Hi,
I just tried sending images and videos from my Raspberry Pi to the LED panel. I wonder if there is other clients that run on other OS platform that I can make use of? Like Windows, even iOS or Android?
Thanks in advance.

Hello,
I want to change the used core that client use? Is it possible?

Hi,
my goal is to stream videos via VLC to an LED matrix, but I have encountered a problem that I can't get fixed.

If I run

root@raspberrypi:~/home/pi/flaschen-taschen/server $ ./ft-server --led-rows=32 --led-cols=64 
--led-chain=8 --led-parallel=2 --led-pixel-mapper "U-mapper"

the led matrix stays black. If I run [changed --led-chain=8 to --led-chain=4]

root@raspberrypi:~/home/pi/flaschen-taschen/server $ ./ft-server --led-rows=32 --led-cols=64 
--led-chain=4 --led-parallel=2 --led-pixel-mapper "U-mapper"

the led panels light up and show the video. I changed --led-chain=4 to --led-chain=6 and the led-panels turn black again.
Depending on the led chain length something is displayed or not.

Here are some facts about my setup

• I use 16 32x64 pixel LED modules with the following mapping:

   [<][<][<][<]  }--- Pi connector #1
   [>][>][>][>]
   [<][<][<][<]  }--- Pi connector #2
   [>][>][>][>]

• For wiring I use an Active-3 breakout board.
• The setup works. I can run examples from rpi-rgb-led-matrix/examples-api-use. All panels show the correct content.
• I use an RPi 4 with Raspbian lite.

I hope this helps solving the problem. If you need any further information i try to answer asap.

Best regards
Thorben

I want to stream an image from my pi to itself (via localhost). I also want to see in the ssh terminal the same output my pi should be showing on the rpi-rgb-matrix (because in my configuration you cant see the matrix from the point of the controller).
(How) Would it be possible to output via matrix and terminal?

In case this doesn't work, how could I send from a client to the client itself functioning as server and the pi as an seperat server? (so you would have two servers with one output instead two outputs at one server)

Sincerely
Christian

Howdy @hzeller! I hate to use an issue to pose newb questions, but where else are things flaschen-taschen discussed?

Looking thru the code to find whether specifying an aspect ratio is possible, and haven't found that yet.

Similarly, when pixels in source image data are mapped to LEDs, are they aliased?

If either or neither -- would these be (a) desirable feature(s) for the flaschen-taschen community? Would it be worth my time to add these? I mean, it would be for me, because the device I am building will result in uniformly rectangular pixel cells, and essentially have no control over that (and suspect that aspect ratio is a thing others might want)

I see that libswscale is employed, and yes it can scale images to match the wxh of an output device's aspect ratio. However, consider a device where physical layout is equivalent, widthPhys=heightPhys but pixel density is different, e.g. widthPixel=2*heightPixel.

Are such nonsquare pixel layouts accommodated by libswscale -and, if so, do I need to do anything else? Ty

Using master, the terminal client produces output like this for all clients I tried (send-image, send-video and the pnmfoo bash thingy from the readme):

According to hzeller/rpi-rgb-led-matrix#372,
(My image and my led screen are 384x96)

I use (./ft-server) and -g parameter (./send-image -g384x96+0+0 some-image.png)
Result : Attempting to send image larger than fits in a UDP packet (110623 > 65507 bytes)

I use (./ft-server) and -g parameter (./send-image -g384x54+0+0 some-image.png)
Result : It does not show anything.

Then I use (./ft-server --led-chian=36) and (./ft-server --led-chian=36 -D 384x54 )
Result : The image became displayed but But not in full screen

My problem is on the height. (96 pixel height >>> error)
What is the problem and How do I get the fullscreen image?

Hi ,
How to make send-image file as Daemon process ?

Regards
Alex

As I see, this flaschen-taschen uses uses old version of rpi-rgb-led-matrix repo. I tried to use latest rpi-rgb-led-matrix by copying in to server/rgb-matrix yet I got
main.cc:(.text.startup+0x11c): undefined reference to `rgb_matrix::CreateMatrixFromOptions(rgb_matrix::RGBMatrix::Options const&, rgb_matrix::RuntimeOptions const&)'
How can I solve this?

