I have the opposite problem of Numlock always off. Numlock is turned on (engages) when the screensaver is first activated.

The option is indeed turned off in the lightdm greeter.

nwayno@bart:/usr/share/lightdm/lightdm.conf.d$ cat 50-xubuntu-numlock.conf
[Seat:*]
greeter-setup-script=xubuntu-numlockx off

That status shows numlock status as off.

nwayno@bart:~$ numlockx status
Numlock is off
nwayno@bart:~$ 

In addition I added

sleep 20 && numlockx off

to the autostart file….

I have now run out of options. I have no idea why ubuntu 18.04 has a penchant for turning on numlock. It’s annoying. I don’t know if I accidentily hit caps lock or scroll lock. It’s mega annoying. But the light still is lit.

Aye!

Wayno

Unfortunately this broke PC Study Bible

WINEARCH

If you have a 64-bit system, Wine will start an 64-bit 
environment by default. You can change this behavior using 
the WINEARCH  environment variable. Rename your ~/.wine 
directory and create a new Wine environment by running

WINEARCH=win32 winecfg

This will get you a 32-bit Wine environment. Not setting
WINEARCH will get you a 64-bit one. 

🙁

There are somethings that Linux does better then Windows. PC Study Bible, although a 32 bit Microsoft Windows application, can be successfully installed in Linux. However, there are some tricks to doing this.

These directions are overly simplified to allow novice Linux users, the best opportunity for success. As always I break it down step by step.

1. If you do not have wine installed, that is the very first step. Wine stands for: Wine is NOT an Emulator (which is recursive). What wine does, is allows you to run most windows applications (that do NOT require USB support) under Linux.

Let’s install wine!


sudo apt-get install wine


NOTE THAT I AM RUNNING THE 64 BIT FLAVOUR OF Linux (Debian) so that requires some extra steps (detailed below)

The fist cd you want to install is the New Reference Library CD.

I choose NOT to autorun anything. So it is necessary to navigate to the CD.

2. As mentioned in the winehq article: we will need to change settings in /etc/security/limits.conf

The # on the line is comment, and does NOT need to be coded.


cd /etc/security # go to the directory
sudo cp limits.conf limits.org # backup the current file
sudo nano limits.conf # edit the file


You want to add a line to the file:

user hard nofile 32000

Where user is your user name. Apparently PC Study Bible likes to open a gazillion files, this sets the upper limit to 32000 files.

ctrl + o to write, ctrl + x to end.

3. To mount the cd, (using system mount points): — mount requires root privileges —


sudo mount /dev/sr0 /mnt


You will get back:

mount: block device /dev/sr0 is write-protected, mounting read-only

which is absolutely NORMAL.

4. Now navigate to the directory:


cd /mnt


5. Install the programme with wine:


wine setup.exe


IF you are installing PC Study Bible in a 64 bit environment, YOU MUST tell it to use a 32 bit architecture (works fine with 64 bit Debian/Wheezy (V7)):

Linux Homer 3.2.0-4-amd64 #1 SMP Debian 3.2.46-1+deb7u1 x86_64 GNU/Linux


wine setup.exe winearch=32


the winearch=32 tells it to use a 32 bit environment. If you do NOT do this, the installshield WILL FAIL.

6. To unmount the cd: (note # is a comment and does not need to be coded)


cd ~ # back to the user home directory
sudo umount /dev/sr0


Repeat steps 3-6 for EACH cd/dvd you want to install.

7. To run PcStudy Bible, it will be necessary to create a shortcut with the following properties: (If a shortcut is NOT automagically added)

env WINEPREFIX=”/home/USERID/.wine” wine C:\\windows\\command\\start.exe /Unix /home/USERID/.wine/dosdevices/c:/windows/profiles/All\ Users/Desktop/PC\ Study\ Bible\ 5.lnk

where USERID is your userid.

The actual executable is located at:

cd ~/.wine/drive_c/Program Files/Biblesoft/PC Study Bible/Program
wine joshua.exe

The file launcher looks like this:

Command: env WINEPREFIX=”/home/USER/.wine” wine C:\\\\windows\\\\command\\\\start.exe /Unix /home/USER/.wine/dosdevices/c:/users/Public/Desktop/PC\\ Study\\ Bible\\ 5.lnk

Working Directory: /home/USER/.wine/dosdevices/c:/Program Files/Biblesoft/PC Study Bible

Where USER is your login username.

8. Et voilà

For me, PC Study Bible runs faster using wine in Linux, than using native Windows.

With the arrival of the Digital Age, Silicon Dust has a niche market: For those people who want to free themselves from cable bills, Silicon Dust created a digital tuner which can easily be added to a computer network, allowing you to have your own Personal Video Recorder. One of it’s unique features is that it is a networked appliance, so any device on the network (with the proper software) can watch videos from virtually anywhere on the planet with highspeed internet connection. It is compatible with Windows, Mac, and Linux.

The product does come with an installation disc for the Windows operating system. I choose to use the free open source Mythtv for Linux. Mythtv installation can be frightening. I required assistance from my friend Mike M. in the Kansas City area.

The installation went with a few hiccups, but the real challenge was just ahead. Configuration. That is more art then science. It required more thaumaturging (magic wand waving) then I would have liked. The biggest issue was that when I did the channel scans, and then ran mythfilldatabase to update the logs. Nothing happened! It turns out that you need to add the xmltv id.(see highlighted red section — xmltv id is just and index into a database that contains the channel specific information. Zap2it is the easiest to use)

After that, I was watching tv for the first time! YaY!

All good things crashed last week. The digital tuner quit working. It would NOT tune any hidef channels, either over-the-air, or cable, even though my HDTV received them fine, either way.

