Latest Raspberry Pi OS update – May 2020
Along with yesterday’s launch of the new 8GB Raspberry Pi 4, we launched a beta 64-bit ARM version of Debian with the Raspberry Pi Desktop, so you could use all those extra gigabytes. We also updated the 32-bit version of Raspberry Pi OS (the new name for Raspbian), so here’s a quick run-through of what has changed.
Bookshelf
As many of you know, we have our own publishing company, Raspberry Pi Press, who publish a variety of magazines each month, including The MagPi, HackSpace magazine, and Wireframe. They also publish a wide range of other books and magazines, which are released either to purchase as a physical product (from their website) or as free PDF downloads.
To make all this content more visible and easy to access, we’ve added a new Bookshelf application – you’ll find it in the Help section of the main menu.
Bookshelf shows the entire current catalogue of free magazines – The MagPi, HackSpace magazine and Wireframe, all with a complete set of back issues – and also all the free books from Raspberry Pi Press. When you run the application, it automatically updates the catalogue and shows any new titles which have been released since you last ran it with a little “new” flash in the corner of the cover.
To read any title, just double-click on it – if it is already on your Raspberry Pi, it will open in Chromium (which, it turns out, is quite a good PDF viewer); if it isn’t, it will download and then open automatically when the download completes. You can see at a glance which titles are downloaded and which are not by the “cloud” icon on the cover of any file which has not been downloaded.
All the PDF files you download are saved in the “Bookshelf” directory in your home directory, so you can also access the files directly from there.
There’s a lot of excellent content produced by Raspberry Pi Press – we hope this makes it easier to find and read.
Edit – some people have reported that Bookshelf incorrectly gives a “disk full” error when running on a system in which the language is not English; a fix for that is being uploaded to apt at the moment, so updating from apt (“sudo apt update” followed by “sudo apt upgrade”) should get the fixed version.
Magnifier
As mentioned in my last blog post (here), one of the areas we are currently trying to improve is accessibility to the Desktop for people with visual impairments. We’ve already added the Orca screen reader (which has had a few bug fixes since the last release which should make it work more reliably in this image), and the second recommendation we had from AbilityNet was to add a screen magnifier.
This proved to be harder than it should have been! I tried a lot of the existing screen magnifier programs that were available for Debian desktops, but none of them really worked that well; I couldn’t find one that worked the way the magnifiers in the likes of MacOS and Ubuntu did, so I ended up writing one (almost) from scratch.
To install it, launch Recommended Applications in the new image and select Magnifier under Universal Access. Once it has installed, reboot.
You’ll see a magnifying glass icon at the right-hand end of the taskbar – to enable the magnifier, click this icon, or use the keyboard shortcut Ctrl-Alt-M. (To turn the magnifier off, just click the icon again or use the same keyboard shortcut.)
Right-clicking the magnifier icon brings up the magnifier options. You can choose a circular or rectangular window of whatever size you want, and choose by how much you want to zoom the image. The magnifier window can either follow the mouse pointer, or be a static window on the screen. (To move the static window, just drag it with the mouse.)
Also, in some applications, you can have the magnifier automatically follow the text cursor, or the button focus. Unfortunately, this depends on the application supporting the required accessibility toolkit, which not all applications do, but it works reasonably well in most included applications. One notable exception is Chromium, which is adding accessibility toolkit support in a future release; for now, if you want a web browser which supports the accessibility features, we recommend Firefox, which can be installed by entering the following into a terminal window:
sudo apt install firefox-esr
(Please note that we do not recommend using Firefox on Raspberry Pi OS unless you need accessibility features, as, unlike Chromium, it is not able to use the Raspberry Pi’s hardware to accelerate video playback.)
I don’t have a visual impairment, but I find the magnifier pretty useful in general for looking at the finer details of icons and the like, so I recommend installing it and having a go yourself.
User research
We already know a lot of the things that people are using Raspberry Pi for, but we’ve recently been wondering if we’re missing anything… So we’re now including a short optional questionnaire to ask you, the users, for feedback on what you are doing with your Raspberry Pi in order to make sure we are providing the right support for what people are actually doing.
This questionnaire will automatically be shown the first time you launch the Chromium browser on a new image. There are only four questions, so it won’t take long to complete, and the results are sent to a Google Form which collates the results.
You’ll notice at the bottom of the questionnaire there is a field which is automatically filled in with a long string of letters and numbers. This is a serial number which is generated from the hardware in your particular Raspberry Pi which means we can filter out multiple responses from the same device (if you install a new image at some point in future, for example). It does not allow us to identify anything about you or your Raspberry Pi, but if you are concerned, you can delete the string before submitting the form.
As above, this questionnaire is entirely optional – if you don’t want to fill it in, just close Chromium and re-open it and you won’t see it again – but it would be very helpful for future product development if we can get this information, so we’d really appreciate it if as many people as possible would fill it in.
Other changes
There is also the usual set of bug fixes and small tweaks included in the image, full details of which can be found in the release notes on the download page.
One particular change which it is worth pointing out is that we have made a small change to audio. Raspberry Pi OS uses what is known as ALSA (Advanced Linux Sound Architecture) to control audio devices. Up until now, both the internal audio outputs on Raspberry Pi – the HDMI socket and the headphone jack – have been treated as a single ALSA device, with a Raspberry Pi-specific command used to choose which is active. Going forward, we are treating each output as a separate ALSA device; this makes managing audio from the two HDMI sockets on Raspberry Pi 4 easier and should be more compatible with third-party software. What this means is that after installing the updated image, you may need to use the audio output selector (right-click the volume icon on the taskbar) to re-select your audio output. (There is a known issue with Sonic Pi, which will only use the HDMI output however the selector is set – we’re looking at getting this fixed in a future release.)
Some people have asked how they can switch the audio output from the command line without using the desktop. To do this, you will need to create a file called .asoundrc in your home directory; ALSA looks for this file to determine which audio device it should use by default. If the file does not exist, ALSA uses “card 0” – which is HDMI – as the output device. If you want to set the headphone jack as the default output, create the .asoundrc file with the following contents:
defaults.pcm.card 1 defaults.ctl.card 1
This tells ALSA that “card 1” – the headphone jack – is the default device. To switch back to the HDMI output, either change the ‘1’s in the file to ‘0’s, or just delete the file.
How do I get it?
The new image is available for download from the usual place: our Downloads page.
To update an existing image, use the usual terminal command:
sudo apt update sudo apt full-upgrade
To just install the bookshelf app:
sudo apt update sudo apt install rp-bookshelf
To just install the magnifier, either find it under Universal Access in Recommended Software, or:
sudo apt update sudo apt install mage
You’ll need to add the magnifier plugin to the taskbar after installing the program itself. Once you’ve installed the program and rebooted, right-click the taskbar and choose Add/Remove Panel Items; click Add, and select the Magnifier option.
We hope you like the changes — as ever, all feedback is welcome, so please leave a comment below!
209 comments
jahboater
The questionnaire about Pi usage doesn’t include all the “Lite” users.
Peter Onion
“This questionnaire will automatically be shown the first time you launch the Chromium browser on a new image.”
I’ve done three installs of 64 bit PiOS now and not seen this questionnaire once! Is it only for the 32bit PiOS ?
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
Yes, it’s not currently working on the 64-bit image due to that using a different version of Chromium which hides its data in different places; it’ll be fixed in the next 64-bit release.
Mike Redrobe
There is a bug where the questionnaire will never show if you’ve first opened chromium in a different way than the icon.
E.g. I checked out the bookshelf app first, and clicked on the website button.
