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Speaking of firefox ....
by Chris Green 08 Nov '04

08 Nov '04

Does anyone else find the 'download manager' in Firefox really annoying? You have to actively clean up the old entries if you want it to stay sensibly small instead of occupying a huge chunk of screen. What use is the download manager anyway? I really can't see any use for a history of past downloads. I'd really much prefer the old download system whereby one got a little window popped up for each download which disappears for ever when completed (with the option of keeping it until you dismiss it yourself). By default it produces little screen clutter but it can cope with multiple, simultaneous downloads quite happily. The new system is just a nuisance. -- Chris Green (chris(a)areti.co.uk) "Never ascribe to malice, that which can be explained by incompetence."

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Firefox editor
by tom potts 08 Nov '04

08 Nov '04

Someone couldnt finds the editor: http://cuneaform.mozdev.org/editor/index.htm however http://www.fckeditor.net/ can be used 'over the web' so can be made part of a documentation system.... ___________________________________________________________ALL-NEW Yahoo! Messenger - all new features - even more fun! http://uk.messenger.yahoo.com

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mysql 'forms' data entry designer
by Chris Green 08 Nov '04

08 Nov '04

My migration of my Access databases to mysql has started. I've got mysql, PHP and apache up and running and I've imported the data from my Access database. I can see it all in phpMyAdmin, most impressive! Now I need to be able to design/build replacements for the Access data input forms and the Access reports. Starting at the input end (seems reasonable!), has anyone got any recommendations for designing input forms for mysql databases? Searching Google isn't very helpful because as soon as you enter 'mysql forms PHP' (with or without the 'PHP' actually) you get zillions of hits on HTML forms for entering data via PHP into a mysql database. The problem is that this gives a rather backwards approach which assumes a 'typical' HTML form and that's not what I want really. For data entry it doesn't really even have to be a web form. What I'm after is essentially a view of my table with some calculations/filters between data entry and the database. I.e. when the 'form' is opened it loads up the whole database table and presents it on screen in tabular fashion. I can edit existing entries simply by moving to them and changing them, I can add entries at the end. Most fields simply get inserted unchanged in the database as I type them but some fields are automatically calculated and inserted when I enter/change other fields in the same row. This is what I've done in Access and I want to do something similar for the mysql database if I can, preferably with some sort of tool to help me! It's the sort of thing Oracle Forms does too. Surely someone must be doing it for mysql. The phpMyAdmin 'Browse' window looks somewhat like what I'm after but I need to be able to edit the data in place (I.e. move to the field and change it), add rows at the end and have 'auto calculated' values. -- Chris Green (chris(a)areti.co.uk) "Never ascribe to malice, that which can be explained by incompetence."

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mysql users, I still seem to be a bit confused
by Chris Green 08 Nov '04

08 Nov '04

Well I have just about everything working now. I've managed to install apache2 and PHP5 (I don't quite understand what I did wrong the first time but going back to PHP4 and then to PHP5 again got it working). I've also installed phpMyAdmin and that's working fine too. However I still can't get ordinary users to work the way I expect. I'm using phpMyAdmin to do all this now. I deleted all the entries for user 'chris' and then added a new user 'chris' with host set to 'Any host', with password set to 'No password' and with all privileges set. This appears to work OK, phpMyadmin says I have a user as follows:- chris % No ALL PRIVILEGES Yes Edit (No is 'Password' and Yes is 'Grant') However if I then say 'mysql -uchris' and try 'use fred' I still get:- ERROR 1044: Access denied for user: '@localhost' to database 'fred' If, on the other hand, I do exactly as above except I set host to 'Local' then user chris works as expected. Something is certainly awry somewhere, it may be my understanding but at the very least things are not quite how one would expect from what one is being told. Is there some security thing that refuses to allow an 'Any host' user to have lots of privileges? No, I've tried creating a user with few privileges and 'Any Host' and they get the 'Access denied...' error too. It seems to me that the 'Any Host' doesn't work. -- Chris Green (chris(a)areti.co.uk) "Never ascribe to malice, that which can be explained by incompetence."

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Anyone got a spare monitor / swap shop wiki page
by Joe Button 08 Nov '04

08 Nov '04

Hi. Does anyone else think it might be worth making a wiki page with a list of kit people have available? If people think it's a good idea I'll start one. Which is my way of introducting the cheeky question: Does anyone have a spare monitor they could sell me cheap? Mine died a while ago and I'd rather not buy a brand new one due to a combination of environmental concern and meanness. They seem to go pretty cheaply on ebay but I'd like to avoid the postage cost if possible. Also, can anyone recommend something to do with my old one? As far as I can tell no-one wants to repair it. Cheers, Joe

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Weekly IRC reminder
by Neill Newman 08 Nov '04

08 Nov '04

This is the automated ALUG IRC meeting reminder sent to remind you that there is an IRC meeting tonight (Monday) at 8.00pm. 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 tkirc, bitchx, xchat 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://freshmeat.net/ http://www.epicsol.org/ Windows http://www.mirc.com (loads of help with irc for newbies!)