The true mettle of a company is revealed when there are repair issues. The problems did not surface until day 31 of a 30 day return period. I am under the manufacturer’s 1 year warranty period now. What I found out…has been challenging. There is NO telephone number to call for Tech Support. It is all done by email via Fog Creek. Silicon Dust does NOT do their own Tech Support. It is done by a 3rd party vendor. Support is very slow, arduous and painful. You can expect 1 reply / day. It could take weeks to solve a simple problem. The embedded diagnostic software, that phones home is operating system dependent: requiring the user to have Windows. For Linux users, this requirement is un-acceptable. If a product is advertised as Linux compatible, then the diagnostic software should be available native to Linux, NOT Windows.

The email Tech Support, lack of native diagnostic software, the Windows requirement, and product reliability/durability gives this product 1.9 out of 5 rating. (C-)

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

When I tried to play an audio cd I recently got from the library in vlc, I got the error:

VLC is unable to open the MRL

And it told me to see the logs. So I tried dmesg, and niente. Nothing. Yeah that helps!

So I went into vlc tools/preferences/Audio and changed the output module to pulse audio output. So it looks like:

Who knew?

Wayno

The solution is very simple.

It’s just so buried, it is hard to find.

Reposted from the original article above.

I was getting:

Gtk-Message: Failed to load module “canberra-gtk-module”: /usr/lib/gtk-2.0/modules/libcanberra-gtk-module.so: wrong ELF class: ELFCLASS64

Trying to run the new V4.0 of Skype in 64 bit Debian. The old trick of doing an LD_PRELOAD does NOT work.

My new skype script, includes the GTK_PATH export as mentioned above. Yes 4.0 skype WORKS! (should work for any 32 bit app, running in a 64 bit mode. Yes Skype 64 bit, USES the 32 bit libraries.)

New skype.sh script!


#!/bin/bash
#
# script preloads the 32 bit video for linux (v4l) libs needed by 64 bit skype
#
# Wayno Guerrini http://www.pkill-9.com v 2.0

LD_PRELOAD=/usr/lib32/libv4l/v4l1compat.so /usr/bin/skype


In my case, it made skype and the video work perfectly.

It’s time to answer: Why an orange theme? Because no one else is using an orange theme. Orange is NOT my favourite colour, but orange to me is something you have to start your day.

Tart. Tangy. Re-freshing.

And you will notice, we changed themes. Still orange. I will be tweaking this over the next week or so.

Wayno

Knowledge should ALWAYS be free. As such, I am passing all the contents of this website into the Creative Commons Community.

This work is now licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License. Share and share alike.

Thanks Joe and Loni for your wisdom, guidance, and mentoring spirit.

Outdoor internet connection provided to Hermitage Cat Shelter, in Tucson, Arizona

NOTE: THIS LETTER HAS NOT BEEN SENT, IN HOPE OF RESOLVING THIS ON A LOCAL LEVEL.

————-
Patrick J. Esser, President
Cox Communications
1400 Lake Hearn Drive
Atlanta, Georgia 30319

The Hermitage Cat Shelter is dedicated to the shelter, protection, and care of homeless cats, especially those that are often not considered adoptable by other organizations. We are both an adoption facility and long-term sanctuary for those felines who are “adoption-challenged.” including felines who are FIV or FeLV-positive, and other types of chronic health issues. All of our kitties roam free within 8,000 sq ft of outdoor/indoor living space. (Mission Statement)

To that end, we rely heavily upon the internet to carry out our mission. Approximately a year ago, The Shelter contracted with Cox Communications here in Tucson, Arizona, to install internet access for the shelter. We have 4 hard wired connections, and a laptop in use, using a central router. Because the way things we’re done, we have a cable modem and laptop (wifi) in one building, and the wifi and hardwired router in another. Because the distance is too great, the laptop cannot connect to the router in the next building, even though it sits a few feet from the cable modem. All of this goes through a single connection from the outside.

When we often have inclement weather during our monsoon season, or extremes in temperature, we experience frustrating and severe outages. Why? Because the technician who installed this took several short cuts (see photo, attached) and obviously has no pride in their work.

We are committed to providing the best opportunity available to the cats under our care. But is Cox committed to doing the right thing and fixing the poor installation quality that was performed?

It’s much much easier then I thought!

You need to use dosfsck!

1. If not already installed, install dosfsck: (it’s in sbin)


sudo apt-get install dosfsck


2. Find your device name.


sudo blkid


You will get output that looks like:

/dev/sdf1: LABEL=”CANON_DC” UUID=”713B-5AE2″ TYPE=”vfat”

Your device name will PROBABLY be different.

3. Check the usb drive or sd card:

Remember that the device should NOT be mounted, and that it needs to run as root (sudo or su -)


sudo dosfsck -av /dev/sdf1


-a says to automatically repair.

-v says to use verbose output.

You will get output that looks like:

dosfsck 3.0.9 (31 Jan 2010)
dosfsck 3.0.9, 31 Jan 2010, FAT32, LFN
Checking we can access the last sector of the filesystem
Boot sector contents:
System ID “PwrShot ”
Media byte 0xf8 (hard disk)
512 bytes per logical sector
32768 bytes per cluster
6304 reserved sectors
First FAT starts at byte 3227648 (sector 6304)
2 FATs, 32 bit entries
483328 bytes per FAT (= 944 sectors)
Root directory start at cluster 2 (arbitrary size)
Data area starts at byte 4194304 (sector 8192)
120752 data clusters (3956801536 bytes)
63 sectors/track, 128 heads
8192 hidden sectors
7736320 sectors total
Reclaiming unconnected clusters.
Checking free cluster summary.
/dev/sdf1: 693 files, 29358/120752 clusters

No errors. Good to go. Look Ma! No Windows!

Wayno