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thomasnorris/Raspberry Pi Kiosk Setup.md

Last active October 22, 2023 03:36
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Instructions for installing a fresh image of Raspbian and turning the Pi into a kiosk (for google slides, google photos, etc)
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Raspberry Pi Kiosk Setup.md

Raspberry Pi Kiosk Setup

  • Install a fresh image of Raspbian and boot the Pi
  • Go through the prompts to finish initial setup
  • Open a Termial window
    • Type sudo apt-get install unclutter
    • Type sudo raspi-config
      • Select Boot Options with Enter
        • Select Wait for Network at Boot with Enter
        • Select Yes with Enter
        • Press Enter again
      • Press Enter again
      • Press Esc
    • Type sudo nano /home/pi/.config/lxsession/LXDE-pi/autostart
      • In this file:
        • Comment this line by putting a # in front of it to disable the screen saver
          • @xscreensaver -no-splash
        • Disable power saving of the attached monitor
          • @xset s off -dpms
        • Remove the mouse cursor from the screen
          • @unclutter -idle 0
        • Start Chromium in full screen at the desired URL
          • @chromium-browser --kiosk --incognito http://site-to-launch.com
            • The --kiosk flag starts Chromium in full screen
            • The --incognito flag hides any message about Chromium not cleanly exiting/crashing
        • Save the file
          • Press Ctrl+X
          • Press Y
          • Press Enter
    • Type sudo nano /boot/config.txt
      • In this file:
        • Uncomment this line by removing the # in front of it to disable screen overscan
          • disable_overscan=1
        • Add this line to increase GPU memory
          • gpu_mem=128
        • Save the file
          • Press Ctrl+X
          • Press Y
          • Press Enter
    • Type crontab -e
      • Pick Nano as the editor if prompted
      • In this file:
        • Add this line to reboot the Pi every day at 12 am via a Cron
          • 0 0 * * * sudo reboot
        • Save the file
          • Press Ctrl+X
          • Press Y
          • Press Enter
    • Type sudo reboot
      • The Pi will reboot
  • On reboot, Chromium should open the specified URL in full screen mode and the Pi will automatically reboot according to the schedule set above
    • Exit to the Raspbian desktop with Alt+F4
@EtzBetz
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EtzBetz commented Aug 17, 2018

Nice guide, wish this would've existed earlier, as I had to find everything manually.

Does Incognito hide the message about not cleanly exiting/crashing? If so, I should probably change my setup so that I don't edit the chromium config file but just open incognito.

@thomasnorris
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@eionsimonelli thanks for the help!

@thomasnorris
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@derRAV3N Yes, that is what the --incognito flag does. I updated the document to include that.

@eionsimonelli
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Awesome project dude!

@tailorvj
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I suggest you check out FullPageOS distro, which does it for you and allows you to set the URL and wifi details in a simple text files on the microSD card.
FullPageOS is also configurable in a way that allows you to create distro variants with your own custom boot commands.

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