[SOFT] NPR Lunchbox on the Raspberry Pi

tl;dr: A set of instructions to install NPR's Lunchbox on your Raspberry Pi and prettify your podcast.

11102019: We don't use the Lunchbox suite anymore, but we tested the tutorial to see if it works for the new Raspberry Pi Model 4. It does! Just follow the instructions below.

Raspberry Pi setup

First off, let's prep your Raspberry Pi. The Johnson County Library MakerSpace has a comprehensive guide on how to do that: follow the instructions, then come back here.

• Install the nginx and mysql servers - sudo apt-get install nginx mysql-server
• Install programming and development tools - sudo apt-get install python python-pip python-dev build-essential git virtualenv virtualenvwrapper
• Install the NodeJS repository - curl -sL https://deb.nodesource.com/setup_8.x | sudo -E bash -

• Install NodeJS and npm - sudo apt-get install nodejs npm

Downloading Lunchbox

• Download the Lunchbox source code from NPR's github repository - git clone https://github.com/nprapps/lunchbox.git
• Reboot your Raspberry Pi.

Configuring a virtual environment

• Create a virtual environment to work in - mkvirtualenv lunchbox
• Move to the Lunchbox folder - cd lunchbox
• Install the software using the script in the Lunchbox folder (it will take a while, be patient) - pip install -r requirements.txt
• Install the software dependencies Lunchbox needs (once again, be patient) - npm install

Testing your Lunchbox instance

All done? Time to build and test your Lunchbox instance. While in your lunchbox virtual environment, type fab app to generate a temporary version of Lunchbox for review.

From your Rasperry Pi, you can use an Web browser to connect to the local server at 127.0.0.1:8000 to check Lunchbox. If everything looks like it's working, you can move on to personalizing Lunchbox for your org.

Personalizing Lunchbox

It's important to personalize Lunchbox before building it and hosting it on your server: settings are spread over several configuration files in the final installation, so doing it now will save you a lot of time. The configuration instructions for logos, URLS and contact information on NPR's repository will walk you through everything you need to do!

After customizing Lunchbox, fill in the server information for the destination server in app_config.py. We used the following settings:

• The FILE_SERVER_USER is the same as our pi user - FILE_SERVER_USER = 'pi'
• Since we're deploying directly to our Raspberry Pi, we use our local address - FILE_SERVER = '127.0.0.1'
• We set up the script to render to a local folder in our user's home directory - FILE_SERVER_PATH = '~/lunchbox-pi'

Rendering Lunchbox locally

If everything looks fine, you're ready for the final render and deployment.

• Save your app_config.py file then turn off your virtual environment - deactivate
• Go back to your pi user home directory - cd /home/pi
• Create the target folder for the rendered Lunchbox files. - mkdir lunchbox-pi
• Restart your virtual environment - workon lunchbox
• Go back to your work directory - cd lunchbox
• Finally, start the file rendering/deployment script - fab fileserver master deploy
• When prompted, accept connection to host 127.0.0.1 and type in the password for your Pi user account
• When rendering is over, deactivate your virtual environment - deactivate
• Go to the target folder where the files have been rendered (lunchbox-test in your pi home folder if you haven't changed the PROJECT_SLUG name in app_config.py - cd /home/pi/lunchbox-pi/lunchbox-test/
• Finally, copy all the files to your nginx web server's hosting folder to use your customized Lunchbox - sudo cp -a /home/pi/lunchbox-pi/lunchbox-test/. /var/www/html/

You can visit your rendered Lunchbox installation from a browser on your Raspberry Pi at http://127.0.0.1/index.html.

Extra Resources

• NPR Lunchbox repository.
• Lunchbox on the NPR blog.
• Linux commands in Raspbian.

Send us your Raspberry Pi questions here!