Trouble getting it to start

[PhilsterM9]

I am a fairly new to coding so stuff like this can get me confused a bit but this tutorial seems to be pretty straight forward. However, I cannot get it to start somewhere between “sudo npm install -g pm2” and “pm2 start mm.sh”. I am following each step correctly but it will not start up and instead give me this:

[johaness_00]

@PhilsterM9 Have you tried pm2 start mm?

[PhilsterM9]

@johaness_00 I have but it keeps coming back with the table. The first time this happened, I reset the whole sd card and re-installed the image to the sd card but came back with the same result.

[in_a_days]

@PhilsterM9

Looks like your issues are occurring in the pm2 install/setup process. Are you able to get the Magic Mirror software up and running before moving on to this step? All this pm2 stuff is intended to restart your mirror in the event of a crash. Did you have the mirror software working first?

[PhilsterM9]

@in_a_days I’m not sure how to test it as I said before that I am fairly new to this.

[in_a_days]

@PhilsterM9

No worries, I did the same thing on my first install!

If you made it this far you should be able to put a fresh copy of Raspbian on your SD Card. Once done, go to the terminal and:

curl -sL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/MichMich/MagicMirror/master/installers/raspberry.sh | bash

for a clean install of MM.

Before it’s going to run, you need to rename/copy the config.js file. Hit the terminal and

cd MagicMirror/config
cp config.js.sample config.js

That config.js file is going to be very important in customizing your mirror. Next:

cd ..
DISPLAY=:0 nohup npm start

If your mirror software pops up without issue you’re in the clear and can proceed with the Configuration and Auto-Start stuff. But if you’ve got any issues at this point, it ought to be troubleshot before continuing with system changes.

[PhilsterM9]

@in_a_days I’ll clear my sd card and restart the process using your instructions here. I will let you know what happens, thanks!

[PhilsterM9]

This post is deleted!

[PhilsterM9]

@in_a_days Could you explain how to do the
“cd MagicMirror/config
cp config.js.sample config.js”
I can’t get it to work because I don’t know how to do it

[in_a_days]

@PhilsterM9

You need to launch the Terminal to get to the command prompt. Same place from which you launched the MM installer. If you type:

cd MagicMirror/config

you should see that you’ve changed directories. Then type:

cp config.js.sample config.js

That’s it. MM should be ready to launch.

[PhilsterM9]

@in_a_days As I did as you said, this is what happened which I am not sure if it is supposed to happen

[in_a_days]

@PhilsterM9

Yes! From that screen type:

cd ..

So you see

pi@raspberrypi: /MagicMirror $

then type

DISPLAY=:0 npm start

[yawns]

@PhilsterM9 said in Trouble getting it to start:

I am not sure if it is supposed to happen!

Just as a side note: This is linux. No news is good news. By default there is no feedback like “1 file copied”.
If you don’t feel comfortable with the shell you can work on your raspberry directly using the file explorer

[PhilsterM9]

@in_a_days I tried it and it turned on. But when I reboot it, it doesn’t open the magic mirror like it should, even though I did all the pm2 steps. Also how do I change some of the settings of the magic mirror? (eg. timezone etc.)

[in_a_days]

@PhilsterM9

That is weird! If you are able to launch the mirror software with

DISPLAY=:0 npm start

PM2 should definitely work :(

If you want to modify system settings like timezone, go to your terminal command line and

sudo raspi-config

This will allow you modify a LOT of system settings including time zone and keyboard layout. If you’re looking to modify the configuration of modules on your mirror software you need to edit your config.js file. In a new Terminal session:

cd MagicMirror/config
nano config.js

This will allow you to edit your MM config file which holds the specific configuration options for your MM modules.

[bhepler]

@in_a_days

That is weird! If you are able to launch the mirror software with
DISPLAY=:0 npm start
PM2 should definitely work :(

Don’t forget, you told him to re-flash his SD card. That would have wiped the PM2 installation.

@PhilsterM9 You’re almost there. Your original mistake was that you told PM2 to run the mm.sh script twice (and then 3 times). Let’s make sure that you have PM2 installed, now that you’ve reflashed your SD card.

Run this: pm2 status. If you get the table, great. Let us know how many entries are in it. If you get the No command 'pm2' found, did you mean: line, go back to the tutorial and follow the steps again, starting with sudo npm install -g pm2.

If you do have more than one line in the table when you check PM2 status, you’ll want to remove all of the extraneous ones. pm2 delete 1 and possibly pm2 delete 2 if there are three entries. Get it to where there is only one entry in the list when you run pm2 status. Then save the pm2 state: pm2 save.

Okay, once you have saved the pm2 configuration, pm2 will make sure that your mirror is running. You don’t need to tell it start ever again. Hopefully. You should be able to reboot your Pi and then run pm2 status and see that the mm process is running all by itself.

[in_a_days]

@bhepler

Most definitely! I inferred from

“even though I did all the pm2 steps”

that @PhilsterM9 had gone through the pm2 install process after re-flash - but your directions should definitely help cross the finish line.

[PhilsterM9]

@in_a_days So I did what @bhepler had written and now works on boot! Now I can’t access the terminal to add some configurations? How do I get around this?

[johaness_00]

@PhilsterM9 press the alt key. It will bring up the menu. Hit file, quit then open terminal and enter pm2 stop mm. Sometimes it takes more than once to get it typed in and hit enter before mm starts up again

[in_a_days]

@PhilsterM9

If you have a keyboard plugged into your Pi you should be able to use the ‘Windows’ key to pull the start menu up on top of MM, from which you can select Accessories > Terminal. Not sure what the equivalent key would be for a non-Windows system keyboard. You can also Alt + F4 to close the MM program - but you’ll have to act fast because the pm2 software is going to automatically re-load it. Either method should allow you to get into the Terminal.

After that, as previously suggested

pm2 stop mm

will shut down the MM program and stop it from re-loading until your next boot up.

I suspect most people prefer to access their Terminal over SSH from a different system. It’s pretty easy to enable on your Pi, and though the process varies depending on your OS, it’s pretty easy to figure out. I can give some pointers if you can’t figure it out from available documentation.