Fun Facts Splashscreens

[hiulit]

Good news everyone!
We have a working Fun Facts Splashscreens generator! :D

https://github.com/hiulit/RetroPie-Fun-Facts-Splashscreens

Fun Facts Splashscreens for RetroPie

Not working yet! Well, it's working, but it's not officially released! It's just for testing purposes!

This script generates splashscreens for RetroPie with a random Fun Fact!™.

WARNING: Splashscreens are only only available on the Raspberry Pi.

For now, this is the best way to use the splashscreen created by this script:

• Create a Fun Fact!™ splashscreen. See the examples below.
• Go to the Splashscreen Menu (the Splashscreen Menu can be accessed from the RetroPie Menu in EmulationStation or through the setup script under option 3)
• Select the Choose Own Splashscreen option. See the Splashscreen wiki.
• Select the recently created Fun Fact!™ splashscreen.

Instalation

cd /home/pi/
git clone https://github.com/hiulit/es-fun-facts-splashscreens.git
cd es-fun-facts-splashscreens/
sudo chmod +x es-fun-facts-splashscreens.sh

Usage

sudo ./es-fun-facts-splashscreens.sh [options]

If no options are passed, you will be prompted with a usage example:

USAGE: sudo ./es-fun-facts-splashscreens.sh [options]

Use '--help' to see all the options

Options

• --help: Print the help message and exit.
• --enable-boot: Enable script to be launch at boot.
  • $1: Path to the splashscreen to be used.
  • $2: Text color.
• --disable-boot: Disable script to be launch at boot.
• --create-fun-fact: Create Fun Fact Splashscreen.
  • $1: Path to the splashscreen to be used.
  • $2: Text color.

If no options are passed to --create-fun-fact or --enable-boot, the script takes the splashscreen and the text color defaults, splash4-3.png and white, respectively.

Examples

--help

Print the help message and exit.

sudo ./es-fun-facts-splashscreens.sh --help

--enable-boot [options]

Enable script to be launch at boot.

WARNING: Backing up /etc/rc.local it's most recommended before using this option. It could erase important stuff. Use it at your own risk.

Options:

• $1: Path to the splashscreen to be used.
• $2: Text color.

sudo ./es-fun-facts-splashscreens.sh --enable-boot /home/pi/Downloads/retropie-2014.png black

--disable-boot

Disable script to be launch at boot.

WARNING: Backing up /etc/rc.local it's most recommended before using this option. It could erase important stuff. Use it at your own risk.

sudo ./es-fun-facts-splashscreens.sh --disable-boot

--create-fun-fact

Create Fun Fact Splashscreen.

Options:

• $1: Path to the splashscreen to be used.
• $2: Text color.

sudo ./es-fun-facts-splashscreens.sh --create-fun-fact /home/pi/Downloads/retropie-2014.png black

Credits

Thanks to:

• @Parviglumis - For the idea of creating the Fun Facts Splashscreens.
• @meleu - For all his help and wisdom with the code :D
• All the people at the RetroPie Forum.

[hiulit]

Here's a little video demo where you can see it generates a new random splashscreens at every boot:

P.S. I know!!! Get a new power supply!! I know!!! :P

[meleu]

@hiulit Good job! :D

[Parviglumis]

WOW. You guys are amazing!

[hiulit]

@meleu @Parviglumis Thanks! : D It's been fun doing this project! There's a couple of things that could be improved to make it more 'bullet-proof' (aka robust) but I'm happy with it.
I hope you can try it and let me know if it works and if you'd like something else implemented.

[hiulit]

Also, I think it's time to add more Fun Facts!, right?

Here it is an online text editor that anyone can edit http://www.writeurl.com/text/w67sdbpbji22fdc7exd5/ps4uvs5e3cu0nn58m757/4fn5n3cx7x3fn4fkvdav

EDIT: Or, if you know how, create a pull request with changes to https://github.com/hiulit/RetroPie-Fun-Facts-Splashscreens/blob/master/fun-facts.txt

Just add a new Fun Fact!™ at the end and I'll grab them from time to time and update the repository.

IMPORTANT: Every Fun Fact!™ must be in one line.

P.S. That's something that could be improved :P
P.S.S. Does anyone know if there's like a video games 'fun facts' database? It would be awesome if it came with an API :D

[Flapperultra]

awesome work but one question does it or will be able to show video splash screens I create?

