Rpi 4 and two monitors

sdetweil

@NathTheDude how about the output of xrandr -q

NathTheDude

@sdetweil . I get the following when trying to run different xrandr commands:

Can't open display

NathTheDude

@sdetweil - ahhh. I need to do this from the desktop:

pi@MagicMirrors:~ $ xrandr -q
Screen 0: minimum 320 x 200, current 2160 x 1920, maximum 7680 x 7680
HDMI-1 connected primary 1080x1920+0+0 left (normal left inverted right x axis y axis) 477mm x 268mm
   1920x1080     60.00*+  60.00    50.00    59.94  
   1680x1050     59.88  
   1280x1024     75.02    60.02  
   1440x900      59.90  
   1280x960      60.00  
   1280x720      60.00    60.00    50.00    59.94  
   1024x768      75.03    70.07    60.00  
   832x624       74.55  
   800x600       72.19    75.00    60.32    56.25  
   720x576       50.00    50.00    50.00  
   720x480       60.00    60.00    59.94    59.94    59.94  
   640x480       75.00    72.81    66.67    60.00    59.94    59.94  
   720x400       70.08  
HDMI-2 connected 1080x1920+1080+0 right (normal left inverted right x axis y axis) 477mm x 268mm
   1920x1080     60.00*+  60.00    50.00    59.94  
   1680x1050     59.88  
   1280x1024     75.02    60.02  
   1440x900      59.90  
   1280x960      60.00  
   1280x720      60.00    60.00    50.00    59.94  
   1024x768      75.03    70.07    60.00  
   832x624       74.55  
   800x600       72.19    75.00    60.32    56.25  
   720x576       50.00    50.00    50.00  
   720x480       60.00    60.00    59.94    59.94    59.94  
   640x480       75.00    72.81    66.67    60.00    59.94    59.94  
   720x400       70.08  
pi@MagicMirrors:~ $

sdetweil

@NathTheDude ok, I can see the same results now that I have my adapter…

may have to wait til tomorrow to work on it…

NathTheDude

Hey @sdetweil , no problem at all - no rush indeed. Thank you for your help thus far.

So thanks to this page I have been able to run up two chromiums, one on each page but I have started up chromium directly via terminal from the desktop. Not quite figured out how to implement this as two MM’s and if running up two at once would kill the CPU.

raspberrypi.org forum post

1st terminal session

DISPLAY=:0 /usr/bin/chromium-browser \
--noerrdialogs \
--kiosk \
--window-position=0,0 \
--start-fullscreen \
--user-data-dir=Default

2nd terminal session

DISPLAY=:0 /usr/bin/chromium-browser \
--noerrdialogs \
--kiosk \
--window-position=1920,0 \
--start-fullscreen \
--user-data-dir=‘Test2’

sdetweil

@NathTheDude copy one MM folder tree to MagicMirror1

then change the config on MM1 to use a different port (8081 maybe)

then start both MM in serverOnly mode (u can set that in config.js too, serverOnly: true,

then launch your two browsers, with the url pointing to separate MM’s…
–app=http://localhost:MM_port,
–app=http://localhost:MM1_port

you can edit the run-start.sh on MM1 to add the

--window-position=1920,0 \
--user-data-dir=‘Test2’

parms to the ones already provided

then change both MM configs to serverOnly: “local”,
and it will launch the chrome browser for you
(this is what we call split mode, using a separate browser)

then u can have pm2 start both of those when the system boots…
have to change the mm.sh in MM1/installers, and maybe the json file title to MagicMirror1, and point to the local mm.sh

NathTheDude

Hey @sdetweil , thanks for the info on this - I am grateful.

I think I am nearly there but just missing a bit or two.

I copied the ‘MagicMirror’ to ‘MagicMirror2’ folder, updated the config.js, run-start.sh and the pm2_MagicMirror.json files.

When I reboot I now get MM and MM2 load up but both on the same screen.

I have messed around with the chromium line from the ‘run-start.sh’ and I don’t think it is actually be used in this case, I even commented the line out and this did not prevent me from running ‘npm start’ and MM2 still loaded albeit on top of the first MM.

Any ideas on where it is getting it’s info on how to start up chromium?

Thanks

Nathan

sdetweil

@NathTheDude sorry. I left out the pm2 steps

From mm2 folder do

pm2 start installers/pm2???.json
pm2 save

Where the json file is the one u modified.

It should start the second mirror app.

The only difference is that window-positio info. And on reboot

pm2 status should show both.

Can u show the two chromium browser lines?

I will attempt to recreate here

NathTheDude

Hey @sdetweil , after looking at how the current MM is setup with pm2 (pm2 show MagicMirror) this had the ‘mm.sh’ as the target.

Within the MM2 folder I ran: ‘pm2 start ./installers/mm.sh --name MagicMirror2’ which started the MM2 but on the first screen. Then used pm2 save.

I just setup pm2 with the .json file instead of the mm.sh file and the results seem to be the same from what i can see with it getting displayed on the first screen.

Within the start-run.sh, I can comment out the chromium line and and it will not break anything which makes me think this line is not being referenced.

MM line:

chromium-browser --noerrdialogs --kiosk --user-data-dir='Default' --window-position=0,0 --disable-infobars --app=http://localhost:$port  --ignore-certificate-errors-spki-list --ignore-ssl-errors --ignore-certificate-errors 2>/dev/null

MM2 line:

chromium-browser --noerrdialogs --kiosk  --disable-infobars --app=http://localhost:8082 --ignore-certificate-errors-spki-list --ignore-ssl-errors --ignore-certificate-errors --window-postion=1920,0 --user-data-dir='Test2' 2>/dev/null

sdetweil

@NathTheDude if u start the json file, pm2 reads the info, gives u a nice name etc.

pm2 delete 0 or 1
pm2 save

Then pm2 start the json file.
And pm2 save
To save for reboot