Scheduled delivery of service timers over HDMI in a low-cost, lightweight package using the Raspberry Pi 3 single-board computer. Supports both real-time Planning Center LIVE timer and an offline generic countdown timer.

pco-live.sh	timer.py	rpi-hdmi.sh
		⏰
Delivery of real-time, interactive PCO LIVE timers via Chromium web browser.	Generic python timer that counts down to a specific time, then counts up.	Utility to turn the Raspberry PI HDMI service on and an off.

Open-source and licensed under GPLv3.

(Commands in code blocks are to be entered in the terminal.)

1. Purchase a Raspberry Pi 3, Case, HDMI cable, USB Micro charging cable and Micro SD Card.

• The official case is very well-designed, and also available in black.
• Purchasing a Micro-SD card with NOOBS preinstalled will also make your life easier. 16GB is more than enough space.
• You can use your own USB keyboard and USB mouse or purchase one. You can check here for compatibility.. Wireless is nice, but once you have VNC/SSH and WiFi set up, you can remote into the Pi headlessly.
• You can Purchase an official PSU if you'd like. Alternately, You can use a high-quality smartphone USB charger (minimum 2A) or another device's USB port at your own risk, though this has worked well for many users.

2. Install Raspbian Jessie directly or via NOOBS.

3. Change the password for the default "Pi" user. (Official Documentation)

• passwd

• Follow the prompts (the default password is 'raspberry'), and choose a strong, unique password. Write it on the Pi's case, or in another safe place that you will remember. This is going on your facility's network, and we're worried a more about remote intruders than local ones.

4. Configure settings

• sudo raspi-config or Menu -> Preferences -> Raspberry Pi Configuration
• Expand Filesystem [1] (this step is critical)
• Boot to desktop, automatically logged in as user 'pi' [3-B4]
• Set localization (keyboard and system locale) [5]
• Enable SSH [9-A4]
• Reboot when finished.

5. Configure wifi settings. Official Instructions

6. Update and upgrade OS and software packages. This will refresh the list of available packages, and upgrade installed packages to the latest versions. It will also update the kernel and the Raspberry Pi firmware to the latest stable versions.

• sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get dist-upgrade -y

• This could be very fast or it could take a while (hours) if your hardware or NOOBS card are a few versions behind. Make some tea while you wait. Watch some Dr. Who. Choose a sufficiently British activity to honour the UK origins of your device.

7. Install needed software.

• Install the official packages. (See below for descriptions of each package)

  sudo apt-get install -y ttf-mscorefonts-installer x11-xserver-utils unclutter xdotool sed realvnc-vnc-server chromium-browser python3-pip
  

• When this is complete, let's clean up the temporary files from the previous steps: sudo apt-get clean

• Reboot, then enable the VNC service as you did with SSH earlier in Step 4 of these instructions. Official Documentation

8. Install pyglet python module.

• For our timer.py application, we have a single module dependency - pyglet a windowing and media library which we use to display the timer. The rest of the required modules are included in default python installs. Python packages are best installed with pip which we installed in the step above. Install pyglet as below:

  sudo pip3 install pyglet`
  

• (Note that we are using pip3 to install Python 3 modules. Python 2 is ending active development and entering an extended maintenance-only phase.)

8. Configure sleep settings using the nano command line text editor.

• sudo nano /etc/lightdm/lightdm.conf

• Find the line below in the in the [SeatDefaults] section. You will find two [SeatDefaults] sections. Make sure you edit the second instance. Uncomment (remove the #) it and edit it as below:

• xserver-command=X -s 0 -dpms. (Disables screen saver and power management. [Reference])

• Press Control-O to save, and enter to confirm.

9. Configure start up behaviour using the nano command line text editor.

• sudo nano ~/.config/lxsession/LXDE-pi/autostart

• Append the lines found here.

• Note: You can press SHIFT-INSERT or right click the terminal window and select "copy" to copy text on the clipboard to the document at the current cursor location. Press Control-O to save, and Enter to confirm.

• Reboot.

10. Add shell functions to your /home/ folder. It's easiest to use the built-in LeafPad text editor for this step.

• Place this file in /home/pi/rpi-hdmi.sh
• Place this file in /home/pco-live.sh
• Place this file in /home/timer.py
• Then, make all of the files executable via chmod (or via File Manager -> Properties -> Permissions menu and allow execution by owner.)
  • chmod +x /home/pi/rpi-hdmi.sh
  • chmod +x /home/pi/pco-live.sh
  • chmod +x /home/pi/timer.py

11. Schedule PCO Live and HDMI service in crontab

• Update cron tab crontab -e with the cron entries in this file.
• Edit the crontab entries to match your own service times and service type IDs. Example entries are provided. There are many helpful websites for designing and validating crontab schedules.
• Note: Only schedule the rpi-HDMI script if you wish to turn off the monitor at certain times of day.

