[Hampshire] Linux Train Simulator Software
Hi, I won't be at today's meting until after 2 pm, but as I now have a portable with linux, I would like to show people a train simulator that I developed over Covid based on 'OpenRails'. Progress has been very slow over the past year but, if anyone is interested, I would welcome feedback on people's experience in setting it up. David Webb -- Please post to: Hampshire@mailman.lug.org.uk Manage subscription: https://mailman.lug.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/hampshire LUG website: http://www.hantslug.org.uk --
[Hampshire] Github Railway
Hi, As a Covid project I had a go at converting a windows train simulator program (openrails.org/) written in C#, to C, so I could run it on my linux box using OpenGL. My version, available from on github (github.com/djw-zr/ZR), has now reached the stage where a single engine can be driven along the tracks to explore the layout. So far I've developed the code using the zig-zag railway route (www.zigzag.coalstonewcastle.com.au/route/downloads/) which is freely available. The reason for this e-mail is that I am concerned that my github version may be missing some key files or instructions - possibly about the needed packages - which are available on my linux system but are not standard. So my request is - if anyone has a wet afternoon and a few hours to spare, that they have a go at downloading, compiling and running the program - at the same time keeping a record of all the problems encountered. If you can then provide me with feedback, I hope to make it easier for other people to try the program out - and maybe even help with further development. Given the summer weather you probably have better things to do, but as I only work on the project from time to time, feedback later in the year will also be welcome. Regards, David Webb. -- Please post to: Hampshire@mailman.lug.org.uk Web Interface: https://mailman.lug.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/hampshire LUG URL: http://www.hantslug.org.uk --
[Hampshire] GNU configure and m4
For a number of years I have used OpenGL and GLUT to visualise and rotate 3-D objects and produce figures for publication. For my latest project which involves many hundreds of data files, I decided that I needed a better user interface and came across GLUI which seemed to fit the bill. A git repository installed by one of the original developers is now available at https://github.com/nigels-com/glui. However I when I tried to make changes I found that my glui code was unstable. Tests using -D_GLIBCXX_DEBUG and/or library -lmtrace showed that that the program was trying to release pointers to memory it had not reserved. I removed the glui calls and then found that with -lmtrace the first glut call gave a similar error. (I presume the default without -lmtrace is to ignore free() calls with invalid addresses). As the problem might be an old bug recently corrected, the next step was to intall the latest version of OpenGL (Mesa) and glut. This required updating a lot of other packages but having done that and successfully run the Mesa configure script, I get a gmake error stating that the system cannot find the pkg-config autoconf macros which should be in /usr/share/aclocal/pkg.m4. Well there is such a file and it does contain PKG-CONFIG lines, so presumably something somewhere thinks it is the wrong version. At this point it looks like I need to get into the details of the mesa makefile and its use of aclocal and *.m4 files - but after going through most of the GNU manuals I feel that I am wasting time on this. I could just give up but before doing this I could do with talking to someone with experience of tracking down problems in this area. Any good pointers would also be welcome. Regards, David Webb. -- Please post to: Hampshire@mailman.lug.org.uk Web Interface: https://mailman.lug.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/hampshire LUG URL: http://www.hantslug.org.uk --
Re: [Hampshire] Lacie Backup Disks
Thanks for everyone's input. I took your advice not to try cleaning the disks but as I was using ext2, befor discarding them I decided to try a journaling file system just in case the errors were due to errors when foolishly switching of the power or similar. I tried ext3, but after unmounting the disk, fsck still stalled. I then tried reiserfs and this time fsck was OK and ran to completion. Read/write speeds through the usb connection were slow so I used the distructive form of badblocks of the first 100 Gb (~8 hours) and then tests of short patches every 100 Gb. These were all OK. Reinstalled reiserfs and copied across about 30 GB of real data - fsck still OK. Tried another 60 Gb but this time fsck failed because it was unable to read one of the blocks. There was a nice message: -- The problem has occurred looks like a hardware problem. If you have bad blocks, we advise you to get a new hard drive, because once you get one bad block that the disk drive internals cannot hide from your sight,the chances of getting more are generally said to become much higher (precise statistics are unknown to us), and this disk drive is probably not expensive enough for you to you to risk your time and data on it. -- I need new archive sytem but what is the best way to do this? One good suggestion was to use disks from different manufacturers, or at least different batches from the same one. However as archiving only takes 10 minutes or so every two weeks (I use rsync) system robustness when heavily used is not as important as lifetime. So, given that I have about 400Gb, and would like to have a 99.9% chance of still holding most of the data in ten years time, 1. Are disks still my best archive storage system? 2. Should I just be buy cheap disks and replace one of the pair each year? 3. Should I be spending as much effort checking the disks as archiving? 4. Is there a better strategy? Regards, David Webb. -- Please post to: Hampshire@mailman.lug.org.uk Web Interface: https://mailman.lug.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/hampshire LUG URL: http://www.hantslug.org.uk --
[Hampshire] Lacie Backup Disks
I have a couple of 1TB usb based backup disks which I alternate between home and my daughters house. They are Samsung HJ103UJ disks in a Lacie enclosure. Both have developed a fault in which I can read files for about 10-20s but they then freeze. I have tried reformatting one (ext4) but then running fsck on the reformatted disk fails after about the same amount of time (although the time does vary between different runs). I guess it is the end of the line for both disks but it seems odd that it has happened to both and in both cases the electronics seems fine up to the point of failure. (I then have to remove the power before I can mount and read them again). Does anyone know of an obvious cause for this type of failure - dust, movement, overheating - or how to get into the enclosure (to clean) without destroying it? Regards, David Webb. -- Please post to: Hampshire@mailman.lug.org.uk Web Interface: https://mailman.lug.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/hampshire LUG URL: http://www.hantslug.org.uk --
[Hampshire] Open/Libre Office
I have just been sent a new password for the new OpenOffice.org site (I once contributed a couple of lines of java to solve a bug which annoyed me) - which has made me more conscious of the fact that we now have both OpenOffice and LibreOffice. It seems to be a waste of effort to have a split like this and I cannot find any discussion about the number of people who have moved across and the number who have stayed with OpenOffice. Without getting emotional about the role of Oracle, has anybody any feel of how this will develop? Regards, David Webb Salisbury -- Please post to: Hampshire@mailman.lug.org.uk Web Interface: https://mailman.lug.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/hampshire LUG URL: http://www.hantslug.org.uk --
Re: [Hampshire] Ultimate Linux Media PC?
