But it’s not working that well - I want to be able to refresh the content from the Windows shared folder regularly and store/run it from an attached USB and when the folders and changed, the content on the USB gets added/deleted automatically.
Also - can it display different content from the same USB on 2 HDMI screens connected to the Raspberry Pi?
I have it running on the Vero4K to display random images from a NFS share from a NAS, but a Windows SMB share isn’t that much of a difference in terms of your goal. You could also attach the USB device to the Pi, share it via SMB, and have other devices access it to put pictures on it or delete them.
Just point to the path of your share in the addon’s settings. You can put images in there, delete, the addon will display them. Set screensaver time to 1 minute.
Not quite sure how to output to 2 screens simultaneously, though. This is a start. Might be easier to buy a HDMI adaptor that outputs to 2 devices. I think the best solutions for this differs if you want to display the same image on 2 different screens or if you want them to display separate images.
€dit: Just read your post again and realised I overlooked the video part of it. As far as I know the addon I linked only supports images. I’ve seen it crash a couple of times when it tried to play .mov files I forgot to remove from the share folder (a single digit number of .mov and about 24,000 images).
Just a thought/idea/question: Do you want to use the Pi with OSMC as a media centre playing movies, shows, music, and additionally have it display the images/videos form the share, or is the image/vidoe display intended as the sole purpose of the Pi? If the latter, then you’re better off with one of the distributions which specialise in digital signage.
Yeah I’ve got the Binary Emotions one, it’s just it doesn’t randomize both images and video and it’s not that reliable, plus it can’t output different media to 2 different screens.
I want the system to be completely hands-off so once I’ve linked the folder whenever it gets updated on my PC the raspberry pi auto-updates too.
To be honest the Raspberry Pi has been nothing but hassle for me, I’m not a programmer and all this code stuff gives me a headache, I just want a simple way to display up-to-date images and videos from folders from my PC on different screens!
Well, there’s also screenly but these guys – surprise, surprise – want to earn money with it.
A free solution named pic’tur was introduced by German IT magazine c’t in issue 13/2019. A second article in issue 23/2019 expanded the project by adding the possibility of displaying on a second screen. Unfortunately you have to pay for the online versions of the articles, besides they’re in German. You should also have done a thing or two with a Pi to configure everything to your needs.
If you’re looking for an easy solution, go for the paid solutions like screenly or pisignage. If you’re looking for a free solution, there will always be some effort involved. After all, the Pi was never intended to be a ready to use consumer product but a learning platform.
Don’t get discouraged if something doesn’t work instantly. We all learnt something new with every Pi project. I, too, could’ve torn my hair when things didn’t work with the ambilight Hyperion because I’m just a network guy, not an electronics guy. Every project will need you to read and understand a varying amount of text. If you don’t succeed, ask on this or any other Pi forum. It’s human to err but also to ask.
I appreciate the help, it’s just time invested vs. time worth it for me - plus I don’t like doing it!
Right now I’m going to just use one screen and try and get the Raspberry Slideshow software working as best I can, I’ve already spent far too much time on this. Definitely don’t want to be paying $30+/month for that subscription service though!!
