Re: "Information station" using Perl and Raspberry Pi

2017-08-01 Thread SSC_perl 
There was some good information in this thread.  Thank you!

> On Jul 26, 2017, at 2:38 AM, David Precious  wrote:
> 
> FWIW, it might be sensible to not fully discount the HTML option -
> seting an RPi up to start a browser on boot in full-screen "kiosk mode"
> is easy, and you could have it load either a page served by the RPi
> itself, or hosted elsewhere, whichever you prefer.

Thanks for this, Dave.  I forgot about kiosk mode, so you were right - 
HTML was the easiest.  Just to get this up and running for my mother, I settled 
on JavaScript embedded in HTML to change the messages for her.  It's pretty 
clunky at this point, but at least it's usable - and I can make changes 
remotely.  That's nice!  Now I can take my time and work on this at my 
convenience to make it a lot more powerful.

Thanks again,
Frank
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Re: "Information station" using Perl and Raspberry Pi

2017-07-27 Thread Mike Flannigan 


I can't be the best one to answer this, but I might be
the only one that responds.

What you want might be hard, though that would surprise
me.  That seems to be the consensus in this discussion:
http://www.tomsguide.com/answers/id-1920620/cheapest-show-browser-long-term.html

I have no direct experience with Raspberry Pi, but
it seems clear it would probably work if you are
abandoning the watching of TV on the set.

I'd like to hear how this works out for you.


Mike


On 7/25/2017 2:21 PM, beginners-digest-h...@perl.org wrote:

Subject:
"Information station" using Perl and Raspberry Pi
From:
SSC_perl 
Date:
7/25/2017 2:20 PM

To:
Perl Beginners 


I'm looking to get some ideas on how to make an "information station" 
for my mother who has the beginning stages of dementia.  I want to display information on 
her TV, like when her next meal is, time of day, date, etc., which of course would change 
daily and throughout the day.

I was thinking that I'd get a Raspberry Pi and program that to retrieve 
text files from a server depending on the time of day.  I don't know how well 
the RPi handles Perl - it seems to be geared for Python.  I would need to be 
able to display text in any size and style.  My first though was to use HTML, 
but I don't want to use a browser to display the text onscreen.  Would this 
require a GUI, such as Tk?

Has anyone done anything like this before?  Am I on the right track 
with my ideas or is there a better way of doing this?

Thanks,
Frank

Re: "Information station" using Perl and Raspberry Pi

2017-07-27 Thread Gary Stainburn 
(resent as it never appeared)

I have seen a few projects similar to the one you've linked. This is the first 
one using a Pi Zero that I've seen but there's no reason why this wouldn't 
work. (I've never used Pi Zero's personally)

A RPi2 and 3 both have 4 USB ports, LAN, HDMI, and audio out. His point about 
a Pi2 and a smaller power supply is a good one, but then you lose WiFi.

My monitors are all VGA, so I use the following to provice VGA out and WiFi

(Sorry if advertising isn't allowed but I've tried other products with less 
reliable success)

https://thepihut.com/collections/raspberry-pi-wifi/products/usb-wifi-adapter-for-the-raspberry-pi
https://thepihut.com/collections/cables-leads/products/raspberry-pi-hdmi-to-vga-convertor

The new version of Raspbian is Pixel which includes a very good X GUI.

I've never done any GUI programming on Linux so I can't help there. My 
personal preference would be to use something like Firefox or Chrome in Kiosk 
mode. There is nothing to stop you then using Perl CGI to update the web 
page, although I would probably have a static HTML /JavaScript page with a 
Perl CGI backend providing the content.

You could of course have Apache also running on the Pi

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Re: "Information station" using Perl and Raspberry Pi

2017-07-26 Thread Sebastian Paaske Tørholm 
On Wed, 2017-07-26 at 10:38 +0100, David Precious wrote:
> On Tue, 25 Jul 2017 12:20:44 -0700
> SSC_perl  wrote:
> 
> > My first though was to use HTML, but I don't want to use a browser
> > to
> > display the text onscreen.  Would this require a GUI, such as Tk?
> 
> FWIW, it might be sensible to not fully discount the HTML option -
> seting an RPi up to start a browser on boot in full-screen "kiosk
> mode"
> is easy, and you could have it load either a page served by the RPi
> itself, or hosted elsewhere, whichever you prefer.
> 
> I'd say knocking up information pages in HTML would be quicker and
> easier than using Tk or similar to write a GUI app.

