the boredom of ramfree17

Last night was my first night of putting interoperability of Linux to a personal test. I work for a Microsoft-centric company so every time I need to do active meeting sessions with counterparts then I have to boot into Windows to ensure that nothing goes off in the middle of the meeting. This is because meetings like those entail a lot of opening of project office documents, searching mails for references, and other stuff. The project documents are also a work of their own since I think the person creating the base templates are certified MS Office template designers (if there is such a thing).

My new project requires me to handle late Tuesday night calls since we are conferencing three very distributed time zones (Manila, Madrid, California). Conference calls are done using Skype since I don’t have IDD capability at home nor am I willing to do the call on my prepaid SIM. Since I already have Skype installed yesterday on Archer, I tested a conference call using Skype’s echo123 service. I was able to hear my recorded message so that portion is not a problem. My headset has a small static sound but I think it has something to do with the connection between the headset and the speaker audio out port. The only possible stumbling block would be the mail searching portion and the documents that needs to be referenced in the call.

An hour before I have already downloaded all reference materials off the web mail interface of the company’s Exchange server. That reminds me that I have the Exchange server because it keeps on kicking my Firefox connection whenever I open a message. The sidebar is OK but the main area gets a “Connection is lost” message. IE doesn’t have this problem when I am in Windows but I wouldn’t install ie4linux just for this now that Metrobank already supports non-IE browser. If anybody knows how to make Thunderbird connect to an Exchange server then let me know although the configuration might also be painful. I couldn’t even configure Outlook in my desktop to connect to the Exchange server *even* after using the company supplied configuration utility. I might even try using Evolution during the weekend.

Anyway, I just created a new Firefox Windows and opened all possible mails that may be referenced in the call so I wouldn’t search for it. I then tried opening all Excel, Word and PowerPoint attachments using OpenOffice.org (2.4). OOo was able to open them all which is admirable enough but I have the following nitpicks:

• For MS Word document some of the formatting especially on tables are misaligned.
• The OO.o Writer is showing too many artifacts like ruler margins and such that could be done without.
• Default rendering size for the spreadsheets were too tiny.
• The comments on the Excel spreadsheet are showing far from the cell they are attached to. I have to scroll just to see them.
• Default rendering size for the presentations are also tiny. I had to play with the zoom control for a bit until I finally hit the “Optimal” option. Why wouldn’t the Optimal option be selected as the default?

Understandably, the nitpicks above are minor and there might be some preferences that could be set to remedy them but I am not using OO.o that frequently aside from a view-only app. The resulting documents from OO.o saves require too much effort to correct to make it my mainstream application for work documentation.

Back on the topic of the call, everything went relatively smoothly although my Skype cannot connect nor message the contact from Madrid. I can see his status is online but for some reason our Skypes just couldn’t communicate. The conference call had to be initiated by the contact from California.

This whole blog post might be seen as petty since there isn’t any groundbreaking achievement but I don’t care as this is a personal achievement about Linux and Windows interoperability. While Linux cannot fully replace Windows right now, Windows’ share of the home computing time is getting smaller.

ciao!

Tags: FLOSS, Work by Erin
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I just learned that German word and wanted to use it in a post. Upon Google search reveals that it meant current intellectual trend.

The current Philippine Linux User Group site is experiencing a slow renaissance of some sorts thanks to the efforts of Gabriel Mercado and company. The latest addition to the site is the aggregation F/LOSS related posts of some PLUGger bloggers. In a post to the list, Gabriel posted the FAQ of the aggregation as


- *What the heck is this?* - This is the aggregated feed of a few
gentlemen PLUGgers / Bloggers who've been kind enough to share their Linux /
FOSS or otherwise PLUG related feeds with the rest of us. Namely, they are
Messrs. Anuerin Diaz, Elijah Alcantara, Manny Amador (Phnix), Michael Cole,
Migs Paraz, Noel Bautista and Zak B. Elep.

- *What's it for?* - Several purposes. Primarily, to achieve 'zeitgest'
so that we may be able to know what things are going on in and around
PLUGgers minds, what's keeping them occupied, and so on. Secondarily, it
provides content for our website. Once syndicated, said content will also
help promote PLUG by spreading our news, info, howtos, etc., onto the
general blogosphere. It can also help us figure out who are actively doing
FOSS work out there, as well as provide a central repository of all things
PLUG related. Not to mention of course, end hunger and promote world peace.


Take note however that each post still belongs to each author and does not reflect the official stand of PLUG (the organization). If I mess up here in the capsule then the blame will all stop here.

Subscribe now! It’s a fun way to get an insight on what is currently happening on the local Linux mindsphere. Unless you have a local RSS reader, I am recommending the Google Reader since it is free and pretty nifty.

ciao!

Tags: FLOSS, Garbage by Erin
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As I have mentioned before, Archer was my first Linux installation wherein I was able to get NTFS writing right from the get go. That means that I no longer have a FAT32 partition in my desktop harddisk as everything is already in NTFS. This helps in downloading those Linux DVD ISO images since I no longer have to think about freeing enough space on my NTFS drive if I want to be able to continue the download on whatever OS is booted up.