Thomas Chan came into Noisebridge and expressed an interest in having a flaschen taschen built for the light parade in Upper Lake, and burning man.
Thomas can be contacted at 707-572-7800, or 805-806-1177

As i see, it is possible to scrool text over an image and video even if image is only one (with just 1 frame). When text scrooling, it fills pixels that text already scrolled with image pixels even there is no another send of image frame. How you handle with that?

Hello,
I realy like what you did with tlaschen-taschen. I wonder that is it possible to broadcast to multiple server? Let say i have 4 LED matrix driving by RPi for each. I want to play a video on them like:
|XY|
|ZT|
->
|X| |Y|
|Z| |T|
so, is it possible that divide the video or image to 4 and broadcast them to 4 server?

So I am running ft-server on a raspbery pi with a 128x64 board (and Arduino hat).

I discovered I can send an image to x & y coordinates so had the great idea to run 4 different pixlets and then take each resulting output gif to an assigned quadrant of the board using the send-image command.

./send-image -g 64x32+0+0 -h matrixboard.local ./tmp/matrixboard_pixletexample1_pixlet.gif -c
./send-image -g 64x32+0+32 -h matrixboard.local ./tmp/matrixboard_pixletexample2_pixlet.gif -c
./send-image -g 64x32+64+0 -h matrixboard.local ./tmp/matrixboard_pixletexample3_pixlet.gif -c
./send-image -g 64x32+64+32 -h matrixboard.local ./tmp/matrixboard_pixletexample4_pixlet.gif -c

It all works great to be honest but my biggest issue seems to be if the gif is animated in any way, the ft-server has a really tough time animating it. I thought maybe it was the fact I was sending several animated gifs to it but I disabled them all and just sent one that was a 3 frame gif and it wouldnt animate it at all.

Here's an example of an animated gif that is just three frames

Is there any magic the ft-server has that can provide better support for animated gifs?

...just like send-image and send-video.

Then I can call send-text without trusting user input 😃 .

Hello fellow pixel lovers,

First, let me emphasis that this flaschen tashchen ppm over UDP protocol is golden. Thank you so much for that.

We have on a pi4 the server running :

~/flaschen-taschen/server$ sudo ./ft-server --led-rows=32 --led-cols=64 --led-chain=6 --led-parallel=2 --led-no-hardware-pulse --led-slowdown-gpio=5 --led-show-refresh

Then on an other machine on the network :

./send-video -h 100.119.152.99 -g 384x64 ~/Downloads/bandeau\ greg.mp4

video is [available here(https://storage.googleapis.com/silvr_temp/bandeau%20greg.mp4)

It all works very smoothly at 95hz. Increasing the screen may be a challenge if the fps drops too much, we will see about that.

Now, what I would like to do is to be able to stream a video. The master plan would be to eventually build something that can capture a web HTML 5 canvas as a video stream and push it to flaschen taschen. This will make coding animations accessible to web developers.

To validate the streaming performance I tried VLC.

Ubuntu 5.4.0-80-generic #90-Ubuntu
VLC media player 3.0.9.2 Vetinari (revision 3.0.9.2-0-gd4c1aefe4d)

Desktop computer with a Nvidia grahic card / Ryzen.

VLC media player 3.0.9.2 Vetinari (revision 3.0.9.2-0-gd4c1aefe4d)
[000055efdd8945b0] main libvlc: Running vlc with the default interface. Use 'cvlc' to use vlc without interface.
[00007f48d8002400] main filter error: Failed to create video converter
[00007f48d8002400] main filter error: Failed to create video converter
[00007f48f0c175a0] avcodec decoder: Using NVIDIA VDPAU Driver Shared Library  450.80.02  Wed Sep 23 00:46:46 UTC 2020 for hardware decoding
[00007f48d8023390] blend blend error: no matching alpha blending routine (chroma: YUVA -> VDV0)
[00007f48d8023390] main blend error: blending YUVA to VDV0 failed
[00007f48d80013b0] flaschen vout display error: sendmsg: error Message too long in vout display flaschen
[00007f48d8023390] blend blend error: no matching alpha blending routine (chroma: YUVA -> VDV0)
[00007f48d8023390] main blend error: blending YUVA to VDV0 failed
[00007f48d80013b0] flaschen vout display error: sendmsg: error Message too long in vout display flaschen
[00007f48d8023390] blend blend error: no matching alpha blending routine (chroma: YUVA -> VDV0)

[... many more...]

