Auto detecting controllers in RetroPie 2.0+

A real improvement to RetroPie EmulationStation 2.x is the ability to easily set up and use multiple different types of controllers in the emulators on the fly. This will also allow you to use two different controllers for different players. In the past I had to write separate retroarch.cfg config files and call them using a program that I wrote.

For this to work there can be no controller information in any of the retroarch.cfg files either in the main one or the system specific file including the hot keys. If you followed my post about setting up controllers in Retroarch (here) then you already have a back up of the original retroarch.cfg file. If you made any other changes to the retroarch.cfg file then make sure to write them down to change again. To change  revert back to the original file use the cp command:

pi@raspberrypi ~ $ cd /opt/retropie/configs/all pi@raspberrypi /opt/retropie/configs/all $ cp retroarch.cfg.bak retroarch.cfg

If you don’t have a backup file then you can find a copy of it on the petrockblock’s git hub here

To start make sure only one controller is plugged in at one time. Use the following commands to load the retropie-setup script:

pi@raspberrypi /opt/retropie/configs/all $ cd /home/pi/RetroPie-Setup pi@raspberrypi ~/RetroPie-Setup $ sudo ./retropie_setup.sh

Once loaded, select ‘Option 3: SETUP (only if you already have run one of the installations above)‘

Then ‘Option 315: Resister RetroArch Controller‘

It will be the same after this as mapping the controllers since it uses retroarch-joyconfig. If you get to a button that your controller doesn’t have, don’t press anything and the program will skip over it. When the program finishes it will tell you what it saved as.

For example I did this with my SNES controller and it saved the configuration file as:

USBGamepad.cfg

After I exited out of the setup script I found the file by running the find command I found the file to be located in:

pi@raspberrypi ~/RetroPie-Setup $ cd pi@raspberrypi ~ $ sudo find / -name USBGamepad.cfg /opt/retropie/emulators/RetroArch/configs/USBGamepad.cfg

This is also the file that you will enter the hot keys you’d want for this controller. I just used the hot key settings that I did in my old retroarch.cfg file.

pi@raspberrypi ~ $ cd /opt/retropie/emulators/RetroArch/configs pi@raspberrypi /opt/retropie/emulators/RetroArch/configs $ sudo nano USBGamepad.cfg

I went to the bottom of the file and added:

input_enable_hotkey_btn = 8 #Select input_exit_emulator_btn = 9 #Start input_save_state_btn = 1 #A button input_load_state_btn = 2 #B button input_state_slot_increase_btn = 5 #R button input_state_slot_decrease_btn = 4 #L button input_reset_btn = 0 #X button input_menu_toggle_btn = 3 #Y button input_state_slot_increase_axis = +0 #Right on D pad input_state_slot_decrease_axis = -0 #Left on D pad input_reset_axis = -1 #Up on D pad input_audio_mute_axis = +1 #Down on D pad

Save and exit with:

Ctrl+x Y Enter

Next time you load EmulationStation it will auto detect the controller! Now all you have to do is repeat these steps for how ever many different controllers you have.

 

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Check out these other helpful links:
Mapping Controllers (1 of 3): For EmulationStation
Mapping Controllers (2 of 3): Mapping Controllers to a File
Mapping Controllers (3 of 3): Setting up Controllers in RetroArch
Auto detecting controllers in EmulationStation 2.0+
RetroPie: Adding game roms, BIOS files, and enabling save states
Setting up GameBoy Advance for RetroPie
Adding a XBMC tab in EmulationStation
Adding an Apps tab in EmulationStation
Setting up Playstation for RetroPie
Creating power logs for EmulationStation (1 of 2)
Creating power logs for EmulationStation (2 of 2)

Mapping Controllers (3 of 3): Setting up Controllers in RetroArch

Now that EmulationStation is configured for inputs and the controllers are mapped to a file we can set up the controllers to work with the emulators. There are a few ways to do this but for now I am going to do it the way I did with the older version just so that I can test this new build. Once I  find that everything is in working order I will revisit this and show off a new simpler method of doing this!

