How to install Reveal.js on Ubuntu

Introduction

reveal.js is an open-source HTML presentation framework. It’s a tool that enables anyone with a web browser to create fully-featured and beautiful presentations for free.

Presentations made with reveal.js are built on open web technologies. That means anything you can do on the web, you can do in your presentation. Change styles with CSS, include an external web page using an <iframe> or add your own custom behavior using our JavaScript API.

So in these times of pandemic, this tool can be quite useful for many students and teachers.

Install Reveal.js on Ubuntu 21.04

1.- Install required packages

Before starting the installation of Reveal.js it is necessary to install some packages first.

So, open a terminal, and run the following command

sudo apt install curl gnupg2 unzip git

Now we have to install NodeJS version 16. For this, we have to add the nodejs repository.

curl -sL https://deb.nodesource.com/setup_16.x | sudo bash -

This will start the whole process of adding the repository along with its GPG key.

Once the process is finished, you can install NodeJS

sudo apt install nodejs

You can check the installed version by running the following command:

node -v

2.- Download and install Reveal.js on Ubuntu 21.04

Now we can start the download and for that, we’ll clone the Reveal.js repository with Git.

git clone https://github.com/hakimel/reveal.js.git

Once the cloning is done, we will have a folder called revel.js access it and install the application.

cd reveal.js
sudo npm install

After you have installed all the dependencies of the application, you can run it using the following command.

npm start

This indicates that reveal is running through port 8000 which is the default port. You can also change this port by using the –port

npm start -- --port=8001

Optionally, you can create a new system service to manage reveal.

sudo vim /lib/systemd/system/reveal.service

And add the following.

[Service]
Type=simple
User=root
Restart=on-failure
WorkingDirectory=/home/unixcop/reveal.js
ExecStart=npm start

Save the changes, close the editor. And refresh systemd. Please replace unixcop with the current user

sudo systemctl daemon-reload

Now you can start, stop, and enable it as a system service.

Now, open your web browser and go to http://your-server:8000 and you will see the default reveal.js presentation which indicates that the installation has been a success.

Conclusion

So, now you know how to install it. You can now create fantastic presentations using web technologies.