Debian GNU/Linux

Desktop Survival Guide

Graham Williams

ii
The procedures and applications presented in this book have been included
for their instructional value. They have been tested but are not guaranteed
for any particular purpose. The publisher does not offer any warranties or
representations, nor does it accept any liabilities with respect to the programs
and applications.
This book is a work in progress (and probably will always be so!). Please
send me comments, suggestions, updates, criticisms.

Printed 5 April 2004

c 2003-2004 by Graham Williams

Copyright
Permission is granted to copy and distribute this book but not for commercial gain with the exception that this document may be included with any
distribution of Debian GNU/Linux, without limitation.

Contents

Preface

xxix

1 Advocacy
1.1

Linux Adopters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

2 History: Unix, GNU, Gnome

1
5

2.1

Unix . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

2.2

GNU . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

2.3

Linux

2.4

Gnome . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12

2.5

Free and Open Source Software . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13

2.6

Free Documentation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15

2.7

Freedom . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15

2.8

General Resources

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16

2.8.1

Books . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16

2.8.2

Internet . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18

3 Distributions

19

3.1

Debian GNU/Linux Distributions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20

3.2

Advantages of the Debian Distribution . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21

iii

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CONTENTS
3.3

Debian Distributions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23

3.4

Debian Packages . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25

3.5

Debian Releases . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
3.5.1

Naming The Releases . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25

3.5.2

Recording Your Choice . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26

3.5.3

Other Flavours . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27

3.5.4

Package Basics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27

3.6

Using dselect . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28

3.7

Debian on CD . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29

3.8

3.7.1

Build or Download the CD Image? . . . . . . . . . . . 30

3.7.2

Obtain The Debian Pseudo-Image Kit . . . . . . . . . 31

3.7.3

Listing of CD Image Contents . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31

3.7.4

Download Debian Packages . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32

3.7.5

CD-ROM Packages from APT . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33

Other Distributions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
3.8.1

Moving From Red Hat . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33

4 Installation
4.1

35

Quick Start . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36
4.1.1

LiveCD Install

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36

4.1.2

Quick Debian Install . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36

4.2

Hardware Compatibility . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39

4.3

Getting the Installation Media . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40

4.3.1

Floppy Distribution . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40

4.3.2

CD-ROM Distribution . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41

4.3.3

LiveCD Distributions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41

CONTENTS
4.4

4.5

4.6

4.7

Boot . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42
4.4.1

SPARCStation Boot . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42

4.4.2

BIOS Not Supporting CD-ROM . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43

Installation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43
4.5.1

Debian Install . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43

4.5.2

PGI Install . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43

Base Install . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44
4.6.1

Keyboard . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44

4.6.2

Partitions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44

4.6.3

Configure Devices . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45

4.6.4

Networking . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45

4.6.5

Time Zone . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46

4.6.6

Floppy Boot Disk . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46

4.6.7

Reboot and User Accounts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46

4.6.8

Package Selections . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46

4.6.9

EMail: Setup Exim . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46

Installing Packages . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
4.7.1

Update To Newest Distribution . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47

4.7.2

Upgrade . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48

4.7.3

New Packages . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48

4.8

Kernel Upgrade: 2.2 to 2.4 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50

4.9

Initial Configurations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51

4.10 Target Machines

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51

4.10.1 Optima Super Vizon II 3600 Customised (Bartok) . . . 51

4.10.2 ASL (Cargo) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58
4.10.3 Custom (Wayfare) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60

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CONTENTS
4.10.4 Dell Latitude C600 (Inci)

