A thread for boring computer questions.

thanks for all this nannying.

So I've been looking online at sites where you can choose the spec for your own computer, building it as you go. It seems that I could get a decent machine for £600 odd, rather than the £900-1000 it would cost bought as a regular package. First of all, a) is this a good idea and b) can anyone recommend reliable and cheap sites for building a computer?

(NB I have no desire or ability to literally build it myself - I just want a bespoke build that someone else then puts together for me)

Thanks!

dali@edvpcdeb:~$ xterm &
[1] 266
xterm Xt error: Can't open display:
dali@edvpcdeb:~$ xcalc &
[2] 267
[1] Exit 1 xterm
dali@edvpcdeb:~$ Error: Can't open display:

[2]+ Exit 1 xcalc
dali@edvpcdeb:~$ gimp &
[1] 268
dali@edvpcdeb:~$
Gtk-WARNING **: cannot open display:

[1]+ Exit 1 gimp
dali@edvpcdeb:~$

thanks in advance

See also Morgan computers who sell dead stock and seconds PC. thir shop is on new oxford st but you can google up their website as well.

in the apple world the apple store do refurb computers on wednesday mornings which can be good deals. Shaye also do refurb macs.

As for build to order the best deals are often from local computer stores but try and get a recommendations as I knew a fat bastard cowboy cunt who set one of these places up.

(I'm assuming from what you've said in the past that your ssh client is on an OS X machine that's got X11 installed on it; I've seen those sorts of errors when trying ssh on an OS X machine without X11)

this is what my ssh_config looks like on the apple box, I just uncomented the forwardX11 value

# Host *
# ForwardAgent no
ForwardX11 yes
# RhostsAuthentication no
# RhostsRSAAuthentication no
# RSAAuthentication yes
# PasswordAuthentication yes
# BatchMode no
# CheckHostIP yes
# StrictHostKeyChecking ask
# IdentityFile ~/.ssh/identity
# IdentityFile ~/.ssh/id_rsa
# IdentityFile ~/.ssh/id_dsa
# Port 22
# Protocol 2,1
# Cipher 3des
# Ciphers aes128-cbc,3des-cbc,blowfish-cbc,cast128-cbc,arcfour,aes192-cbc,aes$
# EscapeChar ~

I've perused the man page but I'm not sure quite what I ought to change.

For completeness I'll include the sshd_config from the debian machine:

# Package generated configuration file
# See the sshd(8) manpage for defails

# What ports, IPs and protocols we listen for
Port 22
# Use these options to restrict which interfaces/protocols sshd will bind to
#ListenAddress ::
#ListenAddress 0.0.0.0
Protocol 2
# HostKeys for protocol version 2
HostKey /etc/ssh/ssh_host_rsa_key
HostKey /etc/ssh/ssh_host_dsa_key
#Privilege Separation is turned on for security
UsePrivilegeSeparation yes

# ...but breaks Pam auth via kbdint, so we have to turn it off
# Use PAM authentication via keyboard-interactive so PAM modules can
# properly interface with the user (off due to PrivSep)
PAMAuthenticationViaKbdInt no
# Lifetime and size of ephemeral version 1 server key
KeyRegenerationInterval 3600
ServerKeyBits 768

# Logging
SyslogFacility AUTH
LogLevel INFO

# Authentication:
LoginGraceTime 600
PermitRootLogin yes
StrictModes yes

RSAAuthentication yes
PubkeyAuthentication yes
#AuthorizedKeysFile %h/.ssh/authorized_keys

# rhosts authentication should not be used
RhostsAuthentication no
# Don't read the user's ~/.rhosts and ~/.shosts files
IgnoreRhosts yes
# For this to work you will also need host keys in /etc/ssh_known_hosts
RhostsRSAAuthentication no
# similar for protocol version 2
HostbasedAuthentication no
# Uncomment if you don't trust ~/.ssh/known_hosts for RhostsRSAAuthentication
#IgnoreUserKnownHosts yes

# To enable empty passwords, change to yes (NOT RECOMMENDED)
PermitEmptyPasswords no

# Uncomment to disable s/key passwords
#ChallengeResponseAuthentication no

# To disable tunneled clear text passwords, change to no here!
PasswordAuthentication yes

# To change Kerberos options
#KerberosAuthentication no
#KerberosOrLocalPasswd yes
#AFSTokenPassing no
#KerberosTicketCleanup no
# Kerberos TGT Passing does only work with the AFS kaserver
#KerberosTgtPassing yes

X11Forwarding yes
X11DisplayOffset 10
PrintMotd no
#PrintLastLog no
KeepAlive yes
#UseLogin no
AllowTcpForwarding yes

#MaxStartups 10:30:60
#Banner /etc/issue.net
#ReverseMappingCheck yes

Subsystem sftp /usr/lib/sftp-server

Caitlin you are such an absolute star for guiding me through this.

Is $DISPLAY set in the shell that you're starting ssh from? If you're starting it from an xterm already running under X11, though, I don't see why it shouldn't be.