The file to edit is RetroArch which is the main configuration file for RetroPie. There are many options in this file and I will get to most of them in later posts when I go back and customize and improve a few aspects for game play.

First since everything changed I have to find where this file is now. to do this I used the find tool again.

pi@raspberrypi ~ $ sudo find / -name retroarch.cfg /etc/retroarch.cfg /opt/retropie/emulators/RetroArch/pandora/retroarch/retroarch.cfg /opt/retropie/emulators/RetroArch/retroarch.cfg /opt/retropie/configs/nes/retroarch.cfg /opt/retropie/configs/atari2600/retroarch.cfg /opt/retropie/configs/segacd/retroarch.cfg /opt/retropie/configs/megadrive/retroarch.cfg /opt/retropie/configs/mame/retroarch.cfg /opt/retropie/configs/mastersystem/retroarch.cfg /opt/retropie/configs/gamegear/retroarch.cfg /opt/retropie/configs/psx/retroarch.cfg /opt/retropie/configs/snes/retroarch.cfg /opt/retropie/configs/gb/retroarch.cfg /opt/retropie/configs/all/retroarch.cfg /opt/retropie/configs/gbc/retroarch.cfg /opt/retropie/configs/doom/retroarch.cfg /opt/retropie/configs/fbs/retroarch.cfg /opt/retropie/configs/pcengine/retroarch.cfg /opt/retropie/configs/cavestory/retroarch.cfg /opt/retropie/configs/sega32x/retroarch.cfg pi@raspberrypi ~ $

The results show a list of all the config files that were loaded on the RaspberryPi when RetroPie was installed. The main retroarch that contains all the important information is the one located in /opt/retropie/configs/all and that is the one I am going to edit. all the other ones in the /opt/retropie/configs/ directory are as you can tell for each system. Those override the main retroarch file. This is useful if you want to apply different shaders or controls per system.

To Start I will make a backup of the file with the cp command. This is always good when you are changing a file just in case you need to revert back to it at some point. I open up the file to edit with nano:

pi@raspberrypi ~ $ cd /opt/retropie/configs/all/p pi@raspberrypi /opt/retropie/configs/all $ cp retroarch.cfg retroarch.cfg.bak/p pi@raspberrypi /opt/retropie/configs/all $ nano retroarch.cfg

From there I scroll down into the input settings area until I find following lines:

# Joypad buttons. # Figure these out by using RetroArch-Phoenix or retroarch-joyconfig. # You can use joypad hats with hnxx, where n is the hat, and xx is a string representing direction. # E.g. “h0up” # input_player1_a_btn = # input_player1_b_btn = # input_player1_y_btn = # input_player1_x_btn = # input_player1_start_btn = # input_player1_select_btn = # input_player1_l_btn = # input_player1_r_btn = # input_player1_left_btn = # input_player1_right_btn = # input_player1_up_btn = # input_player1_down_btn = # input_player1_l2_btn = # input_player1_r2_btn = # input_player1_l3_btn = # input_player1_r3_btn = /p # Axis for RetroArch D-Pad. # Needs to be either ‘+’ or ‘-‘ in the first character signaling either positive or negative direction of the axis, then the axis number. # Do note that every other input option has the corresponding _btn and _axis binds as well; they are omitted here for clarity. # input_player1_left_axis = # input_player1_right_axis = # input_player1_up_axis = # input_player1_down_axis =

I am going to set this up right now only for the SNES_1 controller that I mapped out in the last post. I am also going to set it up for two players since I have two controllers. From the SNES_1.txt file I un-comment and add all the values for the buttons under the “Joypad buttons” section, omitting the ones that aren’t on the controller, as well as un-comment and enter in the values for the D-pad under the “Axis for Retroarch D-Pad” section. Below is how my file was updated.