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
It’s not really a bug; it’s just a consequence of the way Chromium handles pages set for display on first run. If the first time you open Chromium, you do so with a filename as an argument, it overrides the first run page setting, and thereafter, it’s not the first run so it won’t show the first run page. It’s deliberate behaviour from Chromium (and is arguably the right thing to do). There’s not much we can do about it other than to encourage people to not be so over-excited about Bookshelf that they run that before anything else…
Nick
Ha! It should be illegal not to get over-excited about the Bookshelf, considering how easy it makes it to get so many high-quality magazines. :)) That survey should be presented as a shortcut on the desktop or a bookmark in the browser. And a link to it would’ve been nice here in the blog post, because my headless Pis can’t start a browser that they don’t even have installed. :)
Petiteau
I’m on a Raspberry Pi 4 4GB with Raspbian Buster and I did the update. But Bookshelf does not work, when I open it an error message appears: Disk full – unable to download updates.
And the same message when I try to download a book. While I still have 17GB of free space!
Juergen
I am having the same issue — Raspberry Pi OS 32-Bit (Upgrade) and 64-Bit Beta (installed today).
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
As above – can you please post the result of running “df –output=avail ~/Bookshelf”? Thanks.
fush
Same issue.
df –output=avail ~/Bookshelf
df: ‘–output=avail’: File o directory non esistente
File system 1K-blocchi Usati Disponib. Uso% Montato su
/dev/root 61220308 6669392 51977992 12% /
Brumla
Try to do the update, I had same issue and after update (29 May 21:10 CEST) the rp-bookshelf was updated and it works as expected.
Laurence
I got the same when I tried to load CUPS. (Not surprised, that is huge). I switched to a 64Gb SD and was OK. except CUPS and my printer wouldn’t talk.
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
Do you actually have free space in the partition where your home folder is located? Bookshelf saves files to the folder ~/Bookshelf, so that needs to have free space.
Can you please post the result of running “df –output=avail ~/Bookshelf”?
Petiteau
Here is what it gives me:
pi@raspberry:~ $ df –output = avail ~ / Bookshelf
df: –output: Aucun fichier ou dossier de ce type
df: ‘=’: Aucun fichier ou dossier de ce type
df: avail: Aucun fichier ou dossier de ce type
Sys. de fichiers blocs de 1K Utilisé Disponible Uti% Monté sur
/dev/root 30364012 10324288 18757276 36% /
/dev/root 30364012 10324288 18757276 36% /
/dev/root 30364012 10324288 18757276 36% /
pi@raspberry:~ $
(I use the interface in French)
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
Ah – that’ll be the problem; I didn’t realise df translated its text output, which means the grep I do on the returned values fails. Apologies!
I’ll get a fix for that into apt asap.
Petiteau
I just changed the system language to English and GB and Bookshelf works perfectly!
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
Yes, thought that was the problem. I’ve created a fix – just waiting for it to be uploaded to apt; hopefully by this evening you’ll be able to do a “sudo apt update; sudo apt upgrade” to get a version which works properly in French.
Apologies again for the inconvenience!
Petiteau
Bookshelf now works in the French interface! Thank you very much !
Ed
I hope you learned your lesson, young man! ;-) Yeah, never assume text output is the same, could even change between versions. But if you use –output=avail like in your follow-up, you can just pick the second line, right? tail -n1, no need to grep text, I would have thought. One more gotcha, though: make sure to use the -k option with df to set the block size to 1K because that could be overridden by environment variables. Not likely, but still. E.g. strict posix compliancy assumes 512 byte block size.
Bruno B.
Same problem still with German interface:
Result of “df –output=avail ~/Bookshelf”:
pi@raspberrypi:~ $ df –output=avail ~/Bookshelf
df: ‘–output=avail’: Datei oder Verzeichnis nicht gefunden
Dateisystem 1K-Blöcke Benutzt Verfügbar Verw% Eingehängt auf
/dev/root 61078228 4014844 54530892 7% /
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
Try again in a few hours; it takes time for the apt repos to sync up.
Per-Erik Westerberg
If you just prepend a command with “LC_ALL=C” then it will always use english.
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
That’s a useful tip for the future – many thanks!
ME
Like the new name for the ARMHF / ARM64 Operating System. Great improvements as always and amazing how far LXDE has been developed in a few years……
Maybe it is about time the Debian x86 release should be renamed and offer a x86-64 release ?
Nick
The Bookshelf is great, thanks a lot for making it! :D Can it be set to store the magazines in a custom directory? That would be very useful, especially when you want to store them in the network, so you can keep your microSD free of non-mission critical data.
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
It’s something I can look at for a future release, but in the meantime you can set up a symlink to ~/Bookshelf, which should achieve the same thing.
Billy
Setting up raspberrypi-ui-mods (1.20200514) …
Installing new version of config file /etc/xdg/lxpanel/LXDE-pi/panels/panel …
Installing new version of config file /etc/xdg/openbox/lxde-pi-rc.xml …
The desktop has been updated.
To apply the updates, please reboot your Pi, and then select one of the options on the Defaults page in Appearance Settings.
PuTTY X11 proxy: Unsupported authorisation protocol
Unable to init server: Could not connect: Connection refused
(zenity:18258): Gtk-WARNING **: 11:35:31.133: cannot open display: localhost:10.0
Setting up libfl2:armhf (2.6.4-6.2) …
Setting up rp-bookshelf (0.3) …
Headless users beware as usual.
Bob
Any idea what the zenity was trying to tell you while you were upgrading?
Billy
No idea, maybe Simon Long could enlighten us.
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
Zenity is used to show a dialog box with the same message as you saw in the terminal (a warning that the user settings have been updated and you should reset to defaults) at this point – this presumably didn’t run properly over a remote connection. It’s just a repeat of the message that you did see, so if your system seems to be working fine, then there’s nothing to worry about.
Romney Yeoman Walker
Simon,
I’m not very happy about resetting to defaults every time the desktop is updated. I can just about live with changing the desktop wallpaper (which I use to help recognise which of my several RPis I am connected to) and moving – yet again – the taskbar back to the bottom of the screen (where I prefer it). However, resetting to defaults also seems to clear the extensive changes I have made to the File Manager preferences. I’m a computer enthusiast of many years experience, and I want to see far more detail than is provided by the simplified user interface. The job of setting the File Manager preferences on all my RPis takes a significant amount of time, and is also VERY frustrating. I now keep copies of the config files which define my custom preferences which I can copy back to my .config – but this presumably reverses any updates which were made by selecting the default settings in the Desktop Appearances tool. As far as I could quickly identify, the last desktop “update” was simply to add the Magnifier icon to the taskbar – something I could do manually and far more easily than resetting all of my chosen File Manager presets – if only I had known…..
Resetting defaults is something of a sledgehammer cracking the proverbial nut. Please can you provide us with more detail about the specific desktop updates, along with the implications of choosing not to select default settings as the message suggests. There surely must be a better way to address this issue than simply setting everything back to defaults every time there is a (minor) change to the desktop? Is there a way that you can implement updates to each customised configuration file as it currently exists, rather than just replace the entire file with a new default? I am starting to find this issue more than a little frustrating…..
Best wishes, and thanks for all your hard work developing the Raspberry Pi OS.
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
“Is there a way that you can implement updates to each customised configuration file as it currently exists, rather than just replace the entire file with a new default?”
In short, no.
The apt update mechanism is relatively crude, and even if it wasn’t, trying to merge our new changes with whatever changes the user may have made is a mammoth and error-prone task. You can either take all the new changes, or you can stick with your own customised configuration.
If you are the sort of person – like you – who makes extensive changes to your own configuration – then I suggest after an update, you compare the changed defaults (which are all in /etc/xdg) to your own customised files (which are all in .config) and merge them manually yourself. Not least because that will give you some idea of just how awkward it would be to try to do it automatically – but at least you will have the advantage of knowing what changes you have made and want to keep!
