chrome-remote

Summery

Simple remote for chrome / chromium browser. It opens/changes the url chromium is displaying at the moment. Useful for kiosk systems.

Synopse

I tried to find a program which allows me to change the url of a running chrome instance, or simply to refresh the current web site. After a lot of research I found some code snippets mainly done from-for developers. But nothing useable in a simple ssh command or usable in a webhook.

So I wrote my own programm.

Basic Usage

Start a chrome or a chromium browser with the option remote-debugging-port

chromium --remote-debugging-port=12345

Afterwards take call the python script:

./chrome-remote https://www.heise.de 

Advanced Usage

Start chromium on the remote system with the option remote-debugging-port. Afterwards clone this repo to a directory of your choise on the remote system (I prefer /opt).

chromium --remote-debugging-port=12345
cd /opt
git clone <this-repo>

Ensure you have ssh access to the remote system. Call the script from you local system by using the following ssh command:

ssh <remote-user>@<remote-system> '/opt/chrome-remote/chrome-remote.py http://www.heise.de'

if your kiosk needs to refresh

ssh <remote-user>@<remote-system> '/opt/chrome-remote/chrome-remote.py refresh'

Installation

Dependencies

• Arch Linux community/python-websocket-client
• Debian/Ubuntu python3-websocket

Install to /opt

cd /opt
git clone <this-repo>
chown -R <your-username>:<your-username> chrome-remote
chmod 755 chrome-remote/chrome-remote.py

Testing

Tested on the following distributions:

• Arch Linux
• Debian Buster
• Raspbian

Help

./chrome-remote.py 
Usage: ./chrome-remote.py [ -h ] | [ -p <chrome-remote-port>] <url_to_open> | refresh 

 This programm requires chrome/chromium browser. Start this with the following argument: 
 chromium -remote-debugging-port=12345

 -p remote debugging port (default is 12345)
 
 <url_to_open> e.g. https://www.heise.de
 OR
 refresh

Sources

Websocket command for refresh

• https://sakthipriyan.com/2016/02/15/auto-refresh-chrome-when-files-modified.html

Remote open url

• https://stackoverflow.com/questions/52783655/use-curl-with-chrome-remote-debugging

Websocat

• https://github.com/vi/websocat

Misc

• https://github.com/lvancrayelynghe/chrome-remote-reload
• https://stackoverflow.com/questions/31340063/how-to-change-url-on-chromium-kiosk-mode-via-ssh

Alternatives

• long complicated xdotool command for X11 based systems - but if you are on wayland you are doomed