##Introduction The small video_looper.sh script for a Raspberry PI continuously plays video files from USB stick.
This script was created to indefinitely show a set of videos on a trade show. An important requirement was that the display should be empty (black) in between videos and that no OSD menus or information must be shown. Also, since my colleagues on the stand don't
##Good to know
- The loop_videos.sh script will play videos found on an attached USB drive's "Movies" or "movies" directory in alphabetical order.
- When the USB disk is removed, the script detects this and shuts the system down gracefully. The scripts detects it after the mediaplayer stops (because it cannot read the movie). It may take some time (tens of seconds) before the mediaplayer finished playing it buffer.
- As this was to be used on a trade show without sound, the audio output device is set to local instead of the default "hdmi". So unless you attach something to the headphone jack, you won't hear anything.
- In expects only one USB drive to be attached, which it will mount in read-only mode. If no USB drive is found, the script will mention this on stdout and exit.
- It expects one logical partition on the USB drive. The scripts looks for /dev/sd?1 to discover a USB drive.
##Deployment
This is what I did on a Raspberry PI to use the script:
- Install Raspbian Lite on the Raspberry PI (Jessie edition)
- sudo apt-get update
- sudo apt-get install git omxplayer
- git clone https://www.github.com/markvandeveerdonk/RaspberryVideoLooper
- RaspberryVideoLooper/setup_raspberry.sh
- Change pi's password (although not really necessary as auto-login is active)
- Insert USB stick with video files in its "Movies" directory & reboot.
That's it! Happy video looping!
Note: the setup_raspberry.sh script changes quite a few boot and startup settings to turn it into a dedicated video looping system. See comments in the script to see the details.