# Joypad buttons. # Figure these out by using RetroArch-Phoenix or retroarch-joyconfig. # You can use joypad hats with hnxx, where n is the hat, and xx is a string representing direction. # E.g. “h0up” input_player1_a_btn = 1 input_player1_b_btn = 2 input_player1_y_btn = 3 input_player1_x_btn = 0 input_player1_start_btn = 9 input_player1_select_btn = 8 input_player1_l_btn = 4 input_player1_r_btn = 5 # input_player1_left_btn = # input_player1_right_btn = # input_player1_up_btn = # input_player1_down_btn = # input_player1_l2_btn = # input_player1_r2_btn = # input_player1_l3_btn = # input_player1_r3_btn = /p # Axis for RetroArch D-Pad. # Needs to be either ‘+’ or ‘-‘ in the first character signaling either positive or negative direction of the axis, then the axis number. # Do note that every other input option has the corresponding _btn and _axis binds as well; they are omitted here for clarity. input_player1_left_axis = -0 input_player1_right_axis = +0 input_player1_up_axis = -1 input_player1_down_axis = +1

Adding a second player is easy, all you have to do is copy all the lines you just edited and under each section paste them and change the input_player1_ to input_player2_ This can be seen below after I enter it all in:

# Joypad buttons. # Figure these out by using RetroArch-Phoenix or retroarch-joyconfig. # You can use joypad hats with hnxx, where n is the hat, and xx is a string representing direction. # E.g. “h0up” input_player1_a_btn = 1 input_player1_b_btn = 2 input_player1_y_btn = 3 input_player1_x_btn = 0 input_player1_start_btn = 9 input_player1_select_btn = 8 input_player1_l_btn = 4 input_player1_r_btn = 5 # input_player1_left_btn = # input_player1_right_btn = # input_player1_up_btn = # input_player1_down_btn = # input_player1_l2_btn = # input_player1_r2_btn = # input_player1_l3_btn = # input_player1_r3_btn = input_player2_a_btn = 1 input_player2_b_btn = 2 input_player2_y_btn = 3 input_player2_x_btn = 0 input_player2_start_btn = 9 input_player2_select_btn = 8 input_player2_l_btn = 4 input_player2_r_btn = 5 /p # Axis for RetroArch D-Pad. # Needs to be either ‘+’ or ‘-‘ in the first character signaling either positive or negative direction of the axis, then the axis number. # Do note that every other input option has the corresponding _btn and _axis binds as well; they are omitted here for clarity. input_player1_left_axis = -0 input_player1_right_axis = +0 input_player1_up_axis = -1 input_player1_down_axis = +1 input_player2_left_axis = -0 input_player2_right_axis = +0 input_player2_up_axis = -1 input_player2_down_axis = +1

The final this to do in this file for now is to enable Hot Keys. This will give you more options when using a controller that would otherwise be not accessible. I am going to add options such as:

• Exit the current game.
• Save  / Load  State.
• Increase / Decrease Save Spot Location
• Reset the game.
• Mute the Volume.
• Enter RetroArch menu.

There are many other things you can assign to these buttons and after seeing my example it will be obvious to see how others can be added. First locate the following section in the retroarch file.

# Enable other hotkeys. # If this hotkey is bound to either keyboard, joybutton or joyaxis, # all other hotkeys will be disabled unless this hotkey is also held at the same time. # This is useful for RETRO_KEYBOARD centric implementations # which query a large area of the keyboard, where it is not desirable # that hotkeys get in the way. /p # Alternatively, all hotkeys for keyboard could be disabled by the user. # input_enable_hotkey_btn =

Un-comment out that last line and pick a button that will enable the hot keys. You hold this button in addition to pressing another to complete that command. Below I showed how I configured mine with comments.

# Alternatively, all hotkeys for keyboard could be disabled by the user. input_enable_hotkey_btn = 8 #Select input_exit_emulator_btn = 9 #Start input_save_state_btn = 1 #A button input_load_state_btn = 2 #B button input_state_slot_increase_btn = 5 #R button input_state_slot_decrease_btn = 4 #L button input_reset_btn = 0 #X button input_menu_toggle_btn = 3 #Y button input_state_slot_increase_axis = +0 #Right on D pad input_state_slot_decrease_axis = -0 #Left on D pad input_reset_axis = -1 #Up on D pad input_audio_mute_axis = +1 #Down on D pad

Once you have everything set the way you like it save and exit with

Ctrl+X Y Enter

You can set up a PlayStation2 controller the same way also.

