It was time to retire the familiar orangerehash Theme.
Still keeping an orange theme, we are now using Tomasz Mazur orange coloured theme.
If you find any problems, please let me know. I have wanted to use this theme for sometime, but it broke the website. Now it is fixed, and we are ready to move on.
Wayno
It is NOT as easy as it would first seem. Some magic wand waving (oh yes — Hokey Pokey again!) is required.
Download Skype for Debian 7 (multi-arch)
1. What is multi-arch? Multi-arch supports the 32 bit libraries needed to run Skype or even Boinc. So first we need to tell Wheezy (Debian 7 — 64 bit) that we need this support:
Linux 3.2.0-4-amd64 #1 SMP Debian 3.2.41-2 x86_64 GNU/Linux
sudo dpkg --add-architecture i386
Normally, you would just get a prompt.
2. Now update the system:
sudo apt-get update
and it should find all the necessary components for the 32 bit support. Yup, Skype even on a 64 bit system, is a 32 bit application!
3. I found it necessary to run upgrade after doing the update, this differs from what other sites say.
sudo apt-get upgrade
4. Let’s install Skype!
sudo dpkg -i skype-debian_4.1.0.20-1_i386.deb
Or whatever version you download.
5. If you end up with um-met dependencies like I did, Don’t Panic!
Simply tell Linux to fix the dependencies:
sudo apt-get install -f
Repeat step 4 (above)
6. Q.E.D.
If you search on the internet, one of the issues that seems to come up a lot, are connectivity issues with the atheros AR 9485 card.
I am configuring a new laptop, an HP Pavilion G6-2323DX for my Mom. I ran into many issues that caused me to have to do hokey pokey.
This is pure hokey pokey. But it does work.
The operating system I am using is Debian/Wheezy V 7 RC 1 (64 Bit)
If you do a uname -a I get back:
Linux AnnLin 3.2.0-4-amd64 #1 SMP Debian 3.2.41-2 x86_64 GNU/Linux
Let’s just step by step check things.
1. let’s see if Linux see’s the card:
lspci | grep Wireless
You will get back a line like:
02:00.0 Network controller: Atheros Communications Inc. AR9485 Wireless Network Adapter (rev 01)
That means Linux sees it, but of course it is NOT configured.
2. Let’s see if the driver (ath9k) is loaded. We will use modprobe.
modprobe ath9k
if the device driver is loaded, it will just return a prompt. That’s a “good thing” as Martha would say.
3. Let’s look to make sure the wpa-supplicant programme is installed. The WPA supplicant provides wireless protected access (encryption) for our connection.
dpkg -l | grep supplicant
and you should get back:
ii wpasupplicant 1.0-3+b2
amd64 client support for WPA and WPA2 (IEEE 802.11i)
We’re good!
4. Now let’s modify /etc/network/interfaces
cd /etc/network # go to network interfaces
sudo cp interfaces interfaces.org # make a backup copy
sudo nano interfaces
You will get back something like this:
# This file describes the network interfaces available on your system
# and how to activate them. For more information, see interfaces(5).
# The loopback network interface
auto lo
iface lo inet loopback
#define the network interface for the wireless lan card
iface wlan0 inet dhcp
wpa-ssid MyHome
wpa-psk MyPass
wpa-ssid is the name of the wireless network you are trying to connect to. wpa-psk is the password for that network. Yup plain text!
The iface line defines wlan0 so it has access to the internet, and gets it’s ip address dynamically (dhcp).
The card interface is STILL not up!
5. Bring up the interface!
sudo ifdown wlan0; sudo ifup wlan0;
you will get output that looks like:
ifdown: interface wlan0 not configured
Internet Systems Consortium DHCP Client 4.2.2
Copyright 2004-2011 Internet Systems Consortium.
All rights reserved.