Along that line, might I suggest looking into ?

It's a simple software system written for running an info-screen with
some simple HTML slides by some students at my alma mater.

Here's an example of the slide-set used by the system: 
The system simply cycles through the slides, periodically pulling from
git to get new slide content.

It's extremely simple to make new slides for and quite robust, and
designed to run on a device similar to a Raspberry Pi (an ODroid).

While the system itself is written in python, it's pretty easy to
integrate it with perl code. (Either through generating some HTML-files 
from a cron job, or by simply running a Mojolicious-server in the
background that either can be queried via AJAX or simply serve up
webpages.) We use it like that at my place of work, and it's incredibly
low maintenance to keep running and add new content for.

The readme is in Danish, but if there's a demand, it wouldn't be a big
hassle to translate it to English. You can always hop by #diku on
freenode (IRC) if you have any questions about it.

Re: "Information station" using Perl and Raspberry Pi

2017-07-26 Thread Gary Stainburn 
I have seen a few projects similar to the one you've linked. This is the first 
one using a Pi Zero that I've seen but there's no reason why this wouldn't 
work. (I've never used Pi Zero's personally)

A RPi2 and 3 both have 4 USB ports, LAN, HDMI, and audio out. His point about 
a Pi2 and a smaller power supply is a good one, but then you lose WiFi.

My monitors are all VGA, so I use the following to provice VGA out and WiFi

(Sorry if advertising isn't allowed but I've tried other products with less 
reliable success)

https://thepihut.com/collections/raspberry-pi-wifi/products/usb-wifi-adapter-for-the-raspberry-pi
https://thepihut.com/collections/cables-leads/products/raspberry-pi-hdmi-to-vga-convertor

The new version of Raspbian is Pixel which includes a very good X GUI.

I've never done any GUI programming on Linux so I can't help there. My 
personal preference would be to use something like Firefox or Chrome in Kiosk 
mode. There is nothing to stop you then using Perl CGI to update the web 
page, although I would probably have a static HTML /JavaScript page with a 
Perl CGI backend providing the content.

You could of course have Apache also running on the Pi

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Re: "Information station" using Perl and Raspberry Pi

2017-07-26 Thread David Precious 
On Tue, 25 Jul 2017 12:20:44 -0700
SSC_perl  wrote:

> My first though was to use HTML, but I don't want to use a browser to
> display the text onscreen.  Would this require a GUI, such as Tk?

FWIW, it might be sensible to not fully discount the HTML option -
seting an RPi up to start a browser on boot in full-screen "kiosk mode"
is easy, and you could have it load either a page served by the RPi
itself, or hosted elsewhere, whichever you prefer.

I'd say knocking up information pages in HTML would be quicker and
easier than using Tk or similar to write a GUI app.

If you wanted to get real clever, you could look at something like
NeTV, which could take an incoming HDMI feed and overlay text onto it,
so she could be watching telly and still have reminders etc appear (it
wasn't clear from your original question whether you intended for the
TV to still be used for watching things, or solely dedicated to
displaying information).  I've not used them, though, so that's not a
personal recommendation, just another option to consider.

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Re: "Information station" using Perl and Raspberry Pi

2017-07-25 Thread David Mertens 
Hello Frank,

I think I can speak with some minor authority on this. I am a BeagleBone
Black guy, not a RPi guy, but in this situation I think my knowledge of one
is enough to inform the other.

The RPi (and BeagleBone Black) run full Linux OSes running on ARM. Perl
runs just fine on these; web servers run without trouble by extension; and
more interestingly, the X windowing system and GUI layers (like Gnome,
Mate, KDE, etc) run just fine, too. These are fully functional computers,
powered by ARM processors. As such, they would do just fine creating a
display if you can plug the monitor into the computer. BeagleBone has
pre-compiled Debian and Ubuntu images; I'm sure RPi does, too.