To view its current value (I think in any shell) you type:
echo $DISPLAY

To set it, in sh or bash type:
DISPLAY=:0.0
export DISPLAY

(note that when setting it you *don't* type the $ signs. ':0.0' is its current value on my computer.)

If your shell is tcsh, I *think* you type:
set DISPLAY=:0.0

but I'm not entirely sure, because I never use tcsh.

Thanks for spending so much time sorting me out. now to try and get wxPython an pysoulseek working.

thanks again

NFS ones: with the 'mount' command; and by adding them to the file /etc/fstab. SMB ones, I don't know much about.

I'm dashing off home right now, but I'll tell you more on Monday if noone else has by then.

The fstab file format is dead simple: one line per filesystem, with the following fields: device (or network share), mountpoint, filesystem type, options, dump number and fsck number. For network shares, set the last two to zero. All the listed filesystems will be mounted on boot, unless noauto is included in the options column. If you put user or users in the options column, non-root users will be able to mount that filesystem.

Any questions?

i really like the look of arial in cleartype. however, my monitor displays poorly with cleartype on. are there tt fonts that simulate the cleartype ones? i don't even know if that question makes sense. The cleartype arial looks close to the font used in ableton live, which i tried to identify - there are some fonts in the program folders with (i think) an .fon extension. i saw some font converters on the web, but they warned of quality loss so that doesn't seem like such a great idea.

where are the best places to browse fonts?

windows doesn't seem able to use any old font as a system font either. are there any ways to force other fonts into windows?

is that right? (this is all theoretical - i prob couldn't figure out what the hell was going on with a programming language, nor do i want to pay for it, nor is this important ;-)

Also, are there any webmail sites that can also check your webmail on another host? Like my mac.com email cant be accessed from all browsers for some reason

PS - I got my laptop to actually LOAD for the first time in MONTHS the other day. I "renamed" some "devices"!

OK I just changed lots of 1's and 0's about and did DEVICEHIGH stuff HOW MUCH DO YOU ALL PH333333R ME NOW?

No I had nothing better to do :(

I admit now it will load all I can do is play Dopewars.

Phil - there's a Google mirror somewhere where I expect you'll be able to search on http proxy or http tunnels - I've lost all my URLS. However the majority of them are blocked even in my dodgy local council so I expect CHINA will have them blocked as well. If you search ILX you should be able to pull it up. Oh I'm no help. If it's any consolation I'm blocked from practically everything here as well... try getting a Yahoo account - they've got a POP3 thing enabled but I doubt that helps you with yr webmail.

however, my monitor displays poorly with cleartype on.
I haven't seen a monitor yet where it actually improved things. All it's ever done for me is hurt my eyes squinting at the results.

my mum and dad have an imac, a g3 one (its about 3 yrs old), aqnd they want to back up all their docs etc, tyo install mac os 9. so they buy a cd writer, an iomega external one, one of those big purple things, and try and burn all their stuff onto cd. the software it comes with is called hotburn and is shit. it generally seems to be going ok, and in theory the disc has been burned, but then doesnt play in the internal cd drive. apparently those internal cd drives are pretty tempramental. so maybe it just doesnt like it. but i want to burn music onto cd. first i try to burn a copy of a cd ive already got, thru hotburn. again, the internal cd doesnt rtecognise the disc as having anything on it. but neither does any other hifi or anyhting we have. which it should, rihght? i mean, it should be able to be played as a cd. i def. burned it as a 'music cd'. so i found toast somewhere and tried tha. but that refused to recvognise the existence of the iomega writer.

even itunes doesnt seem to like the iomega thing. sure, its ugly, but whats with all the hate?

so, can anyone think why the cds we are burning are not being recoginsed by anything. there is stuff on them, because the cd writer recognises them and can play them, whther theyre data oir music, but not anything else.

whats the solution?

If your mac has firewire, take the iomega drive back to the shop and I'll lend you my yamaha drive.

I thin, ambrose your problem lies with the fact that the version of toast you have does not support the iomega drive and that later versions of toast need OS 9. You kind of have a circular problem, you might not be able to get this drive working at all.

Find out how much stuff is irreplaceable, stuffit into a .sit file and mail it or upload it somewhere.

will tell you how to swap it over

Cleartype is designed for TFT displays, using subpixel anti aliasing.

http://arstechnica.infopop.net/OpenTopic/page?a=tpc&s=50009562&f=67909965&m=2030990365&r=2610982565#2610982565

Try the cleartype adjuster in this thread.

one
two
three

if they don't work go to http://www.cwonline.co.uk/ and search for tv tuner

What if I wanted to save money by just getting a video in without the tuner? And would the PC thing be possible in any way?

Chris, in theory yes, and I think its a doddle with XP.

Depends entirely upon the software controllers on the Windows side of things. It's all 802.11b, so there's no technical reason why you couldn't. I imagine a Windows-user here will have more to say.

(I've used a couple of other places too but now they're either a lot more expensive than Scan or don't stock the brands/models I was hoping for. Maybe I have to choose between good returns policy, competitive pricing and wide stock with good availability. But in the meantime, I'd be very grateful for any recommendations. Thanks!)

http://www.dabs.com