 [00007f48d80013b0] flaschen vout display error: sendmsg: error Message too long in vout display flaschen
[00007f48d80013b0] flaschen vout display error: sendmsg: error Message too long in vout display flaschen

[... many more...]

With -vvv

[h264 @ 0x7fab00cf2080] nal_unit_type: 9(AUD), nal_ref_idc: 0
[h264 @ 0x7fab00cf2080] nal_unit_type: 1(Coded slice of a non-IDR picture), nal_ref_idc: 3
^C[00005652de4c55b0] main libvlc debug: exiting
[00005652de4c55b0] main libvlc debug: removing all interfaces
[00005652de5a7d20] main interface debug: removing module "qt"
[00005652de563640] main playlist debug: deactivating the playlist
[00005652de563640] main playlist debug: incoming request - stopping current input
[00007faae80013b0] flaschen vout display error: sendmsg: error Message too long in vout display flaschen
[00007faae8023530] main blend debug: looking for video blending module matching "any": 1 candidates
[00007faae8023530] blend blend error: no matching alpha blending to

I tried smaller resolution 10x10, in case it was a UDP packet limitation but atlas.

Any ideas on how to approach this issue?

Hi, thanks for the useful libraries and utils this and rpi-rgb-led-matrix projects are great.

I'm trying to build the led matrix backend but the make command fails with

~/flaschen-taschen/server/ $ sudo make FT_BACKEND=rgb-matrix
g++ -Wall -O3 -I../api/include -Irgb-matrix/include -DFT_BACKEND=1 -std=c++03 -c -o main.o main.cc
main.cc:42:12: fatal error: led-matrix.h: No such file or directory
   42 | #  include "led-matrix.h"
      |            ^~~~~~~~~~~~~~
compilation terminated.
make: *** [Makefile:79: main.o] Error 1

I just cloned the repo so I'm not sure what might be causing the issue.

System: RPi Zero W
OS: Raspbian GNU/Linux 11 (bullseye)

I have rpi-rgb-led-matrix cloned in the parent directory, and I've disabled some rpi functionallity based on recommendation from rpi-rgb-led-matrix/README.md, namely sudo apt-get remove bluez bluez-firmware pi-bluetooth triggerhappy pigpio

We tried to run send-text on a Mac but it quits with an error. (see below)
It appears that LoadFont method in the Font class does not properly load the font.
We tried both the latest "master" and the "macos-compatible" branches and the result was the same.
It worked for Miloh on linux.

Here is what send-text says:

$ ./send-text -h ft.noise -o "what happens" -f "fonts/7x13B.bdf" 
Need to provide a font.
usage: ./send-text [options] <TEXT>
Options:
-g <width>x<height>[+<off_x>+<off_y>[+<layer>]] : Output geometry. Default 45x<font-height>+0+0+1
-l <layer>      : Layer 0..15. Default 1 (note if also given in -g, then last counts)
-h <host>       : Flaschen-Taschen display hostname.
-f <fontfile>   : Path to *.bdf font file
-s<ms>          : Scroll milliseconds per pixel (default 60). 0 for no-scroll.
-o              : Only run once, don't scroll forever.
-c<RRGGBB>      : Text color as hex (default: FFFFFF)
-b<RRGGBB>      : Background color as hex (default: 000000)
$

Hello Hzeller,
thank you for sharing this great project.

I am facing the following issue here -
when I compile the server with make FT_BACKEND=ft (then start it as root) and then use send-text or send-image (on localhost) I can't see that the GPIO pins toggle, when I measure with an oscilloscope. For example the clock pin. I still don't have (jet) the spixels PCB, but from layout I don't think it is required for the RPI Pins to toggle? I think Rpi3 is supported too?