Unfortunately there is no good solution to this. We used to do it a different way where we pushed changes to user config, but that upset too many people, so now we leave it entirely up to you; we won’t touch your customisations. If you want to take our new changes, we tell you that they have happened, and we provide an easy mechanism for getting all the changes (at the cost of your customisations) – “reset to defaults”. For most people, if they reset to defaults, it is a few mouse clicks to get back to where they were before. But there’s no way we can reliably handle a situation like yours automatically, and if you are indeed an experienced computer user, it shouldn’t be too hard to come up with a way to do the merge yourself – keep a backup of /etc/xdg, diff it whenever you see a desktop settings update message, manually apply changes, for example.
Romney Yeoman Walker
Simon,
Many thanks for your response. Please rest assured that I was not underestimating the scale of achieving what I was suggesting. I was pretty certain that if it had been easy, then you would have already done it….
Still, I’m particularly grateful for two things:
a) it seems perfectly reasonable for me to ignore the message and choose not to update defaults – it’s not likely to cause a major disaster.
b) it’s very useful to know where to find the updated default settings. I should really have been able to work this out for myself, given the changes I have already made in this area – but sadly I didn’t!
So thank you – I’m now much more confident about what I need to do to avoid my frustrations, and I should now be able identify the updates to the desktop, and copy them forward to my own .config files where appropriate. I hope that this information is also useful for others in a similar situation to mine.
As always, thank you for your hard work maintaining the OS – we couldn’t manage without you
MaM
I would love to fill in the survey, but don’t find any link. I have a hand full of rpis running, but don’t update the OS. Any chance to send my response manually?
Benjamin Rossington
After updating a 32bit install, the menu icon refuses to show. The files are still there, I can even select a different one… But none show. The raspberry icon. None of the other icons are bugged. Literally just the icon to open the menu. I’ve tried changing it to another image in another directory and it still won’t display.
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
The icon loading code for lxpanel has been tidied for this release, as it was (frankly) a mess before. One consequence of this is that it will only load named icons from the current theme; it won’t load arbitrary image files any more. See https://www.raspberrypi.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=66&t=275473&p=1669223#p1669223 for instructions on how to add an image to the icon theme.
Milliways
I have experienced the same missing launch icon.
I read the linked discussion, but it did not help.
AFAIK I have never customised the icon, and have tried all the icons offered in .config/openbox and none work.
There is mention of Themes – I am not sure where this would be – I found a “hidden” Theme and Appearance Settings (I have been castigated by staff before for unhiding these) which shows PiXflat – I probably changed this years ago to get macOS looking Close/Minimise/Maximise buttons.
I would just like a simple fool-proof way to get a Start Menu icon. I tried selecting one from the PiXflat but it didn’t seem to make any difference.
Milliways
For the benefit of others, I eventually got something which worked. I ran the following (as root)
#!/bin/bash
cp /usr/share/raspberrypi-artwork/launch.png /usr/share/icons/hicolor/24×24/apps/launch.png
cd /usr/share/icons/hicolor
sudo gtk-update-icon-cache
Then selected “launch” in the Menu settings for the empty button.
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
Yes, that’s exactly the right thing to do – it adds the file you want to the icon theme.
Herman
Hello team, congrats for another hard- & software big leap in the development of the RPi! I took the 32-bit upgrade (in the Dutch speaking part of Belgium), but I could not spot the Bookshelf and no Magnifier either. Is that a language problem?
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
No, shouldn’t be language-related. Try following the instructions in the blog post for separately installing those two packages, and make sure you do a “sudo apt update” first.
Ed
I also have different language settings (just north of him, nl-NL) and don’t see the magnifier after installation & reboot either, not in the task bar and not in any menu. Also the keyboard shortcut Ctrl-Alt-M doesn’t activate it, instead it pops up a small text box with a µ in it, but that might be because the keypress gets captured by VNC. Or is the whole Magnifier disabled when using VNC?
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
The magnifier is very closely coupled to X; it’s mostly raw X system calls. I’ve not tried it over VNC, but I wouldn’t be at all surprised to find it doesn’t work over a VNC connection. I’ll try it when I get a chance.
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
Actually, I’ve just tried this and the magnifier works fine for me over a VNC connection, switching with both the hot-key combination and the taskbar button. Looks like something may be wrong in your VNC setup.
Ed
Thanks for checking. Nothing wrong with VNC as far as I can tell, but I did find out that Magnifier was simply not added to the task bar. Perhaps a file location/settings issue with the different language of the os or desktop after all? I was able to manually add it, though, and it works as expected with the mouse. Yay! Still no luck on the Ctrl-Alt-M keyboard shortcut. VNC settings do say: “Pass media/special keys directly to VNC server”.
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
If Ctrl-Alt-M isn’t working, it is likely that you haven’t loaded the latest set of UI changes; did you go into Appearance Settings and select one of the default option buttons after the update? I’m guessing not – as that would also mean that the plugin wasn’t loaded in the taskbar…
Ed
Is there a dialog after or during updating which I missed because I updated via ssh? I tried setting defaults just now and that changed nothing that I could see except every custom desktop setting like taskbar size and background, obviously…
Oh dear, was this always there at the end of the article…? If so, then I’m afraid it was user error. Sorry! “You’ll need to add the magnifier plugin to the taskbar after installing the program itself. Once you’ve installed the program and rebooted, right-click the taskbar and choose Add/Remove Panel Items; click Add, and select the Magnifier option.”
However, no luck on ctrl-alt-m, or maybe partially: I tried vnc via the iPad and with the onscreen keyboard it works. Until now, I had only tried on my Windows laptop (Thinkpad, win10 pro, NL settings). Maybe the key is intercepted by Windows settings. On the other hand, there is no text box popup with a mu character in Windows, only on the Pi via vnc.
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
There is a dialog which appears if you update locally, and there is a message displayed in the terminal if you update remotely to prompt you to reset to defaults. And yes, it was always there at the end of the article!
Herman
I managed to full install the 32-bit upgrade on a second attempt, the Bookshelf and Magnifier in particular and the new Raspberry Pi OS in general are working fine. I must have clicked twice on the Chromium window, so I missed the questionnaire, but I still have to install the upgrade on several RPi’s, meaning I will answer the questionnaire on one of those RPi’s.
talraash
Raspberry os after update from raspbian or new image random shutdown rpi4(most when start playback) on twitch.tv. PSU is ok… Sometimes it shutdown at once when start play, sometimes after change video few times. YouTube playback without issue. Old image with kernel 4.19.97 work fine.
Mark
This is only a guess but it could be temperature related? I experienced something similar myself. I was coding in PyCharm at the same time as monitoring SpaceX docking live on Sunday when the Pi shutdown unexpectedly. At first I didn’t suspect overheating because I have an Argon One case with fan and overheating hasn’t been a problem in the past; I watched the launch on Saturday prior to upgrading to the new OS with out any issues. But on Sunday while doing similar things; bit of coding while watching SpaceX it happened twice and on both occasions when it happened, the fan hadn’t kicked in. The second time it happened I spotted the red thermometer on the desktop but it shut down almost immediately it appeared. It seemed to me that the temperature could escalate from default fan off < 55C to overheat, faster than the fan could react. As a precaution I added an extra step in the fan configuration to come on at 45C speed 5%. Since doing that I haven't had any problems but I have noticed the fan kicking in more often for loads that previous to the OS update wouldn't have caused the fan to run. It all could just be a coincidence; OS update, warmer weather, more video streaming loads combined with the fan configuration change, but I am wondering if something in the OS update is making the Pi more susceptible to overheating.
bensimmo
Any chances of having the accessible feature on by default at first boot
then ask the question during initial setup if they are needed (and then removed only of not).
that would work better for all people.
it’s much harder to setup when you can’t read or hear and then find where to add these, than it is for users to ignore or remove them
just an idea.
try see how Windoes10 deals with its initial setup and Android now too.
Accessibility is thrown straight at users, not hidden away.
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
It’s something we are considering. The problem is that Orca is a resource hog; it slows down pretty much everything when it runs, and it’s not small, so it would increase the download size for everyone.