For info, please visit https://www.isc.org/software/dhcp/
Listening on LPF/wlan0/20:16:d8:e5:32:b4
Sending on LPF/wlan0/20:16:d8:e5:32:b4
Sending on Socket/fallback
DHCPDISCOVER on wlan0 to 255.255.255.255 port 67 interval 8
DHCPREQUEST on wlan0 to 255.255.255.255 port 67
DHCPOFFER from 192.168.1.1
DHCPACK from 192.168.1.1
bound to 192.168.1.4 — renewal in 37985 seconds.
6. AND NOW THE HOKEY POKEY PART 1!
Install wicd (Wireless Interface Connection Daemon)
sudo apt-get install wicd
once that is installed, REMOVE the gnome network mangler!
sudo apt-get purge network-manager-gnome
7. HOKEY POKEY PART 2!
Reboot the machine. After re-booting bring up the interface.
sudo ifdown wlan0; sudo ifup wlan0;
It should look like this:
8. HOKEY POKEY PART 3!
now go back to /etc/network/interfaces and remove (or comment out with a # in front the wpa-ssid, and wpa-pskid for the wlan card. so just: iface wlan0 inet dhcp and whatever else was there — just not the wpa information.
cd /etc/network # go to network interfaces
sudo nano interfaces
9. Restart the network:
sudo /etc/init.d/networking restart
you will get back something like this:
[....] Running /etc/init.d/networking restart is deprecated because it may not[warnnable some interfaces ... (warning).
[....] Reconfiguring network interfaces…Internet Systems Consortium DHCP Client 4.2.2
Copyright 2004-2011 Internet Systems Consortium.
All rights reserved.
For info, please visit https://www.isc.org/software/dhcp/
Listening on LPF/wlan0/20:16:d8:e5:32:b4
Sending on LPF/wlan0/20:16:d8:e5:32:b4
Sending on Socket/fallback
DHCPRELEASE on wlan0 to 192.168.1.1 port 67
this basically makes sure we don’t have any errors in /etc/network/interfaces
10. HOKEY POKEY PART 4
Reboot once again, and this time the interface should come up automatically. Screensaver engagement should not knock the connection offline.
And that’s what it’s all about!
I have to thank 3 people for all their help. Joe, Loni and Frances.
Wayno
If you’re like me, you are used to finding the system messages in:
/var/log/messages
But Ubuntu, in their infinite wisdom, changed it!
It is now: /var/log/syslog
Yeah, I knew that! NOT!
Thanks Th0r (in #ubuntu on freenode) for solving this!
Wayno
Dear Mark Shuttleworth:
Thank you for Ubuntu 10.04 lts. It was perhaps the best Linux OS I have used. As it hits end-of-life at the end of the month, I have gone in another direction. Debian/Squeeze. I am not at all happy with the direction that Canonical has taken, in regard to desktop environment. I realise with Unity, you are trying to give the same desktop look/feel to all modes of communication: desktop, laptop, cell phones.
While my cell phone runs a Linux variant, it is customised to the device. One design does NOT fit all. Imagine trying to use a cell phone os, on a desktop. Oh wait. I think that’s windows 8.
Wayno
On 03/26/2013 10:48 AM, wrote:
Sunday night I upgraded my server again – I had previously upgraded it from ubuntu 8.04 to 10.04, so I figured I’d go ahead and take it to 12.04 so it will be supported until 2017.
It all went smoothly. All I had to do to get the ball rolling was to type: ‘do-release-upgrade’ and the process began. Again, the box stayed up all through the upgrade, continued to serve dns and dhcp, routed nat traffic to the internet, and kept the vpns running.
When the upgrade was complete, I had to go to run level 6 to boot into the new kernel, so the system was down for about a minute while the reboot process ran its course.
When it came up, there was a problem with forwarding traffic to the internet. That was caused by a new /etc/sysctl.conf which didn’t have the ipv4 forwarding enabled. I fixed the file, typed “sysctl -p” to make the new setting take effect, and lan access to the internet was restored.