If I compile with FT_BACKEND=terminal I can see the send Image/Text im Terminal.

It would be helpful for flashen-taschen to provide a live view of the pattern shown, in terminal.

For live view during real use, and for exploration of pattern making without FT hardware, with could encourage more widespread use.

hzeller/timg provides a good starting point, to see how to implement terminal graphics.

Thanks about flaschen-taschen library ! it is great . Now , i have 9 module RGB matrix ( 64x32) connecting Pi 3 , I am using flaschen-taschen library to send image and video , but I do not know how to adjust --led-rows= --led-chain= --led-parallel= --led-brightness= -C
https://youtu.be/XVejSbku9Nc

Hi,

With reference to the issue number #323 of rpi-rgb-led-matrix. Can u fix the bug in it through which we can run .bdf files in flaschen-taschen ?

Thanks and Regards,
Anirban Neogi

I wanted to run client code from my laptop(ubuntu), and server as Raspberry pi 3, as in raspbery both client and server code working fine.
but in system i'm getting error while making client file.
error is:
/usr/include/c++/5/bits/c++0x_warning.h:32:2: error: #error This file requires compiler and library support for the ISO C++ 2011 standard. This support must be enabled with the -std=c++11 or -std=gnu++11 compiler options.
#error This file requires compiler and library support \

can you please help me out of this

Hello,
Is it posibble to put brightness adjustment to send-video just like send-image?
I tried to use sws_getColorspaceDetails and sws_setColorspaceDetails but there is only black screen.

Hi,

First of all, thank you so much for your work on flashen-tashen & rpi-rgb-led-matrix ! I've been experimenting with RPI and LED matrix for a couple months and all your work has saved me months (years!) of work :)

Second, I'm having some issues streaming to the RPI server from another computer.

Context: trying to send my square, 64x64 pixel video (squarevideo.h264) to the ft-server, built to output on a 64x64 LED matrix display.

I've managed to make it work when streaming the video from the RPI itself (i.e. run through an SSH console):

./send-video -g 64x64 home/pi/Library/picamerascript/squarevideo.h264

Now if I run the same command, but from my computer, I get this

./send-video -h raspberrypi.local -g 64x64 ~/rasberrypi/squarevideo.h264
flaschen vout display error: sendmsg: error Message too long in vout display flaschen
flaschen vout display error: sendmsg: error Message too long in vout display flaschen
flaschen vout display error: sendmsg: error Message too long in vout display flaschen
...

Interestingly, if I reduce the dimension to anything below 56 it does work

./send-video -h raspberrypi.local -g 32x32 ~/rasberrypi/squarevideo.h264
./send-video -h raspberrypi.local -g 55x55 ~/rasberrypi/squarevideo.h264

^ these works, but -g 56x56 will fail.

Setup
OSX: Software: Max OSX catalina 10.15.4 (19E287))
OSX: Terminal: ITerm3
Pi: Hardware: Raspberry Pi 4 Model B Rev 1.1
Pi: Software: Raspbian GNU/Linux 10 (buster)

Hello ,
first, thank you for the great work you have done with this fantastic apps.
I am running a project for our club to build several different LED-Matrix displays and most of all went fine and works.

Description and successful test of the size but slow:

I do have one display with 4cols and 5rows of 64x32 led-displays.

• FT-Server runs with 256x160 on port 1337
• UDP buffer on the Pi's is increased to max.
• Using the flaschen-taschen client –> send-image, works fine.
• Using the flaschen-taschen client -> send-video works as well on the whole display size
  Command: ./send-video -g256x160+0+0 -h
• Using two Pi’s one for the matrix with the ft-server and the other to decode the video and send it over the network,
  works better but still slow.
• Sending a webcam-stream with command : ./send-video -g256x160+0+0 http:// ,
  works fine .

Now the issue:
I know that you did not wrote the vlc-client flaschen, perhaps you have an idea where to change to get it work.

Using the VLC on a PC or running on a PI , the max size setup in the VLC Flaschen adapter which will work is width = 192 , height = 112.
All other larger setup sizes result in black display no stream visible.

