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Weekly IRC reminder
by Brett Parker 23 Jan '06

23 Jan '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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Ubuntu
by Simon Royal 22 Jan '06

22 Jan '06

Hi I have been running a Ubuntu live CD on a G3 iBook and quite liked it, its the best Linux distro I have encountered. Has anyone any experience with it. I want to buy a laptop to run it on and wondered if anyone had it running on a lo-spec machine as I am short on cash so need to find cheap laptop to run it on. I wondered if anyone has wireless experience in Ubuntu as I have a 802.11g wireless network and what machines they have been run on. Regards Simon Royal >- The box said Windows 2000 or better, so I bought a Mac

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Re: Ubuntu
by Simon 22 Jan '06

22 Jan '06

Hey, Yeah, Ubuntu rocks. It's the distro that got me into Linux 100% and I love it! If you want to run it on a low-spec machine, forget Gnome, for a start. You want to install XFCE, it's easy-- do the following; sudo apt-get install xubuntu-desktop Logout, and click "Sessions" on gdm. Choose XFCE and log back in. The xubuntu-desktop is just a meta package which tells Ubuntu what packages it needs to download for XFCE. Other low-resorce desktops include fluxbox and IceWM. Check them out on Google.. If you look around on the Ubuntu Forums there's a number of threads in the Customisation and Tips section which show you how to fine-tune Ubuntu. For example, disabling unwanted services makes the machine boot quicker. I've not timed mine recently but it doesn't take long at all after disabling stuff like the dialup adapter, the bluetooth module (don't have bluetooth) etc etc. http://ubuntuforums.org/ My laptop has built-in wireless 802.11g and I use it with Ubuntu all the time when I'm at home. Using a prog called "network-manager", apt-get install that for better use. It "just works"(tm).. Never had a problem with it. :) As for cheap laptops, I can't recommend Novatech highly enough. http://www.sionide.net/index.php?page=hardware That's my laptop. It was £609 but they do them much much cheaper than that. See http://www.novatech.co.uk/ -Simon Elliott ps. If you want a set of Ubuntu 5.10 Breezy Badger CDs for PPC, let me know - I have loads.. > Message: 1 > Date: Sat, 21 Jan 2006 21:23:40 +0000 > From: Simon Royal <s.royal(a)totalise.co.uk> > Subject: [ALUG] Ubuntu > To: main(a)lists.alug.org.uk > Message-ID: <736C81D6-59D7-447F-A5EE-F5F9EB57FF5A(a)totalise.co.uk> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII; delsp=yes; format=flowed > > Hi > > I have been running a Ubuntu live CD on a G3 iBook and quite liked > it, its the best Linux distro I have encountered. Has anyone any > experience with it. > > I want to buy a laptop to run it on and wondered if anyone had it > running on a lo-spec machine as I am short on cash so need to find > cheap laptop to run it on. > > I wondered if anyone has wireless experience in Ubuntu as I have a > 802.11g wireless network and what machines they have been run on. > > > Regards > Simon Royal > > >- The box said Windows 2000 or better, so I bought a Mac >

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Antique computer parts: PCI ethernet cards and 5.25 inch disk drives
by Jan T. Kim 19 Jan '06

19 Jan '06

Dear group, in a cardboard box, we've found * two PCI ethernet cards (different models, a large one with a 3Com chip on it and three different sockets, and a much smaller one with just an RJ45 socket * two 5.25 inch disk drives If any of you is interested in these pieces, please send me an email. I'd like to get rid of them all at once. It's pretty clear to me that these things won't have any value unless you happen to have some rather old computer system, e.g. out of historical interest or the like. This email is just an attempt to wrest some final use out of these things before they're scrapped. Best regards, Jan -- +- Jan T. Kim -------------------------------------------------------+ | email: jtk(a)cmp.uea.ac.uk | | WWW: http://www.cmp.uea.ac.uk/people/jtk | *-----=< hierarchical systems are for files, not for humans >=-----*

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RE: [ALUG] apt-get question
by Keith Watson 19 Jan '06

19 Jan '06

> From: Owen Synge Sent: 14 January 2006 10:36 > > #!/bin/sh > # clone debian system > # References http://www.inittab.de/manuals/debootstrap.html > # http://66.102.9.104/search?q=cache:XStg8MdXobEJ:hacking.dk/talks/debian/tip… > # > # > TARGET_DIR=/mnt/hda9/ford_image > DEBIAN_MIRROR_HOST=192.168.0.12 > DEBIAN_MIRROR_PORT=9999 > > DEBIAN_APT_SOURCES=sources.list > DEBIAN_APT_INTERFACES=autoinstaller.etc.network.interfaces > DEBIAN_FSTAB=autoinstaller.etc.fstab > debootstrap sarge $TARGET_DIR > http://${DEBIAN_MIRROR_HOST}:${DEBIAN_MIRROR_PORT}/main > dpkg --get-selections > ${TARGET_DIR}/autoinstall_dpkg.db > debconf-get-selections > ${TARGET_DIR}/autoinstall_debconf.db > cp ${DEBIAN_APT_SOURCES} ${TARGET_DIR}/etc/apt/sources.list > cp ${DEBIAN_APT_INTERFACES} ${TARGET_DIR}/etc/network/interfaces > cp ${DEBIAN_FSTAB} ${TARGET_DIR}/etc/fstab chroot > ${TARGET_DIR} apt-get update > > #base-config > > > #Man kan bruge sin backup med følgende kommandoer: > > debconf-set-selections < ${TARGET_DIR}/autoinstall_debconf.db > dpkg --set-selections < ${TARGET_DIR}/autoinstall_dpkg.db > apt-get dselect-upgrade apt-get -u dist-upgrade > Cheers Owen, interesting use of debconf (now where's my Danish/English dictionary :o) ) Regards, Keith ____________ 'The people who get on in this world are the people who get up and look for the circumstances they want, - and, if they can't find them, make them.' - - George Bernard Shaw

