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Gnome configuration
by Dan Hatton 29 Nov '07

29 Nov '07

Dear All, I decided to have a play with Gnome (usually an FVWM user.) I managed to get a nice user-friendly desktop by doing ln -s /home/username /home/username/Desktop/username and creating a .xsession file that said #!/usr/bin/tcsh /usr/bin/gnome-panel & /usr/bin/gnome-wm But when the session's finished with, hitting the "Log out" option in the system menu only seems to close the gnome-panel, not actually to end the X session. I suspect that this is because I'm starting gnome-panel the "wrong" way. Any ideas, please? -- Thanks, Dan Hatton

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Multiple MySQl MySQL replication (on Debian/Ubuntu)
by Mark Rogers 27 Nov '07

27 Nov '07

Has anyone here played with database replication using MySQL on Debian/Ubuntu? What I have is a database server running a few dozen databases, of which a handful I need to replicate at the customer's premises. That is, for sake of argument, 20 databases on the server, 5 of which need individually replicating to 5 customer offices. Last time I looked at this there were two options, described below for those who care. My problem is that both require me to run multiple database instances and every time I've tried to make MySQL do that from a Debian/Ubuntu binary installation I've failed. Does anyone here have any experience in that area? (I had no joy at all from the MySQL forums last time I went through this; the Debian builds seemed of little interest to MySQL devs.) ---- Option 1. Tell MySQL to create a binary log, with logging enabled on the 5 databases. Run 5 additional database instances using the blackhole database engine, which replicate one database each from the master binary log and use it to create their own logs. Set up MySQL at each customer site to replicate from their respective blackhole database instance. [Background: MySQL can (or could?) only log to a single binary file, so this messing around is required to split the logs out; each blackhole database instance receives the data for all 5 logged databases but ignores everything except that for its own database, which it then logs. The customer's server replicates against that. Otherwise the customer's server has to pull the data for all 5 databases to ignore 4 of them, a bandwidth hog and (more importantly) security flaw. The blackhole database engine simply dumps all data to /dev/null (ie it stores nothing) but in the process maintains the logs correctly.] Option 2. Remove the 5 databases in question from the main MySQL instance, and create new 5 MySQL instances (one for each database that needs logging). Let each separately create binary logs; client databases replicate from them as above. In my opinion both options are poor fixes for what ought to be a trivial change to the master to make it log to separate databases, but my opinions don't often count for much :-) -- 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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Cambridge and East Anglia Python Users Group
by Richard Lewis 27 Nov '07

27 Nov '07

Dear ALUG, The second meeting of the Cambridge and East Anglia Python Users Group will be held on Tuesday 4th December at 20:00 in the Calrton Arms (Carlton Way, Cambridge). There are a few agenda items this time * when pub meetings are * whether we want to join O'Reilly's discount scheme * some discussion about how we might organise talks (particularly where) Feel free to mail me on- or off-list regarding this if you like. Cheers, Richard -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Richard Lewis - UEA, MUS PG http://www.richard-lewis.me.uk/ JID: ironchicken(a)jabber.earth.li -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- http://www.thecarltonarms.co.uk/ http://groups.google.com/group/campug http://www.pyconuk.org/community/Cambridge_and_East_of_England

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Re: [ALUG] BT Home Hub, port forwarding
by samwise 25 Nov '07

25 Nov '07

On 25/11/2007, Greg Thomas <Greg(a)thethomashome.co.uk> wrote: > Well, armed with the knowledge that it can work, I unconfigured the > existing set up, and then reconfigured it again.This time, it worked! > Go figure; probably finger trouble with the set up in the first place. > > FWIW, I've had no issues with the HH since one of the early software > updates; it's stable, reliable, gives me a good enough connection > speed, and (generally) required very little thought from me. Yep, that's what it was designed for. I have discovered one bug - if you change your LAN network to be something other than the default 192.168.0.0, the firewall port forwarding rules won't work. No idea how to report it, tho ... Peter.

