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https://github.com/balena-io-experimental/balena-wpe

Fullscreen WebKit browser with hardware accelerated CSS, WebGL, and HTML5 video for the RaspberryPi 3.
https://github.com/balena-io-experimental/balena-wpe

balena browser html5-video javascript pitft raspberry-pi raspberrypi webgl webkit wpe

Last synced: 3 months ago
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Fullscreen WebKit browser with hardware accelerated CSS, WebGL, and HTML5 video for the RaspberryPi 3.

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README 

        
# WPE Webkit for the RaspberryPi



This project provides an easy way of running [WPE

Webkit](https://www.igalia.com/wpe/) for the RaspberryPi. WPEWebkit is a full

featured browser that takes advantage of the GPU to provide hardware

accelerated CSS, WebGL, and HTML5 video.



## Showcase



* Rendering WebGL [abstract shapes](https://mrdoob.neocities.org/023/)

	* 

* Playing [html5 flappy bird](https://nebezb.com/floppybird/)

	* 

* Playing HD video on [YoutubeTV](https://youtube.com/tv)

	* 



## Table of contents



* [Table of contents](#table-of-contents)

* [Getting started](#getting-started)

* [Configuration](#configuration)

    * [Displaying on an HDMI screen](#displaying-to-an-hdmi-screen)

    * [Displaying on a PiTFT 2.8"](#displaying-to-pitft-28)

		* [Capacitive touchscreen](#capacitive-touchscreen)

		* [Resistive touchscreen](#resistive-touchscreen)

    * [Sound configuration](#sound-configuration)

* [Controlling content](#controlling-content)

	* [Loading a URL](#loading-a-url)

	* [Offline content](#offline-content)

	* [Enabling mouse](#enabling-mouse)



## Getting started



* Sign up on [balena](https://dashboard.balena-cloud.com/signup)

* Go through the [getting started guide](http://balena.io/docs/raspberrypi/nodejs/getting-started/) and create a new application

* Clone this repository to your local workspace

* Add the _balena remote_ to your local workspace using the useful shortcut in the dashboard UI ![remoteadd](http://i.imgur.com/no1DNSx.png)

* `git push balena master`

* See the magic happening, your device is getting updated Over-The-Air!



## Configuration



A lot of the configuration of this project is about setting up `config.txt`.

The way you do this on balena is by setting some special fleet configuration

variables. If you don't know how to do this, you can [find more info

here](https://balena.io/docs/configuration/advanced/#modifying-config-txt-remotely).



First, we need to set the GPU memory to something suitable for hardware

accelerated graphics. You can set only one of the following if you know how

much RAM your Pi has or you can set all of them and your Pi will autoselect

based on its memory. **If you don't set any of these, WPE won't work.**



| Key                                 | Value

|-------------------------------------|----------

|**`RESIN_HOST_CONFIG_gpu_mem_256`**  | **`128`**

|**`RESIN_HOST_CONFIG_gpu_mem_512`**  | **`196`**

|**`RESIN_HOST_CONFIG_gpu_mem_1024`** | **`396`**



### Displaying on an HDMI screen



WPE will display to the primary framebuffer (HDMI output) by default. If you

don't set the resolution, it will be autodetected on boot up. Depending on what

you want to do, you might find the performance at FullHD resolution isn't

enough. In that case you can force the HDMI to 720p by adding the following

fleet configuration variables:



| Key                               | Value

|-----------------------------------|--------

|**`RESIN_HOST_CONFIG_hdmi_group`** | **`1`**

|**`RESIN_HOST_CONFIG_hdmi_mode`**  | **`4`**



### Displaying on a PiTFT 2.8"



PiTFT picture



Displaying to a secondary framebuffer is accomplished by rendering on the

primary and continuously copying the resulting image to the secondary. The

reason for this is that the Pi can only render hardware accelerated graphics to

the primary framebuffer. A side effect of this is that you can't display

different content or have different resolutions between the HDMI and your PiTFT

screen.



Since the rendering will happen to the primary framebuffer, we need to force

the HDMI output to be 320x240, our native resolution. You can do this with the

following variables. If don't set those, the Pi will render on a higher

resolution and then scale down the image to fit the Pi screen.



| Key                                       | Value

|-------------------------------------------|-------------------------

|**`RESIN_HOST_CONFIG_hdmi_force_hotplug`** | **`1`**

|**`RESIN_HOST_CONFIG_hdmi_group`**         | **`2`**

|**`RESIN_HOST_CONFIG_hdmi_mode`**          | **`87`**

|**`RESIN_HOST_CONFIG_hdmi_cvt`**           | **`320 240 60 1 0 0 0`**



#### Capacitive touchscreen



**Warning:** The PiTFT based on the `ft6x06_ts` kernel module is not currently

supported out of the box on balena. If your screen says "FT6206" at the back,

it's probably one of those.



| Key                              | Value

|----------------------------------|--------------------------------------------------------

|**`RESIN_HOST_CONFIG_dtoverlay`** | **`pitft28-capacitive,rotate=90,speed=62000000,fps=60`**



#### Resistive touchscreen



| Key                              | Value

|----------------------------------|--------------------------------------------------------

|**`RESIN_HOST_CONFIG_dtoverlay`** | **`pitft28-resistive,rotate=90,speed=62000000,fps=60`**



#### Controlling backlight brightness



If you have a Raspberry touchscreen, you can control the backlight brightness

by setting the environment variable `RPI_BACKLIGHT` to a value in the range

0-255. The default value is 255 (maximum brightness).



### Sound configuration



WPE will normally try to select an appropriate audio sink to output to.

However, if you want to force a specific output to be used you can set the

**`WPE_GSTREAMER_AUDIO_SINK`** environment variable according to the following

table:



| Value                   | Notes

|-------------------------|--------------------------------------

|**`autoaudiosink`**      | Automatically select output (default)

|**`omxhdmiaudiosink`**   | Outputs sound over HDMI

|**`omxanalogaudiosink`** | Outputs to the 3.5mm jack

|**`alsasink`**           | Outputs using alsa (EXPERIMENTAL)



## Controlling content



### Loading a URL



To configure the URL displayed by webkit, set the **`WPE_URL`** environment

variable. The default value is [Youtube TV](http://www.youtube.com/tv)



### Offline content



If you want your device to display content even without internet, you can add

your content in the docker image and point WPE to them. Append a similar

Dockerfile fragment to your project:



```Dockerfile

COPY public_html /var/lib/public_html



ENV WPE_URL="file:///var/lib/public_html/index.html"

```



### Changing content at runtime



balena-wpe ships with [tohora](https://github.com/mozz100/tohora/) so which provides a web interface for changing target URLs at runtime on port 8080



### Enabling mouse



To enable the mouse cursor you have to set the following environment variable.

Keep in mind that there are some known issues with mouse support when the

webpage includes iframes.



| Key                    | Value

|------------------------|---------

|**`WPE_BCMRPI_CURSOR`** | **`1`**