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@seffs
Last active June 9, 2024 00:50
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Raspbian Bookworm - Ultra Minimal Kiosk Setup

This was tested on a fresh Raspbian Bookworm Lite installation. Proceed with caution.

EDIT 23/12/2023: Removed dead download link and added own release

EDIT 09/06/2024: Force wayland after install


First Steps

Update your system

sudo apt update && sudo apt -y full-upgrade

Install core packages

sudo apt install wayfire seatd xdg-user-dirs

Create ~/.config/wayfire.init

touch ~/.config/wayfire.init

Force Wayland through raspi-config

See https://raspberrypi.stackexchange.com/a/144867 ---> REBOOT

On systems older than Pi4: you need wayland=enabled
See https://www.raspberrypi.com/documentation/computers/configuration.html#wayland
---> REBOOT

Test wayfire

wayfire ---> A black screen will appear with the mouse pointer at the center.

Note: if you are controlling your Pi with a physical keyboard, you might not be able to terminate the process from the same session. This is because no keybindings exist in the config file yet. You can spawn a second tty with ctrl+alt+f2 and kill it from there.


Change display orientation

sudo apt install wlr-randr

Rotate display: WAYLAND_DISPLAY=wayland-1 wlr-randr --output HDMI-A-1 --transform 180
(------------------------has to be launched from within the session. Keep reading---------------------------)


Hide mouse pointer

You'll need the wayfire-plugins-extra package. Unfortunately it is not available in the Bookworm repos. You have two ways to install it [1]

1.1) Download compiled library

  1. Choose your arch
  1. Decompress with tar xf /path/to/wayfire-plugins-extra.tar.xz
  2. Each plugin comes with a .so and a an .xml file. You will need to copy those files to their correct paths:
    /usr/lib/aarch64-linux-gnu/wayfire/<desired-plugin>.so
    /usr/share/wayfire/metadata/<desired-plugin>.xml

1.2) Build from source

  1. Follow the instructions in https://github.com/seffs/wayfire-plugins-extra-raspbian/. Install source packages with
    sudo apt install libglibmm-2.4-dev libglm-dev libxml2-dev libpango1.0-dev libcairo2-dev wayfire-dev libwlroots-dev libwf-config-dev
  2. Each plugin comes with a .so and .xml file. meson should take care of the installation. Otherwise check if the following path exists for any new extra plugin:
    ls /usr/lib/aarch64-linux-gnu/wayfire/<new-extra-plugin>.so
    ls /usr/share/wayfire/metadata/<new-extra-plugin>.xml

2) Activate your plugin(s)

I was only interested in hiding the mouse pointer. This can be accomplished with the hide_cursor plugin. The same concept applies to the rest of plugins.

Open your ~/.config/wayfire.init file and paste the following:

[core]
plugins = \
        autostart \
        ### We need to add the extra plugin to the list ###
        hide-cursor

### Execute commands on compositor startup ###
[autostart]
rotate_display = WAYLAND_DISPLAY=wayland-1 wlr-randr --output HDMI-A-1 --transform 360
# my_script = /path/to/script

### We can tweak it to our liking. You will find the documentation inside of each plugin's XML file. ###
[hide-cursor]
#toggle = <alt> KEY_Z
#hide_delay = 3

Execute your script on startup

Adjust my_script = /path/to/script to your needs. Don't forget to uncomment it.

Start wayfire

wayfire -c ~/.config/wayfire.ini ---> See? No pointer!


[1] Based on bjtheone's instructions

@swvalenti194
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Seated was installed and already up to date

@seffs
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seffs commented Apr 15, 2024

@swvalenti194 there could be a number of reasons for this to happen. I'm afraid I won't be able to help you troubleshoot this to the very end, but I'm willing to point you to other resources. I would suggest starting from scratch and document each step you followed before the error appears. What is your current setup (Pi model, connected hardware)? Are you using a fresh Bookworm Lite Image?

@swvalenti194
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@seffs I understand, I appreciate the effort. PI4 with bookworm desktop and touchscreen display. I guess the issue is it's not the lite version.

@seffs
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seffs commented Apr 16, 2024

@swvalenti194 then you might not need to install seatd at all. Uninstall it and then execute the following command:

apt-get install --reinstall -o Dpkg::Options::="--force-confask" raspberrypi-ui-mods

This should bring your Desktop GUI back to default. After that, try to switch wayland -> X11-> wayland through raspi-config (see my second comment on this thread).

In (the best) case of a reinstall, skip the First Steps section. The wayfire.init file is already provided by the desktop image. Just fill in the missing sections.

@I7T5
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I7T5 commented Jun 8, 2024

Hi I'm getting the following errors trying wayfire with my pretty fresh (only docker and portainer, still a noob) RPI Zero 2 W with latest bookworm lite 64bit. Seems like wayland kiosk mode is very unfriendly for Lite OS users...