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63

4.10.5 Compaq Presario 5740AP (Friends) . . . . . . . . . . . 66

4.10.6 Dell Precision 650 (Caravan) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
4.10.7 Dell OptiPlex GX270 (Modern) . . . . . . . . . . . . . 72
4.10.8 Dell OptiPlex GX150 (Fairmond) . . . . . . . . . . . . 76
4.10.9 Dell OptiPlex GX240 (Bigdaddy) . . . . . . . . . . . . 79
4.10.10 Dell OptiPlex GX260 (Vince) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81
4.10.11 Dell Optiplex GX260 (Festival) . . . . . . . . . . . . . 84
4.10.12 Dell Optiplex GX260 (Uramys1) . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88
4.10.13 Optima (Vivaldi) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91
4.10.14 Dell Precision 620 (Brick) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95
4.10.15 Dell Precision 620 (Atom) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97
4.10.16 Optima WorkPro (Bach) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 99
4.10.17 Dell OptiPlex GXi 523M (Prefect) . . . . . . . . . . . 103
4.10.18 Dell Precision 420 MT (Cleveland) . . . . . . . . . . . 105
4.10.19 Dell Optiplex GX240 (Cultus) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 106
4.10.20 Dell Precision WorkStation 530 MT (Altrop) . . . . . . 108
4.10.21 Sun SPARCstation 5 (sun4m) (Cepheus) . . . . . . . . 111
4.10.22 Toshiba Satellite 1800 (HAX) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 112
4.10.23 IBM ThinkPad (Hukz) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 114
4.10.24 Dell Latitude C600 (Inco) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116
4.10.25 Dell OptiPlex GX1p (Plymouth) . . . . . . . . . . . . 119
4.10.26 Dell Precision WorkStation 420 MT (Velox) . . . . . . 121
4.10.27 Dell OptiPlex GX110 (Mint) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 123
4.10.28 Dell Latitude CPiD300XT (Inka) . . . . . . . . . . . . 125
4.10.29 Dell Latitude XPi (Rose) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 131

CONTENTS

vii

4.10.30 Generic 486/DX66 (Roast) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 133

4.11 Resources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 133
4.11.1 Books . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 133
5 Basic Survival
5.1

5.2

135

Basic Linux . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 135

5.1.1

File and Directory Protections . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 135

5.1.2

Background Jobs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 135

System Information . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 136

6 Wajig: Administering Debian

137

6.0.1

History: Motivations For Wajig . . . . . . . . . . . . . 137

6.0.2

Installing Wajig . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 138

6.0.3

The Basic Debian Tools . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 138

6.0.4

Wajig Overview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 139

6.0.5

Getting Started with SUDO . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 140

6.0.6

Available Packages . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 141

6.0.7

Finding Packages . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 142

6.0.8

Installing Packages . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 144

6.0.9

Checking Whats Changed Before Installing . . . . . . 145

6.0.10 Installing Alien Packages . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 145

6.0.11 Putting Packages on Hold . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 146
6.0.12 Building Packages . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 146
6.0.13 Managing A Local Package Archive . . . . . . . . . . . 147
6.0.14 Mirroring With APT . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 148
6.0.15 Pinning Distributions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 148
6.0.16 Cache Packages Locally

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 149

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CONTENTS
6.0.17 Reconfigure Packages . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 149
6.0.18 Setting Default Applications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 149
6.0.19 Bugs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 150
6.0.20 Managing Daemons or Services . . . . . . . . . . . . . 150
6.1

Other Commands . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 151

6.1.1

Maintaining a Distribution Archive . . . . . . . . . . . 151

6.1.2

Synchronising Two Installations . . . . . . . . . . . . . 153

6.2

Package Information . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 153

6.3

Alternative Applications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 154

6.4

Building Debian Packages . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 155

6.5

Packages: Roll Your Own . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 156

6.5.1

Prepackaging Development Environment . . . . . . . . 156

6.5.2

Initiating the Debian Package . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 158

6.5.3

Building the Debian Package: First Time . . . . . . . . 159

6.5.4

Adding the Package to Your Archive . . . . . . . . . . 159

6.5.5

Updating the Debian Package . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 160

7 Audio

163

7.1

Configuring Your Audio Chip . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 163

7.2

Audio Not Working . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 164

7.3

Audio File Information . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 164

8 AbiWord: Word Processor

8.1

165

Export to LaTeX . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 165

9 APM: Power Management

167

CONTENTS
10 Backup

ix
171

10.1 Backup To Other Computers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 171

10.2 Legato NetWorker

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 173

11 Command Line: Bash

177

12 Booting

179

12.1 Lilo . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 180

12.1.1 Large Disks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 180
12.1.2 Kernel Images . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 180
12.2 GRUB: The Grand Unified Boot Loader . . . . . . . . . . . . 181
12.3 Secure Boot . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 183
12.4 Dual Boot: Multiple Operating Systems . . . . . . . . . . . . 183
12.4.1 Dual Boot with MS-Windows/NT . . . . . . . . . . . . 183
12.4.2 Boot NT from LILO . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 185
12.5 MS-Windows/NT or MS-Windows/2000 . . . . . . . . . . . . 185
12.6 The Booting From Floppy Alternative . . . . . . . . . . . . . 186
13 Cameras

