Okay. Separate question.
After installing and running through the setup, are there any optimizations folks use to force accelerated graphics in say firefox-YouTube, celluloid etc.?
Configure.txt should include the following, but I believe these are now all included in the base image.
max_framebuffers=2
dtparam=audio=on
dtoverlay=vc4-fkms-v3d
disable_overscan=1
Firefox needs additionally “gfx.webrender.all true” to be set. However Firefox performance is still slower than the RPi optimised package of Chromium.
There is also apparently an issue with the Chromium snap that prevents HW acceleration, but I assume this isn’t included.
thanks!
On a separate matter - but related - has anyone used instructions like these to overclock their Pi4? https://magpi.raspberrypi.org/articles/how-to-overclock-raspberry-pi-4
It might be nice to consider an application/applet for budgie-extras that is specific to the Pi/Arm boards to allow users to tweak/reset these things.
Possibly could build upon Sam’s temperature applet - make it a “Pi-Tweak” applet maybe? (https://github.com/samlane-ma/pi-tempmonitor) Thoughts? Anyone interested in pursuing?
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Over locking is very straight forward, adding the following to config.txt the following would set CPU at 1.8 GHz and 750 MHz for the GPU
over_voltage=4
arm_freq=1800
gpu_freq=750
In addition to the config settings I mentioned earlier, I also typically add
“hdmi_enable_4kp60=0” which disables 4K output and set “dtparam=sd_poll_once” when booting from SSD. This stops the system continually searching for SD card
There is now a Canonical tool piobootctl for editing boot settings. Full details can be found here I believe this was developed as replacement for the raspi-congfig , but I’m not sure what the plans are for the tool. It’s possibly just a stop gap, but it works well.
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Neat. Then a simple GUI wrapper over that app would be more than useful.
Has anybody got any scripts to set up VNC in such a way that it starts on boot rather than after login?
In that way you can then vnc from a laptop to the Pi - control the PI remotely including logging out and logging in.
Default vnc configuration is just a systemctl service, can be set to run on boot, can’t remember though if some network services are on login too though, ymmv
Will check this evening when I’m near a Pi
the solution for me has been to:
-
Pre-enable ssh, usually a “ touch ssh “ in the boot partition after flashing, prior to the first boot
-
Find out the Pi’s ip address by matching oui bits in nmap (from laptop)
-
Log in from laptop
-
Set up latest realvnc release from ssh, configure to start the service immediately after networking is running
-
Profit
Will try to remember to add some scripts this evening
Thx! The reason for the request for a scripted method is because we should look to offer some “simple ways” to-do these sorts of things in our UBpi image.
So for example - setting up SSH access should be really a “button” or similar on a Budgie-Pi-Config app - one click methods to get the most out of using budgie on a Pi
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ok - just a quick update as to where we are.
We now can produce a Ubuntu Budgie image - you can generate your own image via our newly minted UBpi repo - instructions should be fairly self explanatory.
From this image we can see that there are a number of areas we need to tackle moving forward.
- Need to remove the existing Canonical snaps in the donor 20.10 image
- If possible need to install the budgie-welcome snap - the fallback will be tweaking the existing budgie-welcome deb package to autostart on login and invite users to install the snap
- On first logon we need to sense if the connected monitor/screen is less than 1024 px - and invite people to use a more compact layout for budgie - probably something like
- This compact layout will need also to adjust font sizes to work better at expected lower Pi resolutions - we are targeting 800x600 as a minimum. Additionally the panel should have autohide set
For the compact layout we should really use the classic budgie menu - ideally with its compact mode ticked - how to tick that checkbox in the applet settings is a really good question!
- We know some outputs are 480px high - so we probably should look at a xrandr type solution so that the user can scroll when needed. Remember UB is a desktop solution - all the apps are expecting desktop type resolutions.
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Hi folks,
introducing our tech-preview - this is a first public technical preview of our Ubuntu Budgie raspberry pi image. It is based on 21.04.
It is pre-alpha - just for testing folks and to get feedback. It includes our unstable PPA as well which includes stuff we are testing ourselves.
Just download and write to a SD Card via Disks or raspi-imager. After installation and reboot you will see our budgie-arm-config app. Again this is a test version showing our thoughts.
First tab sets up the layout for UB - default desktop, a compact layout and a mini layout depending on the screen resolution you are using with your raspi 4
Second tab is our overclock - its intention is to allow you to overclock your raspi - @samlane is working through the issue here so its visual only - in the future hopefully this will work based on pibootctl.
The final tab is remote connection tab - this should be functional - allows you to connect to your raspi via VNC, XRDP and SSH
So let us know your thoughts - the apps -
- are they all needed?
- should some be substituted with apps that work better with a raspi?
- are there anything else that should be included on a raspi?
Known issues - the graphics are slightly glitchy - this is because hirsute itself is pre-alpha
It looks beautiful, but it’s far too sluggish to be usable on Pi 4 so far.
I think a stripped down version would be very beneficial. Fewer animations, I suspect some of the transparencies in the UI are difficult for pi to handle. Maybe a prompt to disable some of the applets by default.
Do check if its using accelerated 3D graphics or not - look in Menu - About - if it says “V3D” for the graphics that’s ok. If it says “llvmpipe” then thats software rendering and its damn slow.
We have found booting with dtoverlay=vc4-kms-v3d-pi4 specified in /boot/firmware/config.txt is much better than the default.
I have built arm64 OS image with budgie desktop.
The build is fully automated on
CircleCi and the image is available
on Cloudsmith
https://cloudsmith.io/~bbn-projects/repos/bbn-repo/packages/?q=lysmarine
Although the script builds distribution for marine purposes I think you can easily tweak it to build Ubuntu Budgie
from base Ubuntu server image.
The image also contains number of tweaks for touchscreen. Right click
emulation with long touch, and desktop launcher (easily customizable).
I hope you find this interesting.
Thanks,
—MG
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Nice!
For those tweaks do you have any details how they have been implemented? @samlane and myself would be interested in making those changes for our raspi image as well.
Right click is done using this
I had to patch original and I build Debian packages on launchpad PPA.
To experience desktop launcher you probably better off just trying it out by installing the image on some SD card and running it
Thanks,
—MG
Excellent! Thank you for this fix for the right click emulation. It works very well!
I added it to my touchscreen pi, and it solves a big issue. Eventually, you will run across something you need to do that is difficult, if not impossible, to do without right-clicking, so a mouse was still always needed.
Thanks. You are welcome to try the OS image https://cloudsmith.io/~bbn-projects/repos/bbn-repo/packages/?q=lysmarine
It has some other features you could use. Check it’s usage of onboard screen keyboard and desktop launcher.
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