We’re looking at ways to make its installation easier via the startup wizard and to have those ways made more accessible without necessarily having to have Orca itself installed.
beta-tester
“(Please note that we do not recommend using Firefox on Raspberry Pi OS unless you need accessibility features, as, unlike Chromium, it is not able to use the Raspberry Pi’s hardware to accelerate video playback.)”
HW acceleration for video playback will never happen for firefox, or is still in the queue and not released yet?
was HW acceleration for chromium developed by you or google?
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
Hardware acceleration for Chromium was developed by us. We have no current plans to add it to Firefox; we don’t have the resource to support two separare browsers.
beta-tester
when FireFox crashes on video playback sometimes, is it because of missing HW acceleration?
makes it sense to always send the crash report to mozilla or will it be ignored by mozilla, because raspberry pi + FireFox is such a niche?
PV
I have a new RP4-4GB model that I set up just a couple weeks ago for home schooling my children during the pandemic. (So annoyed to have bought it just before the 8GB model was released.) In order to complete the survey, I had to temporarily remove my ~/.config/chromium folder. It would be nice to be able to access the survey more conveniently. Furthermore, rather than seeing a hash of my serial number in the form, the string “UNIDENTIFIED” is displayed instead. I have tried with both my own user and the pi user.
Clint
Can Bookshelf be used like a headless ebook server for your digital books? Similar to Calibre?
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
No – that’s not what it is designed to do. It’s just a browser and downloader.
Harry Hardjono
I want to see a user activated survey, instead of a one time automatic one. I may be in a hurry, setting up the Pi so would decide to defer it later, only to see it disappear entirely! Also, it may be a good idea to update the survey periodically as I buy new Pis and change my usage!
Graham
Are the pdf downloads ONLY available via the Raspian Bookshel app? When I go to the website I only see options to purchase, no pdf download option.
Cheers
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
Downloads are available from the magpi.raspberrypi.org site. (But Bookshelf is obviously easier… ;) )
Rick
Two things:
First is that I didn’t use the Raspberry Pi OS 32-Bit (Upgrade). I just did the “sudo apt update” and “sudo apt full-upgrade” method. Does this give me the “Raspberry Pi OS”?
Second thing, how do I get to the survey???
Thanks
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
1. Yes, it gives you Raspberry Pi OS
2. rm -rf ~/.config/chromium – that resets Chromium to defaults and will show the survey the next time it is launched. It will also delete all your bookmarks, plugins, history etc, so you might not want to bother!
Graham Sharples
Hi, I to installed the May OS via sudo route on raspberry pi. My problem is that bookshelf and magnify did not download with it?
I have tried sudo apt install rp-bookshelf but no luck, same with magnif. Any ideas please.
Thank you
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
Make sure you typed “sudo apt update” first…
Graham Sharples
Hi, sorry yes I did do sudo apt update first, when I have look in help, bookshelf in not there, top item is Debian reference. Same with magnifier, no universal access on menu in recommended software , also no coded classics in Games as promo YouTube video.
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
Are you by any chance running stretch or jessie rather than buster? Other than security patches, we don’t build new software for older releases of the operating system. If you are not being offered magnifier or Code the Classics, that suggests to me that you are not running buster.
Dir Konitzer
Hi all.
I am new to the Raspian. I use the Raspian with 4 GB. After the update I lost my sound. I checked the “.asoundrc” file and I can see, that there will be the change between the “0” and “1”, when I changed the sound from hdmi to analog (via speaker symbol). I normally use win10, so I am a little bit lost here.
Has someone an idea for me? Do you need some more information?
Thanks in advance
Dirk
W. H. Heydt
Is it possible to set the Bookshelf to *not* download and store anything? I can foresee quite a lot of problem posts on the Forums asking why someone is suddenly out of space on their SD card. Alternatively, we’ll have to start recommending much larger SD cards to beginners. (I still miss the days when a full Raspbian install fit on a 4GB card…)
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
Bookshelf will not download anything unless there is at least 100MB free on the card. As for it not downloading anything, wouldn’t that render it rather pointless? All it would do then would be to show you some pretty pictures of cover art – as far as I know, neither Chromium nor any other browser can show a PDF file on a remote server; they must be downloaded first.
James Carroll
I actually liked it being called Raspbian but it’s a small thing considering all the great things. The one thing that sets the Pi above all the SBC competition is the Foundation and the Community that support it. No matter what problem I have I can find a post somewhere to help with it. Thanks so much for making such a wonderful product and keeping it maintained so well.
Eric H
I have the same fondness for the name Raspbian, it acknowledges the relationship and debt to Debian. I also agree it is not a big issue. I do wonder, however, what problem the new name solves.
Eric H
I now see the links below.
David Gee
Is Mathematica available on these OS images? ISTR it wasn’t available when the Pi4 first launched.
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
It’s available on the 32-bit images; it’s not at present available on the 64-bit image.
David Gee
I take it you can install the 32-bit version on an 8Gb Pi4? (I realise that means I can’t access >4Gb of memory).
David Gee
Sorry—I’ve just looked at the blog for the 8Gb Pi and this is dealt with there—32 bit is still recommended for now, and you can use all of the memory, just not >3Gb in a single process.
John Mills
Hi team,
I applaud you on another substantial release, you all are creating a really unique experience specific for the Pi.
As LXDE is getting quite old now is there any plans to switch to LXQT? It will certainly allow the use of more modern desktop technologies. Also LXQT is very performant.
On another note I’m in two minds about switching to Raspberry Pi OS as the name of your shipping Linux Distro.
I might be an old curmudgeon here but this decision appears to me to ‘erase’ the legacy of the original Raspbian release and what that stood for.
Raspbian was originally a community endeavour aimed at getting the most out of the Pi when the foundation was shipping the ‘broken’ version of Fedora.
Raspbian was so much better than what was shipping at the time and was a very significant part of the success of the Raspberry Pi. Indeed if it wasn’t for Mike Thompson’s hard work I’m not sure you would be where you are today.
I in a small way supported that effort by advocating and contacting many universities to get the first Raspbian mirrors setup and I helped user test the distro and also happily donated to the first build farm. We did this because we realised that a great hardware device needs the software to really make the device shine.
I remember the evening in IRC after advocating that Raspbian be the official release that I was told that the foundation would be switching to it before the official announcement.
A whole lot of hard work was done and good will given towards meeting the goals for an OS that powers a device we believed successfully would change the world in a small way.
So I am somewhat saddened that this legacy is being sidelined in respect of the corporate name.
Anyway guys I wish you the very best for the future and will continue to use and advocate the Pi in the future.
Regards,
John
ME
Regards Raspbian, Raspberry Pi OS ARMHF 32but is still based of Raspbian.
https://www.raspberrypi.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=66&t=275380&sid=1a468f226394ccddf4654a3d3d90cb7d#p1668466
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
Please see Peter Green’s (one of the co-founders of Raspbian) comment on the renaming at https://www.raspberrypi.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=66&t=275380#p1668466 – it has been done with his approval, and is not an attempt to “sideline” anything or anyone.
Nick
To me, age is not a problem as long as we’re getting security and stability updates. Linux is how old, 29? Surely that’s not an issue. :)
Pixel is very nicely polished and it requires less RAM compared to LXQt, which is great because we still have older Pis in use, with 1GB RAM or less. Also, if we’re talking about age, LXDE is mature, while LXQt is still working its way up.
So strictly on the RAM consumption, I’d vote for whatever takes less RAM on the Raspberry Pis, as long as it gets security and stability updates and it offers a decent user experience, which we currently have. I do hope LXQt will require the same amount or even less RAM compared to LXDE, because then it will be well worth spending time and money to give it a nice polish for the Pi. The difference in RAM usage is not huge, but Pi Zero and 3 A+ have 512MB RAM, so every MB matters.
