December 2004 - main

RE: [ALUG] Syleham Meet on 28th November
by Keith Watson 06 Jan '05

06 Jan '05

I shall definitely be going along to this (acts of God excepted!) so anyone in the Norwich area who wants a lift let me know ASAP. :) (work email keith.watson at kewill.com or private email kpwatson at ukfsn.org) Who else is coming? Anybody interested in me doing a demo of converting a Windows only box into a dual boot Windows+GNU/Linux (Debian) system using Knoppix? Let me know via the list otherwise I'll assume it's of no interest to anyone. Incidentally I've been testing this out and a basic Windows (2000) install takes just over an hour and the conversion takes 45 mins. And the Debian install has all the functionality of Knoppix (as opposed to the very basic Windows set-up). Here's what I propose; 1) boot box with Knoppix and run the install script (includes using QTParted to repartition the disk) which sets up a 2.4 and 2.6 Linux kernel based system and uses LILO as the boot loader. [and, if we have a web feed...] 2) set up a Debian sources list and use synaptic to update the software to latest versions 3) show how easy it is to maintain the GNU/Linux software on a Debian set-up by using synaptic. As there'll be some time spent waiting for things to load off CD or from the net we can talk around some of the issues. I haven't a spare printer ATM so if anyone's interested and wants to bring one along we can also have a go at setting up a printer. If there's time I'd also like to have a chat about making backups using gnu/tar as I'm playing around with putting a script together to do this and need all the help I can get :) Regards, Keith ____________ ARMOR, n. - The kind of clothing worn by a man whose tailor is a blacksmith. - Ambrose Bierce - The Devil's Dictionary

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Linux, TV cards and DVD recording
by Barry Samuels 03 Jan '05

03 Jan '05

I am thinking of getting a digital TV card for my computer so that I can record programmes for viewing later on my television using a DVD player. I already have a DVD R/W drive on my computer ( 2 x 1.3 MHz CPUs ). I'm using a 2.4 kernel and don't propose moving to 2.6 in the near future. I'm planning to use what I believe is called Terrestrial digital broadcasting and NOT satallite broadcasts. I've borrowed someone's set top box for a short time and was able to get BBC1, BBC2, BBC3, BBC4 and Channel 5. This was using an ordinary pre-channel 5 aerial so I'm hoping that a proper digital aerial will give more channels. According to freeview.co.uk I can't get any digital channels for my postcode, BBC tells me that I can get only BBC channels and dtg.org tells me I can get all of them. Ain't the web wonderful? This raises lots of questions and the more research I do the longer the list of questions seems to grow. I'm thinking of an Hauppauge WinTV-Nova-T PCI as I understand it works with Linux. Is it going to be difficult to set up? Any suggestions/ recommendations for other PCI cards? The specification for this says that it accepts UHF input only but what I want to know is can I plug my tv aerial lead into it and expect it to work? What Linux software is available/needed? I don't understand a lot of the terminology and don't know what to search for. I run Debian Sarge/ Testing. How easy/difficult is it to create DVD discs with, for example, 2 hours of recording? What about file sizes greater than 2 GB? Do I need to take the different DVD formats ( DVD-R DVD+R ) into account when using a DVD player for playback? Watching the only DVD disc I have (Life on Earth - BBC), which came with a packet of cornflakes, I see that moving objects are noticeably blurred. Is this a function of my video setup Matrox Millenium AGP. Any comments and advice would be appreciated at this stage. I feel like someone who's learning to fly for the very first time in dense fog! Barry Samuels http://www.beenthere-donethat.org.uk The Unofficial Guide to Great Britain

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Transcode tips
by Wayne Stallwood 02 Jan '05