II 07-06-24 22:11:13.300 - [src/main.cpp:280] Starting wayfire version 0.7.5
II 07-06-24 22:11:13.301 - [libseat] [libseat/libseat.c:73] Seat opened with backend 'seatd'
II 07-06-24 22:11:13.301 - [libseat] [libseat/backend/seatd.c:212] Enabling seat
II 07-06-24 22:11:13.302 - [backend/session/session.c:109] Successfully loaded libseat session
II 07-06-24 22:11:13.310 - [backend/backend.c:220] Found 1 GPUs
II 07-06-24 22:11:13.311 - [backend/drm/backend.c:186] Initializing DRM backend for /dev/dri/card0 (vc4)
II 07-06-24 22:11:13.311 - [backend/drm/drm.c:242] Found 4 DRM CRTCs
II 07-06-24 22:11:13.312 - [backend/drm/drm.c:200] Found 24 DRM planes
II 07-06-24 22:11:13.338 - [render/egl.c:201] Supported EGL client extensions: EGL_EXT_device_base EGL_EXT_device_enumeration EGL_EXT_device_query EGL_EXT_platform_base EGL_KHR_client_get_all_proc_addresses EGL_EXT_client_extensions EGL_KHR_debug EGL_EXT_platform_device EGL_EXT_platform_wayland EGL_KHR_platform_wayland EGL_EXT_platform_x11 EGL_KHR_platform_x11 EGL_EXT_platform_xcb EGL_MESA_platform_gbm EGL_KHR_platform_gbm EGL_MESA_platform_surfaceless
libEGL warning: MESA-LOADER: failed to open vc4: /usr/lib/dri/vc4_dri.so: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory (search paths /usr/lib/aarch64-linux-gnu/dri:\$${ORIGIN}/dri:/usr/lib/dri, suffix _dri)

EE 07-06-24 22:11:13.349 - [EGL] command: eglInitialize, error: EGL_NOT_INITIALIZED (0x3001), message: "DRI2: failed to load driver"
libEGL warning: MESA-LOADER: failed to open vc4: /usr/lib/dri/vc4_dri.so: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory (search paths /usr/lib/aarch64-linux-gnu/dri:\$${ORIGIN}/dri:/usr/lib/dri, suffix _dri)

EE 07-06-24 22:11:13.352 - [EGL] command: eglInitialize, error: EGL_NOT_INITIALIZED (0x3001), message: "DRI2: failed to load driver"
EE 07-06-24 22:11:13.352 - [EGL] command: eglInitialize, error: EGL_NOT_INITIALIZED (0x3001), message: "eglInitialize"
EE 07-06-24 22:11:13.352 - [render/egl.c:264] Failed to initialize EGL
EE 07-06-24 22:11:13.353 - [render/egl.c:554] Failed to initialize EGL context
EE 07-06-24 22:11:13.353 - [render/gles2/renderer.c:688] Could not initialize EGL
EE 07-06-24 22:11:13.353 - [src/main.cpp:144] Fatal error: Segmentation fault
EE 07-06-24 22:11:13.397 - #1  wf::print_trace(bool) ??:?
addr2line: '�,��': No such file
addr2line: '�,��': No such file
EE 07-06-24 22:11:13.419 - #2  ho4�� ho4��
EE 07-06-24 22:11:13.450 - #3  wlr_renderer_is_gles2 ??:?
EE 07-06-24 22:11:13.480 - #4  wlr_renderer_is_gles2 ??:?
EE 07-06-24 22:11:13.511 - #5  wlr_gles2_renderer_get_egl ??:?
EE 07-06-24 22:11:13.552 - #6  main ??:?
EE 07-06-24 22:11:13.931 - #7  __libc_start_call_main ../sysdeps/unix/sysv/linux/aarch64/libc-start.c:74
EE 07-06-24 22:11:14.313 - #8  call_init ../csu/libc-start.c:128
EE 07-06-24 22:11:14.354 - #9  _start ??:?

Wayland is forced through raspi-config. seatd is installed and the video driver is KMS.

Also touch ~/.config/wayfire.init just gives No such file or directory...

@seffs
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seffs commented Jun 9, 2024

@I7T5 Did you install the plug-ins already?

If so, have you tried deleting them first and then starting wayfire that way?

@I7T5
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I7T5 commented Jun 9, 2024

I did not install the plug-ins. Ended up using DietPi with Chromium which (finally!) worked but the display's not optimal. Guess the Pi Zero's not fit for kiosk mode, at least not with a high refresh rate? Thanks for the gist and the reply though!

@seffs
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seffs commented Jun 9, 2024

I've been using the kiosk mode on a Pi Zero W, which has the same board as of the Pi 1. No flaws so far.

I think I've found the culprit. I will update the gist accordingly. Thx for the feedback.

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