Raphaël
I think that it would be a bad idea for the Pixel desktop to switch to LXQT instead of LXDE. The additional eye candy is not worth the 20% increase in memory usage.
This may not matter much on a Raspberry Pi 4, but I am still using my good old Raspberry Pi 2B with 512 MB RAM. I also have several Pi Zero’s, although only one of them has a desktop and I do not use it that often.
For these boards with a limited amount of RAM, losing an extra 15 MB or 20 MB due to the switch to LXQT would be very bad for the usability of the desktop.
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
I’ve yet to see any convincing argument for moving to LXQT – as you say, it’s more resource-hungry, and the only reason to move seems to be “it’s newer”. I’ve spent five years honing and tweaking LXDE; all moving to LXQT would do is mean I had to do it all again!
We’ll be sticking with LXDE until something which offers a clear advantage over it comes along; that hasn’t happened yet…
richard
Are all the user space applications 64 bit too or is it just the kernel. Using 64 20.04 unbuntu on the RPi4 and runs so nice as it’s all 64bit. But GLES is missing on that. Will go back to RPi OS if that is now all 64 bit. IIRC there was a build early beta a little while ago that only the kernel was 64bit, but I maybe miss remembering it..
Many thanks.
Llewelyn Thomas
Is this for the Pi 4 only or will it run on Pi 3?
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
The 32-bit version will run on all models of Pi back to Pi 1, so yes, it will run on Pi 3.
Owen Stillman
Since the update both my PIs, the zero W and pi 4, looks to be randomly shutting off. No request to do so, nothing in the syslog. Any idea?
Owen Stillman
Ok, had an initial look. Looks to be down to some wifi connectivity issues where the wifi just drops out. No issues before this update and I did see some form of wpa supplicant update go through?
Rodd Clarkson
Not sure what you can do about this, but it would be great if Sonic Pi could be updated to support a sound server like pulse audio so it can run easily on other Linux distros too.
James Hughes
Sonic Pi is developed by a third party, you would need to talk to them.
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
There’s nothing we can do about that – Sonic Pi is a third-party product. Feel free to suggest it to the developers of Sonic Pi!
Anthony DiLello
I am always amazed at how much great educational material you guys produce and just give away for free. Keep up the good work!
Ilya
Will it be available a x64 lite version of OS?
I need it for headless server.
Nelson Schmidt
I updated my version from February to May. The previous version, I had sound, now in this update, there is no sound on Jack. I noticed that the .asoundrc file is generated by the system, and even if I change it to 0 or 1, I still have no sound on Jack. The sound only comes out on the hdmi. I have eardots, and when paired, there is no sound either. How to fix this BUG?
James Hughes
Please use the forums for technical support.
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
Use the desktop audio switcher (right-click the speaker on the taskbar) to select the output; the headphone jack is now ALSA device 1. If you are using Sonic Pi, this is currently hard-coded to only send output to ALSA device 0, which is the HDMI port – the Sonic Pi developers are looking into a fix for this.
Bender Rodriquez
You kill my favorite developer board. ?
James Hughes
You will have to be more specific…the forums are the place for techical help.
Lance Sedgwick
Anyone figured out the headless issues yet? I had to leave a monitor plugged in to get it to boot. I also am having issues with auto-mounted hard drives for a media server. RPI won’t boot at all unless I unplug these devices and plug them in after boot. I run headless because it is easier for me to be remote and that includes updates and reboots as needed. I can’t keep going to the device to plug and unplug everything just to get it to boot. Most of the time I am not even home.
Sonora Technical
going to miss the Rasbian name.
please don’t let this be a precursor to using another distribution besides Debian. I really appreciate the stability of Raspbian (er… Raspbian Pi OS) based on the Debian distro.
Sonora Technical
sorry, I should have begun that last post by saying congradulations on your accomplishments and thank you for your tireless efforts. i mean that sincerely.
James Hughes
Why would you think we are changing base disto? Never crossed our minds! Quite happy with Debian.
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
Fear not – we’ve got no intention of moving to a new underlying distro.
Victor
Congratulations on the new release. Installation was easy.
Can you please let me know how to run a Time Server on Buster.
I have tried by using several posts but none works correctly.
Thank you
Victor
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
Please direct requests like that to the forums, where hopefully someone who has solved that problem in the past will be able to help.
Herman
Will there be a search function in Bookshelf in the near future? Or an index in what issues one can find articles about a certain topic?
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
Unfortunately, that information isn’t available from the MagPi website. It would be great to be able to do what you suggest, but without a lot of changes to the website backend, it’s not possible.
TheDiveO
Moved to Ubuntu 20.04 Server 64bit for Raspberry Pi some months ago. The reasons are the lack of knowledge of Debian and Raspbian packagers to get their job done so that Docker and Kubernetes work. MACVLAN? Erm, needs some alpha kernel. Seriously, that’s years in production on x86 all word sizes. cgroup systemd setup botching Kubernetes? Welcome to Debian hell, now with Raspberry flavor. For some reasons Ubuntu manages to correctly configure their distribution, so the stuff that works on x86 also works on arm 64bit. Raspberry Foundation has good ideas, hardware slowly getting better (albeit now hitting the usual passive cooling and power bumps), but for software outside the original education target field … I left for good and never regretted going Ubuntu.
James Hughes
Ubuntu is fine for certain things, but if you want to take advantage of the RP hardware, then no good at all, loads of stuff doesn’t work. Our target is the make the Pi HW work, not things like Docker or Kubernetes as they are not things required by the majority of our target audience; they will come, probably fairly quickly now we have our own 64bit beta, but it’s a secondary target.
James Hughes
Quicker than I thought; from the Pi8GB blog post comments.
“I can confirm Docker and Kubernetes using k3s work nicely on the 8GB Pi4B with the 64 bit beta OS.”
James Hughes
Also, are you aware that Ubuntu is ALSO based on Debian – so if you know that you also know Raspbian?
TheDiveO
Yes I know. And I also know that k3s isn’t k8s. And that Ubuntu does some work of their own on top of Debian. Did you actually know that? And that Debian, but not Ubuntu breaks k8s in unforeseen ways. Did you know that? And that Rancher doesn’t do integration tests on Debian? And that several CNI plugin project also don’t test on Debian? Did you know. I happen to know as my colleagues and I actually tried to get Kubernetes and CNI plugins working on Debian, or MACVLAN working on Raspbian Docker CNM. Did you know? Erm, obviously not.
James Hughes
No, I didn’t know any of that. I’m not in the slightest bit interested in Docker, Kubernetes etc. I’m just passing on stuff I have seen that you may not have. I’d suggest not using Raspberry Pi OS until that support is present, if it’s ever added. Not really necessary for our core aims, but you never know. Add a issue to our LInux github tracker if you are really desperate for features that are not currently present. Blog comments are not generally scanned, github issues are.
Marco
Donde puedo comprar en Monterrey, N.L. Mexico
Rasperri 4 de 8GB
Adam
WOW, I would like the 8gb pi4, its more ram than my crappy 4gb acer aspire x3200
Marco Besozzi
Can’t hear any sound after upgrade to Raspberry Pi OS on my two Raspberry.
1) raspberry with on board audio card
1a) I have in config.txt
# Enable audio (loads snd_bcm2835)
dtparam=audio=on
1b) I have in .asoundrc
pcm.!default {
type asym
playback.pcm {
type plug
slave.pcm “output”
}
capture.pcm {
type plug
slave.pcm “input”
}
}
pcm.output {
type hw
card 1
}
ctl.!default {
type hw
card 1
}
2) raspberry with HiFiBerry Digi+ Pro card
2a) I have in config.txt
# Enable audio (loads snd_bcm2835)
#dtparam=audio=on
dtoverlay=hifiberry-dacplus
2b) don’t find the file .asoundrc
Thanks for help!
