notes

Gnash 0.8.5_1 + FreeBSD 7.2

[29062009]

Basically, these were the steps required to install gnash and watch some videos on youtube.

- Installed gnash selecting gstreamer as the ONLY media handler and selecting also to create gnash firefox plugin (I dont know why I chose gstreamer )

- Installed the gstreamer-ffmpeg plugin

- Installed the gstreamer-faad plugin

- Create a link in ~/.mozilla/plugins to the gnash library plugin

It seems it is working correctly here on youtube

[09072009]

WIth this basic gnash installation

— The stats chart in wordpress does not work. It displays an image that is not the stats.

— I can not see videos published by friends on facebook

— Not all the popup featurues in a youtube window work. nor all the videos are displayed

— Not all the flash animations (i.e. web pages) are visible

— It crashes sometimes but the web-browser behavior is great (goes on working fine)

write your experience if it can be of help !

Add comment June 29, 2009

FreeBSD 7.1 + Linux Runtime Binaries (linux_base-f8-8_11)

20090331/20090522

On this laptop Linux Binary Compatibility works quite fine, but I have not heavily tested it. Anyways, here we go. References and thanks are at the end of the post.

-PLEASE NOTE – These instructions work if you have NOT any linux_base port installed.I did these steps in a (almost) clean system.

I did everything from a root console.

A – LET’S MAKE THINGS INSTALL

1 – Open a “root console”.

2 – I use to update the ports collection always before installing anything

#portsnap fetch update

3 – Load linux KLD object if it is not loaded (this means that you are turning on the Linux Binary Compatibility)

#kldload linux (->Enter)

2 – FreeBSD 7.1 by default has the key “compat.linux.osrelease” set to ‘2.4.2′. I had to set it to ‘2.6.16′ for the runtime libraries to be installed and work

#sysctl compat.linux.osrelease=2.6.16

3 – Enter the following directory : /usr/ports/emulators/linux_base-f8

#cd /usr/ports/emulators/linux_base-f8

4 – Build and install

#make install clean

If everything worked as expected …

5 – …Doing

#pkg_info | grep linux_base-f8

…Should show our newly installed port.

Ending NOTE :

- To make other ports use these libraries __instead of___ compiling and installing other libraries (such as the linux_base-fc-4) I STRONGLY encourage to do this : edit the file ‘/etc/make.conf’ and add the lines OVERRIDE_LINUX_BASE_PORT=f8.
OVERRIDE_LINUX_NONBASE_PORTS=f8
i.e.

#vi /etc/make.conf
(…) Add the lines :
OVERRIDE_LINUX_BASE_PORT=f8
OVERRIDE_LINUX_NONBASE_PORTS=f8
Save and exit

B – LET’S MAKE THINGS BE PERSISTENT

1 – Edit the file /etc/rc.conf adding the line

linux_enable=”YES”

2 – Edit the file ‘/etc/systcl.conf’ adding the line

compat.linux.osrelease=2.6.16

Ref.

[1] – http://www.freebsd.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/handbook/linuxemu.html

[2] – /usr/ports/UPDATING

[3] – http://forums.freebsd.org/showthread.php?t=795 (Aragon post)

Add comment March 31, 2009

FreeBSD 7.x + OpenOffice.org 3.x build time

Pentium IV 2.66 GHz – 448MB RAM

12 * 13 March 2009

FreeBSD 7.1-RELEASE #0: Thu Jan 1 14:37:25 UTC 2009 /src/sys/GENERIC i386

13h19.08s real 8h59m11.96s user2h20m1.98s sys

Note: There were other processes running (firefox/gnome) while the build was in progress. The extra load was not so heavy and did not last long. But anyways you should take those values as an upper bound.

20 * 21 May 2009

OpenOffice.org 3.1.0

FreeBSD 7.2-RELEASE #0: Fri May 1 08:49:13 UTC 2009 GENERIC i386

/usr/bin/time …

12h4m23.18s real 9h12m33.97s user 1h27m16.80s sys

Note : There was no X running or other relevant processes.

