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10368 discussions

Software patents, and a petition
by Ted.Harding＠manchester.ac.uk 12 Jan '10

12 Jan '10

Hi Folks, ComputerWorldUK have an article describing the resurrection of the European Software Patents issue: http://www.computerworlduk.com/toolbox/open- source/blogs/index.cfm?entryid=2721&blogid=14 There is a link therein to a petition, which you may wish to consider signing. Best wishes to all, Ted. -------------------------------------------------------------------- E-Mail: (Ted Harding) <Ted.Harding(a)manchester.ac.uk> Fax-to-email: +44 (0)870 094 0861 Date: 09-Jan-10 Time: 07:19:28 ------------------------------ XFMail ------------------------------

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Programs that use dbus appear not to work as remote X clients
by Chris G 12 Jan '10

12 Jan '10

I have been trying to use Gnome Planner running as an X remote client application running on another computer on the LAN. I.e. I am logging into another computer using ssh from a terminal window on my desktop (using 'ssh -X <remote> so X is allowed and DISPLAY is set) and then entering 'planner' at the command prompt. It's totally broken as far as I can see, planner tries to connect to a local (i.e. on the remote system) dbus which isn't there because the X session it needs to talk to is on my desktop computer. The symptoms in planner are a huge delay starting up, a failure to find saved data and a wierd pop-up error box when it finally appears on the screen. I also tried running yelp as a remote X client and it too failed miserably with a load of similar dbus errors:- (yelp:2860): Yelp-WARNING **: Cannot find dbus bus GConf Error: Failed to contact configuration server; some possible causes are that you need to enable TCP/IP networking for ORBit, or you have stale NFS locks due to a system crash. See http://projects.gnome.org/gconf/ for information. (Details - 1: Failed to get connection to session: Failed to connect to socket /tmp/dbus-nrMIzFk9Y7: Connection refused) GConf Error: Failed to contact configuration server; some possible causes are that you need to enable TCP/IP networking for ORBit, or you have stale NFS locks due to a system crash. See http://projects.gnome.org/gconf/ for information. (Details - 1: Failed to get connection to session: Failed to connect to socket /tmp/dbus-JTLaNQBBPo: Connection refused) (yelp:2860): Yelp-WARNING **: Failed to load config file: No such file or directory ** (yelp:2860): CRITICAL **: atk_object_set_name: assertion `name != NULL' failed ** (yelp:2860): CRITICAL **: atk_object_set_name: assertion `name != NULL' failed (yelp:2860): Yelp-WARNING **: An error occurred getting the gconf value /apps/yelp/use_system_fonts: Failed to contact configuration server; some possible causes are that you need to enable TCP/IP networking for ORBit, or you have stale NFS locks due to a system crash. See http://projects.gnome.org/gconf/ for information. (Details - 1: Failed to get connection to session: Failed to connect to socket /tmp/dbus-4gA9VDJgu5: Connection refused) (yelp:2860): Yelp-WARNING **: An error occurred getting the gconf value '/apps/yelp/variable_font' ... plus loads more in similar vein. Other remote X client applications (which, presumably don't attempt to use dbus) work perfectly OK. I even have synaptic installed on the (headless) remote system and run it on my desktop to do upgrades to the remote system (I usually use apt-get but sometimes synaptic is easier). So am I missing something or is the whole dbus thing completely broken if you're trying to use X in the classic way with remote applications? I've done a few Google searches and didn't find anything very obvious about this so *maybe* there is something vital I'm missing, or maybe no one now uses remote X (at least not with Gnome). -- Chris Green

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New list member
by Mark Wilson 12 Jan '10

12 Jan '10

Hi all, Just thought I'd introduce myself. I've been subscribed to this list quite a while but this is my first post. I'm a Norwich resident who has been using Linux for probably 3-4 years now. I'm into programming (C++, Java) as an amateur hobbyist. Mark Wilson

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Re: [ALUG] MP4 To MP3 Converter Ubuntu
by Srdjan Todorovic 12 Jan '10

