Third-Party Module - how to get help?

[sdetweil]

@ember1205 you could try to force electron not to cache images

edit the js/electron.js file and add this line

	app.commandLine.appendSwitch('disable-http-cache');

function createWindow() {
	app.commandLine.appendSwitch("autoplay-policy", "no-user-gesture-required");
----> here 

[ember1205]

@sdetweil said in Third-Party Module - how to get help?:

app.commandLine.appendSwitch(‘disable-http-cache’);

Thanks. I have made the change and restarted the mirror.

I’m running with only this module and the clock enabled and am finding that having the image caching disabled (so far) is significantly slowing down the rendering of the images on screen.

Is there a way to set the node.js maximum memory or set a limit on cache size? I have found some commentary that seems to say that node.js will use up to 1.7G of RAM by default and have no idea if there is anything in any of these configuration files that would lower that limit using the settings:

--max-old-space-size={limit in KB} --optimize-for-size --max-executable-size={limit in KB}

Given that my system is 1GB of RAM, and the default for node.js is to use up to 1.7GB, I could see where it could conceivably be trying to use memory beyond the bounds of the system, especially if there were some sort of issue with the underlying OS and its interaction with node.js to control the memory usage.

[sdetweil]

@ember1205 you should increase the swap space .

https://wpitchoune.net/tricks/raspberry_pi3_increase_swap_size.html

yes, lack of cache will slow down rendering.
I added javascript code to the other module to wait til the image was loaded before showing,
made a huge improvement, no lag rendering

you could try it
https://github.com/sdetweil/MMM-ImagesPhotos
git clone that and then use this in config

		{
			module: "MMM-ImagesPhotos",
			position: "fullscreen",
			config: {
				opacity: 0.9, 
				animationSpeed: 0,
				updateInterval: 30000,  // how often to change pic
				backgroundColor: "#808080", // color around pic (if u want something other than black)
			},
		},		

u have to put images in the uploads folder,
or make a link (ln command) for the uploads folder where the pics are (I use my linux server, external usb drive)

cd ~/MagicMirror/modules/MMM-ImagesPhotos
ls -laF
lrwxrwxrwx   1 sam sam    45 Dec 12 08:53 uploads -> /media/buildserver/media/Photos/selectedpics//

add

disabled: true, 

the the existing module definition (after the name)
to turn it off, without changing anything

[sdetweil]

the command

free -m

will show u memory usage

nano 
sam@nano:~/MagicMirror$ free -m
              total        used        free      shared  buff/cache   available
Mem:           3956        2097         359         559        1499        1149
Swap:          1978         460        1517

pi4 -4gig, default swap space
free -m
              total        used        free      shared  buff/cache   available
Mem:           3906         650        2053         447        1201        2656
Swap:            99           3          96

[ember1205]

@sdetweil said in Third-Party Module - how to get help?:

https://wpitchoune.net/tricks/raspberry_pi3_increase_swap_size.html

I will give this a shot. Given that each time the slideshow has died, it has indicated that it ran out of memory at roughly 100Mb (and the default swap is 100Mb), this could definitely be related. I’ll try doubling it to see what happens with this module.

I was going to try tackling the transitioning to prevent changing to the new image until it was rendered (to prevent the “painting”), but need the memory issue fixed first. :)

Does your image module contain the JS code you were referring to that hides the image until it’s rendered?

[sdetweil]

@ember1205 yes, it contains the code for the transition handling.

I would make the swap 1 gig… its only a little disk (memory card) space…

the code.

basically it adds an img (appends) to the div to display, the image is hidden,
then there is an onload handler, that gets notified when the image is loaded (not yet visible)
it also adjusts the image size to keep the proportions correct, (css background-size:cover and contain both distort the image)

it makes the image visible, and starts the timer for the next image.

it then checks to see if there are TWO images in the div,
if so, it hides the 1st, shows the second and removes the 1st (old image)
repeat

[ember1205]

@sdetweil

I will give your code a try. Increasing the swap size and re-enabling the cache resulted in another almost immediate crash.