Marco Besozzi
Post “Can’t hear any sound after upgrade to Raspberry Pi OS on my two Raspberry.”
1) solution: in the file .asoundrc deleted all text and written (now it works)
defaults.pcm.card 1
defaults.ctl.card 1
2) my fault, SD was an old backup and the correct line in config.txt was (now it works)
dtoverlay=hifiberry-digi
Benjamin
How do I upgrade to the 64 bit version? I don’t want to do a fresh install.
MW
It was stated in the forum somewhere there is no upgrade path from Raspberry Pi OS ARMHF to Raspberry Pi OS ARM64
So if you need BETA ARM64 Userland and Kernel you will need to grab a SD Card and fresh 8nstall..
voxnulla
64Bit OS is certainly welcome. Won’t be adopting early, but when there is a lite version, I’ll certainly upgrade both my desktop and my personal network minion.
If the various benchmarks between 32 and 64 bits are an indication, this would be a nice upgrade.
Nelson Schmidt
I use the desktop audio switch (right-click on the speaker in the taskbar) to select the output; the headset is now the ALSA 1 device. I use Sonic Pi, which causes the bug to output audio only on the hdmi output. There is no sound at all in the headset or in Bluetooth eardots. How do I stop using Sonic Pi? I don’t use audio on hdmi, only on the headset and Bluetooth?
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
If you really need Sonic Pi output on the audio jack, I suggest you download an older OS image from http://downloads.raspberrypi.org/raspbian/images/ and use that until Sonic Pi is updated.
Juan Pablo Calles
Hello
I need Audacity output on the audio jack, it doesn’t work since last OS updated. I have to go back to an old OS version, but I don’t know how to download from http://downloads.raspberrypi.org/raspbian/images/ .
For example, I choose raspbian-2019-04-09 : there are 6 files, what file do I have to choose for downloading? all? the biggest? then, just to unzip or Imager is needed? Thank you very much
Juan Pablo Calles
Gracias, gracias, gracias! Just updated: It works!
Joe McCabe
Youtube crashing with new OS on Rpi 4 4gb. Hope this helps.
shawn
Good news! But i wonder when can we have a full guide on the 64bit Raspi OS,such as the differences between the old one,the improvements,and those apps that still have to be delayed to be ported. 64bit OS is very very attractive to us developers on servers. thanks!
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
The differences between the old one and this are that this one is 64-bit.
The improvements are that this one is 64-bit.
The apps which are not yet ported are the ones which you can’t see in the 64-bit image…
Seriously, there really isn’t much to say – this is, as closely as possible, a 64-bit version of the 32-bit OS. Some apps are not included because they do not currently work on 64-bit. There is a newer kernel version on this release, which will be included in the 32-bit version in future. But that really is pretty much it!
Simon
I’ve just updated my original 3B+ (it was still on Stretch, so it was well over due an update!), by erasing the card in the Raspberry Pi Imager on my Windows 10 PC, and using Imager to download and write the default “Raspberry Pi OS (32-bit)” option.
However when I’ve started up my Pi, and type “cat /etc/os-release” I get the following output, which still has mentions of Raspbian:
—
PRETTY_NAME=”Raspbian GNU/Linux 10 (buster)”
NAME=”Raspbian GNU/Linux”
VERSION_ID=”10″
VERSION=”10 (buster)”
VERSION_CODENAME=buster
ID=raspbian
ID_LIKE=debian
HOME_URL=”http://www.raspbian.org/”
SUPPORT_URL=”http://www.raspbian.org/RaspbianForums”
BUG_REPORT_URL=”http://www.raspbian.org/RaspbianBugs”
—
Is it updated to “Raspberry Pi OS”, or am I still on the old Raspbian Buster? I do have the Bookshelf app in the Help menu when using the Pi via VNC, and also had the survey on the first launch of Chromium, but the references to Raspbian in ‘/etc/os-release’ seems odd to me.
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
If you have done the update, then you have Raspberry Pi OS; you’re just seeing the naming of some of the underlying parts of Raspbian which it uses.
Roland
Great work – I especially like the new Bookshelf but there are some books missing, e.g. Get Started with Raspberry Pi, Raspberry Pi Beginner’s Guide, Raspberry Pi Quickstart
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
The books we are not showing are ones which were either only supplied with hardware, or which have been superseded by newer versions. The Beginner’s Guide should definitely be in there, but we are only showing the most recent third edition.
r40334
Missing HackSpace issue 29 and a couple of book titles on the Bookshelf application
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
Thanks for the heads-up on Issue 29 – there’s a glitch in the data file which we will fix.
We’re not showing every single book title – some of them were superseded by newer titles, or were only ever supplied with hardware.
noyal
Is there a sdcard writer or imageflasher that works on raspberry pi os.plzzz make one if there is none so we can write sdcard with new images.plzzzz guide me if there is one plzzzzzz
Nelson Schmidt
After erasing all my card with a new installation of the image downloaded from the website, my raspberry pi 3, the sound worked, even my Bluetooth airdots headset works. Vlc and qmmp work perfectly.
Mike Redrobe
Any reason MagPi issues only go back to issue 31 in bookshelf ?
All issues from 1 are on the website itself.
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
We’re only putting the titles which were published by Raspberry Pi Press into Bookshelf; those earlier issues predate it.
Mikael Bonnier
I also have no sound from the 3.5 mm connector after full-upgrade. E.g. Scratch makes no sound. I’ve changed using right click on speaker to Analog, but it still gives no sound. Not even after reboot. The speakers work because they make sound when I connect the cable. I deleted .asoundrc and selected Analog again, and it recreates this.
pcm.!default {
type asym
playback.pcm {
type plug
slave.pcm “output”
}
capture.pcm {
type plug
slave.pcm “input”
}
}
pcm.output {
type hw
card 2
}
ctl.!default {
type hw
card 2
}
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
I’ve just tried all three versions of Scratch, and all of them correctly output audio to the headphone jack for me. Which version of Scratch are you using?
I notice that the headphone jack seems to be card 2 for you – are you using two separate HDMI monitors on a Pi 4?
If so, can you select audio to both your monitors correctly? It’s possible that something strange is happening in a 2-monitor situation.
Can you get audio from eg a YouTube video on Chromium out of the headphone socket correctly?
Mikael Bonnier
Yes, I’m using both HDMI of Pi 4 B 4GB and they are connected to monitors via DVI-D. Since DVI-D doesn’t carry sound I have to use the headphone jack. Yes I get card 2 when I choose Audio. I tried to set in .asoundrc this:
defaults.pcm.card 2
defaults.ctl.card 2
It didn’t work. I also tried with 0 and 1, but no sound. There is no sound at all in the headphone jack. I also tested YouTube in Chromium. Scratch version is the latest because I did full-upgrade: Scratch 1.4 (NuScratch) of 2016-12-12. I usually use Scratch to test that sound works on the Sound tab.
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
OK, thanks – we’ll check to make sure we haven’t got something wrong with the twin monitor configuration. It might be a few days because we’re all still working from home, and I’ve only got one monitor here…
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
OK, I just went into the office (where I have a twin monitor setup) and tried this – audio switching was working correctly for me; I was able to get audio from both Chromium and Scratch via either HDMI output or via the headphone jack. So it looks as if this is an issue with your system – perhaps a hardware problem with your jack or cable?
One thing to check – are you using the 32-bit or the 64-bit image? I was testing with the 32-bit image, but it’s possible there is something odd on the newer kernel on the 64-bit image whiich is affecting audio.
Mikael Bonnier
Sound works in current LibreElec (RPi4) using the same setup, so it’s not the cable or connector that is broken.
I use Raspberry Pi OS 32-bit, but upgraded using full-upgrade almost every day. It is enabled to be able to run 64-bit apps so that I can run BOINC with tasks from Rosetta (COVID-19 research). I also tried it using one monitor, and no sound then too in Raspberry Pi OS, but sound works in LibreElec.
