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Weekly IRC reminder
by Brett Parker 10 Apr '06

10 Apr '06

This is the automated ALUG IRC meeting reminder sent to remind you that there is an IRC meeting tonight (Monday) at 8.00pm. Historically, these used to be the only time a lot of us would be about, now the channel has some usual faces that are there most of the time (except at silly o'clock, when we might be sleeping, or on the second thursday of the month, where we might be drinking in the Reindeer), so don't feel limited to visit during this time, come visit us when ever you feel like it! The meeting takes place on the irc server irc.alug.org.uk in the #alug channel. Most IRC clients should allow you to get there with the commands "/server irc.alug.org.uk" and "/join #alug". Popular IRC clients include xchat, irssi and EPIC on Unix, and Mirc under windows. Here are some links to help you get started with irc. Unix http://www.xchat.org/ http://www.irssi.org/ http://www.epicsol.org/ Windows http://www.mirc.com (loads of help with irc for newbies!)

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Re: ThinkPad & Wireless (Rob Grant)
by R.Grant＠uea.ac.uk 09 Apr '06

09 Apr '06

[Simon Royal wrote] > Hi > > I have decided to buy a cheap PC laptop and run Linux on it. I was > going to buy a Mac laptop - being a Mac fan, but I can get a second > hand PC laptop with higher specs cheaper than a Mac one. And as it is > going to run Linux it doesn't matter. > > I have been told IBM Thinkpads are good for Linux can anyone recommend > anything in particular? > > Also I want to buy a wireless PCMCIA card that will work on a laptop > and under Linux, any suggestions? I agree that Thinkpads are an excellent choice, both in general and for Linux in particular. For wireless, some web research told me that any card with an Atheros chipset should be supported by my distro- Kubuntu Breezy- so I ordered a 3Com Office Connect Xjack 3CRXJK10075 11g card from Amazon for just under £40. This worked out of the box beautifully. It has a retractable arial, so no awkward protrusion when not in use. Pushing the arial in also turns off power to the card. The only downside is a flashing green LED that you could use to guide in an aircraft- but a small piece of black insulation tape cures this. The card is actually easier to use in Ubuntu than in XP, which I have on the same machine as a dual boot. I think that maybe this is because installing the 3Com software was a mistake. Anyway, just getting it to connect is rather clunky. Opting for Thinkpad also means that you can take advantage of a lot of helpful stuff that others have written on the web about their experiences with linux. There are also packages written specifically for the machine to get features such as volume on-sreen display and trackpoint configuration working. The first of these is easily accessible from the Ubuntu repositories. The other requires a little fiddling with kernel patches. Trackpoint is so splendid imho, that I wouldn't buy another laptop without it. The relative 'stickyness' of its functioning in Ubuntu is one of the very few downsides compared to Windows. So even though I am probably the least technically able person on this list by a long way I'm going to try and do the kernel patching. Or at least I would if I didn't suspect that the patch will be included in the kernel that ships with Dapper. On the downside this will mean compiling driver modules for the built in winmodem again- but if I can do it anyone can. The Thinkpad I have by the way is a T22, PIII 900MHz 256MB purchased from ebay second hand for about £305 including shipping in 2004. The only upgrade I've done is to replace the 20G HD with a 60G one when it burnt out. A lovely keyboard for typing and a nice sharp display. Case has cracked near the DVD/floppy drive bay: my holding it by the front edge probably contributed to this. Now the thing is working pretty beautifully with Kubuntu. Plays most DVDs (mission-critical as I have no TV) using Mplayer, which also records audio streams like BBC, all my mp3s with Amarok, opens Word, Excel and Powerpoint files from work... if only shockwave and some decent qualitative research software were available for linux things would be perfect. By the way, if you do decide to give the 3Com card a try, make sure that you check that the precise model you go for has actually got a supported chipset like Atheros- that is why I gave the full part spec above. Best wishes, Rob

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Mandriva on Toshiba laptop
by Dave Briggs 08 Apr '06

08 Apr '06

Hi chaps I am playing around with different distros at the moment, and having got Ubuntu working on my Toshiba laptop, I soon got bored and had a go with Mandriva. I'm finding that even more boring, though, because the b*st*rd thing won't work. It either gets as far as the KDE desktop loading up, plays a little tune, then keeps playing the last note of that tune on, and on, and on... Eventually I get bored, and switch the thing off. Then, when I startup again, it only gets as far as the KDE loading screen, it says something like "restoring session" and *then* hangs. Any ideas on what might be wrong, and what I might be able to do to get things going again? Assume I know nothing, because I don't! Cheers Dave

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Re: [ALUG] Talks offered Ted Haegar from Novell and Jono Bacon
by MJ Ray 08 Apr '06

08 Apr '06

I wrote about the 20th April meeting offer: > Either way, I'll publicise it if I have final details by Tue 4th. Are there confirmed details for this talks meeting yet and do you need any help with it? Best wishes, -- MJ Ray - personal email, see http://mjr.towers.org.uk/email.html Work: http://www.ttllp.co.uk/ irc.oftc.net/slef Jabber/SIP ask

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Newbie Distros
by Simon Royal 08 Apr '06