I wonder if we can take this discussion a bit further - possibly expanding it so that it does not just cover the 'ultimate' system. If there was a smart linux hardware+software package to fit neatly under the TV for less than £250 that could combine the roles of PVR, network interface and DVD writer (blue-ray for a bit extra?) then it could be a very attractive consumer product. I see the Hants Wiki has thought a bit about the options but has not come up so far with any solutions. Of the three main suggestions made in the current discussion, (I know nothing about the X-Box), John Wesleys seems to have the most options, but I query the power requirement (is 65 W high these days?), the TV tuner (freeview and/or freesat - USB stubs would look out of place) and most importantly the user interface (we really need a handheld). Also are there drivers for the VIA CX700M2 graphics chip which is a key component. The total price comes out around £500 (without a blueray writer) which is a bit on the high side. In comparison Alan Pope's Acer Aspire seems much more cost effective - but does it need another box for the (twin) TV tuner and does it look right under the TV? Is the power sufficient to handle two input and one output TV streams at once? The great advantage with such a package is that the drivers should always work and problems like power/heat dissipation and hardware compatability should have been sorted out. Finally Hugo Mills' Popcorn Hour looks very professional but has none of the PVR properties which, from now on is likely to be considered essential. Anyway I wonder if we could start with these - as three levels which might attract interest - and then have suggestions about how they could be improved and what software would work together. Maybe a winter meeting devoted to 'around the house' media systems would be useful. Regards, David Webb === Brief summaries: John Wesley, Hardware + Mythbuntu: £425 processor: Via C7 memory: 1 Gb Hard Drive: 1.5 Tb Optical drive: None Graphics: VIA UniChromeTM Pro II 3D/2D AGP Monitor:None Networking: Ethernet (RJ-45) Firewire Controls: Mouse and Keyboard Power supply: 65W adaptor Audio/Video:1 x DVI 1 x RJ45 1 x miniDIN (S-Video) 1 x Triple RCA (composite video and steoeo) 1 x Triple RCA (component video) 1 x S/PDIF coaxial 1 x S/PDIF optical Internal ports: 2 (+ 4) x USB 1 x 1394 1 Front panel audio header 1 Audio line in header 1 LPC header 1 LVDS header 1 TV out header for SCART and D-terminal 1 video connector for VGA output 1 x video input and SMBUS 1 x PS2 mouse/keyboard header 2 x SATA Other connectors: 2 x fan connectors 1 x ATX power connector TV Control: Keyboard?!! TV Receiver:PCI Card Alan Pope, Acer Aspire Revo Desktop PC + Linux(?) £155.99 Processor: Intel Atom Memory: 1 Gb Hard Drive: 160 Gb Optical drive: None Graphics: NVidia IONth Monitor:None Networking: WiFi (802.11) Ethernet (RJ-45) Controls: Mouse and Keyboard Power supply: 65W adaptor Audio/Video : 1 x D-sub VGA 1 x HDMIth Headphones, Mike Other ports:6 x USB 2.0 1 x eSATA 1 x Mini PCI express slot TV Control: Keyboard?!! TV Receiver:mini PCI card? Hugo Mills: Popcorn Hour A-110, Syaba OS(?), $215 (£215?) Memory: 256 Mb Networking: Ethernet Power: 12V (Less than 36 W) Audio/Video: HDMI v1.3a (up to 1080p) Component Video S-Video Composite Video Stereo Analog Audio S/PDIF Optical Digital Audio Other ports: 1+2 USB SATA TV Control: Hand held remote control TV Receiver: The system streams data from the www, other computers and attached storage. It is not clear of it can also act like a PVR and record from digital TV input, say via a receiver connected to a USB port. == -- Please post to: Hampshire@mailman.lug.org.uk Web Interface: https://mailman.lug.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/hampshire LUG URL: http://www.hantslug.org.uk --
Re: [Hampshire] Ultimate Linux Media PC?
Stephen Rowles wrote: You've missed my suggestions My mistake - sorry about that. What is the position re Linux drivers? Are they the same NVidia ones as the Acer Aspire? David. -- Please post to: Hampshire@mailman.lug.org.uk Web Interface: https://mailman.lug.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/hampshire LUG URL: http://www.hantslug.org.uk --