Mario Abajo
I had the same issue and i manage to solve it removing the “pulseaudio” package and rebooting. After reboot i had to select again the analog output and the sound was back again
Mikael Bonnier
Thanks, this worked here too i.e. sudo apt purge pulseaudio
then reboot and select Analog, but it was already selected in my case.
Thomas
My solution:
sudo nano /etc/mpd.conf
change: device “hw:0,0”
to: device “hw:Headphones”
Mikael Bonnier
I do not have the file /etc/mpd.conf, but the method above with
sudo apt purge pulseaudio
worked.
Alan
On the 64bit version, and that is the only one Ive tried, there is no VNC server.
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
VNS server is not currently compatible with 64-bit – this is being worked on and we hope to have a fix at some point.
Peter Merchant
1. If I do a ‘sudo apt full-upgrade’ on my R-Pi B ver 2 with it’s apps, does this command destroy everything on the Pi? How long does it take? I am doing it over a powerline adapter from my router so it is not superquick. The last upgrade took well over 12 hours. I thought updating from Stretch to Buster would be easier than reflashing with Buster and reloading Flask and my apps and the AP software.
2. Will this new OS fit on my R-Pi B ver 2? I guess that I’ll know this answer in a few minutes.
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
“If I do a ‘sudo apt full-upgrade’ on my R-Pi B ver 2 with it’s apps, does this command destroy everything on the Pi?”
No, it just upgrades any package for which there is a new version; it shouldn’t destroy any data.
“How long does it take?”
How long is a piece of string? It’s impossible to say – it depends on how long it is since you last upgraded, and how fast your network connection is. Anything from a couple of minutes to several hours.
“Will this new OS fit on my R-Pi B ver 2?”
It will work on all versions of the Pi.
Peter Blackwell
Hi Simon .. great work … I’ve ordered a 8gb pi .. BUT .. it will be running libreelec .. so .. I wont be able to fill out the form .. Many of the pi’s I own are media servers … … Are folks who run other os taken in to consideration? .. regards Pete
I LOVE PI!
Ken
While I imagine I’m one of the minority that use multich audio output, after the update I seem to have lost multich audio from HDMI. It seems the Pi only thinks it can output 2ch now. “speaker-test -c6 -Dhw:0,0” gives me the following (“-c2” works fine):
speaker-test 1.1.8
Playback device is default
Stream parameters are 48000Hz, S16_LE, 6 channels
Using 16 octaves of pink noise
Channels count (6) not available for playbacks: Invalid argument
Setting of hwparams failed: Invalid argument
Could this be a misconfiguration on my end or due to the changes in the audio from this update?
James Hughes
There are changes to the audio to make it more Linux standardised – please see the forums for more information, and reread the blog post.
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
There have been a few changes in the low-level audio in this release; this may have been an unintended consequence of those. I’ll flag it with the relevant people.
ADALU MARK
Please Update for XMR mining
Simon
Short question regarding the change of ALSA:
Is this changed only for Pi4 or on all Pi models?
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
All Raspberry Pi models; it’s a software change, not a hardware one.
Alex
re: Bug? After this update the audio card numbering seems to change randomly after a reboot. I use a C-Media USB audio card on my RetroPie setup (RPI4; 4.19.118-v7l+) and it used to be Card #1 before this update, not it keeps swapping between Card #1 and Card #2. It swaps place with the headphones jack. Fortunately it doesn’t happen on every single reboot, but when it does I have to change the default and reboot for RetroPie to play sounds.
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
I’ve not seen that behaviour, but it shouldn’t happen – I’ll report it to the relevant people.
Are you using a RetroPie image, or a Raspberry Pi OS image with Retropie on it?
Alex
@Simon – I believe I installed an image when it wasn’t officially supported. I’ve been updating it using the RetroPie Setup menu options only. I fixed the issue by disabling the onboard audio in config.txt so that the only option is the USB Audio card, however before doing so, it randomly (not at each boot) swapped Card 1 and 2. Card 0 seemed to always remain the same.
Mike
Maybe I missed something, but the article states you can get the new 64-bit image [here] and gives a link. However, only the 32-bit images are there. I just picked up an RPi 4/8GB and would like to try the 64-bit image but I can’t find it.
MW
ARM64 is BETA release:
https://www.raspberrypi.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=117&t=275370
Mike
Thank you MW. It would have been better had Simon posted that link. There is nothing in the article pointing to where to find it other than the Downloads page which, as you know, it is not there. There isn’t even a link on the Downloads page to beta releases. That also would have been helpful.
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
The blog post on which you are commenting is about the changes to the 32-bit image, not about the 64-bit image, which was discussed in the previous day’s blog post.
As we have said, the 64-bit image is a beta and is not recommended for most users at this stage; it is only there for the small number of people who really need to access 8GB of RAM at once. Hence it is not linked from the main downloads page and is deliberately more awkward to get to.
Paul
When I try to use the bookshelf the publication downloads but does not open in chromium. Clicking on the pdf file duplicates the download tile showing in the browser downloads bar but does not open the file. PDF viewer will open the file but that’s a pain in the neck. My copy of raspberry pi os was just installed via noobs. I have installed cups and fswebcam since.
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
No idea what is happening there, but it sounds as if either the download is failing, or the file is not being written to your disk once it has downloaded – might be a permissions problem?
Paul
This is the 2nd installation of RPI OS The first time was with a full-upgrade a per instructed in this blog post. This time was noobs from the os menu this should have cleared the sd card.
Paul C Smith
Fixed it. Chromium was set to download PDF’s instead of opening them.
Nick
Can you please handle this in the post-install scripts? If it’s some vital setting, it should be done through the script as long as Xorg is not started/available. And if it’s not vital, the least you can do is to stop attempting to work with the GUI if it isn’t accessible, and only report what should be changed later.
Ideally, if a new setting is important for proper functionality, set that as default and inform the users they can adjust that (and where/how). The users shouldn’t see error messages that could easily be handled by the post-install scripts.
Setting up raspberrypi-ui-mods (1.20200602) …
The desktop has been updated.
To apply the updates, please reboot your Pi, and then select one of the options on the Defaults page in Appearance Settings.
Unable to init server: Could not connect: Connection refused
(zenity:13644): Gtk-WARNING **: 06:28:29.365: cannot open display:
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
The short answer is no, we can’t, because it upsets people!
We used to override the user config files when we made a GUI change so that everyone got the change. This caused dozens of complaints that we were discarding users’ settings and customizations, even though we backed them up, told people about the backup etc. So we now do not change the user’s configuration at all; we just tell them that a new configuration is available and it is up to the user if and when they take it.
“Ideally, if a new setting is important for proper functionality, set that as default and inform the users they can adjust that (and where/how)”
Which is exactly what we are doing.
“The users shouldn’t see error messages that could easily be handled by the post-install scripts.”
You are only seeing an unimportant error message caused by Zenity not working over SSH; the actual message – that the user needs to reload defaults – is also presented on SSH, as you can see it in the log you posted.
There is no ideal solution to this problem, but the one we have currently adopted seems to upset the smallest number of people, so we will be sticking with it.
Nick
Thanks for your reply, that makes sense. :)
My point about Zenity is that it should only be run if it’s not in a TTY, which would prevent the error message to be displayed. This can be checked during the script, no problem.
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
We already do check for whether X is present before displaying the Zenity message – unfortunately that check fails over a remote connection, because X is present; it’s just that Zenity can’t access it. There may be a fix for this, but given all it results in is a spurious error message in a relatively small number of circumstances, it’s not a high priority.
Juan Pablo Calles
Hello
I have a R PI 2 1Gb. Since I’ve updated the OS yesterday, I have no sound on head-phone jack until setted thru raspi-config OR right-click on Volumen-icon (I did both). But I have no sound on Audacity yet. Changing in .asoundrc file doesn’t work anymore just because everytime R PI starts, this file is rebuilt or restored. As Sonic-Pi, is this issue up to Audacity team? Thank you. I really appreciate what you, people, do at Raspberry Pi Foundation, Thank you very much.
