Beta testing Gramps 6.0 on Raspberry Pi5 Bookworm

Development Beta Testing
1

Hi

Just to say that I have tried to install Gramps 6 on my Pi5 Bookworm which is supposedly compatible with orjson. I have done an install from the .zip but I cannot sort the dependency issue or orjson. Anybody know of a non programmers guide to installing orjson?

any tips gratefully
received.

The install seems to have gone OK just gramps won’t run because of the missing dependency

phil

2

Try:

python -m pip install orjson
3

Hi Nick

That does not work get externally-managed-environment error

recommends using python3 - m venv (file path) in other words a virtual
environment will get back to you once I have had a read up on that.
phil

4

If it helps, the Windows AIO build script does just that (the relevant part is not Windows specific)

See

You can use these 3 commands to create the python venv:

pythonvenv=$TMP/grampspythonenv
python -m venv $pythonvenv --system-site-packages
source $pythonvenv/bin/activate

adjust pythonenv depending on where you would like the python venv to be stored

now run the pip command: python -m pip install orjson

If you want to go back to the system python, run the command deactivate

1 Like
5

Some progress
This is an issue for Pi5 running Bookworm all python programs must be in
the venv virtual environment to “reduce conflicts” (Official Pi speak)
To prove this I set one up and installed orjson with no issues.
Looking further must now decide either to set up an environment purely
for Gramps or whether it will be easier to go system wide for the user
and as I largely only use the Pi for Gramps the system setup might be best.
Will keep you updated
phil

2 Likes
6

Progress

Pi5 Bookworm
using venv created a user environment into which I placed the extracted
ver 6 .tar
had to install gettext (using apt-get) as would not build without this
also installed orjson (using pip) as a precaution
Then sudo python3 setup.py build
and finally sudo python3 setup.py install
Seems to have got me a running copy with no missing dependencies reported.

Thanks for help
phil

1 Like
7

Thanks for sharing that. I will try it. Did you do anything with the GRAMPSHOME environment variable?

8

Possibly in the change to get safe mode working for Windows. See bug report #13300 and pull request #1881.

9

Simple answer NO I have it working not worried about the how at this stage
phil

1 Like
10

Thanks again. I did all that, and then (still within the venv):

$ python3 Gramps.py

and got:

ModuleNotFoundError: No module named ‘gi’

Meanwhile, I think the act of building affected my normal Gramps, because now running “gramps” outside of the venv I get:

ResourcePath.ERROR: Unable to determine resource path

I still have my .gramps directory with everything in it (no subfolder for gramps60), and backups elsewhere.

11

My Pi was totally clean so I cannot answer about an existing version of GRAMPS

I had the “gi” error once and I think (not sure) the issue is between setting up project env vs user env

At this stage I would say that 6 is not really suitable for Pi5 until someone with far more knowledge of GRAMPS and Bookworm can sort it.

I am running from a terminal window which if closed shuts down GRAMPS because the env becomes deactivated.

To some extent I am not bothered about this because only wanted a look see about 6 no reason to migrate from 5.2.3 at the minute

phil

1 Like
12

You will need to backport orjson from Trixie.

13

Is this (packages.debian.org page) the correct reference for finding Python3 orjson in Trixie to do the backport?

14

Yes, that is correct.

There is also a thread on the Raspberry Pi forums called “How to install a package from testing apt repo in Bookworm?” which may help.

1 Like
15

Just to add a comment - this problem affects all Debian systems based on bookworm (Debian 12), not just the raspberry flavour.

1 Like
16

Yes I have been reading more about this I have already had to revert to X11 from Wayland due to issues on dual screens so maybe Bookworm on Pi5 is not the way to go for now.

Not sure if it is now becoming more niche than general purpose and therefore may not be suitable for GRAMPS developers to warrant somebody spending time and effort getting 6 to work seamlessly.

phil

17

@GeorgeWilmes Did you ever resolve this? I’m having this issue in an Ubuntu 24.04 environment under WSL on Windows 11.
If I try to pip install orjson outside of a virtual environment, I get the “externally managed environment” mentioned earlier, and after switching to a venv for gramps, I can install orjson, but then I get the gi error above.
Any hints will be appreciated. Thanks!

18

Resolved the situation just a few minutes after posting (isn’t that how it always works?). Anyway, gi requires PyGObject, but pip installing that failed because of “ERROR: Dependency ‘girepository-2.0’ is required but not found.”

So I installed that first, and then PyGObject installed successfully, and now I am able to run Gramps 6.0.3 in my environment.

sudo apt-get install girepository-2.0
python3 -m pip install PyGObject
19

No, but it sounds like you just did. Thanks for sharing. I will get around to trying it someday.

20

As an aside, I’m curious, why run Gramps under WSL on Windows? Why not just run the Gramps Windows AIO? Presumably, because you can do more and deeper geeky things to Gramps if it’s running in it’s native Linux environment compared to hacking the Windows version?