RPi is supposed to be better than BeagleBone for multimedia because it has
more and varied ports, but the BBB has HDMI output, too. I don't do
mutlimedia with my BBs so I don't know or care. If you can plug your
mother's TV into a DVI input, or get a converter, then you could simply use
the TV as a monitor. Then you could write Tk or Prima applications to
achieve what you want. Language level support (Python, Javascript, or
otherwise) need not have any bearing on your decision here.

BTW, the big differences that I know of between the BB and RPi are:

   - BB is fully open-source, including board layout; RPi is not because of
   Broadcom (I believe) licensing agreements.
   - RPi's Broadcom chipset is more multimedia friendly, and it has two USB
   ports to the BB's one.
   - BB is built on TI's Sitara chip. This chip includes two
   microcontrollers *within the main CPU silicon*, making it all-around
   much better for industrial and real-time applications. It's like having two
   Arduinos baked into the chip. This should have no bearing on your decision,
   but was the deciding factor for me picking BB.

Good luck! Feel free to reach out either on this list or directly if you
have questions!

David

On Tue, Jul 25, 2017 at 7:53 PM, SSC_perl  wrote:

> On Jul 25, 2017, at 2:08 PM, Andrew Solomon  wrote:
>
> In case you want to see what's already out there, the search engine term
> for you is "assistive technology".
>
>
> Thanks, Andrew!  I appreciate it.  However, I think that's more than what
> I need.  I'm really only looking to display formatted text on a TV screen.
>
> ---
>
> I finally found a project that looks similar to what I want to do:
>
> https://www.cnet.com/how-to/turn-an-old-monitor-into-a-
> wall-display-with-a-raspberry-pi/
>
> It's a lot more elaborate than what I need and it uses a web service to
> display the information.  I'd prefer to use Perl, if at all possible, and
> use my own server for the files.
>
> Frank
>



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  Therefore, if you write the code as cleverly as possible, you are,
  by definition, not smart enough to debug it." -- Brian Kernighan

Re: "Information station" using Perl and Raspberry Pi

2017-07-25 Thread SSC_perl 
> On Jul 25, 2017, at 2:08 PM, Andrew Solomon  wrote:
> 
> In case you want to see what's already out there, the search engine term for 
> you is "assistive technology".

Thanks, Andrew!  I appreciate it.  However, I think that's more than 
what I need.  I'm really only looking to display formatted text on a TV screen.

---

I finally found a project that looks similar to what I want to do:

https://www.cnet.com/how-to/turn-an-old-monitor-into-a-wall-display-with-a-raspberry-pi/

It's a lot more elaborate than what I need and it uses a web service to 
display the information.  I'd prefer to use Perl, if at all possible, and use 
my own server for the files.

Frank

Re: "Information station" using Perl and Raspberry Pi

2017-07-25 Thread Andrew Solomon 
Hi Frank

Apologies in advance for a non-Perl answer to a Perl question :-)

In case you want to see what's already out there, the search engine term
for you is "assistive technology".

I only know this because I once had to advise a government funding body on
the feasibility of a start-up's proposal for developing the kind of system
you're referring to.

Hope that's helpful!

Andrew



On Tue, Jul 25, 2017 at 8:20 PM, SSC_perl  wrote:

> I'm looking to get some ideas on how to make an "information
> station" for my mother who has the beginning stages of dementia.  I want to
> display information on her TV, like when her next meal is, time of day,
> date, etc., which of course would change daily and throughout the day.
>
> I was thinking that I'd get a Raspberry Pi and program that to
> retrieve text files from a server depending on the time of day.  I don't
> know how well the RPi handles Perl - it seems to be geared for Python.  I
> would need to be able to display text in any size and style.  My first
> though was to use HTML, but I don't want to use a browser to display the
> text onscreen.  Would this require a GUI, such as Tk?
>
> Has anyone done anything like this before?  Am I on the right
> track with my ideas or is there a better way of doing this?
>
> Thanks,
> Frank
> --
> To unsubscribe, e-mail: beginners-unsubscr...@perl.org
> For additional commands, e-mail: beginners-h...@perl.org
> http://learn.perl.org/
>
>
>


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