Baslinux mailing list

[sindi keesan <keesan AT sdf.lonestar.org>]

On Sun, 29 Jan 2006 3aoo-cvfd AT dea.spamcon.org wrote:

> sindi keesan wrote:
> > Can something be added to rc to go directly into X?
>
> Put startx at the bottom of /etc/profile

Thanks, it was not working from rc, could not find the path, so I tried 
writing out the entire path to startx, then it could not find xinit...

Why don't the aliases in /etc/profile work in X?  I had to make scripts 
instead of aliases.  They work in console mode.

> > Is there some way to run the dialer within X
>
> Isn't ppp-on in the X menu?
>
> > and see the lines you see when running from console
> > (IP addresses, etc.) so we can know when it has connected?
>
> In icewm a little box appears at the bottom of the screen
> when it is connected.  It disappears when the connection
> is broken.

My friend is 84 and has trouble aiming the mouse.  He can find keys on 
the keyboard much more easily, so I tried having him type out 'dial' in 
the rxvt (that I put into .xinitrc).  To hang up he types h, to exit X he 
can type e.  I know he could use the menu with arrow keys and Enter, but 
he can't remember where it is or how to access it (or how to hit Ctrl and 
ESC at the same time, which makes it difficult to access the menu>)

He can't manage Ctrl-Alt-Backspace but he can type 'e' for exit to exit X. 
How would I write a 1-letter script for Ctrl-Alt-Del?  He keeps asking 
which Ctrl, Alt, and Del key he is supposed to use, there are two of each.
(No he is not going to get better at this, he is 84 and having memory 
problems which he can't fix).

BL2 has shutdown but BL3 does not.

I will look for the little box.  I dialed in BL2 X and then exited X to 
use ssh, and went back into X but don't see such a box.

My friend knows how to watch the pink and green moving 'charts' in the 
lower right to know that a website is downloading.  (He likes stock 
charts).  Maybe something happens there during dialing too.  (He can't 
remember to look in the lower left in 'links2' for messages).  He prefers 
links to opera because he can use the up and down arrows to navigate (he 
can't remember a and q and tab).

Why do I get messages during dial in BL2 but not BL3 X, and in  console 
BL3 I also get them, and can I change BL3 to see them in X?

> > Can startx start opera when opera is being run from a wrapper
> > in an opera directory?
>
> Probably  ( in ~/.xinitrc ).

I experimented but could not figure out how to start opera, which has to 
be started by first cd /opera and then opera.  If I make a script 'o' to 
do this, it has to be called as '. o' (to avoid opening another shell, I 
am told).  How do I put '. o' into .xinitrc?

My friend can probably learn to type 'l' for links2 -g and '. o' for 
opera.


> > Opera won't work online on either of two computers,
>
> What do you mean by "won't work"?  Exactly what happens?

'Network error' no matter which URL I try to access.
It accesses local files.  I accessed a script as a test.

> > What else might I try upgrading besides the libraries in
> > glibc 2.2.5 and pppd (which is uclibc static
>
> My Opera (8.02) works fine with the old BL2 pppd.  Are you
> suggesting Opera doesn't work with the BL3 pppd?  That would
> surprise me.

> Cheers,
> Steven


I tried both pppd's, the BL3 one and David's new static-uclibc one.
I am using the BL3 static Xvesa, the same static pppd, the same libraries 
from glibc, the same opera (it even works online in BL2 from the 
opera-7.23... directory).  But the following differ, libc5 vs. glibc:

icewm

/X11R6/lib libX11 libICE libSM libXext libXpm (used by icewm and opera, so 
I would have to replace icewm if I replaced them with glibc ones)

Might opera work online if I replaced all of these with BL2 versions?

Could you or anyone else please test this out:  copy the opera-7.23 .tgz 
file from BL2 (or download it from opera) to BL3 /, add the glibc ldconfig 
ld-linux libc libm libdl libpthread to BL3 /sbin/ and /lib (and run 
ldconfig), tar -zxvf the opera file, then cd /opera*, startx, dial, load 
opera by typing opera in an rxvt, and access a URL online?

Or some other version of opera if you have it already but this is what my 
friend got used to.

If Opera can be made to work with BL3.40-glibc, it would be ideal for 
setting up people who only want computers for browsing.  We ran into 
someone yesterday willing to spend $200 for what he thought was the 
minimum used computer to go online (500MHz, lots of HD, Win2000).
He also thought he needed a laptop - there was a $20 486 which would have 
been ideal (with external modem and power supply) with either swap file or 
PCMCIA memory added.

I had to up the RAM from 32 to 48MB to keep links from exiting suddenly 
with an out of memory error at image-heavy sites (llbean is a good test) 
when I was running two copies of it at once.  But a swap file should also 
work.  We got three 16MB DIMMs for $1 each.

BL2 is bigger and more effort to set up but also works with Xvesa.