Add comment March 13, 2009

debian etch + kde 3.5.5 + firefox 3 (GTK applications with QT style)

#20080630#20080701

#Please note : these instructions are “high” level instructions . I mean: much of the details are not explained. If anyone is interested we can talk about it more !

#Please note : The gtk application must make use of the $HOME/.gtkrc-2.0 rc file. Or adjust everything according to the actual configuration of the application.

Also GTk+ applications can make use of the Qt widget styles while KDE is running. If you are using KDE 3.5.5 in debian etch, it is possible to allow this behavior first installing the following package through aptitude/synaptic

gtk-qt-engine

and then configuring the environment using the newly installed KDE module named “GTK Styles and Fonts”.

You can access this module from the KDE Control Center – section “Appearence & Themes”.

This new module will give you the ability to choose wether GTK applications will have the same theme as your KDE applications or have their own gtk theme. The new module will also let you choose which set of fonts GTK applications will use while KDE is running.

If Firefox 3, as well as the gtk+ libraries that firefox needs, have been installed in your home directory it can’t make use of the newly installed engine.

At present I don’t know how I can set the path of installed engines. So I tried this workaround, that seems to work here: installing the gtk-qt-engine 0.7 also in $HOME/<folderofchoice>.

#PLEASE NOTE:PLEASE NOTE: In my system executing the following step 3 leads to an “installation error” : THe script tries to write to a folder for which as a user I do not have writing permissions. It is odd: the script should not write outside of our $HOME … But it seems that the core gtk-qt-engine library is succesfully installed in $HOME. So be careful, and if You find a solution, write back !

I fetched version 0.7 of gtk-qt-engine from here.
I installed the following packages using aptitude/synaptic :
- g++;
- qt3-dev-tools;
- kdebase-dev;
I installed in $HOME/<folderofchoice> the just fetched engine. I did this step as a non root user, with its drawbacks. But I like it and it s convenient to my system.
- Open a console.
- Unzip and untar the package somewhere in the home folder.
- Change the current working directory to the main gtk-qt-engine package directory.
- Modify the environment variable PKG_CONFIG_PATH so that its content is the path to gtk+ 2.12.10’s pkgconfig directory. Oh, well here we go if you are using BASH :
  export PKG_CONFIG_PATH=$HOME/<folderofchoice>/lib/pkgconfig.
- Modify the environment variable LD_RUN_PATH so that its content is the path to the gtk+ 2.12.10’s libraries. If you are using BASH here is the command
  export LD_RUN_PATH=$HOME/<folderofchoice>/lib
- Execute the script configure located in the gtk-qt-engine main folder. I had to pass configure the following parameter –prefix=$HOME/<folderofchoice> so that the gtk-qt-engine could be completely rooted to <folderofchoice>. The command was the following : ./configure –prefix=$HOME/<folderofchoice>.
- Execute the command make install. After that you should have gtk-qt-engines built and rooted in a subfolder of $HOME/<folderofchoice>. To test this you can ls the contents of $HOME/<folderofchoice>/lib/gtk-2.0.

3 – I set up the gtk applications to use the qt widget styles using the KDE module “GTK Styles and Fonts”.

4 – I modified the script that starts firefox 3 so that it uses the ~/.gtkrc-2.0 rc file.

… and then firefox 3 is visually well integrated in kde 3.5.5

Add comment June 30, 2008

debian etch + gtk-engines-2.15.1 + gtk+ 2.12 (towards firefox3 customization)

#20080620

#Please note: Thank you to the people who was talking here about the gtk-engines and for their links and feedbacks.

#Please note: This is working in progress and, as usual, I am in a hurry. If you think these informations are wrong write a note. If they work for you leave a note too (if you want to…of course ).

#Please note: These engines require gtk+ version 2.12.0 or later. So I think you will have troubles if you want to use them with older versions of gtk+.

#Please note: These notes are my starting point.