A bit later I noticed a second problem: wireless devices were not able to access the internet. I found that the dhcp server was not running. I tried starting it manually and it failed. Looking in the log, I could see that apparmor didn’t like the fancy things dhcpd was trying to do. Admittedly it’s a custom configuration, and the new version of dhcpd might require a few changes. At any rate, I just unloaded apparmor to get things up and running. Then dhcpd was able to start, and there were no other problems.
All in all, a smooth upgrade with a rather short outage.
Joe
This has absolutely nothing to do with Linux.
He sends me cheesy movies! The worst he can find! (sha-la-la)
Knowing I have a penchant for uber quality challenged horrible films, my friend Eric sent this to me:
]
Santa Claus Defeats (conquers) the Aliens (Martians)
79 cents. Can not beat the price!
In case you missed this cinematic blunder, here’s the official trailer:
Thanks Eric!
Wayno
I am looking for a replacement for Ubuntu 10.04. It reaches end-of-life, in April, 2013. I just could not get used to the Unity Desktop Environment, simply because there is no guide on how to use it. (HINT!)
The Good
A friend suggested Bodhi Linux, which is Ubuntu 12.04 based, with the enlightenment window manager.. Enlightenment is small, compact, and very fast.
The installation of 2.1 Bodhi was quick and somewhat painless. But I will admit the grub_divmod64_full grub boot error had me in a tailspin. I had to drop back to Windows 98 Floppy to fix the problem. (fdisk /mbr) After nuking the master boot record, I tried a second time, all was well.
The Bad
Creating a desktop icon, is NOT straightforward. For example, if you are used to using the gnome-terminal, it is called “Terminology” in Enlightenment.
If you try to create a symlink to this in the Desktop folder, that won’t work! Instead, you have to copy the .desktop to your home Desktop folder. So:
cp /usr/share/applications/terminology.desktop ~/Desktop
Thanks to conspiritech and deepspeed on the #bodhilinux irc.freenode.net for solving that mystery, and the file manager mystery (below.)
Trying to put an Enlightenment File Manager (EFM) desktop icon, proved impossible. They suggested using Thunar or Pcmanfm
And the above code snippet (substituting Thunar.desktop or pcmanfm.desktop) works!
When I tried to install boinc, things got ugly quick!
Here is what I did, and the explanation below:
w@H:~$ ssh w@p
w@p's password:
Welcome to Bodhi Linux 2.0.0
* Documentation: https://wiki.bodhilinux.com/
Last login: Sat Jan 26 08:02:16 2013 from 192.168.1.101
w@P:~$ sudo apt-get install boinc
[sudo] password for w:
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
You might want to run 'apt-get -f install' to correct these:
The following packages have unmet dependencies:
boinc : Depends: boinc-client (>= 7.0.27+dfsg-5ubuntu0.12.04.1) but it is
not going to be installed
Depends: boinc-manager (>= 7.0.27+dfsg-5ubuntu0.12.04.1) but it is
not going to be installed
libc6-dev : Depends: linux-libc-dev but it is not going to be installed
nvidia-173 : Depends: linux-libc-dev but it is not going to be installed
Recommends: nvidia-settings but it is not going to be installed
E: Unmet dependencies. Try 'apt-get -f install' with no packages (or specify a
solution).
w@P:~$ sudo apt-get -f install
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
Correcting dependencies... Done
The following packages were automatically installed and are no longer required:
gir1.2-appindicator3-0.1 9menu gir1.2-json-1.0 gstreamer0.10-x pkg-config
gir1.2-javascriptcoregtk-3.0 ratpoison libiec61883-0 gir1.2-timezonemap-1.0
gir1.2-gstreamer-0.10 gir1.2-soup-2.4 libraw1394-11
gstreamer0.10-plugins-good gir1.2-webkit-3.0 libtag1-vanilla libavc1394-0
libtimezonemap1 libshout3 libdv4 gir1.2-xkl-1.0 screen-resolution-extra
libtag1c2a libxklavier16 python-xkit
Use 'apt-get autoremove' to remove them.