02 Jan '05

Maybe I am not even using the right tool here...but I have a DVD (or actually a set of DVD's) to which my client holds full rights, they are unencumbered by any CSS copy control system. We have a solid state media playback system that we want to play back the DVD content from a memory card. From what I can tell from the Engrish manual that came with the media player the video format needs to be VCD (which I gather is mpeg1) Try as I might I can't get transcode to do anything but come up with cryptic error messages, first it was complaining that- [transcode] warning : (encoder.c) audio codec not supported by export module That was using the following command transcode -i vts_01_1.vob -o /home/wayne/wayne.mpg -x mpeg2 -y mpeg2enc -F vcd Now I am not bothered about audio for this task....so I tried transcode -i vts_01_1.vob -o /home/wayne/wayne.mpg -x mpeg2,null -y mpeg2enc,null -F vcd Which gives me the following output at the bottom of this message. Anybody able to point me at a readable howto or tell me what I am doing wrong..I am sure it shouldn't be this hard. transcode v0.6.12 (C) 2001-2003 Thomas Oestreich, 2003-2004 T. Bitterberg [transcode] (probe) suggested AV correction -D 0 (0 ms) | AV 0 ms | 0 ms [transcode] auto-probing source vts_01_1.vob (ok) [transcode] V: import format | MPEG-2 (V=mpeg2|A=null) [transcode] V: AV demux/sync | (1) sync AV at initial MPEG sequence [transcode] V: import frame | 720x576 1.25:1 encoded @ 4:3 [transcode] V: bits/pixel | 0.174 [transcode] V: decoding fps,frc | 25.000,3 [transcode] A: import format | 0x10001 LPCM [48000,16,2] 1536 kbps [transcode] A: export | disabled [transcode] V: encoding fps,frc | 25.000,3 [transcode] A: bytes per frame | 7680 (7680.000000) [transcode] A: adjustment | 0@1000 [transcode] V: video buffer | 10 @ 720x576 [import_null.so] v0.2.0 (2002-01-19) (video) null | (audio) null [import_mpeg2.so] v0.4.0 (2003-10-02) (video) MPEG2 [export_null.so] v0.1.2 (2001-08-17) (video) null | (audio) null [export_mpeg2enc.so] v1.1.10 (2003-10-30) (video) MPEG 1/2 [import_mpeg2.so] tcextract -x mpeg2 -i "vts_01_1.vob" -d 0 | tcdecode -x mpeg2-d 0 [export_mpeg2enc.so] *** init-v *** ! [export_mpeg2enc.so] cmd=mpeg2enc -v 0 -I 0 -q 3 -f 0 -4 2 -2 3 -b 1800 -F 3 -np -a 2 -o "/home/wayne/wayne.mpg.m1v" sh: line 1: mpeg2enc: command not found wayne@linux:/media/dvd/video_ts>

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RE: [ALUG] Christmas Meal
by Elisabeth 02 Jan '05

02 Jan '05

>===== Original Message From Anthony Anson <tony.anson(a)zetnet.co.uk> ===== >from Brett Parker: > >> Of course, the other thing that now needs organizing (not one of alugs >> strong points at the moment ;) is how the hell we all get there, but >> that's not such a big problem :) > >That's reassuring - I thought it was. And getting home again an even >bigger one. Only if you can't stagger to one of the cars. e

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Debian and large hard drives
by tom potts 31 Dec '04

31 Dec '04

It sounds as if you've got a version with an old 137G disk limit. At a rough guess I would suggest you partition and possibly (minimum) install of mandrake so you can check for any usefull settings. You should then be able to install debian in its place and then re-compile the kernel with >137G support - check its available first. Then the NTFS partition should become visible and mountable (readonly) under Linux. If you wish to 'communicate' Linux<->XP you may wish to consider a smaller Win32 type partition which can be mounted under Debian and XP then you could just partition the hard drive and then stick debian on it and ignore the fact it cant read 137G+ of bug ridden code which sounds like a blessing to me! Happy new day counter overflow error! ___________________________________________________________ ALL-NEW Yahoo! Messenger - all new features - even more fun! http://uk.messenger.yahoo.com

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Re: [ALUG] Debian and large hard drives
by adam＠thebowery.co.uk 31 Dec '04