12. Activate the built-in systemd software/hardware watchdog service to automatically reboot the Pi if hung. [Ref]

• sudo nano /etc/systemd/system.conf

• Uncomment and change these two lines from:

  #RuntimeWatchdogSec=0
  #ShutdownWatchdogSec=10min

• to:

  RuntimeWatchdogSec=10
  ShutdownWatchdogSec=10min

• Reboot your Pi for the changes to take effect, then check that the watchdog is working:

• cat /var/log/syslog | grep watchdog (search for, then display any lines in the syslog that feature the word "watchdog")

• Ouput should look like:

  raspberrypi kernel: [    3.885798] bcm2835-wdt 3f100000.watchdog: Broadcom BCM2835 watchdog timer
  raspberrypi systemd[1]: Hardware watchdog 'Broadcom BCM2835 Watchdog timer', version 0
  raspberrypi systemd[1]: Set hardware watchdog to 10s.
  raspberrypi CRON[482]: (pi) CMD (sudo /usr/sbin/service watchdog start)
  raspberrypi systemd[1]: Starting LSB: Start watchdog keepalive daemon...
  raspberrypi systemd[1]: Started LSB: Start watchdog keepalive daemon.
  
  

• Your Pi will now automatically reboot if is hung or frozen for more than 10 seconds.

13. Set up automatic login to Planning Center Online. Planning Center Online session cookies will eventually expire and you will be logged out. You can manually re-login when this happens (via VNC or a keyboard). But there are better, maintenance-free methods. The Lastpass extension for Chromium is free and can automatically log in to sites in a very secure manner.

• It is strongly recommended that you use or create a special-purpose Planning Center user with the minimum-required permissions (viewer) for each service type. Do not use an "admin" level user. If you want to use this user for other applications such as ProPresenter integration or a Producer's iPad, "Editor" permissions are sufficient. This user will always be logged in on the Pi, so we want to limit the damage that could be done by anyone who accesses it and plugs in a keyboard.
• Install the Lastpass extension from the Chromium web store.
• Create a dedicated LastPass account. (We will only add the credentials of your generic limited-permissions PCO user.)
• Login to the extension with your new LastPass account. Check both "Remember User" and "Remember Password".
• Visit the login page for PCO and login to you generic limited-permissions user. Save these credentials to Lastpass when prompted.
• Then in the extension's Preferences menu, ensure both auto-logout options are unchecked. Then check "Automatically Fill Login Information"
• In the extension's Sites menu, select the Planning Center Online entry you just saved, and edit it. Under "Advanced Options" for the site, enable "Auto-Login".
• Click on My Vault in the extension's menu. Then access "Account Settings". Click "Show Advanced Settings", and in the "Re-prompt for Master Password" section, check "Access a Site's Password".
• Voila! We've now securely stored the password for your minimum permissions PCO user. You will be required to login to view the PCO password, but the extension will enter it for you automatically with no manual intervention.
• If you already use LastPass personally or professionally, you could get fancy with securely sharing passwords, but we'll leave that to the power users.

13. Run pco-live.sh and configure the timers to suit your requirements. As a recommended starting point:

• Set the layout to "Countdown: Full"
• Set the timer to "Countdown: End item on time" (This option dynamically adjusts the countdown to keep your service on track, but requires an operator to follow along advance through the service items during the service. The smartphone app is free and very handy for this purpose)
• Set the colour theme to "Dark"

15. Set your Raspbian desktop background to the official 1920x1080p Zeitgeist wallpaper!

• wget -N https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Chalta/Zeitgeist/master/zeitgeist-wallpaper.png -P /home/pi/
• pcmanfm --desktop-pref

• From a Mac just type the following into Terminal ssh pi@192.168.X.YY, using the actual IP address of your RPi.

• On Windows, install puTTY.

• On a Mac, just type the following into Terminal: vnc://192.168.X.YY using the actual IP address of your RPi.

• On Windows, install RealVNC. RealVNC is pre-licensed for Raspberry Pis and allows free cloud and direct connections for non-commercial users.