1st Section : Build the gtk-engines-2.15.1 and install them as a non-root user

Install through aptitude/synaptic some of the packages the gtk-engines-2.15.1 depends upon. Here is the list of what I had to install (do you think we can slim it down ?):
- The package intltool. All its dependencies are handled automatically.
Choose a folder/subfolder in the home directory where the gtk-engines will be installed. I will call it <folderofchoice> from now on. I chose the folder where in the previous post I installed all the libraries and binaries related to the gtk+ package. But you can choose it your way.
Fetch and install the package gtk-engines-2.15.1. I did this step as a non root user, with its drawbacks. But I like it and it s convenient to my system.
- Open a console.
- Unzip and untar the package somewhere in the home folder.
- Change the current working directory to the main gtk-engines package directory.
- Modify the environment variable PKG_CONFIG_PATH so that its content is the path to gtk+ 2.12.10’s pkgconfig directory. Oh, well here we go if you are using BASH :
  export PKG_CONFIG_PATH=$HOME/<folderofchoice>/lib/pkgconfig.
- Modify the environment variable LD_RUN_PATH so that its content is the path to the gtk+ 2.12.10’s libraries. If you are using BASH here is the command
  export LD_RUN_PATH=$HOME/<folderofchoice>/lib
- Execute the script configure located in the gtk-engines main folder. I had to pass configure the following parameter –prefix=$HOME/<folderofchoice> so that the gtk-engines could be completely rooted to <folderofchoice>. The command was the following : ./configure –prefix=$HOME/<folderofchoice>.
- Execute the command make install. After that you should have gtk-engines-2.15.1 built and rooted in a subfolder of $HOME/<folderofchoice>. To test this you can ls the contents of $HOME/<folderofchoice>/lib/gtk-2.0.
Okay, you are done. The engines and also some themes are there, here is the list (as my configure says..) :
- ClearLooks
- Crux
- HC
- Industrial
- Mist
- Redmond
- Glide
- Smooth
- ThinIce
and you can use them, but how ? First, as I understand, it is good to know that the engines are used by control options and lay on bottom of them. For our purposes we will be using the themes/control options and we will not be using directly the engines.

#Please note: I am not an expert in this field, so sorry if I lack of terminology.

2nd Section : Configuring and Using those themes in your gtk+ applications (i.e. Firefox 3).

Way one – Do it by hand (not that ! )

Two different goals we can reach.

Goal 1 – Set the aspect of EVERY gtk application in the system (not recommended)
#Please note: this is not recommended because as of my tests here the new themes do not work fine if some of your applications are still using the “old” gtk+s libraries and, also, some of these themes we just installed do not contain informations about windows borders or icons.
- Open for writing the file .gtkrc-2.0, that is located in your home folder, with a (simple) text editor. If this file does not exist, create it.
- There should exist a line like this:
  include “…./themes/….”
- (If you found a line like that, comment it out with a # and) add this new line, replacing the missing informations and always according to your installation:
  include “<full_path_to_folder_of_choice>/<folderofchoice>/
  share/themes/<theme_name>/gtk-2.0/gtkrc”
- Launch a gtk application. Its controls have a “new style”.
is it working ?
Goal 2 – Set the aspect of a SINGLE gtk application in the system (i.e. Firefox 3)
#Please note: this is good I think if you want only a specific (or set of specific) application(s) make use of the new engines.
- Think of a name. Let’s suppose it to be <mygtkrc>.
- Create the file ~/.<mygtkrc> and open it for writing. (If that file alreadys exist Think of another name).
- add this new line to ~/.<mygtkrc> (adding the missing informations and always according to your installation):
  include “<full_path_to_<folder_of_choice>>/<folderofchoice>/
  share/themes/<theme_name>/gtk-2.0/gtkrc”
- Create a (wrapper) script (if you already have one for this application modify it) somewhere in the home folder, replacing the missing informations:
  #!/bin/sh
  export GTK2_RC_FILES=$HOME/.<mygtkrc>
  <full_path_to_the_gtk_application_you_want_to_wrap>/<x_application_name>
- Launch the SCRIPT. The application controls have a “new style”.
is it working ?

Way two – Do it with software products

<STUB_NOT_DONE>

3rd Section : Icon themes for firefox 3.

