How to run webshot2 on a Linux server?

[lijinbio]

Hi,

I am trying to run webshot2::webshot() on a Linux server. The server does not have Chrome, and I got the below error that Chrome is not found.

`google-chrome` and `chromium-browser` were not found. Try setting the CHROMOTE_CHROME environment variable or adding one of these executables to your PATH.
Error in initialize(...) : Invalid path to Chrome
Calls: source ... <Anonymous> -> initialize -> <Anonymous> -> initialize
Execution halted

I understand webshot2 uses Chrome back-end, but my account in the server can only install local tools using conda. Could you please help suggest any workaround? Either install a local Chrome? or another solution without a browser? Thanks.

[AroneyS]

I tried installing chromium through conda (https://anaconda.org/esss/chromium) and then setting the env variable CHROMOTE_CHROME to the path for chrome install by that package. But I just get a different error:

webshot2::webshot("https://www.r-project.org", file = "test.png")

# https://www.r-project.org screenshot completed
# Warning messages:
# 1: In onRejected(...) :
#  An error occurred: Error in self$Page$captureScreenshot(clip = list(x = xmin, y = ymin, width = xmax - : unused argument (captureBeyondViewport = TRUE)

# 2: In normalizePath(value) :
#   path[1]="An error occurred: Error in self$Page$captureScreenshot(clip = list(x = xmin, y = ymin, width = xmax - : unused  argument (captureBeyondViewport = TRUE)
# ": No such file or directory

Similar error to rstudio/gt#1029, though they only get the error running webshot2 through gt and not running webshot2 directly.

[henrique1008]

Hi
I see you mentioned my issue in gt
This: rstudio/gt#1029

I've been looking deeper into this, and found out what part of the webshot was having the problem.

If I run
webshot2::webshot("path to gt table saved in html with htmltools", file = "test.png")
Everything is fine, but the image is blank

But if I run
webshot2::webshot("path to gt table saved in html with htmltools", file = "test.png",selector = "table")
This broke

file:////tmp/RtmpFJCC7k/file99d1167031a0f.html screenshot completed
Warning messages:
1: In onRejected(...) :
  An error occurred: Error in onFulfilled(value): Unable to find any visible elements for selectors.

2: In normalizePath(value) :
  path[1]="An error occurred: Error in onFulfilled(value): Unable to find any visible elements for selectors.
": No such file or directory

The problem is in the selector parameter
And that's why I had problems in gt, because it uses selector = 'table'

Hope this helps us to come up with a solution.

[dxbhans]

My issue relates to the above. I have installed on a minimal Ubuntu 22 server rstudio server, chromium, webshot2 and chromote. We need - via rstudio server - to generate PDFs of Rmarkdown documents that contain DiagrammeR flowcharts.

The PDF rendering fails stating that s$close() is a non-function. With webshot we can generate files of individual shots, but we can not knit the full rmarkdown as a PDF. The issue does not relate to DiagrammeR, any integrated webshot fails.

Before raising a full issue with the proper support and details, I would to aks if anyone has helpful pointers that relate to the matter.

Many thanks!