12 Jan '10

Hi, 2010/1/12 Simon Royal <simonroyal(a)live.co.uk>: > Hi > Tried the command you said. First I had to sudo apt-get mplayer, which all > went fine. > However when I run the line you gave me (replacing the filename of course), > I get: > Unknown option on the command line: -aoc > Error parsing option on the command line: -aoc > Any ideas? Yes I think my memory is at fault (though I think mplayer devs changed the syntax of the command line options lately). It should have been -ao pcm:file=somefile.wav Srdjan > --- Catch me on Twitter: http://twitter.com/SimonRoyal or Skype: Simon-Royal > > > >> Date: Tue, 12 Jan 2010 15:56:41 +0000 >> From: todorovic.s(a)googlemail.com >> To: main(a)lists.alug.org.uk >> Subject: Re: [ALUG] MP4 To MP3 Converter Ubuntu >> >> On 12/01/2010, Simon Royal <simonroyal(a)live.co.uk> wrote: >> >> > Can anyone recommend a program that will extra audio from an MP4 video >> > file >> > and either convert it to MP3 straight or at least extract to AIFF or >> > WAV? >> > Im running 9.10. >> >> Off the top of my head, something like this should work: >> >> mplayer cool_video.mp4 -vo null -vc dummy -aoc pcm:file=myoutput.wav >> >> You could also use -aoc mp3lame or -aoc lavc to encode straight to mp3 >> but I can't remember the syntax for it right now. >> >> Srdjan >> >> _______________________________________________ >> main(a)lists.alug.org.uk >> http://www.alug.org.uk/ >> http://lists.alug.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/main >> Unsubscribe? See message headers or the web site above! > > ________________________________ > Do you have a story that started on Hotmail? Tell us now

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MP4 To MP3 Converter Ubuntu
by Simon Royal 12 Jan '10

12 Jan '10

Hi. Im fairly new to Ubuntu, been running it for a few weeks now solid and loving it. Can anyone recommend a program that will extra audio from an MP4 video file and either convert it to MP3 straight or at least extract to AIFF or WAV? Im running 9.10. Simon Royal --- Catch me on Twitter: http://twitter.com/SimonRoyal or Skype: Simon-Royal _________________________________________________________________ We want to hear all your funny, exciting and crazy Hotmail stories. Tell us now http://clk.atdmt.com/UKM/go/195013117/direct/01/

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Forwarding Desktop Ports
by Paul Grenyer 11 Jan '10

11 Jan '10

Hi all I've VritualBox running a Win 2003 Server on my 64bit Ubuntu 9.10 desktop installation. And that in turn is running Microsoft SQL Server. I can access SQL server from my ubuntu desktop as http://win2003server:1433. But I want to be able to access it is http://localhost:1433, as if it was actually running on ubuntu. So what I want to know is, is there a way to forward all localhost:1433 traffic automatically to win2003server:1433? Is there a better solution? -- Thanks Paul Paul Grenyer e: paul.grenyer(a)gmail.com b: paulgrenyer.blogspot.com

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AVI & WMV from Linux don't play on Windows
by Ted.Harding＠manchester.ac.uk 11 Jan '10

11 Jan '10

Hi Folks, I'd be most grateful for help with the foloowing puzzle. Background: I VHS-taped an item from yesterday evening's BBC1 "Look East", since it is of interest to people I know. I then copied this onto a "scratch" DVD, to have it readable on my Debian laptop (OK, I know it can probably be done with a cable, but I'm not up to that). I wanted to put it up on my Zen web-site so that others can view it from there (and they will mostly be using WIndows). So I first created an AVI file usingmencoder as follows (following an example in 'man mplayer'): mencoder dvd://1 \ -o denvermilllookeast2010.01.05.avi \ -oac copy \ -ovc lavc \ -lavcopts vcodec=mpeg4 The resulting .avi file plays fine using totem. I then ftp'd it to my website, and tried playing it from there using IE on Windows Vista. It failed, saying a codec was missing. However, the file on the website still plays fine on Debian with totem. So I then created a WMV file using "wmv2" format with: mencoder dvd://1 \ -o Denver.wmv \ -oac copy \ -ovc lavc \ -lavcopts vcodec=wmv2 Then I uploaded this one as well. Once again, this played fine in totem both from the file on the Debian laptop and from the copy on the web-site. This time, when I try IE from Vista on the web-site copy, I get the video OK, but no sound. So I'm wondering what the problem is, and how to solve it! In the past, I've had no problems with playing AVI files created by my digital camera using IE (video and sound both OK), though I haven't tried WMV before. So presumably there's some mysterious mismatch between the AVI created by mencoder as above, and AVI as Windows MediaPlayer expects to see it; ditto with WMV. The files in question can be found at http://www.zen89632.zen.co.uk/DenverMill AVI: denvermilllookeast2010.01.05.avi WMV: Denver.wmv and an example of a working AVI (both in totem and IE) at http://www.zen89632.zen.co.uk/Earith/Earith_Crab_2009.10.25.avi As well as the video, there is background noise from the water falling over the sluice, and from passing traffic, which comes through quite clearly both in totem and in IE. For anyone interested: this is probably a Mitten Crab which has found its way some 30 miles upstream from the sea, spotted by me when I was strolling over the bridge above the sluice-gate on the Old Bedford River at Earith, in the shallow water above the concrete sill below the sluice-gate. A still photo is at http://www.zen89632.zen.co.uk/Earith/Earith_Crab_2009.10.25cropped.jpg The location of the photo is marked "A" on: http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&source=s_d&saddr=52.353953,0.038109& daddr=&hl=en&geocode=&mra=mi&mrsp=0&sz=15&sll=52.353901,0.038023& sspn=0.011586,0.034719&ie=UTF8&z=15 [equivalent: http://tinyurl.com/yb57epr ] Any comments on the problem would be most welcome! With thanks, Ted. -------------------------------------------------------------------- E-Mail: (Ted Harding) <Ted.Harding(a)manchester.ac.uk> Fax-to-email: +44 (0)870 094 0861 Date: 06-Jan-10 Time: 21:38:51 ------------------------------ XFMail ------------------------------

