July 2009 - main - earth.li

Face Recognition
by Mark Rogers 09 Nov '09

09 Nov '09

On the back of a bus I saw an advert for the Apple Mac talking about its ability to use face recognition when processing photos. Is there anything like this in Linux? It looks like Google had it planned for Picasa back in 2006: http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2006/08/better-way-to-organize-photos.html .. but as far as I know it's not there yet? -- Mark Rogers // More Solutions Ltd (Peterborough Office) // 0845 45 89 555 Registered in England (0456 0902) at 13 Clarke Rd, Milton Keynes, MK1 1LG

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Over-clever keyboard detection in Gentoo
by Dan Hatton 09 Sep '09

09 Sep '09

Dear All, I usually operate my Gentoo netbook with one of two USB keyboards plugged in - a Microsoft Comfort Curve keyboard or an Apple Pro Keyboard. Usually, the computer responds to either of these, and its built-in keyboard, as if they were PC-style keyboards, i.e. shift-2 gives ", shift-' gives @. I quite like it this way. Occasionally (usually while the Apple keyboard is plugged in, although I've seen it once while the Microsoft keyboard was plugged in), however, the computer switches to responding to both the USB keyboard and its built-in keyboard as if they were Apple-style keyboards, i.e. shift-2 is @, shift-' is ". There's nothing wrong with this in itself, but unfortunately it coincides with the computer becoming very to respond to keypresses, and frequently mistaking a single keypress for a large number of multiple presses of the same key. It also coincides with the second light from the left (of six) in xkbvleds coming on, which suggests that the behaviour is switchable. Any ideas how to switch it, please? -- Thanks, Dan

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No network every time
by Chris Walker 10 Aug '09

10 Aug '09

I've no idea what I've done recently to provoke it, but every time I power on my machine, it tells me there's no configured network interface. All I have to do to fix it, is give the root password, and then click ok several times until I get to 'finish'. It remembers all the static ip details but I can't persuade it to remember to start. All I can recall doing recently is trying to persuade the box to talk to my Nokia phone but I'm not sure if that's the cause. I mention it just in case. I've tried googling for the solution but got nowhere. Anybody any ideas?

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DPMS on LG monitor
by Dan Hatton 01 Aug '09

01 Aug '09

Dear All, I usually operate my Gentoo netbook with one of two external monitors plugged into its VGA output: - an LG Flatron W2234S; or - a Samsung SyncMaster 710N. I'm also usually running xscreensaver with the following options (among others) timeout: 0:02:00 cycle: 0:01:00 lock: True lockTimeout: 0:00:00 passwdTimeout: 0:01:00 dpmsEnabled: True dpmsStandby: 0:05:00 dpmsSuspend: 0:05:00 dpmsOff: 0:05:00 The netbook's built-in screen and the Samsung monitor switch off after five minutes like these options tell them to. But the LG monitor stays on, advising me to "check signal cable". Any ideas how I can get the LG monitor to obey the DPMS commands, please? -- Thanks, Dan

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Anonymous FXP
by lists＠glover.uk.net 29 Jul '09

29 Jul '09

Hi, Here's a question for you all (because I'm sure I'm not the only person whose attempted this!) We have a piece of software at work (Omnibus Transomneon), which initiates FXP transfers of files between video servers. Because this software is pretty dumb, and it normally only talks to Omneon Video servers, it will only log into FTP as anonymous. The problem I have is I have a Linux (Unbuntu 9.04) that I need this to transfer files onto. I have tried vsftp, which will accept anonymous FTP, but won't do anonymous FXP, authenticated FXP works. I tried proftpd, which will allow anonymous FXP, but bitches about the "Size command in ascii mode". Transomneon uses this to check the progress of transfers. Although the transfer is in binary mode. I tried pureftpd, which would not allow anonymous user to delete files. I gave up with wu-ftpd because I couldn't get ls to work. This has been driving me insane all day. I know what I'm trying to do is very insecure, but I'm on a private well firewalled network. Anybody got any ideas of an FTP server that will support anonymous FXP, and the size command, and allow anonymous deletes? Many Thanks Chris

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BB: Comparing notes
by Ted.Harding＠manchester.ac.uk 27 Jul '09

27 Jul '09

Greetings Folks, Probably not a Linux issue (though it could be). Anyone else having trouble logging in to their Barclays Bank online banking using their new interface (which went live this morning)? On the machine which I've usually used for this (somewhat slow, smallish RAM), which has always worked OK in the past, with the new interface my browser (Firefox) is completely choked and goes bananas. I then used another machine (faster, more RAM) and didn't get that trouble (Browser = Iceweasel); but even so had to try a few times before their system would recognise my details ("didn't match our records"). When I phoned up their helpline, I was finally "talked through" a login. What I was told to enter for URL was A: www.ibank.barclays.co.uk and this led to a successful login. What I usually use is B: https://ibank.barclays.co.uk Both lead to the same apparent page: https://ibank.barclays.co.uk/olb/m/LoginMember.do but it was B which gave the problems. I was told by the Indian lady not to use entries stored in "Favourites" (yuk) or in Bookmarks "for security reasons", but to type it in explicitly. There are some other details I could give, if it was of interest; but I'm mainly interested at the moment in whether other people have been having similar problems. Best wishes to all, Ted. -------------------------------------------------------------------- E-Mail: (Ted Harding) <Ted.Harding(a)manchester.ac.uk> Fax-to-email: +44 (0)870 094 0861 Date: 24-Jul-09 Time: 09:45:54 ------------------------------ XFMail ------------------------------