The following extra packages will be installed:
linux-libc-dev
The following NEW packages will be installed:
linux-libc-dev
0 upgraded, 1 newly installed, 0 to remove and 0 not upgraded.
5 not fully installed or removed.
Need to get 948 kB of archives.
After this operation, 3,177 kB of additional disk space will be used.
Do you want to continue [Y/n]? Y
Err http://packages.bodhilinux.com/bodhi/
precise/stable linux-libc-dev i386 3.5.0-11.11
404 Not Found
Failed to fetch http://packages.bodhilinux.com/bodhi/pool/stable
/l/linux/linux-libc-dev_3.5.0-11.11_i386.deb 404 Not Found
E: Unable to fetch some archives, maybe run apt-get update or try with --fix-missing?
w@P:~$
The Really Bad
I tried to install boinc, as shown above. But it complained that the libc6-dev was actually a later version than it needed. I tried to “fix” the broken packages, but I got a 404 error. The needed file, was NOT found in the Bodhi 2.1 repository. FAIL.
While I could probably get around this, by adding the correct Ubuntu repository, this is NOT something a n00b (novice/new) user would know how to fix. The combination of the repository failure, and the methodology of adding desktop icons, gives bodhi Linux a grade of: D-. Not ready for primetime.
Another review, called it a square peg in a round hole.
When I tried to install the nvidia-173 legacy mode drivers for my graphics card, it completely broke Bodhi, so much that it would not boot. Went into recovery mode, purged the nvidia driver, and then rebooted back into Bodhi.
Kubuntu is starting to look pretty good.
Wayno
A Turing Test is used to distinguish whether or not I am you are talking to a machine or a human. If the responses would be generally considered that of what a real life person would give, then it is said, to have passed the Turing Test.
One of the first machine based artificial intelligence programmes was Eliza. It was primitive by today’s standards, but none-the-less was the first machine based AI programme I encountered in college.
This recent chat with Comcast would seem to indicate a Turing Test failure. To wit:
analyst Arthur has entered room
Arthur: Hello Wayno, Thank you for contacting Comcast Live Chat Support. My name is Arthur. Please give me one moment to review your information.
Wayno: My Issue: Life Line service
Arthur: I am here to provide you with excellent customer service today. Please be assured I will do my best to help you with your concern.
Arthur: Can you please elaborate your issue?
Wayno: hi arthur. I have a question about life line services.
Wayno: qualifications, cost mostly.
Arthur: I understand your concern is about life line services, am I correct?
Wayno: correct
Arthur: May I have 2 minutes to check on that?
Wayno: absolutely
Arthur: Thank you.
Arthur: Thank you for waiting, Wayno.
Arthur: XFINITY Voice service is compatible with personal emergency alert response systems provided by Philips Lifeline and Linear LLC. XFINITY Voice service doesn’t guarantee compatibility with other systems. To check compatibility, contact the agency that provided you with the personal emergency alert response system.
Wayno: no that does not answer my question. what are the qualifications and cost of life line service?
Arthur: Contact your alarm company before your XFINTITY Voice installation. Provide the date and time of your installation so the alarm company can check the status of your alarm on installation day. If your alarm system needs to be reactivated after XFINITY Voice is installed, you will not be compensated for the cost of reactivation.
Wayno: okay I am not talking to a human being.
Arthur: I am a live agent, Wayno.
Arthur: I just gave you the information about Life Line service. It is for free.
Arthur: You just need to have a Comcast phone service.
Wayno: how does contacting my alarm company have any thing to remotely do with lifeline?
Arthur: I can see here that you don’t have Comcast phone service.
Wayno: okay you failed the Turing Test.
=========
Actually I was able to find the information on-line for lifeline phone eligibility.
Wayno
This was a question I posed to my friend Matt. He suggested:
the best is dban
Darick’s Boot and Nuke
You burn dban to a cd and boot the computer with it. This eliminates EVERYTHING from the hard drive, including the operating system.
If you are more comfortable running a program from Windows itself i recommend eraser.
Both are free. I’m always glad to help a friend.
☠
\m/