With this the controllers are all set up to work with both EmulationStation and the emulators that work with RetroArch! In later posts I will go over other configuration setting in this file as well as setting up emulators that don’t work under RetroArch. When I do that I will add links below!

 

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Check out these other helpful links:
Mapping Controllers (1 of 3): For EmulationStation
Mapping Controllers (2 of 3): Mapping Controllers to a File
Mapping Controllers (3 of 3): Setting up Controllers in RetroArch
Auto detecting controllers in EmulationStation 2.0+
RetroPie: Adding game roms, BIOS files, and enabling save states
Setting up GameBoy Advance for RetroPie
Adding a XBMC tab in EmulationStation
Adding an Apps tab in EmulationStation
Setting up Playstation for RetroPie
Creating power logs for EmulationStation (1 of 2)
Creating power logs for EmulationStation (2 of 2)

Mapping Controllers (2 of 3): Mapping Controllers to a File

Previously I set up all my controllers to work on the front end of EmulationStation (found here). To have them also work on the emulators I am going to need to edit the main emulator configuration file with the controller’s button information. I found it easier to record the button inputs to a file so that I can reference them later.

When you install RetroPie an nice tool is included called ‘retroarch-joyconfig’. What this does is prompt you for a button and then display the button’s value. The results can be used to set up the controller for the emulators.

Since this is the new version of RetroPie I had to find the program’s new location. To do this I used the find command:

pi@raspberrypi ~ $ sudo find / -name retroarch-joyconfig

The results showed two locations:

/opt/retropie/emulators/RetroArch/installdir/bin/retroarch-joyconfig /opt/retropie/emulators/RetroArch/tools

I used the one in the tools directory but I don’t think it matters which you use. I needed a location to store these files that I am going to be making so I created a folder in the pi’s home directory with:

pi@raspberrypi ~ $ mkdir /home/pi/keymaps

and then went into that directory with:

pi@raspberrypi ~ $ cd /home/pi/keymaps

I am going to label the controllers the same way that I did in the previous post to make things simple.

It is important to note that you should only have one controller plugged in at a time when doing this. The retroarch-joyconfig program will only recognize the first input device.

I typed the following command (all one line) to run retroarch-joyconfig and told it to record the values to a new file SNES_1.txt

pi@raspberrypi ~/keymaps $ /opt/retropie/emulators/RetroArch/tools/retroarch-joyconfig > /home/pi/keymaps/SNES_1.txt

When you run this it will To see the contents of the file that was just created you can either open it in the editor with nano or view it in the terminal with cat. The file that I created looks like following when I displayed it with cat:

pi@raspberrypi ~/keymaps $ cat SNES_1.txt input_player1_joypad_index = “0” input_player1_b_btn = “2” input_player1_y_btn = “3” input_player1_select_btn = “8” input_player1_start_btn = “9” input_player1_up_axis = “-1” input_player1_down_axis = “+1” input_player1_left_axis = “-0” input_player1_right_axis = “+0” input_player1_a_btn = “1” input_player1_x_btn = “0” input_player1_l_btn = “4” input_player1_r_btn = “5” input_player1_l2_btn = “9” input_player1_r2_btn = “9” input_player1_l3_btn = “9” input_player1_r3_btn = “9” input_player1_l_x_plus_btn = “9” input_player1_l_x_minus_btn = “9” input_player1_l_y_plus_btn = “9” input_player1_l_y_minus_btn = “9” input_player1_r_x_plus_btn = “9” input_player1_r_x_minus_btn = “9” input_player1_r_y_plus_btn = “9” input_player1_r_y_minus_btn = “9”

Since this was a SNES controller I didn’t have all the buttons so I hit the Start button for all the other ones. I did the same for the two PlayStation 2 controllers PS2_1 and PS2_2 respectively.

pi@raspberrypi ~/keymaps $ /opt/retropie/emulators/RetroArch/tools/retroarch-joyconfig > /home/pi/keymaps/PS2_1.txt pi@raspberrypi ~/keymaps $ /opt/retropie/emulators/RetroArch/tools/retroarch-joyconfig > /home/pi/keymaps/PS2_2.txt

Those files will look very similar also.

