A thread for boring computer questions.

(This is now the thread where Ed updates about his adventures trying to get Debianlinux and pySOulseek working)

Also is there a util that allows me to tell what ip address a DHCP server has assigned Debian?

I just switched to XP and have a stupid system tray problem. I thought I'd posted it on this thread but I don't see it, so if I'm being repetitive, forgive me. I don't have a connection icon in my system tray when I'm connected to the internet. I've gone to Network Connections, right clicked on my connection for properties, and selected "show icon in notification area when connected". An icon then appears. I also have it set to "always show" on my system tray but the icon disappears right after I log off, and then deselects itself in Network connections when I dial up again. It seems like it may be a prob with XP and my ISP software...annoying.

select the 'taskbar' tab if it's not already

uncheck "group similar taskbar buttons"

if the reason you want to always have the icon is so you have something to click on to connect/disconnect, then i suggest putting a network icon in your quicklaunch. also, if you are on a broadband connection, there is a way to get an icon which will connect with one click, rather than popping up the "dial" dialog box. right click the start menu - properties, hit customize button. advanced tab. in the scroll down menu, look for network connections - select "display as connect to menu". the dialup icons in this menu will still bring up a "dial" box, but the broadband connections will just connect automatically when you click them, and you can right click --> disconnect them. so you can copy this shortcut to your desktop or quicklaunch. you could remove the menu from the start menu after you copied that shortcut, if you don't want it.

enough blabbering out of me ;-)

Thanks for the explanation of the taskbar "always show" not showing...that makes sense in a microsoft-being-ridiculous kinda way.

Yes Graham, it is a G4. Thanks for the advice, I almost missed it. :)

i'm tempted to say ipconfig but that's a dos command. i'm sure there's something very similar for linux. ifconfig perhaps? can't check without rebooting...

oh, btw, /var/log/XFree86.0.log (or something similar, slocate is your friend here) has lots of details about xfree86 startup problems. have spent ages recently pondering this whilst trying to get tvout to work

andy

How do I configure x access from outside, to get ssh -X working. ssh works now, but I can't start any x apps.

thanks, caitlin.

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.