Connected Monitor/Screen Output - Can I "Show" an app or something?

[IAmOrion]

Bit of a random question, from a previous post, I'm super new to this and TrueNAS, but had another question and typically not sure where this falls category wise.

Anyways, I currently have a monitor connected to my TrueNAS Server (I connected it for the initial setup). I have an old 5" HDMI monitor I wanted to utilize with this but not sure it's possible -- I connected the small 5" display via HDMI, and once TrueNAS is booted, it sits at the "Console Setup" dos/command style output, showing me the IP address and awaiting me to input a number if I wanted. I'm assuming this is the expected/intended behaviour since the continued setup is done via a web browser. But this led me to question, can I display something else somehow?

As an example, AIDA64 has nice customizable sensor panel things... I appreciate that wouldn't run on TrueNAS (I don't think) but basically I want to customise what is shown on the screen, is this possible or will it only show debug/console output here?

I'm open to other ideas such as using a Pi Zero to output to the screen instead, but I'd like a way to display info from the TrueNAS server.
Imagine it like AIDA64 Remote Monitoring

 

[Redcoat]

only show debug/console output here?

Yes, just the console.

I'd like a way to display info from the TrueNAS server

TrueNAS itself has such information available on the Dashboard and in Reporting.

IPMI can also give you information if you have it.

 

[IAmOrion]

Yes, just the console.

TrueNAS itself has such information available on the Dashboard.

IPMI can also give you information if you have it.

Ah, yeah, the dashboard is pretty nice, although I notice it's not customizable. I would want to hide the Help part, and also change the display order of the 'widgets' which as far as I know is not possible

Edit: Just found an older post where someone said could use Grafana - I've no idea what it is and looking into it is confusing the hell outta me but I shall persevere ha

 

[sretalla]

In SCALE you can do that... at some point CORE and SCALE were supposed to go back to sharing the GUI a little more closely, but I guess 13 wasn't the time for that.

 

[IAmOrion]

In SCALE you can do that... at some point CORE and SCALE were supposed to go back to sharing the GUI a little more closely, but I guess 13 wasn't the time for that.

Oh what! So in TrueNAS SCALE you *CAN* modify the dashboard? Or you mean you can output something else to the attached display?

Every "DIY Budget NAS" guide I've come across all say use TrueNAS Core so never paid attention to the difference between CORE and SCALE.
Should I change to SCALE ? (At this point, everything is a "fresh" install, so there's no data to be lost, so starting again wouldn't matter)

 

[Redcoat]

Oh what! So in TrueNAS SCALE you *CAN* modify the dashboard?

Yes. I don't use Scale so I'm not sure to what degree (I suppose I should spin up my VM Scale and investigate).

You might also want to look into Netdata (a Community plugin - though I'm not a plug-in advocate) and search for posts on Grafana by author @Patrick M. Hausen, a serious contributor here.

 

[IAmOrion]

Yes.

You might also want to look into Netdata (a Community plugin - though I'm not a plug-in advocate) and search for posts on Grafana by author @Patrick M. Hausen, a serious contributor here.

Interesting - I'll take a look at his posts.

If SCALE can do the dashboard stuff anyways, is there any reason for NOT using it? I looked at the comparison chart, it seems to most likely things to affect me as a home user is that SCALE uses Linux containers and not Plugins like the CORE version does. Am I missing something? Why do most people choose CORE over SCALE?

 

[sretalla]

Should I change to SCALE ?

Depends what you want from your NAS...

SCALE puts you in the apps territory, so no jails, which means working out the kubernetes way of doing things, which is a bit more complex than jails (although conceptually a lot in common... actually very different). TrueCharts has done the work to offer many more apps than there are plugin jails.

SCALE is the new kid on the block, so some things like performance tuning and stability are yet to arrive in full, but should come in good time.

SCALE will also offer features that are cool if you have more than one (probably at least 3) systems to run on.

 

[sretalla]

Why do most people choose CORE over SCALE?

SCALE hasn't existed very long, so you didn't have a choice some years back... CORE is more stable and performs better on SMB for example.

 

[IAmOrion]

Depends what you want from your NAS...

SCALE puts you in the apps territory, so no jails, which means working out the kubernetes way of doing things, which is a bit more complex than jails (although conceptually a lot in common... actually very different). TrueCharts has done the work to offer many more apps than there are plugin jails.

SCALE is the new kid on the block, so some things like performance tuning and stability are yet to arrive in full, but should come in good time.

SCALE will also offer features that are cool if you have more than one (probably at least 3) systems to run on.

SCALE hasn't existed very long, so you didn't have a choice some years back... CORE is more stable and performs better on SMB for example.

Realistically I just want access to my files, from multiple machines - iPhone, Windows PC, Macbook Pro. I want to be able to store my data in a safe manner (So looking at mirror setup for now).

I already use a Raspberry Pi 4 for my Home-Bridge & Plex Server setup - so I'm not bothered about those plugins (or any others currently on offer)

As for SMB speed (I presume I need SMB for Windows access - I played with OpenMediaVault on a Raspberry Pi 3 (with a single hdd) and setup an SMB share that I used across all devices) - but ultimately, I'm not copying large amounts of data often, and I guess performance difference between scale and core would barely be noticeable in my usage case. I'm really the only one accessing the files, it's a home/personal setup, and copying files every now and then. I would describe it as light usage.

I may install SCALE to take a look whilst I'm still in a position to do so! (Eg, no data in use, empty hard drives atm etc etc)

 

[sretalla]

I may install SCALE to take a look whilst I'm still in a position to do so! (Eg, no data in use, empty hard drives atm etc etc)

Sure, sounds like the right thing to do... kick the tires a bit.

 

[sretalla]

Also... theoretically, you can actually run a VM and have it display on the attached screen... I was involved in a thread where it turned out I was wrong and it can be done, so there's that. I think that's a SCALE only option.

 

[IAmOrion]

Sure, sounds like the right thing to do... kick the tires a bit.

Also... theoretically, you can actually run a VM and have it display on the attached screen... I was involved in a thread where it turned out I was wrong and it can be done, so there's that. I think that's a SCALE only option.

Sounds like SCALE may be more "fun" to play with then :) I'm gonna give it a go - thanks for your help & info