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WAN/LAN IP routing/spoofing question
by Chris Green 18 Jan '06

18 Jan '06

My Zyxel router can limit access to its web configuration menu in various ways, i.e. it can be:- From LAN only, from WAN only or from anywhere From any IP address or from a single specified IP address The trouble is that I'd like to be able to configure it when I'm at home, that means "from LAN only, any IP address" *and* from work which means "from WAN only, specified IP address". The options are exclusive so I can't have both together. Can anyone suggest a way I can either:- Make my home machine's browser look like it's connecting from an outside IP address? or:- Make it look like a connection from work is coming from within my home LAN? I suspect the second possibility above is more likely to be possible, though I don't quite see how at the moment. The router is a Zyxel 2602HW by the way. -- Chris Green (chris(a)areti.co.uk) "Never ascribe to malice that which can be explained by incompetence."

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OT: SGI IRIX MIPSpro C Compiler
by Ashley T. Howes, Ph.D. 17 Jan '06

17 Jan '06

I recently acquired a SGI Indy with IRIX 6.5 to run my old Ph.D. research on. This now works and I can run the original executables I built several years ago. However, I can't actually recompile any code, because I need an additional piece of software: MIPSpro C Compiler Given that the members of this group come from a variety of backgrounds, I was wondering if anyone out there has a license for this software they no longer require, or can supply it at a low cost. Any help would be useful. Thank-you in advance. -- Ashley

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OpenAdvantage
by Ted.Harding＠nessie.mcc.ac.uk 17 Jan '06

17 Jan '06

Hi Fenny Folks, You may be interested to study http://www.openadvantage.org and in particular http://www.openadvantage.org/about/whyfree/view which states: Why are We Free? Advantage West Midlands, the regional development agency have provided significant funding to OpenAdvantage and as a result everything on offer at our Solution Centre is free of charge. The EU is adopting a positive stance in the use of Open Source and the West Midlands is taking the lead for the UK. OpenAdvantage offer a full range of services, from consultancy, to seminars and training to enable all business's and organisations understand more, adopt and gain a business advantage from using Open Source software. EEDA anyone? Best wishes to all, Ted. -------------------------------------------------------------------- E-Mail: (Ted Harding) <Ted.Harding(a)nessie.mcc.ac.uk> Fax-to-email: +44 (0)870 094 0861 Date: 17-Jan-06 Time: 12:20:44 ------------------------------ XFMail ------------------------------

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Any better ways to merge mbox files?
by Chris Green 16 Jan '06

16 Jan '06

I have two hierarchies of mbox mail, one is the 'live' one (called Mail) and the other is the archive (called MailArchive). I want to set up a cron job such that all mail that I save in the Mail hierarchy will also be automatically merged into the MailArchive hierarchy. This then allows me to delete old mail from the Mail hierarchy safe in the knowledge that it's archived. The Mail and MailArchive hierarchies have the same basic filenames and structure so a simple 'sledgehammer' approach is to do the following:- Use 'find' to traverse the Mail hieararchy. For each mbox file run 'formail' on both the Mail and the MailArchive mbox into a temporary file Run 'formail' on the temporary file to remove duplicates and put the result in place of the MailArchive mbox. Can anyone think of a more elegant way of doing this? Actually I think I've thought of one possible improvement, I can avoid that second 'formail' by adding the remove duplicates option to the first 'formail' pass. In fact that would seem to be reasonably efficient now I come to think of it. (... and don't anyone say use Maildir, I have moved to using Maildir several times over the past few years and every time I return to mbox after a few weeks. Maildir just isn't so easy to live with, for me at least) -- Chris Green (chris(a)areti.co.uk) "Never ascribe to malice that which can be explained by incompetence."

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Introducing myself
by Luzie U. Wingen 16 Jan '06

16 Jan '06

Hello everybody, after meeting some of you last Thursday in the Reindeer I finally come around joining the mailing list. A short introduction why I am interested in Linux: I am using Linux some years now for scientific computing in the biosciences. There is quite a lot useful software around for Linux and doing analyses with help of scripts seems to be a much more sensible thing than doing millions of clicks on a Windows machine ... I have some experiences with Suse (yes, I am from Germany) and debian but now have to work on Redhat or Fedora. There may turn up questions related to that ... Luzie

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