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Dual Booting OSX & Ubuntu
by Simon Royal 25 Jul '09

25 Jul '09

Hi I am a Mac user who currently has a PowerBook G4 which I want to dual boot OSX and Ubuntu on. Is there any on the group that has done this? I really don't want to mess my current Mac OSX Leopard installation up, but luckily I do triple boot at the mo between OSX Leopard, OSX Tiger and OS9 all on separate partitions. So if I could I would lose or use the Tiger and OS9 partitions for use in this project. I have dual booted OSX and Ubuntu a few years ago and it worked, but I can't for the life of me remember how. Simon Royal --- Visit my Mac site at http://www.simonroyal.co.uk. Or Skype me on 'Simon-Royal'. (Apple PowerBook G4 867Mhz, 1GB RAM, 80GB HD, SuperDrive. Mac OSX 10.5, 10.4 & 9.2.2...)

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DVD-RW drive refuses to read CD-R disks
by Srdjan Todorovic 25 Jul '09

25 Jul '09

Hi everyone, I'm perplexed - I've got a DVD+RW drive that refuses to read CD-Rs and other CDs, but these disks can be read in my laptop's DVD+RW drive. Manually mounting such CDs gives me: mount: No medium found I know I can read some factory-pressed CD such as the EF2000 CD (lovely game). My drive is: LG HL-DT-STDVD-RAM GSA-H55N and was purchased in very early 2008 I believe. Laptop drive is: HL-DT-ST DVDRAM GSA-T40N (Which I believe is also an LG) Is this likely to be a hardware fault and I have to buy a new drive? Thanks Srdjan

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Re: [ALUG] appalling service from 1and1
by James Elsey 23 Jul '09

23 Jul '09

I've been using 1and1 for about 3 years now and must admit I haven't had any issues with their service. They had an outage with their servers but after a quick and friendly phone call my sites were back up within the hour But then again, I haven't tried moving any domains/packages etc J -----Original Message----- From: main-bounces(a)lists.alug.org.uk [mailto:main-bounces@lists.alug.org.uk] On Behalf Of mick Sent: 22 July 2009 19:48 To: Steve Fosdick Cc: main(a)lists.alug.org.uk Subject: Re: [ALUG] appalling service from 1and1 On Wed, 22 Jul 2009 15:45:59 +0100 Steve Fosdick <lists(a)pelvoux.nildram.co.uk> allegedly wrote: > On 21/07/2009 22:16:40, mick wrote: > > > I also had some feedback from MJ Ray that 1and1 (my main provider of > > DNS management, mail and blog) could be difficult. I'd never had > > much problem with them, except for their habit of "forgetting" to > > tell me that they had improved their packages when prices changed, > > so thought no more. > > Do I take it you mean they have reduced the price of the package to > new customers but forget to tell you and continue to charge the > higher price? Yes - but slightly more subtle than that. They introduced a "new" package which offered better services (more mailboxes, more webspace, more traffic) at a slightly lower charge. I was not offered the new service. When I noticed the new services (from a magazine ad as I recall) I contacted them and was the told that I had to cancel my existing package and move to the new one. Mick --------------------------------------------------------------------- The text file for RFC 854 contains exactly 854 lines. Do you think there is any cosmic significance in this? Douglas E Comer - Internetworking with TCP/IP Volume 1 http://www.ietf.org/rfc/rfc854.txt --------------------------------------------------------------------- __________ Information from ESET NOD32 Antivirus, version of virus signature database 4267 (20090722) __________ The message was checked by ESET NOD32 Antivirus. http://www.eset.com __________ Information from ESET NOD32 Antivirus, version of virus signature database 4267 (20090722) __________ The message was checked by ESET NOD32 Antivirus. http://www.eset.com

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appalling service from 1and1
by mick 22 Jul '09

22 Jul '09

Some while ago I sought the list's advice on good commercial hosting services (full root access, with as few restrictions as possible). I had a few recommendations and eventually settled on a VPS from bytemark as offering just what I needed. (As an aside, I also now have a VPS from rapidswitch which is also excellent value - and gives a bigger monthly bandwidth allowance that bytemark). I also had some feedback from MJ Ray that 1and1 (my main provider of DNS management, mail and blog) could be difficult. I'd never had much problem with them, except for their habit of "forgetting" to tell me that they had improved their packages when prices changed, so thought no more. But, I have recently had cause to complain, and loudly. I have tried to move one of my domains (I have several with them) to bytemark so that I can have greater control. The process is unnecessarily complex (and for a naive customer would probably be impossible) but the worst part is that having unlocked the domain at their end and posted it as "pending transfer", they now refuse to answer any DNS queries despite still being authoritative for that domain. That domain has fallen off the edge of a cliff and may as well not exist. Their reponse to my complaint so far is "thank you for your patience". Guess who loses my business. Mick --------------------------------------------------------------------- The text file for RFC 854 contains exactly 854 lines. Do you think there is any cosmic significance in this? Douglas E Comer - Internetworking with TCP/IP Volume 1 http://www.ietf.org/rfc/rfc854.txt ---------------------------------------------------------------------

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