note to self....

Chris J— (Jarnaker.com) has done a hack on a cordless phone to connect it thru the sound card on a PC such that it can be used for voice over IM and Skype

To fix problems with BS and DEL keys generating ^H and ^? garbage and more arcane problems like the Emacs help screen popping up when you hit the backspace key, there is an excellent page by Anne Baretta entitled BackSpace and Delete Configuration for Linux (VT, xterm, bash, tcsh, netscape and more)

Labels: gui, linux, x11

There is a Linux mini-HowTo entitled How to change the title of an xterm. This how to covers several shells and has a lot of good information about the various escape sequences of various shells and how to use them.

The section 4.3 Bash has example code for setting the XTerm title from within Bash.

The Bash shell uses the value of the environment variable PS1 as the prompt. The default Bash prompt set during the installation of the Cygwin environment uses the escape sequences described in the How-To to set the title of an XTerm.

This is fine, unless you want to use the same prompt value in the .bashrc file on a Linux box. The technique does work, but cases some annoying behaviour at the console when you log in to the Linux box without the benefit of the X environment.

Also, the dynamic setting of the XTerm title can interfere with static title settings you may try to use.

Now that we know the escape sequences that are used to set the XTerm title, we can examine the default Cygwin prompt and re-write it to leave the XTerm title alone, while still giving us the two-line prompt that can be useful for readability.

The default value is something like:

export PS1='\[\033]0;\w\007\033[32m\]\u@\h: \[\033[33m\w\033[0m\]
\$'

We can re-write this as

export PS1='\033[32m\]\u@\h: \[\033[33m\w\033[0m\]
\$'

This keeps the Bash prompt, but doesn't try to set the XTerm title.

Note that the bashrc file can contain code that checks the value of $TERM before setting the prompt. That would eliminate the problem that occurs for console logins, but still won't help us when we're setting the XTerm title ourselves e.g. using -n and -T. We prefer to simply remove the dynamic setting of the XTerm title as a default.

references

Labels: bash, cygwin, faq, gui, link, linux, prompt, ps1, x11, xterm

This applies to Windows 2000 Professional Edition - it may apply to other versions of Windoze as well.

To prevent Windows from hiding portions of the menu until you hit that stoopid double-down arrow thing:

1. From the Start menu, select Settings, then Taskbar & Start Menu...
2. The Taskbar and Start Menu Properties window will open. Near the bottom of the window, uncheck Use Personalized Menus, and then click OK.

Since Excel doesn't respect the system level setting, you will need to do this again in Excel (and perhaps other MS Office components, don't know yet).

According to Univ of Indianna you will, and they seem to think it's a standardized procedure, even:

1. From the Tools menu, select Customize... .
2. Click the Options tab.
3. 1. In Office XP or 2003, under "Personalized Menus and Toolbars", check Always show full menus, and then click Close.
   2. In Office 2000, under "Personalized Menus and Toolbars", uncheck Menus show recently used commands first, and then click Close

Note that we got there by right-mousing the menu bar to get to the appropriate dialog.

Labels: fix, gui, menu, ms, win2k, win32, windows

"NetworkSolutions Consumer Insight" is the text of the "stealth" popup that the Network Solutions account management pages opens when you log in to your account there to manage domains you have registered there.

While that may seem unremarkable, what we have found over the course of the last week is that, when trying to manage these Network Solutions registered accounts, any changes made will silently fail unless your trusty Firefox browser has enabled all of a) allow popups for networksolutions.com, b) allow cookies for networksolutions.com, and c) enable Javascript.

Furthermore, if popups are disabled and/or cookies are not allowed for the site, no errors are returned from Network Solutions servers - that is, any changes you request (e.g. to the DNS records) will fail without telling the use why the changes are not accepted. In fact, no indication is given that the changes were not accepted except for the fact that e.g. the DNS changes are not shown and are never propagated.

Network Solutions tech support did not inform us of what the problem was, even when explicitly asked. We specifically asked the rep if not having cookies enabled could be causing this problem, and the rep didn't think so. Nor was any mention made of the stealth popup or Javascript.

After about 20 minutes on the phone with Network Solutions tech support - which ended with them telling us "the problem is on your side" - we decided to try a few things, which is how we discovered this problem.

It is our considered opinion that Network Solutions should make clear in their documentation that Javascript, Cookies, and Popups are all required by the Network Solutions Account Manager pages. Also, it might be nice if an error of some kind - perhaps even a specific error, say "YOU NEED TO ENABLE COOKIES TO USE THIS SITE" - would be a good idea.

Finally, there is a bit of actual weirdness involved here, in that the cookie for networksolutions.com does not show up in our cookie list. The Javascript source code shows that at least one cookie is being set, but it doesn't show up.