Next time I will finally set up the controllers to work with RetroArch so that they work with the emulators!

 

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Check out these other helpful links:
Mapping Controllers (1 of 3): For EmulationStation
Mapping Controllers (2 of 3): Mapping Controllers to a File
Mapping Controllers (3 of 3): Setting up Controllers in RetroArch
Auto detecting controllers in EmulationStation 2.0+
RetroPie: Adding game roms, BIOS files, and enabling save states
Setting up GameBoy Advance for RetroPie
Adding a XBMC tab in EmulationStation
Adding an Apps tab in EmulationStation
Setting up Playstation for RetroPie
Creating power logs for EmulationStation (1 of 2)
Creating power logs for EmulationStation (2 of 2)

Mapping Controllers (1 of 3): For EmulationStation

When you start up EmulationStation for the first time it prompts you to setup your input devices such as gamepads and keyboards. Currently I have two types of SNES controllers (I only set up one for right now.), two different PlayStation 2 controller adapters, and a keyboard. Even if you don’t plan on using it, it is a good idea to set up a keyboard just in case a controller isn’t working for some reason.

The controllers / adapters I have are:

• SNES Retro USB Super Nintendo Controller
• Buffalo Classic USB Gamepad for PC
• Playstation to USB Adapter from Radio Shack (No longer avaliable.)
• PS2 to PS3 Playstation Controller Adapter USB Converter

I will label them as:

• SNES_1
• SNES_2
• PS2_1
• PS2_2

respectively.

To start, I plugged in all the controllers and keyboard and then loaded up EmulationStation by typing the following two lines in the terminal (Note: if you are not running a vncserver then ignore the first line.):

pi@raspberrypi ~ $ vncserver -kill :0 pi@raspberrypi ~ $ emulationstation

With EmulationStation 2.0+ it tells you how many inputs are detected. Follow the on screen setup for each controller until they are all set up.

I created a table so that I can keep track of what I assigned to each button:

Command	Player 1	Player 2	Player 3	Player 4
	SNES_1	PS2_1	Keyboard	PS2_2
Up	Up	Up	Up	Up
Down	Down	Down	Down	Down
Left	Left	Left	Left	Left
Right	Right	Right	Right	Right
A	A	Circle	Enter	Circle
B	B	X	Backspace	X
Start	Start	Start	Space	Start
Select	Select	Select	Tab	Select
Page Up	Left	Left	Page Up	Left
Page Down	Right	Right	Page Down	Right

The first time I ran this it didn’t find all the controllers. After I rebooted  and mapped the controllers to a file for a later use I noticed that they were found when I tried again. This only sets up the controllers for EmulationStation. In a future post I will go over how to set the controllers in RetroArch which is the main configuration file for the emulators.

If you ever want to re-do the initial controller set up run this command:

pi@raspberrypi ~ $ rm /home/pi/.emulationstation/es_input.cfg

That will remove the EmulationStation input configuration file. You can also do it from within EmulationStation but I like to remove the file to start fresh.

 

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Check out these other helpful links:
Mapping Controllers (1 of 3): For EmulationStation
Mapping Controllers (2 of 3): Mapping Controllers to a File
Mapping Controllers (3 of 3): Setting up Controllers in RetroArch
Auto detecting controllers in EmulationStation 2.0+
RetroPie: Adding game roms, BIOS files, and enabling save states
Setting up GameBoy Advance for RetroPie
Adding a XBMC tab in EmulationStation
Adding an Apps tab in EmulationStation
Setting up Playstation for RetroPie
Creating power logs for EmulationStation (1 of 2)
Creating power logs for EmulationStation (2 of 2)

Removing RetroPie boot up information

One of the ways I knew I installed EmulationStation 2.0 is the information that loads when you turn on the RaspberryPi or when you load a terminal from the GUI. The image below is the information that I was talking about. A lot of that information is useful but I just don’t want to see it each time.