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Wanted, sort of Journal/Blog/Calendar/ToDo all in one, probably web based
by Chris G 10 Jan '10

10 Jan '10

Yes, I know that's a bit of a broad requirement! :-) I'm after an application of some sort that will help me keep track of what I suppose is a project (buying a boat in France). I'm open to any sort of idea really as, at the moment, I'm a bit lost as to how to do it. Straightforward calendar applications don't quite cut it as I want it to be a bit more 'textful' than that, I also want easy ways to link to web pages and other information. I might be persuaded that something like Sunbird/Lightning or evolution is the way to go though. Can one put links into sunbird entries? A blog *might* do what I want but I need easy ways to search and/or browse through entries by date and a way to remind myself to do things. I don't think blogs usually allow one to create future entries and or planning sections do they? I suppose a project planning utility might be what I'm after but they often seem a bit too much oriented towards large multi-person projects. I will go and do some looking on this front though as it isn't a way I've thought of going before. -- Chris Green

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Error writing to /sys
by Richard Lewis 09 Jan '10

09 Jan '10

Hi ALUG, I'm just trying to replace acerfand <http://www.electronpusher.org/~rachel/acerfand> with acerhdf <http://www.piie.net/index.php?section=acerhdf> on my Acer Aspire One. The module comes with my kernel (Debian 2.6.31-1-686), is loaded, and reports the current temperature correctly. However, I can't enable the automatic fan control because, when I try and write "enabled" to /sys/class/thermal/thermal_zone0/mode it says "Permission denied": $ sudo echo "enabled" -n >/sys/class/thermal/thermal_zone0/mode bash: /sys/class/thermal/thermal_zone0/mode: Permission denied Or, # echo "enabled" -n > /sys/class/thermal/thermal_zone0/mode bash: echo: write error: Invalid argument I even tried switching to runlevel 1 and I still get the "Invalid argument" error. Any ideas why I can't write to this file? Or how to make it work? Best, Richard -- -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Richard Lewis ISMS, Computing Goldsmiths, University of London Tel: +44 (0)20 7078 5134 Skype: richardjlewis JID: ironchicken(a)jabber.earth.li http://www.richard-lewis.me.uk/ -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- +----------------------------------------------+ | Support open access to scholarship | | http://freeculture.org/ http://www.doaj.org/ | +----------------------------------------------+

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Re: [ALUG] Weird rendering of website!
by Anthony Anson 09 Jan '10

09 Jan '10

Anthony Anson wrote: > Chris G wrote: >> On Fri, Jan 08, 2010 at 01:28:11PM -0000, Ted Harding wrote: >>> Hi Folks, >>> Still following up one of my current side-interests, I visited the >>> website >>> >>> http://www.denvermill.co.uk >>> >>> using Iceweasel on Debian Etch. Hopeless rendering of text (massive >>> vertical expansion), much of the page simply missing, and hardly >>> any of the links apparently active and none of them working. >>> >>> On the other hand, if I view it in Windows Internet Explorer then >>> it all seems to work perfectly. >>> >>> What might be the explanation for this difference? >>> >> Looking at the source:- >> >> <meta name="GENERATOR" content="Microsoft FrontPage 6.0"> >> >> This, plus a total lack of testing, would explain a lot! :-) >> >> Not to mention how does a fairly simple page require such a *huge* >> amount of junk to generate it? Very good question - and I have to wonder what it sends back to M$... Seems to work (FSVO work) OK in Firefox, though. Site written by a complete bloat-happy numpty: all those graphics on the main page... -- Tony Anson www.girolle.co.uk/

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