I work with a local maker space teaching 3D printing, a few months ago i was give a RPI as a gift and as i have been learning about all it can do. After seeing my RPI in action Vocademy (maker space in Riverside, Ca) asked if it could be used for slide shows and to post other information on the big screen. I know that XBMC can be used for slideshows but locking for something simpler. this RPI is meant to be mounted to the wall and not moved and have no keyboard or mouse plugged in or pc remote even. i want to ssh in so that in future the slideshow can be updated or i can even write a scripted that download new pictures for me.
so after having to learn a lot about how to use VI and how to edit and save files using VI i was able to fallow this guide up to the part about installing xbmc
I am testing the open sources version but once again this means we need to have a network connection in the room i like this one the best so far because i can add more images and can likely build a scripted to update the images but will need to wait until im sure that the network is up and running in the room. I am using the open sources version because I don't want to have to use the web version
The simplest answer to this project is to use xbmc or openelec but i really wanted to try something with more of a Raspbain
type layout because it has much more that can be loaded for future projects so after trying xbmc i decide to install XBMC to Raspbain using this guided but have had no lock
Next i found this build of Raspbain that is a digital sign that i really though would do the the trick. however there is both a paid version and a free version and the free version is very limited in what it can do so this is also a no go http://www.binaryemotions.com/raspberry-digital-signage/faq.html
Getting slides/pictures up on a screen in a way that's easy to update is actually a bit annoying still. I'm not sure what the best solution is, but I'm looking forward to seeing what one you prefer.
I have not updated this project in a few days but for now i have went with XBMC on top of raspbian with a auto start on xbmc the RPI boots to Raspbian GUI then sleeps for 5sec then boots XBMC for now the pics are on a thumb drive but in the future i want have pics pulled from the internet with a script and replace older images. because its a maker space they want it to pull from their pinterest which is full of ideas for members and projects created by members. I have taken a few days off of the project but will be working on it more in the next week or 2.
I use qiv https://www.linuxlinks.com/qiv/ and use a little python script to show date and location with osd_cat. Just on a standard rpi install.