:(

[sdetweil]

@ember1205 hm… mine runs like a top on pi0 , pi3 b+, pi4, odroid, jetson nano , macOs, ubuntu

my selected pics holds 100 pics, some as large as 15meg. 7.4 meg avg

[ember1205]

@sdetweil

Seems your code has dependencies? I’m getting an error when trying to load:

WARNING! Could not load config file. Starting with default configuration. Error found: Error: Cannot find module 'node_helper'

[sdetweil]

@ember1205 node_help is the build in module,

sounds like u did an npm install, even tho not needed (and finds a bug or new feature we don’t want)

recover with this

cd ~/MagicMirror
git checkout modules/node_modules/node_helper/index.js

[ember1205]

@sdetweil said in Third-Party Module - how to get help?:

git checkout modules/node_modules/node_helper/index.js

yeah, I get into the habit of installing add-ons this way and I did the npm install.

Your fix cleaned it right up and it started up. But, guess what? Out of memory again.

Seems that I have bigger issues here…

[sdetweil]

@ember1205 show me the output of

node-v 
npm -v
lsb_release -a
uname -a

and other than image, you are running default modules, correct?

I’m gonna be out for a couple hours, running xmas errands. will try to look in on my phone

[ember1205]

@sdetweil

pi@raspberrypi:~ $ node -v
v10.17.0

pi@raspberrypi:~ $ npm -v
6.11.3

pi@raspberrypi:~ $ lsb_release -a
No LSB modules are available.
Distributor ID: Raspbian
Description:    Raspbian GNU/Linux 10 (buster)
Release:        10
Codename:       buster

pi@raspberrypi:~ $ uname -a
Linux raspberrypi 4.19.75-v7+ #1270 SMP Tue Sep 24 18:45:11 BST 2019 armv7l GNU/Linux

[ember1205]

@sdetweil said in Third-Party Module - how to get help?:

and other than image, you are running default modules, correct?

I have installed your MMM-ImagesPhotos and MMM-BackgroundSlideshow. Even paring the configuration down to ONLY one third-party module running, it will die unless I have the http cache disabled.

I have changed the swap size from the default of 100 to 250 and when it crashed, there was only a small portion of swap being used.

[sdetweil]

@ember1205 hm

my uname -a

Linux raspberrypi4 4.19.75-v7l+ #1270 SMP Tue Sep 24 18:51:41 BST 2019 armv7l GNU/Linux

we have different kernels… wonder why
just got the pi4 yesterday

[ember1205]

@sdetweil Possibly because you’re running on a 4 and I’m on a 3?

[sdetweil]

are u using pm2 to manage? if so, do a pm2 logs --lines=100 >somefile

I’d like to see the error

[sdetweil]

@ember1205 ok, from my pi3

Linux raspberrypi 4.19.75-v7+ #1270 SMP Tue Sep 24 18:45:11 BST 2019 armv7l GNU/Linux

[ember1205]

I just did an apt-get update and apt-get upgrade. I then flushed the PM2 logs and restarted. When it crashes again, I’ll post the log info as you asked.

[ember1205]

At a minimum, the apt-get update / upgrade seems to have at least helped. After installing the updates and restarting, I’ve been running this module with clock, calendar, current weather, and weather forecast all enabled and it hasn’t crashed in about an hour.

I stopped everything and reverted to the BackgroundSlideshow module to see if it would also run clean, but it died pretty quickly. I’ve flushed the logs again (although I did capture their contents from the other module’s crash) and once again changed over to ImagesPhotos to see what happens after another run.

While I’m waiting to see if it will crash, I have some questions about the rendering configuration.

I’ve tried both the “fullscreen” and “middle_center” settings and the photos are not constrained to the screen (in terms of the actual image, not where it’s shown). I can change the details so that I use less than full height and/or width, and there is a black border. However, the image itself is getting cropped - badly.

How can I get this to display the entire image on the screen like I can with the other module?