Lately Windows has been ruling the desktop since I need some Windows-specific apps for work. I was transferring some files from the desktop hard drive into the portable hard disk (backups are not paranoia). I was moving some stuff so I don’t leave outdated rubbish files in the desktop HDD then suddenly Windows gave an error that the file was in use so the move operation is being denied access and the delete operation cannot continue. I can’t track the process holding it as only Windows Explorer is touching the file so I scheduled a checkdisk execution at the next boot and then rebooted the machine. During startup, Windows checkdisk found and fixed the entries from some file which I assume is the file I was moving. Upon completion of the checkdisk execution I logged again in Windows and tried doing the move. The same thing happened. I just shrugged my shoulders and rebooted to Archer. It was about time to get the latest package updates from the repository anyway.

I boot all of my Linux systems into run level 3 (console mode). I would like to say it has something to do with the speed to get between when the BIOS screen and the login prompt but I think this has just been my force of habit as my desktop has enough processing power that I am in the prompt in less than 1 minute, and another 10 seconds to enter XFCE. This time booting in a console mode a good thing because I saw that mounting the NTFS drives were encountering errors since they are tagged as in use. I am presented with the following messages for each NTFS partition:

Failed to mount ‘/dev/sda7′: Operation not supported
Mount is denied because NTFS is marked to be in use. Choose one action:

Choice 1: If you have Windows then disconnect the external devices by clicking on the ‘Safely Remove Hardware’ icon in the Windows taskbar then shutdown Windows cleanly.

Choice 2: If you don’t have Windows then you can use the ‘force’ option for your own responsibility. For example type on the command line:

mount -t ntfs-3g /dev/sda7 /windows/d -o force

Or add the option to the relevant row in the /etc/fstab file:

/dev/sda7 /windows/d ntfs-3g defaults,force 0 0

Being a firm believer in Murphy’s laws, I opted to be on the safe side and just let them be and tried to mount them manually. The mount message provided an additional clue that I might be able to leverage in fixing the problem: the NTFS drive log file says it was not cleanly unmounted!

I tried searching for the answer on how to clear the partition log from Windows but I came up with nothing. Constantly rebooting Windows does not help either. The log is still being marked as in use whenever I try mounting them in Linux. After two nights I was already exasperated so I went for the force route. I mounted the partitions manually as root and specified the -o force option. The forced mount directive did the trick and cleared the NTFS partition log. I haven’t found any data loss YET but I have a nagging feeling that I might and at the worst possible time (again, Murphy’s law).

I am still at a loss on who messed up the partitions. The partitions were being utilized exclusively by Windows for the past few days but I know that there were times that I used Archer and started utorrent in wine so the partition was also being used even for only a while. I am getting frustrated with Windows since it should have been able to clear the dirty markings on the partition logs since it was able to complete its shutdown sequence properly. If I am going to defend Windows I will say Linux messed up the log which prevents it from marking it correctly after a clean shutdown. But that is hogwash since I should have been notified that something is wrong after the initial bootup, or even before it enters the shutdown sequence.

I think my finger knows which OS is the culprit but until I get more information on this problem (and how to clear the log from within Windows), I am going to be on the fence on who is really at fault. I am just crossing my fingers that I haven’t damaged any data since there are some stuff in the hard disk that I am not putting in my portable HDD and I still haven’t gotten around to putting them in DVD.

ciao!

Tags: FLOSS, Techology by Erin
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Metrobank’s eBanking interface rates a notch better in my book since it now supports Firefox, where previously it only supports IE and *gasp* Netscape. The stupid ActiveX control that was previously required (which effectively locks the interface to IE) is also gone. Actually that is the first clue I had since I transferred to another PC at work and was curious why I didn’t get the irritating prompt about the ActiveX installation.

The office network prevents me from uploading the screenshot but you can test it for yourself. I did it with the beta 5 of Firefox 3.

Kudos Metrobank Online! But I still despise you for that 10-character password requirement.

[edit] I finally grabbed a screenshot while in Archer (my Arch system). The picture is using “Bon Echo” which is a rebranded Firefox browser. The version is 2.0.0.14.

MetrobankOnline in Linux!

ciao!

Tags: FLOSS, Garbage, Reviews, Techology by Erin
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This is a post on my attempts to run an ArchLinux-based desktop on Leo thus the codename “Leo the Archer”. Leo by the way is Betsy’s replacement which we picked up last July prior to my Denmark assignment. The attempt to create an ArchLinux system is partly due to the lack of support of the Mandriva 2007.1 installer (the one I had handy at the time) for the JMicron motherboard controller. Between Ubuntu and ArchLinux, I think I would learn more if I use ArchLinux.

Last night’s development included the following

• Update to the latest release. This is what is great about rolling distributions, the option to use the latest and the greatest are always at your fingertips, assuming you have an available broadband.
• better acquaintance with pacman. Installing new packages from Internet repositories does not include specifying -A or –add in the command line. That is reserved for installing local packages.
• NTFS-3G works. This is my first Linux distro that I have easily achieved successful NTFS writing support.
• Sound still does not work. I followed the beginner’s guide for getting sound but no sound devices are being detected.

As it was already getting late, I decided to call it a night. The fact that my wife is practically breathing down on my neck to go to sleep had nothing to do with it. PROMISE! I hope the restart would make udev detect and produce the right devices when I start it up again. All in all, not a bad piece of update.

[edit] the sound device got created after the reboot but for some reason flash sound (i.e., youtube) is not being processed.

ciao!

Tags: FLOSS by Erin
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