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BT Home Hub, port forwarding
by Greg Thomas 25 Nov '07

25 Nov '07

[This is not strictly Linux, but I guess it's the sort of thing a number of people on -list may have played with] I was playing with the port forwarding on my BTHH the other day, and noticed something odd. If I forward port 80 from the internet to my Linux box running Apache, when I visit whatever non-RIPE address the HH has at that time (from inside the NAT range), it still presents the HH admin interface, not the Apache files - i.e. the calls aren't being forwarded. Is there a way around this other than running on a port other than 80? Anyone know if it works from the internet proper (still waiting for my BT FON to be enabled)? TIA, Greg

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Re: [ALUG] Openwrt/dd-wrt/x-wrt
by mbm 25 Nov '07

25 Nov '07

Don't you just /love/ flame wars? (and my two penn'orth. None of the wrt applications could really be said to be suitable for newbies. Think about how they have to be acquired. Most ADSL users either use the router supplied by their provider, or (a smaller number) they will use a router bought at PC World. The kind of user who is prepared to install openwrt tends not to be at the newbie end of the spectrum). Mick

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sane-find-scanner finds my scanner, what next?
by Chris G 25 Nov '07

25 Nov '07

If I run sand-find-scanner it finds my scanner successfully but none of the front-ends can find a scanner, what am I missing? home$ sane-find-scanner -q found USB scanner (vendor=0x04b8 [EPSON], product=0x012c [EPSON Scanner]) at libusb:007:004 found USB scanner (vendor=0x093a, product=0x2603) at libusb:003:004 home$ home$ scanimage scanimage: no SANE devices found home$ Similarly xsane, xscanimage etc. can't find my scannner(s). -- Chris Green

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Re: [ALUG] BT Home Hub
by mbm 24 Nov '07

24 Nov '07

Please, please, anyone using a BT Home hub do yourself a big favour and stop right now. Go out and buy a decent router that BT don't control. I spent some long time earlier this year playing with the hub and everything that I found bothered me (and others with whom I corresponded). The is a crippled Thomson router which is locked to BT's network. They routinely update the software remotely without your agreement. You can lock it down to prevent this, but frankly why bother - just buy a decent router. I documented this at http://baldric.net/2007/01/22/bt-home-hub-and-the-gpl/. That post also points to comments from me (and many others with similar experiences - see Kai Robinson in particular) on a good site called homehubblog. See for example http://www.homehubblog.com/2006/12/23/christmas-present-from-bt/. Mick >Ill have a look when I get home, but Ive done exactly the same thing >as you and I can access my apache webserver ok. The only slight >difference is that I use dydns name instead of IP address but this is >the same. >Also I had no idea it was possible to access the BT home hub >management interface from the internet. That is rather worrying >considering how often it resets itself and port forwarding rules >disappear,

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Why is /etc/cron.daily happening twice
by Chris G 24 Nov '07

24 Nov '07

If I do a 'ps -ef' on my system I see the following:- root 17343 1 0 04:02 ? 00:00:00 crond root 17344 17343 0 04:02 ? 00:00:00 /bin/bash /usr/bin/run-parts /etc/cron.daily root 18023 17344 0 05:05 ? 00:00:00 /bin/bash /usr/bin/run-parts /etc/cron.daily Why does '/bin/bash /usr/bin/run-parts /etc/cron.daily' appear to be spawning a copy of itself just over an hour after it started? I have looked at the /usr/bin/run-parts script and I really can't see a reason why it should do this unless one of the scripts in /etc/cron.daily is doing something wierd and I have only added a very simple backup script there. Oh, this is on Fedora 7 by the way. -- Chris Green

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Re: [ALUG] Ubuntu questions
by Greg Thomas 22 Nov '07

22 Nov '07

On 19/11/2007, Ian Thompson-Bell <ianbell(a)ukfsn.org> wrote: > Greg Thomas wrote: > > > > o There's no obvious way to get out system information; Device Manager > > will tell me it's a PIII, but not the speed. > > Hardware info gives this as you might expect. It will tell me I've a PIII Coppermine CPU, but unless I'm missing something, there's no CPU speed. > > o There are two package managers (Update Manager and Synaptic Package > > Manager). The former, at least, tells me when there are updates > > available. I don't know yet if it will include extra packages > > installed by the latter (e.g. Apache WWW Server). > > Update manager will manage updates for everything installed by itself or > synaptic. Well, that's reassuring, at least. > > o Disappointed that something as basic as NTP isn't installed by > > default. Even (spit) Windows has had this since NT4. > > Yes, but Windows doesn't have a full blown set of Office apps etc etc > etc as standard. If you do by a Windows PC, it will often come with MS Works, which contains everything bar a presentation package. > > So, is Ubuntu not quite as ready for the mainstream as I thought, or > > have I missed something? > > Define mainstream. Ready for someone who has no interest in the OS other than as a productivity tool. Greg

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