Minty Cat

Care and Feeding of Minty Cat Catalog Computers

So we did the thing and now you have one or more “new” catalog computers, so unlike the old PK catalogs, we can update and adjust the settings without having to reinstall every time. Let's cover the basics of what you need to know about keeping Linux mint (LM) up to date, keeping OpenKiosk updated and the settings you may want to adjust, and lastly where to adjust the screensaver if you wish.

What is Minty Cat?

So, let’s take a step back and define a couple of things. Linux Mint (LM) is an operating system that can do most of the things that Windows can do, but doesn’t have as strict hardware requirements as Windows does, letting us reuse older hardware for online catalogs.

Open Kiosk is a web browser based on Mozilla Firefox that has extra features to lock out users from accessing the desktop or going to other websites, like Amazon or Facebook. It also doesn’t retain data, like login information or browsing history.

So let’s get started with Open Kiosk since we can’t do anything else until we log in as admin.

OpenKiosk Login and Settings

Press SHIFT+F1 to bring up the admin login

The password should be the admin password and it should open to the settings page.

Note the Quit Button on the upper right

By default it will go to the OpenKiosk settings page, keep full screen enabled to lock patrons out of the rest of the system, and if you need to you can scroll down to change the Password.

Under General you can confirm that OpenKiosk is up to date, by scrolling to the section OpenKiosk Updates.

Selecting Home from the left will let you update the homepage

Please do not change anything under Privacy & Security, as some options are duplicates of settings found under OpenKiosk, and may break the functionality of the Open Kiosk browser.

Sync is a holdover from Firefox, again nothing useful to set

More from MDG - other products from the folks who brought you OpenKiosk

Updating Linux Mint

Much like Windows, LM is constantly being updated. In the screenshot below I’ve used several arrows to point out some basic items, we’ll start with the big yellow one, it's the panel and works just like the taskbar in Windows. Next the blue one, is the Menu and is similar to the Start menu, the tall white arrow shows your network status, in this case using an Icon that looks like an ethernet port to show a wired connection, finally the red arrow is update indicator, and the dot shows we have updates to install, it will change color depending on how important and how long its been since the last set of updates. To check for updates close OpenKiosk, at the desktop click on the shield by the date and time

The Update manager will pop open and look like this:

Go ahead and click select all then Install updates, A dialog box may pop up like this one

Click OK, type in the password for selcoamin (if asked) and then wait for it to finish

Screensaver Options

If you want to change the screensaver, either the floating text or use something else, here’s what you need.

From the applications Menu, click settings, then Xscreensaver

It will open to the settings window as shown if you want to try a different screen saver the options are on the left, Phosphor, Flip Text, Spilt-Flap, and Xmatrix are good choices if your current screen savor seems glitchy or jumpy

If you want to change the text click on the advanced tab, and change the text in the box - you could also use a text file for a longer message, like you library hours. Also on this tab, you turn off the fade in/out feature, which some video chipsets seem to have trouble with.

More Information

https://openkiosk.mozdevgroup.com/

https://www.linuxmint.com/documentation.php

As always feel free to contact the Help Desk at helpdesk@selco.info if you have any questions.

Minty Cat - Set up Checklist

Boot From Mint USB (Linux Mint Xfce V. 22)
Hit enter to select the default boot option
Double click on Install LM
install Mint - install answers :
- Language - English
- Keyboard - English US
- Check install multimedia codecs
- select Erase Disk and install Linux Mint
- click install now
- click continue
- select Chicago (close enough)
- For the Who are you Dialogue
  - name - selcoadmin
  - computer name - Minty-Cat-[location]-0X replacing X with a number (ex. Minty-Cat-S#L-01)
  - do not encrypt the home folder, it will break auto login for patron

Click Continue
wait for it
Click Restart Now
Follow prompts to remove USB stick and hit enter

After Reboot
- login
- check for and install updates
- when asked about a local mirror - say no
- Click OK when asked about additional changes
- reboot if needed
- login

Mint settings under SELCOadmin

check for available hardware drivers
- Launch Menu ‣ System ‣ Driver Manager
  - Tick the appropriate checkboxes to select the available drivers and click Apply Changes.
System > users and groups
- add patron
  - Name: patron
  - PW: the usual patron Password
  - Check
- confirm that SELCOadmin is an Admin and patron is Desktop user that’s not required to enter a PW

System > Login Window
- under the users tab - fill out auto login for patron with a delay of 0

Open Firefox and search for open kiosk - on the open kiosk webpage there will be 2 commands under Debian install - copy each into the terminal and hit enter
curl -O https://www.mozdevgroup.com/dropbox/okcd/115/release/OpenKiosk115.12.0-2024-06-25-x86_64.deb
sudo apt install -y ./OpenKiosk115.12.0-2024-06-25-x86_64.deb

Reboot - confirm that patron auto logs in

From patron User account

uncheck the show this dialog at startup on the welcome window then close
settings > session and startup
- under the Application Autostart tab:
  - click add
    - Name : OpenKiosk
    - Command: /bin/OpenKiosk (use browse to get there)
    - Trigger: on login

Set up screen saver

From start select the software manager
- search for screen saver
- select Xscreensaver from the list
  - click install
  - enter admin PW
  - click the back arrow
- select Xscreensaver-gl-extra, and install
- select Xscreensaver-data-extra and install
- close the software manager
Start>system settings> Xscreensaver
- mode: only one Screen Saver
- select “Font Glide”
- click settings
  - select Horizontally scrolling text
  - Font border 0
- under the advanced tab
  - select Text in the text manipulation box, Change the text to “Library Catalog”
click close to save the changes

Set up OpenKiosk

From Start menu - under internet select open kiosk
- shift + F1 to open settings (admin is the default PW)
- Under general - Automatically install updates
- Under Home set home to library catalog
Under OpenKiosk:
- enable full screen
- change PW to standard administrative PW
- uncheck Enable Context Search

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