[hiulit]

@flapperultra I'm sorry, but this script doesn't work with videos, only images. It creates a splashscreen (the one shown at boot) based on an image you choose and the color for the Fun Fact!™.
It was never intended to create videos with fun facts.

If you want to show a video splashscreen you've created, see the Splashscreen Wiki.

[meleu]

@hiulit there's another PR on your repo.

Also, I'm thinking if this functionality could be converted in a scriptmodule and submitted to @zerojay 's RetroPie-Extra repository... What do you think?

[zerojay]

If you build it, I'll take it. I accept PRs. :)

[hiulit]

@meleu Thanks again for the PR! :) There's quite a few changes, so I'll try to understand everything. Then maybe I'll ask you some questions about it :P , test it and merge it.
@zerojay That's a great idea! I'll take a look at how to implement that :)

[hiulit]

@zerojay @meleu I've created a PR ;) https://github.com/zerojay/RetroPie-Extra/pull/265

[hiulit]

I think we are ready for a v1.0.0!!! https://github.com/hiulit/RetroPie-Fun-Facts-Splashscreens

Here are the latest updates:

• Added a bunch of new Fun Facts!
• Had a lot of help from @meleu , so the code should be quite good :P
• Some refactoring has been done. Check out the new README.
• Created a GUI. Some examples:

Also, I created a scriptmodule that is waiting to be integrated in @zerojay 's RetroPie-Extra repository. This will make installation and usage easier, because the script will be in RetroPie Setup.

[hiulit]

Thanks to @zerojay , Fun Facts! Splashscreens for Retropie is officially on the RetroPie-Extra repository!!! :D

You can find it in the supplementary section.

[meleu]

@hiulit well done sir!!

[hiulit]

Good news everyone! Fun Facts! Splashscreens v1.1.0 is here! :D

Added

• --apply-splash to use the generated Fun Facts! splashscreen.
• --update to check if the Fun Facts! script needs updates.

Deprecated

• --splash is now --splash-path.

Now it's possible to apply/set/use the Fun Facts! splashscreen right within the script, with the command --apply-splash.
This will append the generated Fun Facts! splashscreen to /etc/splashscreen.list. This file is the one responsible to tell the system which splashscreen to show at boot.

Also, I've added the --update command, to stay up to date with the latest changes ;)

It would be awesome if you guys could try this script :)
Let me know if it's working (or not), if you find some functionality is lacking, etc.

Thanks!

[hiulit]

We are now at Fun Facts! Splashscreens v1.4.1! :D

You can check the CHANGELOG to see the latest changes, but the main ones are:

• More Fun Facts!, thanks to Thunderforge.
• "Set the text color" is now split into 2 subsections, basic colors and full list of colors.
• Check if there are updates to download.

You can use the Update script option from within the script to get the latest version.

If you are using the script via the RetroPie-Setup (if you installed it via the Retropie-Extra repository), go to:

• Manage packages
• Manage experimental packages
• fun-facts-splashscreens
• Update from source

[fnkngrv]

This is definitely pretty cool however why are you saying that it is only able to be used on the Raspberry Pi boards?

[hiulit]

@fnkngrv I guess you are referring to other boards like Odroid, Orangepi, Tinker boards, etc, right? Maybe I should change that. What I meant is that Splashscreens are NOT available on these systems !x86 !osmc !xbian !mali !kms.

[fnkngrv]

@hiulit said in Fun Facts Splashscreens:

@fnkngrv I guess you are referring to other boards like Odroid, Orangepi, Tinker boards, etc, right? Maybe I should change that. What I meant is that Splashscreens are NOT available on these systems !x86 !osmc !xbian !mali !kms.

Correct.

Is this specific capability 100% dependent on OMX player? I ask because as an example the Odroid XU4 has a mali GPU and we (Odroid Retro Arena) do have splashscreens working albeit they are the video ones. I have not tested static images as of yet because quite frankly most people I know prefer video over static.

To provide further background my dev team that I put together a few months ago have been working to provide a base RetroPie image for the Odroid XU4 that rivals the experience on the Raspberry boards and in many cases surpasses it. My goal when I started was to work toward assisting to have more robust support for the board and eventually providing our results to the RetroPie devs to incorporate those results and make the experience for the XU4 users more seemless from the start like with the RPi boards.