31 Dec '04

On Fri, Dec 31, 2004 at 11:52:58AM +0000, Chris Walker wrote: > On Fri 31 Dec, tom potts wrote: > > > > It sounds as if you've got a version with an old 137G > > disk limit. > > But it's virtually the latest version on the site. We found a patched kernel > which somebody had posted but my son wasn't keen on using that as it would > have been out of step with everything else. I just had another thought, you are trying to install using a 2.4 series kernel and not a 2.2 series kernel? (I /think/ that the default for 3.0 was still a 2.2 kernel and you needed to tell it at boot time to use a 2.4 series kernel) Oh, and after a bit more digging, are you installing Windows XP SP1 (or SP2) as they both support disks larger than 137 Gigs, plain old Windows XP doesn't support 137GB disks until you apply a service pack. Adam -- jabberid = quinophex(a)jabber.earth.li AFFS || http://www.affs.org.uk/ || Not a filesystem

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Re: [ALUG] Debian and large hard drives
by adam＠thebowery.co.uk 31 Dec '04

31 Dec '04

On Fri, Dec 31, 2004 at 12:54:18PM +0000, Chris Walker wrote: > > It could be that the BIOS on the machine doesn't know about large disks > > (i.e. greater than 137G) try looking for a BIOS update for the machine, > > as if the Debian installer is going by the size reported by the BIOS > > then you will see a problem. I would expect once you have the machine > > installed it will work fine as the kernel will talk direct to the IDE > > controller rather than look at geometry via the BIOS. > > But Windows sees the large capacity now as does NetBSD. So why doesn't > Debian? As a guess, the Debian installer/partitioner is going by the size reported by the BIOS, NetBSD and Windows are going by what the disk and controller say. I could be wrong as I havn't bothered to google it up, its just a suggestion :) Adam -- jabberid = quinophex(a)jabber.earth.li AFFS || http://www.affs.org.uk/ || Not a filesystem

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Re: [ALUG] Debian and large hard drives
by adam＠thebowery.co.uk 31 Dec '04

31 Dec '04

On Thu, Dec 30, 2004 at 09:27:14PM +0000, Chris Walker wrote: > I think he'd still like Debian though and on the large drive. He's currently > contemplating installing it on a smaller i.e. less than 137 GB drive which is > also in the machine but currently used. > > What does he need to do to an install on the large drive? He doesn't live in > this part of the world and isn't an ALUG subscriber so I'll have to be the go > between. It could be that the BIOS on the machine doesn't know about large disks (i.e. greater than 137G) try looking for a BIOS update for the machine, as if the Debian installer is going by the size reported by the BIOS then you will see a problem. I would expect once you have the machine installed it will work fine as the kernel will talk direct to the IDE controller rather than look at geometry via the BIOS. Adam -- jabberid = quinophex(a)jabber.earth.li AFFS || http://www.affs.org.uk/ || Not a filesystem

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Christmas Meal
by Wayne Stallwood 30 Dec '04

30 Dec '04

Have we got a firm date for the Christmas meal yet ? I remember there being some discussion about the 7th or the 14th of Jan and I think we have established Buckinghamshire Arms as the venue (or was that just a suggestion that has stuck in my mind) My head is still clearing after the Seasonal Event of Overconsumption and I want to get my social calendar in shape before the Predicted Post New Year's Eve Blackout (currently scheduled to last until at least Jan the 5th)

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'locate', does anyone find it useful?
by Chris Green 29 Dec '04

29 Dec '04

I tend always to use find when looking for files but recently discovered 'locate'. However the 'locate' way of doing things strikes me a not very useful as it searches for the string you give it in every part of the filename which, in general, gives far too many hits. E.g. if I do "locate organ" in the hope of finding some file containing organ music I get thousands of hits with 'Korganizer' etc. in. I also tried "locate -r '^organ" but that found nothing (which is also wrong). "find / -name 'organ*'" does what I want (if slowly), is there any way of doing the same search with locate? -- Chris Green (chris(a)areti.co.uk) "Never ascribe to malice that which can be explained by incompetence."

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