Once you are done with the gtk theme customization of Firefox (as explained before) you can choose an “icon theme” (I mean a theme that preserves the current gtk theme) for Firefox and install it.

[I hope I can collect links to themes for Firefox 3 which are not too intrusive. If you know of any nice theme send the link and I will update the following list.]

Here is the first, In my opinion it is very nice !

Phoenity ;

Add comment June 20, 2008

debian etch + gtk+ 2.12 + firefox 3

#20080610#20080626#20080827

#Please note: It’s many months now that I wrote these steps. Libraries may have changed and I did not update the links. So you have two choices :

- directly follow the links I wrote: in this case these instructions will help you but you will have slightly old libraries.

- search for new versions of the libraries: if something has changed these instructions will not be able to cover the new subject.

anyways, choose as you like

Another note: Lenny is about to be released … I suppose we will have iceweasel version 3 by default .

#Please note : this _is_ and _will remain_ work in progress. Before executing the steps think of what I wrote : I am in a hurry and the informations lack of completeness here and there. Any suggestions/corrections are welcome. At present it seemed they worked fine for many people.

#Please note: Every change to the environment variables described here vanishes if you do not store it somewhere (i.e. bashrc or something).

#Please note : some steps need root privileges. I installed all the libs as a non-root user . if you want to do it differently modify the steps according to your taste.

#Please note: I just found a writing about the use of LD_LIBRARY_PATH. And it is a bit “scary”… See http://www.eyrie.org/~eagle/notes/rpath.html . Setting the value of LD_LIBRARY_PATH influences all our next compilations and execution of programs that use the libraries we are going to install- it’s useful to remember this. So do we need to change something in the following lines ? Do we need to compile FireFox from source and link everything statically ?? Suggestions greatly appreciated. UPDATE: Okay, thank to that page, I found the solution, that is explained in the 2nd section.

1st Section – Build the libraries gtk+ 2.12 and install them as a non-root user.