Since it loads at both boot and when a new terminal is opened I figured that it was located in the .bashrc file. This is the same file that I set up programs to auto load on boot up.

I checked the file with:

pi@raspberrypi ~ $ sudo nano /home/pi/.bashrc

When I scrolled to the bottom I found what i was looking for. I commented out all the lines with a ‘#’  instead of deleting them because some of the information might be useful later in later programs. The section ended up looking like this:

# RETROPIE PROFILE START # Thanks to http://blog.petrockblock.com/forums/topic/retropie-mushroom-motd/#post-3965#let upSeconds=”$(/usr/bin/cut -d. -f1 /proc/uptime)” #let secs=$((${upSeconds}%60)) #let mins=$((${upSeconds}/60%60)) #let hours=$((${upSeconds}/3600%24)) #let days=$((${upSeconds}/86400)) #UPTIME=$(printf “%d days, %02dh%02dm%02ds” “$days” “$hours” “$mins” “$secs”)# get the load averages #read one five fifteen rest < /proc/loadavg#echo “$(tput setaf 2) # .~~. .~~. `date +”%A, %e %B %Y, %r”` # ‘. \ ‘ ‘ / .’ `uname -srmo`$(tput setaf 1) # .~ .~~~..~. # : .~.’~’.~. : $(tput setaf 3)`df -h | grep Filesystem`$(tput setaf 1) # ~ ( ) ( ) ~ $(tput setaf 7)`df -h|grep rootfs`$(tput setaf 1) #( : ‘~’.~.’~’ : ) Uptime………….: ${UPTIME} # ~ .~ ~. ~ Memory………….: `cat /proc/meminfo | grep MemFree | awk {‘print $2’}`kB (Free) / `cat /proc/meminfo | grep MemTotal | awk {‘print $2’}`kB (Total)$(tput setaf 7) # ( $(tput setaf 4) | | $(tput setaf 7) ) $(tput setaf 1) Running Processes..: `ps ax | wc -l | tr -d ” “`$(tput setaf 7) # ‘~ ~’ $(tput setaf 1) IP Address………: `ifconfig | grep ‘inet addr:’| grep -v ‘127.0.0.1’ | cut -d: -f2 | awk ‘{ print $1}’` $(tput setaf 7) # *–~-~–* $(tput setaf 7) The RetroPie Project, http://www.petrockblock.com #$(tput sgr0)” # RETROPIE PROFILE END

I saved and quit with

Ctrl+X Y Enter

and next time I loaded up a terminal the message didn’t come up!

RetroPie Install and initial setup

Hey guys since I now have my RaspberryPi image all setup the way I like I can now begin to install a few things that I plan to use this build for. I thought that installing RetroPie first would be best since it take a long time to install. I can have this run overnight!

 

RetroPie is an awesome set of retro gaming emulators all neatly organized in a very clear way. There are also a lot of options to change so that You can make it your own. I have built RaspberryPi’s for some of my friends based on this program alone so that they can enjoy games from NES games to Playstation and all the systems in between!! The list is very impressive what this small computer can do. For more information you can head over to petRockBlog’s site for more information and a strong community of people who can help out with a lot of things.

 

I am experienced with RetroPie and EmulationStation so I have learned a few tricks and tips that I can’t wait to share when I get up to changing settings, the front end, controllers, and customized programs. My goal for this set up is to boot directly into EmulationStation and then from there choose what to do instead of having a boot menu (Which in a later post I will go into how to make a really good one!).