189

13.1 Setup of HP Photosmart 320 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 189

13.2 Accessing Photos . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 189
14 CD-ROM

191

14.1 Setup . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 191

14.1.1 CD Writer as a SCSI Device . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 193
14.1.2 Docking Station CD-ROM . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 195
14.1.3 LG CED-8080B Problems . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 195
14.1.4 cdrecord Problem: Cannot . . . Bytes on /dev/zero . . . 196

CONTENTS
14.2 CD Software . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 197
14.2.1 cdrdao . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 197
14.2.2 gcdmaster . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 198
14.2.3 xcdroast . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 199
14.2.4 MP3 Encoders

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 199

14.3 CD Audio . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 199

14.3.1 Duplicate Audio CD Using cdrdao
14.3.2 Duplicate Audio CD Using cdrecord

. . . . . . . . . . . 199
. . . . . . . . . . 201

14.3.3 Audio CD From Collection of MP3s . . . . . . . . . . . 201

14.4 Grip: CD Audio Extraction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 202
14.5 Copy a CD image to Disk . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 206
14.6 CD Data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 206
14.6.1 Intermediate Image . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 207
14.6.2 No Intermediate Image . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 207
14.6.3 Direct Copy Data CD from /dev/cdrom to SCSI burner 208
14.6.4 Copy Video CD . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 208
14.7 CD Mixed Data Audio . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 208
14.8 CD-RW . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 209
14.9 Multi Session CDs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 209
14.10CD Labels . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 210
15 Chinese

211

16 ChRoot: Multiple Distributions

213

17 Clock: An Explanation

215

17.0.1 Timezones . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 215

CONTENTS

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17.0.2 System Clock Drift . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 215

17.0.3 chrony . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 217
17.0.4 Hardware Clock Drift . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 219
18 Commercial

221

18.1 Corel WPO Office Alternative . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 221

19 Configuration

223

19.1 System Configuration in /etc . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 223

20 CRON: Regular Tasks

225

21 CVS: Concurrent Versioning

227

21.1 Managing a Project . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 227

21.1.1 Initialising your own Repository . . . . . . . . . . . . . 227
21.1.2 Creating a New Project . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 228
21.1.3 Adding Files to a Project . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 229
21.1.4 Updating Your Project Copy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 229
21.1.5 Identifying Changes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 230
21.1.6 Removing Files from a Project . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 230
21.1.7 Committing Changes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 231
21.1.8 Tagging a Release . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 231
21.2 Tuning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 231
21.2.1 Location of Repository . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 231
21.2.2 Using ssh Rather Than rsh . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 232
21.2.3 Notify Users of Changes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 232
21.2.4 Ignoring Files . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 232
21.3 CVS for NT . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 233

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CONTENTS

22 Desktop

235

23 DIA: Charts and Diagrams

237

23.1 Basic Operation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 238

23.2 Walkthrough: Creating Simple Diagrams . . . . . . . . . . . . 238
23.3 Reference: Command Line Options . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 240
23.4 Reference: The Tools Windows . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 241
23.4.1 Pointer, View, and Text Objects . . . . . . . . . . . . . 241
23.4.2 Standard Shapes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 242
23.4.3 Handles and Connection Points . . . . . . . . . . . . . 242
23.4.4 Sheets . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 243
23.4.5 Pen . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 243
23.4.6 Lines . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 243
23.5 Reference: The Right Mouse Button Menu . . . . . . . . . . . 244
23.5.1 The File Menu . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 244
23.5.2 The Edit Menu . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 247
23.5.3 The View Menu . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 248
23.5.4 The Select Menu . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 248
23.5.5 The Objects Menu . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 249
23.5.6 The Tools Menu . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 250
23.5.7 The Dialogs Menu . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 250
23.6 Reference: Sample Sheets . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 250
23.6.1 Chronogram . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 250
23.6.2 Circuit . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 251
23.6.3 ER . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 251
23.6.4 Flowchart . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 251

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23.6.5 FS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 251
23.6.6 GRAFCET . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 252
23.6.7 Ladder . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 253
23.6.8 Networks