Install through aptitude/synaptic some of the packages gtk+2.12 depends upon. Here is the list of what I had to install (do you think that we can slim down this list ?) :
- The package xorg-dev. All its dependencies are handled automatically.
- The package libtiff4-dev. All its dependencies are handled automatically.
- The package libpng12-dev. All its dependencies are handled automatically.
- The package libpango1.0-dev. All its dependencies are handled automatically.
- The package libatk1.0-dev. All its dependencies are handled automatically.
- The package libgtk2.0-dev. All its dependencies are handled automatically.
- The package gettext. All its dependencies are handled automatically.
- The package libxul-dev. All its dependencies are handled automatically. (NEW)
Choose a folder/subfolder in the home directory where all the libraries,binaries man pages will be installed. I will call it <folderofchoice> from now on.
Fetch and install the package glib 2.16. I did this step as a non root user, with its drawbacks. But I like it and it s convenient to my system.
- Open a console.
- Unzip and untar the package somewhere in the home folder.
- Change the current working directory to the main glib package directory.
- Execute the script configure located in the glib 2.16 main folder. I had to pass configure the following parameter –prefix=$HOME/<folderofchoice> so that glib could be completely rooted to <folderofchoice>. The command was the following : ./configure –prefix=$HOME/<folderofchoice>.
- Execute the command make install. After that you should have glib 2.16 built and rooted at $HOME/<folderofchoice>. To test this you can ls the contents of $HOME/<folderofchoice>.
Fetch and install the package pango 1.20. I did this step as a non root user, with its drawbacks. But I like it and it s convenient to my system. Please note that pango 1.20 requires glib 2.14 or newer. Glib 2.12.4 is installed system-wide so We must tell pango to use the glib 2.16 we installed in the previous step. Look :
- Open a console.
- Unzip and untar the package pango 1.20 somewhere in the home folder.
- Change the current working directory to the main pango package directory.
- Modify the environment variable PKG_CONFIG_PATH so that its content is the path to glib 2.16’s pkgconfig directory. Oh, well here we go if you are using BASH :
  export PKG_CONFIG_PATH=$HOME/<folderofchoice>/lib/pkgconfig.
- Modify the environment variable LD_RUN_PATH so that its content is the path to the newly installed libraries. If you are using BASH here is the command
  export LD_RUN_PATH=$HOME/<folderofchoice>/lib .
- Execute the script configure located in the pango 1.20 main folder. I had to pass configure the following parameter –prefix=$HOME/<folderofchoice> so that pango could be completely rooted to <folderofchoice>. The command was the following : ./configure –prefix=$HOME/<folderofchoice>.
- Execute the command make install. After that you should have pango 1.20 built and rooted at $HOME/<folderofchoice>. To test this you can ls the contents of $HOME/<folderofchoice>.
Fetch and install the package gtk+2.12 . I did this step as a non root user, with its drawbacks. But I like it and it s convenient to my system. Please note that gtk+2.12 requires glib 2.14 or newer. Glib 2.12.4 is installed system-wide so We must tell gtk+2.12 to use the glib 2.16 and pango 1.20 we installed in the previous steps.
- Open a console.
- Unzip and untar the package gtk+2.12 somewhere in the home folder.
- Change the current working directory to the main gtk+ package directory.
- Modify the environment variable PKG_CONFIG_PATH so that its content is the path to glib 2.16’s pkgconfig directory. Oh, well here we go if you are using BASH :
  export PKG_CONFIG_PATH=$HOME/<folderofchoice>/lib/pkgconfig.
- Modify the environment variable LD_RUN_PATH so that its content is the path to the newly installed libraries. If you are using BASH here is the command
  export LD_RUN_PATH=$HOME/<folderofchoice>/lib .
- Execute the script configure located in the gtk+2.12 main folder. I had to pass configure the following parameter –prefix=$HOME/<folderofchoice> so that gtk+ could be completely rooted to <folderofchoice>. The command was the following :
  ./configure –prefix=$HOME/<folderofchoice>.
- At this point you should have configured the gtk package. One problem arises. In my system if I next give the command ‘make’ the build process stops complaining libtool has an invalid argument. A temporary workaround is the following.
  - Open with a text editor the Makefile located in the gtk+2.12 main folder.
  - Search for the word ‘tests’ and delete it. The result is that the gtk tests will not be built but the package will be built correctly. I hope I can find the correct fix, anyways.
- Execute the command make install. After that you should have gtk+2.12 built and rooted at $HOME/<folderofchoice>. To test this you can list the contents of $HOME/<folderofchoice>.
That’s it ! You should have everything set up to run Firefox 3. Let’s try it !

2nd Section – Fetch and install Firefox 3.

Fetch the Firefox 3 binary package that you like the most and execute it making sure that the environment variable LD_LIBRARY_PATH stores the path to the newly installed libraries.
- Open a console.
- Unzip and untar the package firefoxXXX somewhere in the home folder.
- Change the current working directory to the main firefoxXXX package directory.
- Now, you can fallow one of two ways :
  Way one
  #Please Note: this way the scope of LD_LIBRARY_PATH is the whole shell environment.
  - Modify the environment variable LD_LIBRARY_PATH so that its content is the path to the newly installed libraries. If you are using BASH here is the command
    export LD_LIBRARY_PATH=$HOME/<folderofchoice>/lib .
  - Run the local copy of Firefox 3. Here is the command : ./firefox. It is important that you tell the shell to run the local copy of firefox otherwise the “system wide” firefox will be executed.
  Way two (I think “safer”)
  #Please Note: this way the scope of LD_LIBRARY_PATH should be only the program we are executing, not system wide scope.
  - Create a wrapper script that has the following 3 lines (sorry, I had to cut the “export” in 2 lines). NOte: this is a very basic script. I mean I am just passing one parameter to the “real” firefox (i.e. an URL). To allow more complex situations you have to modify it.
    #!/bin/sh
    export LD_LIBRARY_PATH
    =$LD_LIBRARY_PATH:$HOME/<folderofchoice>/lib
    <full_path_firefox_folder>/firefox $1
  - Save the script with a non-conflicting-name that you like in the main firefoxXXX package folder (the current folder, if you followed the steps). Let’s suppose to call the script startfox.
  - Change the permission of the script so that it can be executed :
    chmod u+x ./startfox
  - Run the script startfox.
- is it running ?