 

Let’s get started. In the terminal type the following two commands to set up and download the necessary tools (The second one is one line.).

pi@raspberrypi ~ $ sudo apt-get install -y git dialog /p pi@raspberrypi ~ $ git clone –depth=0 git://github.com/pertrock/blog/RetroPie-Setup.git

Once that finishes downloading we will install RetroPie. To do this type:

pi@raspberrypi ~ $ cd RetroPie-Setup /p pi@raspberrypi ~/RetroPie-Setup $ sudo ./retropie_setup.sh

This will load the installer script. If the second line above didn’t work then it might not be setup as an executable file. If this is the case run:

pi@raspberrypi ~/RetroPie-Setup $ sudo chmod +x ~/RetroPie-Setup/retropie_setup.sh

Once this installer script is loads I like to select option 2 which is the Source based install. This is good because it will download the latest versions of everything but the downside is it takes a while to run. It has taken me anywhere between 12-36 hours depending on what else I am doing on the internet! The next screen gives you all the options on what to install. I select them all because it won’t take up that much room and I never know what system I might want to play. Once you’ve selected what you want hit enter to start the install process. I like to do this over night on a weekday since I will be sleeping and then at work so it can do its thing while I’m gone.

To recap the above options:

• I selected option 2, source based install.
• Selected all the options and emulators.
• Started the installation.

Once that was done I rebooted the Pi with:

pi@raspberrypi ~/RetroPie-Setup $ sudo reboot

and when it rebooted I ran:

pi@raspberrypi ~ $ sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get upgrade -y

This updated my system (I probably should have made this the first step!).

 

Once everything was done you can load EmulationStation with:

pi@raspberrypi ~ $ emulationstation

 

But there is one more thing I would suggest doing before that. A final thing that I like to do that I learned from experience is to go back and update the RetroPie Binaries. I found that I have to do this in order to get GameBoy Advance to work in RetroPie.  This will also take some time but if you do it now you won’t have to worry about doing it later!

To start do the same steps as above:

pi@raspberrypi ~ $ cd RetroPie-Setup /p pi@raspberrypi ~/RetroPie-Setup $ sudo ./retropie_setup.sh

This time I selected option 5.

Once that is done I rebooted the system and everything is all good to go!

I loaded up Emulationstation and was surprised to see that I just installed the newer 2.x version. I was used to the older version and heard that they changed a lot. I wasn’t sure if I wanted to make the jump to the new version but for now I will see what I can do with it. I looked around and it looks like a lot of folders got changed and some files got split up. With that said I am looking forward to using this new beautiful front end and testing out some new ideas that I have!

See you next time where I will continue to set up my RaspberryPi!

-Weekend Engineer

Setting up the image (9 of 9): Editing the boot script

The easiest way to auto load programs I have found is to edit the .bashrc file. Doing so will run the programs in the terminal when it is started.

Some advantages of doing this are:

• Easy to do.
• Easy to edit and try other things.
• If running a certain task headless then there is no worry about the program not running.
• Can run a few lines of code for setting up or logging information on start up.

Two disadvantages that I can think of is the programs don’t always run in the background if they are not designed to so you would have to stop the program with

Ctrl+C

and if you start a SSH session or open up the terminal in the GUI the processes might run again.

 

I feel that the advantages outweigh the disadvantages so that is why I am doing it this way. If I ever have the need to do it any other way then I will post about that at a later time.

 

Everything is done in the .bashrc file so open it with:

pi@raspberrypi ~ $ sudo nano /home/pi/.bashrc

scroll to the bottom and add the following lines:

if [ $DISPLAY == ”]; then echo “hello” vncserver :0 -geometry 800×600 -depth 24 fi

in between the if and fi lines is where you would put the lines of code that you’d want to run at start up. The easy thing about this is that you would type it just like if you were typing it in the terminal! All of these commands are done after the system has fully booted right after logging in.

Save and exit with:

Ctrl+X Y Enter

And next time you start your RaspberryPi whatever you have in there will auto load!

 

These are all the steps that I do whenever I set up a new image for my RaspberryPi’s! Now would be a good time to make a backup as a baseline image. I should have done this last time since i would have saved me some time re-doing my image.

 

In future posts I will expand this image to include a lot of fun things and learn along the way so stick around!