Labels: link

National Map Viewer

6th Pl

Labels: link

VIA EPIA-M10000 Mini-ITX Motherboard With NEHEMIAH 1GHz CPU for $159.95 from ComputerGate.

Damn Small Linux on a bootable 128MB USB Pen Drive

Labels: hardware, link, linux, miniITX, small, software, USB

geektechnique.org: ...making an encrypted fileserver

Presidential Candidate Pat Buchanan - The Dark Side: "'Women are simply not endowed with the same measure of single-minded ambition and the will to succeed in the fiercely competitive world of Western capitalism.' - Pat Buchanan"

Labels: politics

Today is the anniversary of the shooting of Kent State University Students by Ohio National Guard. This was done on the orders of the then-govenor of Ohio. Four students were killed. No one was every prosecuted, despite the very public threats made by the Govenor.

This shouln't be forgotten, kidz - it's the action that forever neutralized peaceful protest in the US.

Labels: politics

Slashdot picks:

• Linux PDA Resurfacing U.S. - a discussion about the Sharp Zaurus Linux-based PDA, where to get it, and the pros and cons of using it. [ handhelds.org (iPaq distro), EO Forums, openzaurus.org, Zaurus Software Index, elsi (embedded linux software index), OpenBSD Zaurus Port]
• Broadband War & an Interactive Municipal Map - Telcos vs Muni WiFi [Bandwidth Commune, or Cooperative? (also try 66.173.232.178)]
• Netcraft: 5,600 Phishing Sites Since December - Netcraft Toolbar and listing of phishing sites
• Toshiba Demonstrates Cell Microprocessor - video decoder (DRM)
• Build your own DVR

Labels: link

• http://www.faqs.org/
• http://www.cs.ruu.nl/cgi-bin/faqwiais/
• http://www.lib.ox.ac.uk/search/search_faqs.html
• http://www.jazzie.com/ii/faqs/archive/
• http://www.best.com/~ii/faqs/archive/
• ftp://rtfm.mit.edu/pub/usenet/
• mailto:mail-server@rtfm.mit.edu
[message body containing usenet/newsgrp/subgrp/faqid
• UUCP: uunet!/archive/usenet/newsgrp/subgrp/faqid

Labels: link

Unix Daemons in Perl is a short, to-the-point tutorial about how to create basic daemons using Perl in a UNIX environment.

Labels: link

C-Kermit 7.0 Case Study #11: "Pty (pronounced 'pity') is the common abbreviation for 'pseudoterminal' (or 'pseudoteletype'). A pseudoterminal is a virtual (simulated) device that has the characteristics of a real terminal. A Pty is used by UNIX as your controlling terminal when you come in via Telnet, Rlogin, SSH, or other 'virtual' means, rather than through a serial port with its 'real' terminal driver. The Pty driver mimics what the real terminal driver does on a real terminal."

There are several problems that can commonly occur between your host computer and the internet when connecting to the internet using a DHCP to configure host computers on a local area network attached to a cable modem via home router. The setup we are currently discussing here is

• cable modem


• 802.11b/g wireless router


• wireless network card (NIC) in Linux host

These same principles will apply for wired networks and for non-Linux based computers, but any commands specified on the host may differ slightly for either exception. Likewise, the principles will apply for uplink devices other than cable modems (e.g. DSL routers).

There are several things that must happen when the DHCP client configures the NIC on the host computer. DHCP configuratino of the host NIC happens when a network interface is brought up. Typically, network intefaces are brought up either when the computer is powered up, or when the user manually commands it. In this case, we are starting the DHCP configuration of the wireless NIC manually using the Kinternet widget.

The things that must happen during DHCP configuration of the NIC are:

• The host acquires an IP address from the a DHCP server and assigns it to the NIC


• The host acquires a DNS address from the DHCP server and assigns it to the host for use resolving network names


• The host acquires a default gateway address - also known as a default route - which is assigned to the TCP/IP stack on the host and used for all non-local network traffic (i.e. Internet access).

As the host computer NIC is brought up and configured via DHCP, if any of the above operations fails, then the host computer will exhibit behavior which provides a tip-off to what the problem is:

• If no IP address was acquired from the DHCP server, then the network connection has failed - Kintenet will not show an the connection as active, and /sbin/ifconfig will not show an IP address for the wlan0 interface.



• If no DNS server address is provided (or if the DNS is unsuccessfully set on the host), then network names will not be resolved for the host - e.g. web browser requests will time out with "host not found" type errors.



• If no default gateway is provided, or if the default route is not set for the host, then web requests via the browser will be returned immeadiately. Network requests in general will be returned with "network unreachable" errors.

Labels: link

export PS1='\[\033]0;\w\007\033[32m\]\u@\h: \[\033[33m\w\033[0m\]
$'

Labels: bash, prompt, ps1