08 Apr '06

Hi I am looking at different distros. I need high hardware compatibility, ease of use for newbies plus reasonable speed out of dated hardware. I have yet to find a laptop, but have been looking at anything from Pentium 2 300Mhz upwards. Ubuntu I have tinkered with Ubuntu 5.10 live cd on a G3 iBook 500Mhz with 386MB ram and an AMD 1.3Ghz desktop with 768MB RAM and both were ok speed wise. I know an install would speed things up anyway. OpenSUSE I have heard good things about OpenSUSE but I don't know how power hungry it is. Vector Linux Finally I was looking at Vector Linux as it is aimed to run comfortably with only 32MB RAM and under a 1gig install space, but I don't know anyone who has used it. If you could help point in the right direction for a low specced distro that runs on a laptop and is usuable on a daily basis without having to delve to much into the Linux underbelly just to get things going. Kind Regards Simon Royal ---- www.simonroyal.co.uk The box said requires Windows 2000 or better, so I bought an Apple Mac

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Cobalt RAQ4
by Mark Rogers 08 Apr '06

08 Apr '06

I have a Cobalt RAQ4 sat in front of me, which I either need to reinstall with its native OS or stick something else on it. I don;t have any particular purpose in mind for it, although as it has two network ports I'm thinking of using it as a gateway/firewall. Suggestions for an OS/distro? -- Mark Rogers More Solutions Ltd :: 0845 45 89 555

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RE: [ALUG] Re: [Fsfe-uk] Date Stamp
by John Seago 07 Apr '06

07 Apr '06

There still remains, for me at least the puzzle that unless I set Kmail to display the FULL headers of the digest messages from FSFE, the 'Long Headers' date everything from FSFE UK Thu Jan 1 00:59:59 1970. I have however carried out an experiment 'Standard Headers', 'Brief Headers' and 'Fancy Headers' don't display the date on the email, (the digest version), at all. Having changed the headers there seems to be no alteration to the date displayed in the folder. -- John Seago GNU/Linux Registered User No. #219566 () ascii ribbon campaign - against html mail /\ - against microsoft attachments

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Zero-width non-breaking space/Unicode byte-order mark
by John atkinson 07 Apr '06

07 Apr '06

I have a new computer loaded with SuSe Linux 10.When I attempt to invoke a program I have successfully used in the past for many years I get the response "cannot execute binary file". The file, (written for me years ago) forming the program has "execute" permission. I understand this means that the operating system realises this is a program, but not a standard binary program file containing machine instructions. I was told the operating system looks for an interpreter program to run it. The interpreter, not containing the expected character sequence, uses the default system interpreter and looks at the first line of the file, finds that it contains non-printable byte values and so condemns it as a binary file. My program file, as written, contains only printable characters and starts with the identifying #! /bin/sh It turns out that to the first character in the file there has been added a "Unicode byte-order mark" otherwise known, I am told, as a "zero-width non-breaking space". This by its nature is not a printable character nor a visible one. It is one, however, devilishly difficult to get rid of on a permanent basis. Following directions I tried, starting with the command "locale". The output indeed ended with "UTF8", the initial cause, I understand, of all the trouble. Again following directions I typed "LANG=en_GB" followed by "locale" again and then, using "vi" edited the file. The hated rogue character showed as three components in blue. When, using "x", I got rid of them, I thought I was on top of the problem, but the final stage which I will quote in full defeated me. This is 'Finally, edit the file $HOME /.bash_profile and insert "LANG=en_GB" or "LC_ALL=en_GB" as appropriate to prevent the problem coming back'. The computer crashed. Moreover, I have not succeeded in locating the file. I suspect I have gone about it in the wrong way. I would be grateful for the exact key strokes required to get the file into "vi". It seems strange to me that Linux, without my knowledge or my permission should insert a zero-width non-breaking space that not only prevents a program, very important to me (and, no doubt others), from working, but makes it difficult to handle the file because the first byte is not a printable character. Please forgive my abysmal standard of computer literacy. In mitigation I would point out that I have been in touch with several gurus with, it seems, a total absence of familiarity with the zero-width non-breaking space alias the Unicode byte-order mark. John Atkinson (Ancient John -- and I do not mind being called that because I now am ancient)

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HTML
by John Seago 07 Apr '06

07 Apr '06

It would appear, despite my signature lines that I have been sending HTML email, I have two installations of Slackware 10.2 and the HTML Toolbar has been turned on on one installation. and that when using that installation I have been sending HTML email's. I did think that it may have been turned on by my wife, however she has only used the browser to look up the likely implications for her chickens should Avian Flu break out. I can only apologise to any to whom this has caused inconvenience. -- John Seago GNU/Linux Registered User No. #219566 () ascii ribbon campaign - against html mail /\ - against microsoft attachments

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Re: [Fsfe-uk] Date Stamp
by John Seago 06 Apr '06

06 Apr '06

On Thursday 06 Apr 2006 12:01,MJ Ray <mjr(a)phonecoop.coop> wrote: > Is this the only list with this effect for you? Yes. > Has anyone else on fsfe-uk noticed it? I have raised it once or twice with FSFE, I have no knowledge that others have the same problem, or indeed if it is considered to be a problem. > Can ALUG help us at all? -- John Seago GNU/Linux Registered User No. #219566 () ascii ribbon campaign - against html mail /\ - against microsoft attachments

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