Eric
Same problem for me with a Pi4B on Raspotify or MPC.
Juan Pablo Calles
It works now, just do apt upgrade
Eric
Problème résolu en adaptant également /usr/share/alsa/alsa.conf
adam wolter
what name should be reported by –
cat /etc/os-release
after full-upgrade
??????
Francisco Palleiro
Hi, im on a Pi 4 with 4gb ram and just upgraded to raspberry pi os, i did the “select a default setting” thingy and added the magnifier, but not only the magnifier does not appear on the task bar though listed ammong the pannels, but it also automaticaly logs me out of my user session when i click the “Properties” of the magnifier, any ideas on how to solve this?
Thaks
Mike
Im using Raspian Lite on a Pi3B as headless webradio under MPD/MPC. With the latest update volume control in MPC is not possible! The command “MPC volume xx” (xx number 0..100) returns “volume n/a” . If I enter “alsa -l” there is only Card0: headphone Device0: BCM2835. HDMI is not available.
The a.soundrc file trick does not help.
I tried several settings in mpc.conf but did not get sound/volume control to work.
Please help.
Thomas
My solution for this issue:
sudo nano /etc/mpd.conf
change: mixer_type “software”
to: mixer_type “hardware”
Thomas
… sorry, wrong direction: change from “hardware” to “software”
Diego Camilo Peña Ramirez
Hello:
Where can i request packages for the distro? Some packages was removed from raspbian
Nick Valery
Latest Raspberry Pi 4 OS seems to break USB booting. Do I need to update *.elf and *.dat files?
TIA, NickV
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
USB booting is not part of the official OS release yet; it’s still in beta, so you’ll need to redownload the original files you used to enable it.
Charles Moore
My “hash of my Raspberry Pi serial number” from the Chromium User Research page is showing UNIDENTIFIED. Now I am worried that my Raspi4b is either malfunctioning or fake. Could someone please explain why I should get a bad serial number? Thanks.
Just Manuel
I did the update / full-upgrade on a rpi 3b with buster and: 1) my customized menu icon vanished
2) Text Editor lost it’s ability to be minimized or changed size, covers entire screen.
3)My Google Assistant implementation now gives me an error which solves itself by simply installing pulseaudio, but chromium or OS sound is then lost forever.
4) My chromium now gives me a “oops something snapped” each time i try to open a video…
jimbob
Was it not possible to tell if something is plugged in to the headphone jack?
The relative absence in Windows of little features like “update the operating system and the audio stops working” is why Microsoft still sits on the world’s desktops.
Ben
With this new OS I’m now able to use Bluetooth and wifi concurrently on my pi zero!
Cederick Schäfer
I was wondering if we ever be able to get the free pdf versions of the magazines direcly via google play books since I love to read things on my tablet and it is a hassle to always upload it myself via PC and it would be a nice to have option as well!
Done :)
Hi. I’m new to Raspberry Pi. I’ve used it for a couple of years. I have a pi 4 B 4 Gb and have just purchased a 8 Gb. I came from windows and lowed the win xp and win 10, but i have found out that Pi 4 is a much better option. It has been OK to learn the ‘language’ so far (remember i’m a novice :) ). It has met my requirements very good and i like the updates that have been made. I just wonder if i can make the bluetooth work with my bluetooth speaker. It works fine with Chrome, but not with Firefox. Keep up the good work :)
Raspberry Pi Staff Ashley Whittaker
Hi ? our forums are a good place to start with technical questions. Here are all the existing threads about Bluetooth: https://www.raspberrypi.org/forums/search.php?keywords=bluetooth+speaker&sid=eba45ecda497f27f050f7f9dda87ccce
Ask a new question if you can’t find the answer there already!
Marco
Hi! How can I update mi raspberry pi os from 32 bits os to 64 bits?
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
You can’t update the 32-bit OS to the 64-bit version – you need to download the 64-bit version and flash it to an SD card. The address for the 64-bit version is on the launch blog post for the 8GB Pi.
潇飏郭
Can I install a 64 bit OS on a pi 3B+？
Nathan
I’m confused.
sudo apt update; sudo apt full-upgrade
0 upgraded, 0 newly installed, 0 to remove and 0 not upgraded.
cat /etc/os-release
PRETTY_NAME=”Raspbian GNU/Linux 10 (buster)”
NAME=”Raspbian GNU/Linux”
VERSION_ID=”10″
VERSION=”10 (buster)”
VERSION_CODENAME=buster
ID=raspbian
ID_LIKE=debian
HOME_URL=”http://www.raspbian.org/”
SUPPORT_URL=”http://www.raspbian.org/RaspbianForums”
BUG_REPORT_URL=”http://www.raspbian.org/RaspbianBugs”
The full-upgrade instruction doesn’t seem to do anything. Is there a way to actually upgrade the distribution (i.e. similar to “do-release-upgrade” for Ubuntu”)?
Raspberry Pi Staff Simon Long — post author
You’re seeing the underlying OS information, which is the Raspbian port of Debian. Raspberry Pi OS is the name for the changes made by us at Raspberry Pi to bare-bones Raspbian – the desktop, the applications etc. If you have followed the upgrade instructions, you have Raspberry Pi OS – check the splash screen at startup to be certain.
Erik
I just wanted to let you know that I don’t think the new name is very Google search friendly. Trying to google for a problem/solution and then using Raspberry Pi OS as a part of your search argument, will definitely also deliver lots of pages about buster or other distro’s. Buster works on a “Raspberry” “Pi” and is als an “OS”, so all three search items will also hit lots of pages about older distro’s.
Peter Hansen
Erik, in theory simply surrounding your search terms with quotation marks would resolve that, as it then requires exactly that phrase. Googling “Raspberry Pi OS” should be almost as effective as googling “Raspbian”.
Marcin
Great update, but I wonder… Will the auto-update feature ever be available? For as long as I’m using Raspberry, unattended-upgrades have been bugged, and when using RPi as server where security updates should be done automatically it’s still a shame we have to use workarounds for it.
Juan Pablo Calles
Hi. Again, Audacity doesn’t work since I’ve updated OS. It seems it can’t see others sound servers or playing/audio devices than ALSA / dmix. For example, VLC works with bcm2835 as audio device, but Audacity can’t see it, any help?
Thank you
john
With raspbian 64 bits I cannot play netflix.
With 32 bits it was no problem after streaming advice on Youtube.
sam
need help please. i do not know how to install TOR on Raspberry PI 4 , i looked online in the forum and cant cant find any post. I have canakit raspberry pi 4 max kit. bought at best buy for $114.00. Please direct me in the right direction on how to install TOR on the 64gb sd micro please. thank you. Im also trying to learn Linux, and Python.
john
have a look at…berryroot images…
varun
i ran these 2 commands sudo apt install and sudo apt full-upgrade. both got completed and i rebooted the pi. after rebbot i ran uname -m to check whether it got upgraded to 64 bit but i got armv7l (32bit). what should i do now? pls help me through this.
Eric
Any schedule about 64 bit version?
John
Hi everyone,
I’m visually impaired and to work with computer I have to use magnifier in full screen and also the ability to increase/decrease the zoom factor easily via shortcut (just like the windows 10 magnifier).
Do these 2 things are possible with this version of raspeberry pi os ?
Thanks
Joe G Rodriguez
Raspberry Pi 4 Headless Windows 10 Remote Desktop. RPi4 no Sound, choppy video. All Updates, Upgrades preformed. I did notice that the speaker icon on RPi4 desktop screen has checkmark on Anolog. Everything else works great except that Configuration Tool Screen does not show “3. Boot Options”. Please help.