Delay running of python script on boot until desktop is finished

Question

I tried simply editing the autostart file to run a Python script on boot, but it runs with errors, I assume becasue the desktop hasn't completed. Can someone tell me how I would launch a script with a delay?

• Steve Robillard: Have you looked at this raspberrypi.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=31&t=43509
• Bachalo: Yes, It works partially as mentioned in my post, but pretty sure I need a delay BEFORE I execute my script.
• Steve Robillard: What is the exact error?

Answer 1

you should do approximately this:

1. crontab -e, add a line

   @reboot /home/pi/bash_script

2. inside the bash script write the following

   #!/bin/bash

   /bin/sleep 100 && /usr/bin/python /home/pi/blah.py

where blah.py is your script you want to run with a delay.

• Bachalo: don't I need to do a chmod on the script as well to make it executable?
• Bachalo: ok, I have another issue with tKinter, if I simply run my script from LXTerminal it works, but if called via a cron job get _tkinter.TclError: no display name and no $DISPLAY environment variable
• lenik: well, set the environment variable DISPLAY and it will run perfectly