 

See you next time,

WeekendEngineer

Setting up the image (8 of 9): Installing TightVNC

Being able to SSH into the RaspberryPi is good but what if you wanted to log into the GUI of the RaspberryPi? This is good if you have to view pictures and a few other things. What TightVNC does is creates a remote desktop environment on your RaspberryPi. One real advantage to this is you can log in, open up the terminal, run a program, log out of the TightVNC, and the program will still run! I have done this many times in the past where I would compile a program that takes a few hours as well as set up a quick motion detection program straight from my iPad or phone! This saves the trouble if you are running headless to hook up a monitor and keyboard. You can also do this over SSH with the

pi@raspberrypi ~ $ screen

command but I feel more confident with the VNC server.

 

To start we will install the program with:

pi@raspberrypi ~ $ sudo apt-get install -y tightvncserver

Once it is done installing we will set it up with:

pi@raspberrypi ~ $ tightvncserver

It will ask you to enter a password for the server and optionally a password for viewing only. I did both and wrote them down in my log.

And that’s it!

 

To start a session you can run the following command:

pi@raspberrypi ~ $ vncserver :0 -geometry 1920×1080 -depth 24

Where

:0 (That’s a zero) is the session ID. You can have multiple sessions if you’d like

-geometry 1920×1080 is the resolution of the server. This can be changed to whatever best fits your screen, Often times I use 800×600 since it is also faster.

-depth 24 is the color quality (24 bit).

 

To stop a session you can run:

pi@raspberrypi ~ $ vncserver -kill :0

Where

:0 (That’s a zero) is the session ID that you want to kill.

 

There are ways to make this auto load at boot and I will be talking about the easiest way to do it in my final post about setting up my RaspberryPi. The way I describe will make it very easy to disable that when it is not needed.

 

See you next time,

WeekendEngineer

Setting up the image (7 of 9): Disabling the Camera LED

On the Camera Board for the RaspberryPi there is a little red LED that is lit when the camera is in use. This is good but not good when you are doing surveillance  or anything where you don’t want to be noticed. Luckily there is a real easy way to take care of this and its only one line!

 

We have to edit the config.txt file with:

pi@raspberrypi ~ $ sudo nano /boot/config.txt

Scroll to the bottom of the document and add the following line:

disable_camera_led=1

Save and exit with:

Ctrl+X Y Enter

And next time you take a picture that annoying LED will not come on!

 

See you next time,

WeekendEngineer

Setting up the image (6 of 9): Setting up WiFi

An advantage with the RaspberryPi’s is being able to  have it run over WiFi, cutting down the number of wires going to it. This makes running it headless a lot easier since it only needs a power cable then. I got a USB WiFi module form adafruit which can be found here. I am also going to be giving it a static IP address like I did in my previous post and I will be giving it the same one also since I will be either using the Ethernet cable or the WiFi module.

I did this with the Ethernet cable plugged in and the USB WiFi module not plugged in.

 

I’ll start with editing the same file as in the last post.

pi@raspberrypi ~ $ sudo nano /etc/network/interfaces

Scroll down to the last line and add the following lines:

iface home inet static address 192.168.1.115 netmask 255.255.255.0 gateway 192.168.1.1 iface default inet dhcp

Again, the address line is the IP address I am assigning to the RaspberryPi on WiFi and the other lines I got from the router.

Save and exit the editor with:

Ctrl+X Y Enter

There is another file that you have to edit with the network information, wpa_supplicant.conf

pi@raspberrypi ~ $ sudo nano /etc/wpa_supplicant/wpa_supplicant.conf

Scroll to the end of the document (There should only be 1-2 lines in there.) and add the following:

network={ ssid=____ key_mgmt=NONE auth_alg=OPEN wep_key0=____ id_str=”home” }

ssid is the network name and wep_key0 (That is a zero after key!) is the password with wep encryption.

Save and exit the editor and you should be all set.

I turned off my Pi with:

pi@raspberrypi ~ $ sudo halt

and once it powered down I removed the power cord and Ethernet cable, plygged in the USB WiFi module, and plugged back in the power cord.

I tested my connection with

pi@raspberrypi ~ $ ifconfig

and saw that I was connected! I am now one cable lighter on my RaspberryPi!

 

See you next time,

WeekendEngineer