Here are some notes about the customization of the gtk theme

Linked articles (thanks to the senders) :

http://ddesani.blogspot.com/2008/06/firefox-3-debian-etch.html (Portuguese)

cheers !

36 comments June 10, 2008

debian etch + openbox + Gnome 2

#Please NOTE: you need root privileges to do this. The goal is to install openbox and modify a file that belongs to GNOME 2 to make openbox work correctly.

#Please NOTE: I do not have GDM running and so these instructions do not fully cover the subject

1 – Install the package called ‘openbox’.

2 – Edit the environment variable WINDOW_MANAGER so that its value is ‘openbox’. Example (if you are using the shell bash) : export WINDOW_MANAGER=openbox. If you want to make the change permanently you should add the line export WINDOW_MANAGER=openbox to your ‘.bashrc’ (if you are using bash).

3 – Grant root privileges and open the file ‘/usr/bin/gnome-wm’ for writing.

4 – Add this “case”

openbox)
OPT1=–sm-client-id
OPT2=$SMID
CURRENT=openbox
;;

to the list of cases that follow the line : “case `basename “$WINDOW_MANAGER”` in” .

5 – Start Gnome and you should have openbox running as its window manager.

If I did any mistake, just tell me and I will update the contents of this post,

Add comment May 22, 2008

debian etch + determine default runlevel

#It’s pretty easy to do this. The information we need (default runlevel) is stored in a file and so … we need to read it. We have at least two ways to do it …

#Please note : NO root privileges are needed.

- Way 1 -

Open for reading, with a (simple) text editor, the file ‘/etc/inittab’.
Each line, apart from the lines that are comments that start with a ‘#’ and blank lines, has the following format : <id>:<runlevels>:<action>:<process> .
Search for the line whose <action> “field” is ‘initdefault’ (If this line does not exist, it means you don’t have a default runlevel and you will be ask at every system startup to specify the runlevel to go through).
If you found that line, the <runlevels> field specifies your system’s default runlevel. Example: I found a 2 … My system’s default runlevel is runlevel 2.

- Way 2 – (faster)

At the command line type this
cat /etc/inittab | grep default
You should see displayed as a result (apart from any comments that start with a ‘#’) a line such this
id:X:initdefault:
where X is a number.
The number found in the previous step is the default runlevel of the system.
NOTE: If you don’t have that line displayed this means no default runlevel is defined.

5 comments May 6, 2008

debian etch + disable GDM at startup

#Please note : you need root privileges to do this.

In my notebook
The goal is to prevent the script that launches ‘gdm’ from being executed at system startup.

You need to determine the number of the default runlevel the system will go through at startup. In my debian etch system the default runlevel is the 2nd – so the number is 2.
[Each runlevel has a folder associated in the filesystem. The folder contains links to scripts that will be executed at system startup] The folder associated to runlevel 2 is ‘/etc/rc2.d’ (runlevel 3 has the folder ‘/etc/rc3.d’ and so on). The script that launches the GDM is the file named “S21gdm” (that is a link to the file ‘/etc/init.d/gdm’).
To prevent the GDM to be launched at startup we must rename the script that launches the GDM according to this rule:
“the new name begins with a ‘K’ and a two-digit number, where the number is the difference between the two-digit number following the ‘S’ in its current name, and 100.”
So in my case I renamed the file ‘S21gdm’ into ‘K79gdm’.

Next time the system will start the GDM will not be launched.

cheers !

4 comments May 2, 2008

debian etch + GNU GRUB Legacy

#Please note : at present (2008-05-02) “GNU GRUB” is known as “GNU GRUB Legacy”

Link to the GGL documentation : http://www.gnu.org/software/grub/
Location of GGL ‘menu.lst’ file: /boot/grub/menu.lst

Add comment May 2, 2008