Wondering how Dirk in Schabeutz got his very large display working with stream showing.
Hope you have an idea or can help with this.

Kind regard

I checked all my solders (I'm using the spixels board), and all the connectors have solid continuity from their pins to the 74HCT245's pins.

This has been a persistent problem though, across 2 spixels boards (the other board I put together just for testing, only used one 74HCT245, and only SPI_P2 was working). 2 different rpis (3b and 3b+), and quite a few Raspbian lite installations, so my only guess is that the cause is some difference in gpio/spi functionality between the rpi2 and rpi3.

I could be way off, I am not sure what else I should be testing though, at this point. Any ideas?

Hi,
first of all, thanks for this great library. I really like it.
However, I stumbled upon the following problem: My Matrix is 320 x 128, that's 40960 Pixel. If I send three bytes for RGB for each pixel and add the header, the Packet exceeds the maximum packet size of 65536 Bytes quite a bit.

Can I send the image partially in multiple packets?

Some weeks ago I bought a RGB Led Matrix, and during this last holidays I spent some days programming a video game for the matrix. Without your work, this could not be possible.

Thank you very much for enabling others :-)

PD: In case anyone is interested in putting to use their RGB Matrix: https://github.com/mmartinortiz/rgb-led-matrix-space-invaders

Hello Hzeller

I am trying to make the scroll fields static. "./send-text -h localhost "Flaschen" -f fonts/10x20.bdf -s 20 -g 288x64+64+10+1" . I have tried with '-s 0', but it works for 10-15 seconds. I am trying for an infinite static . Please guide me in this issue.

hi

Great job !.. I'm working on this project and not able to extend the chain length, (in rpi-rgb-led-matrix used -c option to extend the chain length) , how to extend the chain length in this project.

Thanks
Alex

I was making ft-demos and got this error on OSX 10.11.6 (El Capitan)

make -C ft/api/lib
c++ -Wall -O3 -I../include -I. -fPIC -c -o udp-flaschen-taschen.o udp-flaschen-taschen.cc
c++ -Wall -O3 -I../include -I. -fPIC -c -o bdf-font.o bdf-font.cc
c++ -Wall -O3 -I../include -I. -fPIC -c -o graphics.o graphics.cc
ar rcs libftclient.a udp-flaschen-taschen.o bdf-font.o graphics.o
g++ -shared -Wl,-soname,libftclient.so.1 -o libftclient.so.1 udp-flaschen-taschen.o bdf-font.o graphics.o
ld: unknown option: -soname
clang: error: linker command failed with exit code 1 (use -v to see invocation)
make[1]: *** [libftclient.so.1] Error 1
make: *** [ft/api/lib/libftclient.a] Error 2

Hello sir,
I am new to git hub
I'm working on HUB75 for a project with Pi, and i am using your client server code with 1:16s scan rate , HUB75 board each four 32x32 panel connected in series and parallel .I have did different types of text scrolling and yours ppm files as included in this flaschen -taschen but i don't know how to create own ppm image file and run it in this F/T protocol .please help me actually i am new one to this
Thank you

Hello Hzeller

I am using a P2.5 64x64 32S. Have used both the rpi-rgb as well flaschen-taschen commands viz..

RGB - sudo ./demo -D 1 runtext.ppm --led-chain=1 --led-cols=64 --led-rows=64 --led-pwm-bits=1 --led-pwm-lsb-nanoseconds 1000 --led-multiplexing=1

F&T - @ Server - sudo ./ft-server --d-chain=1 --led-rows=64 --led-multiplexing=1 D64x64 --led-pwm-bits=1
@ Client - ./send-text -h localhost "999" -f fonts/10x20.bdf -s 0 -g 64x64+0+0

I am facing two issues here -
1 - I am not getting full display of the ppm or even the text. I have attached the images for ur ref..
2 - The text colours are not changing other than RGB & W. If I give ./send-text -h localhost "999" -f fonts/10x20.bdf -s 0 -g 64x64+0+0 -c FF8800, the text colour is displayed as red rather than some what amber one. It holds good for other 2 colours also, if i give 00f8bb which has to be
a somewhat close mint colour it displays a green.