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 253

23.6.9 Pneumatic/Hydraulic . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 253

23.6.10 SADT . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 253
23.6.11 Sybase . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 254
23.6.12 UML . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 255
23.7 Walkthrough: Creating Your Own Shapes . . . . . . . . . . . 255
23.7.1 Simple Example . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 255
23.7.2 Shape Elements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 256
23.7.3 SVG Support . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 258
23.7.4 Sheet Elements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 258
23.7.5 Installing New Sheets . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 258
23.8 Reference: The dia Save Format . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 258
23.9 Acknowledgements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 258
24 Directories: Linux Folders

261

24.1 The Standard Linux Directory Structure . . . . . . . . . . . . 261

25 Disks

263

25.1 New Disk Setup . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 263

25.2 Ext2 to Ext3 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 263
25.3 Disk Parameters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 263
26 Documentation

267

26.1 Debian doc-central . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 267

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27 Email

269

27.1 Setting up EMail . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 269

27.1.1 Exim . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 270
27.2 Retrieving and Filtering Email . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 270
27.2.1 Fetchmail: Collect Mail from Remote Hosts . . . . . . 270
27.2.2 Procmail to Filter and Split Email . . . . . . . . . . . 272
27.2.3 IMAP: Mail Server . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 273
27.2.4 POP Mail Server . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 273
27.3 Reading Email

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 274

27.3.1 Mutt . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 274

27.3.2 Gnus . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 274
27.4 Email Tools . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 275
27.4.1 Grepmail: Search mail archives . . . . . . . . . . . . . 275
27.4.2 EMail Attachments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 276
27.4.3 MS-TNEF attachments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 276
27.4.4 Uuencode and Uudecode in Mail

. . . . . . . . . . . . 276

27.4.5 Mailing Lists . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 276

27.5 Spam . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 276
27.6 Viruses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 277
27.7 SMTP Direct . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 278
28 Eye of Gnome: Image Viewer

279

29 Evolution: GNU Personal Information Manager

281

29.1 Managing Email . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 281

29.1.1 Using Virtual Folders . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 281
29.2 Contacts and Address Book . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 282

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29.3 Managing Your Calendar . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 282

29.4 Tracking Your Tasks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 282
30 File Systems

283

31 Firewalls

285

31.1 IPMASQ . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 285

31.2 IPCHAINS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 285
32 Floppy Disks

289

32.1 Floppy Drive Access Permissions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 289

32.2 Format a Floppy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 289
32.3 Using DOS-Like Commands . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 290
32.4 Mounting Floppy Disk Device . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 290
33 Fonts: X Window System

293

33.1 Setting Up Fonts in X . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 293

33.2 Fonts are too Large . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 295
34 Ghemical: Chemical Modelling

297

35 GIMP: Image and Photo Manipulation

299

35.1 Remove Red Eye . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 299

35.2 Image Quality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 299
35.3 Gimp Resources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 301
36 Glade: GUI Builder

303

36.1 Using Glade . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 304

36.2 Glade Walkthroughs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 305

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36.2.1 Building the GUI . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 305
36.2.2 Building the C Code . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 313
36.2.3 Using Libglade C . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 315
36.2.4 Using Libglade with Python . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 315
36.2.5 Using Libglade with Perl . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 316
36.3 Glade Reference . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 317
36.3.1 Writing Your Code . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 317
36.3.2 Command Line Options . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 318
36.3.3 The Menus and Toolbar . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 319
36.3.4 Project Options . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 323
36.3.5 Widget Properties . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 326
36.3.6 Widget Palettes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 326
36.3.7 The Glade Save Format . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 327
36.4 Glade Resources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 327
36.5 Acknowledgements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 328
36.6 Using Napster . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 328
36.7 Gnome Hack . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 332

37 Gnome: The Desktop

333

37.1 Using Menus . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 334

37.1.1 Tear-Off Menus . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 334
37.1.2 Shortcuts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 335
37.2 Toolbars . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 336
37.2.1 Floating Toolbars . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 336
37.3 Dialogues . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 336
37.3.1 Filename Completion and Hidden Files . . . . . . . . . 336

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37.4 Gnome Applications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 336

37.4.1 Other Applications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 338
37.5 Desktop Managers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 340
37.6 Window Managers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 340
37.7 Other Desktops . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 340
37.7.1 KDE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 341
37.7.2 XFCE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 341
37.8 Troubleshooting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 342
37.8.1 Locked File . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 342
37.9 Gnome Resources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 342
37.9.1 Gnome Books . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 342
38 GnuCash: Finances

