How can Raspberry Pi boot directly to eToys like Scratch?

On 18.11.2013, at 18:21, Charles Schultz <[hidden email]> wrote:

> Just curious, how does one configure the Raspberry Pi to boot directly into eToys just like the new option to boot directly into Scratch?

I haven't looked at how Scratch does it (do you have a URL?).

But in general the simplest thing would be to just launch Squeak from the linux startup mechanism. When the Linux kernel is finished booting, it runs an executable specified in /etc/inittab. Typically that's "init" which then executes the rc script which in turn launches everything, including the graphical shell. That is where you can hook into - either with an X server (so you would have to make Etoys auto-start when X is run) or without the X server using Squeak's fbdev display driver. The latter would make startup faster, but you would have to benchmark both to know for sure which would be more efficient at runtime.

- Bert -

Ah. The raspi-config script is here:

https://github.com/asb/raspi-config/blob/master/raspi-config

You could edit that to add a boottoetoys.sh similarly to boottoscratch.sh.

If you're not that familiar with shell scripting, try replacing "& scratch" with "& etoys" on this line:

        printf "openbox --config-file /home/pi/boottoscratch/openbox_rc.xml & scratch" | xinit /dev/stdin

and then when you choose "boot to scratch" it should actually boot to Etoys instead.

Before doing that, make sure that executing "etoys" on a command line actually starts Etoys successfully.

- Bert -

On 19.11.2013, at 09:35, Charles Schultz <[hidden email]> wrote:

> You know more than I do on this topic. :) I do not have an URL for how Scratch boots directly, but I can point you to documentation on the raspberrypi.org website that shows you how to configure it in raspi-config (basically, you select an option - all the details are abstracted away). I have already asked this question on the raspberrypi forums, and I have not yet received a reply:
> http://www.raspberrypi.org/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?t=61117
>
> I'll try to dig around with what little Linux knowledge I have and using your hints to see how Scratch is booted.
>
>
> On Tue, Nov 19, 2013 at 9:28 AM, Bert Freudenberg <[hidden email]> wrote:
> On 18.11.2013, at 18:21, Charles Schultz <[hidden email]> wrote:
>
> > Just curious, how does one configure the Raspberry Pi to boot directly into eToys just like the new option to boot directly into Scratch?
>
> I haven't looked at how Scratch does it (do you have a URL?).
>
> But in general the simplest thing would be to just launch Squeak from the linux startup mechanism. When the Linux kernel is finished booting, it runs an executable specified in /etc/inittab. Typically that's "init" which then executes the rc script which in turn launches everything, including the graphical shell. That is where you can hook into - either with an X server (so you would have to make Etoys auto-start when X is run) or without the X server using Squeak's fbdev display driver. The latter would make startup faster, but you would have to benchmark both to know for sure which would be more efficient at runtime.
>
> - Bert -
>
>
>
>
>
>
> --
> Charles Schultz