Hope you understood my queries. I am posting this in F&T as i am more towardly going to use F&T.

Thanks.

Hey!

I'm trying to setup flaschen taschen for my led matrix but I can't seem to stream the vlc to the udp server. I'm running:
vlc --vout flaschen --flaschen-display=localhost --flaschen-width=64 --flaschen-height=64 "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QH2-TGUlwu4" --no-audio
I'm getting:

VLC media player 3.0.10 Vetinari (revision 3.0.10-0-g7f145afa84)
[01e52db0] vlcpulse audio output error: PulseAudio server connection failure: Connection refused
[01e775c0] main interface error: no suitable interface module
[01dd7b58] main libvlc error: interface "globalhotkeys,none" initialization failed
[01dd7b58] main libvlc: Running vlc with the default interface. Use 'cvlc' to use vlc without interface.
[01e775c0] skins2 interface error: cannot initialize OSFactory
[01e775c0] [cli] lua interface: Listening on host "*console".
VLC media player 3.0.10 Vetinari
Command Line Interface initialized. Type 'help' for help.
[b0f00d58] http stream error: local stream 1 error: Cancellation (0x8)
[b042ca40] mmal_codec decoder: VCSM init succeeded: CMA
[b0d192f8] chain filter error: Too high level of recursion (3)
[b0d18dd0] main filter error: Failed to create video converter
[b0d192f8] chain filter error: Too high level of recursion (3)
[b0d18dd0] main filter error: Failed to create video converter
[b0d192f8] chain filter error: Too high level of recursion (3)
[b0d18dd0] main filter error: Failed to create video converter
[b0d192f8] chain filter error: Too high level of recursion (3)
[b0d18dd0] main filter error: Failed to create video converter
[b0d192f8] chain filter error: Too high level of recursion (3)
[b0d18dd0] main filter error: Failed to create video converter
mmal: mmal_vc_port_info_set: failed to set port info (3:0): EINVAL
mmal: mmal_vc_port_set_format: mmal_vc_port_info_set failed 0xb0d05380 (EINVAL)
[b0d03340] mmal_codec filter error: Failed to commit format for output port vc.ril.hvs:out:0(OPQV) (status=3 EINVAL)
Segmentation fault`

Initialising the server with:
~/flaschen-taschen/server $ sudo ./ft-server --led-slowdown-gpio=4 --led-cols=64 --led-parallel=2
I built it with:
make FT_BACKEND=rgb-matrix
any idea?

Hello, and thank you for this great project.
I'm testing some configuration with Processing sending images to ft-server: it works :-)
I have seen that ft-server, differently from the other demos, is missing the -L option for U turn display configuration.
Is it a feature you can add ?
Thank you
Marco

Hi,
In text example program , If I give text in small letters it is displaying in capital letters. Is their any other ways to display small letters?
If I provide more than one text by pipe lining with different offset i am getting flickering problem ,Is it is due to power issue ? please do find the attach link
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iqwcEEiQQgU&feature=youtu.be

Thanks
Alex

Hello sir,

I am new to git hub..

I'm working on HUB75 for a project, the connectivity with pi3, and i am using your client server code.
using 3 different scan rate HUB75 board each four 32x32 panel connected in series and parallel

code:

Server: sudo ./ft-server --led-parallel=2 --led-rows=64 -D64x64 --led-chain=2

Client: sudo ./send-text -g64X64+0-0+1 -h localhost "hello" -f fonts/6x12.bdf -c ff0000

HUB75-P5-16S-32x32-B0 consist of ABCD data lines (Works absolutely fine with series and parallel connections)

HUB75-P2.5-32S-64X64 consist of additional E data line, wiring is properly connected(Not working properly, some set of upper led wont glow even i made correction -D128x128)

HUB75-P5-8S-32x32 ABC data lines(Not working properly, multiple prints appear )

Please help me to set different scan rate. is there any other libraries has to downloaded or any other arguments i need to give.. ??

Sorry for posting in that issue i thought it was similar