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mdk 10.1 Off. and nvidia
by Syd Hancock 07 Nov '04

07 Nov '04

Never forget - google is your friend :-) Especially groups.google.com From alt.os.linux.mandrake: >Exactly the same problems here. Then I used the rpm on the December >Linux Format DVD version (media/drivers/) subdirectory. > > nvidia-kernel-2.6.8.1-10mdk-6111-1mdk.i586.rpm >instant success. >There is one dependency. Can't rember whether it was >dkms-nvidia-6111-1mdk.i586.rpm >or >nvidia-6111-3mdk.i586.rpm >either way both are in the /media/drivers/subdirectory >so urpmi nvidia-kernel-2.6.8.1-10mdk-6111-1mdk.i586.rpm >will sort it HTH Syd

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lastlog puzzle
by Ted.Harding＠nessie.mcc.ac.uk 07 Nov '04

07 Nov '04

Hi Folks, On one (A) of my 3 running machines, I noticed that 'ls -ls' on /var/log shows: A: 44 -r-------- 1 root root 19136220 Oct 30 10:52 lastlog which is inconsistent: 44K according to $1, but 19136220 bytes (19MB) according to $6. The latter is enormous! However, it seems that it has some validity, since # cat lastlog | wc -c 19136220 gives the same result, here obtained by byte-counting the output of 'cat'. This first got me wondering if the lastlog file or its inode contents were corrupted. (For reference below: I don't have a file /var/log/faillog on this particular machine, A). Interestingly, however, when I look at 'ls -ls' for my two other machines (B & C), I get B: 3 -rw------- 1 root root 12216 Nov 6 15:32 faillog 3 -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 16128 Nov 6 15:32 lastlog C: 8 -rw------- 1 root root 12072 Nov 4 13:17 faillog 16 -rw-r--r-- 1 root tty 146876 Nov 4 13:17 lastlog and for both machines, and also for both 'faillog' and 'lastlog', I see the same sort of discrepancy between $1 (size in KB) and $6 (size in bytes), the latter being distinctly too big compared with the former. I do not see this discrepancy for any other files in /var/log, on any of the three machines. This suggests that there's something a bit weird about 'lastlog' and 'faillog' as files, and that this is deliberate! And I'm wondering how on earth a 19MB lastlog file could arise (this machine, A, has been in use for a shorter time (about 1 year) than C (about 3.5 years) and much shorter than B (about 7 years); yet the sizes of 'lastlog' are in the reverse order!) The output of the 'lastlog' *command* in all cases is just a few dozen lines; but, again interestingly, doing it on machine (A) (the one with the 19MB lastlog) induces semi-paralysis and much swapping for a while. I'm puzzled! Comments welcome. Best wishes to all, Ted. -------------------------------------------------------------------- E-Mail: (Ted Harding) <Ted.Harding(a)nessie.mcc.ac.uk> Fax-to-email: +44 (0)870 094 0861 [NB: New number!] Date: 07-Nov-04 Time: 11:15:56 ------------------------------ XFMail ------------------------------

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linux laptops
by Syd Hancock 07 Nov '04

07 Nov '04

(Sorry it's not threaded but only reading via online archives at present). The HP offering was disappointing. Very half-hearted effort especially not having the wi-fi configured. One suggestion: get an IBM Thinkpad from ebay and install a mainstream distro. The T series is good (I use a T23) and I have heard good things about the more recent X series as well. Good build quality. Thinkpads are sturdy. Three year warranty so it is easy to get one with a long warranty period remaining - mine came with 2.5 years remaining. Good support under linux with all mainstream distros - I use Mandrake 10.0 Official (although there is a gotcha with the X-windows config that you need to know about before installing). A linux-thinkpads mailing list and plenty of support and advice can be found via google etc. Lots of support for on IBM websites including linux-specific info. Did I say good build quality? :-) I added a wi-fi card and a second battery which swaps with the DVD/CD-R. It is an excellent general-purpose machine. ACPI is apparently problematic with recent 2.6.x kernels. I use APM instead and it works well. HTH Syd

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Trying to install apache2 and PHP5 on slackware9.1
by Chris Green 07 Nov '04

07 Nov '04

I'm trying (as per the subject line) to install apache2 and PHP5 on slackware 9.1. I've uninstalled PHP4 and apache1.3. I've installed the apache2 and PHP5 .tgz packages. I've installed the extra library dependencies that apache2 needs. Now I get the following error when I try and start apache:- Syntax error on line 8 of /etc/apache2/mod_php.conf: Invalid command 'AddType', perhaps mis-spelled or defined by a module not included in the server configuration All seems in order to me. There is a line above the line 8 of mod_php.conf which loads the PHP5 library, i.e.:- LoadModule php5_module lib/apache2/libphp5.so No errors are reported for this line. All the lines were produced by script so typos are unlikely. Are there any old libraries in slackware 9.1 that may need updating to get apache2 to work? (I.e. libraries that aren't missing but are too old). Any other ideas? -- Chris Green (chris(a)areti.co.uk) "Never ascribe to malice, that which can be explained by incompetence."

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