-browser).

my current setup is like this: /etc/xdg/lxsession/LXDE/autostart:

@xset s off
@xset -dpms
@xset s noblank
@midori -e Fullscreen -a http://www.playr.biz/23612/15122

this new web browser is discussed here

but when I look at the manpage, it does not say much about CLI options.

man epiphany-browser

so, my question is: how can I start the epiphany-browser in full screen mode, and start a specific URL like I have done with midori above? (if possible at all).

update: I followed advice and I tried the following in file /etc/xdg/lxsession/LXDE/autostart

@epiphany-browser http://www.playr.biz/5dd1/1ddd5
@sleep 2s
@echo key F11 | xte

but it did not make it full screen, so I tried to run xte manually, but got an error " Unable to open display 'default'"

so, I did two things, I changed the file /etc/lightdm/lightdm.conf and I looked for this line:

xserver-command=X -s 0 dpms

then I changed it to:

xserver-command=X -s 0 dpms :0

to define the display/screen as :0 (localhost number 0)

now, if I run this

echo key F11 | xte -x:0

the screen goes full screen.

but, when I update the /etc/xdg/lxsession/LXDE/autostart like this:

@epiphany-browser http://www.playr.biz/5ddd/1dddd
@sleep 60s
@echo key F11 | xte -x:0

PS: I tried 2s, 10s, 60s and 120s, but that did not help.

So I guess the @sleep 60s might not work.

techraf
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Sverre
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4 Answers4

9

This is not a direct answer to your problem, but it is a suggestion based on the context.

I am trying to setup a "kiosk mode" box. I have successfully done this with midori, but midori does not support html5.

Chromium (a fork of chrome) is available for the pi, supports HTML 5, and although it is undocumented, has a --kiosk mode. I tested this on the raspbian, but I imagine it is in the Arch and Pidora repos as well:

> apt-get install chromium

A surprisingly small download, < 100 MB. Then:

> chromium --kiosk

Presto, full screen. There does not seem to be a way to get it out of full screen (F11 doesn't work), but perhaps that is the point of kiosk mode.

Initially, chromium has a residential memory footprint (i.e., actual RAM usage) of ~70 MB.

goldilocks
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  • tested this now, and the kiosk mode works as adverticed, but my html5 video still complains. – Sverre Mar 17 '14 at 03:49
  • The HTML5 video standard looks to involve the usual mess of legal infighting over what formats are supposed to be supported; AFAICT reading this the result is there aren't any that are required, lol. If it is H.264, there's a note there that it was removed from chromium (but not chrome) which is a shame since the pi has hardware acceleration for that. Firefox might (have you tried that?), although firefox doesn't seem to have a fullscreen/kiosk mode except via F11. – goldilocks Mar 17 '14 at 04:28
  • I guess FF is next on my list :) – Sverre Mar 17 '14 at 04:47
  • FF did the trick.. but also chromium was very usefull, thanks for the help. – Sverre Mar 17 '14 at 07:03
8

It doesn't look like there's a way to do it directly, but the xte tool can be used to simulate a key press.

epiphany-browser http://www.playr.biz/23612/15122
sleep 2s # give it time to start
echo key F11 | xte # simulate pressing the full screen key
Fred
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  • Thanks, I will try this. I would vote you up, but I have no karma on this one. (raspberry pi) – Sverre Mar 14 '14 at 08:43
  • I installed xautomation to get xte, but when I try to run xte I get this error message "Unable to open display 'default' tried to google it, but so far nothing – Sverre Mar 14 '14 at 10:03
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    Try "DISPLAY=:0 echo key F11 | xte" instead. – Fred Mar 15 '14 at 11:28
  • yes did that, thanks.. helped. now I only need to make the delay work :) – Sverre Mar 15 '14 at 11:35
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    I think the problem may be the @. According to the ArchWiki (https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/LXDE#Autostart_files), that's used for processes that need to continuously be restarted if they crash, which means that whole file is executed non-linearly. That is to say the sleep doesn't actually do anything. Put it all into a bash script to ensure linear execution, and have the autostart file call that, so that if it does crash it gets restarted. – Fred Mar 15 '14 at 11:39
  • Thanks for your help, you helped me a lot, and your answer actually answered my question, even if I ended up using a different browser for now. – Sverre Mar 17 '14 at 07:04
  • if I could mark both as the correct answer I would :( and I have no carma to even upvote this solution. sorry – Sverre Mar 17 '14 at 07:04
  • anyone know how to keep epiphany from reopening the last session? Can't figure how to disable such a useful and annoying "feature" – Jonathan S. Fisher Oct 31 '14 at 18:50
4

Here's an example of a digital picture frame using epiphany kiosk style: http://simplyautomationized.blogspot.com/2015/04/rpicframe-html5-kiosk-style-picture.html

You will need a window manager opened before launching. matchbox-window-manager is light weight

The -a in the CLI will load it in kiosk mode:

sudo -u pi epiphany-browser -a --profile ~/.config http://localhost/index.html
raspi-ninja
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1

I think the trick here is to include the sleep command in the automation script instead of depending on /bin/sleep.

My /etc/xdg/lxsession/LXDE-pi/autostart looks like this and seems to work as intended:

@xset s off
@xset -dpms
@xset s noblank
@epiphany-browser index.html
@xte 'sleep 10' 'key F11'

Of course you should replace 'index.html' with a real URL and you still need the xautomation package.

Greenonline
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Bodo Junglas
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