343

39 Gnumeric: Spreadsheet

345

39.1 Other Spreadsheets . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 347

39.1.1 The StarOffice Calc . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 347
39.1.2 KSpread . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 347
39.1.3 ApplixWare Spreadsheet . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 347
40 GQView: Viewing Images

351

41 Graphics

353

41.1 Graphics Editors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 353

41.1.1 Xfig: Vector Graphics Editor

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 354

41.2 Common Operations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 355

41.2.1 Charts and Plots . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 355
41.2.2 Screen Capture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 356

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41.2.3 Thumbnails . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 357
41.2.4 Transparent PNG Images . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 357

41.3 Conversions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 357

41.3.1 PostScript . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 357
42 Groups: Managing Access Permissions

359

43 HTML Editors

363

43.1 Bluefish . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 363

44 ImageMagick

365

45 Initialisations on Booting

367

45.1 Run Levels . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 367

45.2 Initialisation Scripts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 369
45.3 CTRL-ALT-DEL: The Three Finger Salute . . . . . . . . . . . 370
45.4 Terminals . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 370
46 Java

373

46.1 Install Sun Java . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 373

46.2 Java Alternatives . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 374
46.3 Mozilla Java Plugin . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 374
47 Jigdo: Build CD-ROM Images

377

48 KDE: Desktop Management

379

49 Kernel: Rolling Your Own

381

49.1 Getting Started . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 382

49.2 Kernel Configuration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 383

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49.3 Kernel Modules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 385

49.4 Compiling the Kernel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 385
49.5 Installing the Kernel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 385
49.6 Lilo Configuration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 387
49.7 Kernel Versions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 387
49.8 Latest Kernel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 387
49.9 Why make-kpkg? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 388
49.10Loading Kernel Modules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 389
50 Keyboard

391

50.1 Mapping a Key . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 391

51 Konqueror: The KDE File Manager

393

52 LaTeX

395

52.1 LaTeX Documentation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 395

52.2 Generating LaTeX . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 395
52.3 Creating LaTeX Documents . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 396
52.3.1 Using LyX . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 396
52.3.2 Using Emacs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 396
52.4 Processing a LaTeX Document

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 396

52.5 LaTeX Tips and Tricks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 397

52.5.1 Bibliography Starts on a New Page . . . . . . . . . . . 397
52.6 TeX Capacity Exceeded . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 397
53 Login
53.1 All Capitals Login

399
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 399

53.2 Login Screen . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 399

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53.3 Midnight Commander . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 401
53.4 Gnome Memory Blocks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 401

54 Magellan: KDE Personal Information Manager

403

55 Modems

405

55.1 Silence . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 405

55.2 No Dial Tone . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 405
55.3 Chat Script Giving up Too Early . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 406
56 MSWindows

407

56.1 Wine: Emultaing MS-Windows . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 407

56.2 Citrix: MSWindows Under Linux . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 407
56.2.1 Screenshot . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 408
56.2.2 Installation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 408
57 Music

411

58 MySQL

413

58.0.3 MySQL Root Password . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 414

58.0.4 Creating New Database . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 414
58.0.5 Create a New User . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 416
58.0.6 Remote Host Access . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 417
58.0.7 Remote User Permissions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 417
58.0.8 Basic MySQL . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 418
59 Nautilus: Navigating FoldersNear and Far

421

59.1 Finding Your Way . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 421

59.2 Browsing HTML Documents . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 422

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59.3 Nautilus CD Creator . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 423

59.4 Browsing Remote Sites . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 423
60 Networks

425

60.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 425

60.2 Network Configuration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 426
60.2.1 Graphical Tools . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 426
60.2.2 Manual Setup . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 426
60.2.3 Neighborhood Table Overflow . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 427
60.2.4 Example Configurations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 427
60.3 Wireless Network . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 429
60.4 Domain Name Searching . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 430
60.5 Hostname Changes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 431
60.6 Ports and Services . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 431
60.7 Getting the Cabling Right . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 433
60.8 IP Forwarding: Home Networks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 433
60.9 Multiple Ethernet Cards . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 436
61 NFS: Network File System

437

61.1 Setting Up NFS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 437

61.2 Export Lists . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 438
61.3 Root Access On NFS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 439
62 NT File System

441

63 OpenOffice

443

63.1 OpenOffice Writer

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 443

63.2 Dictionaries . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 443

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63.3 OpenOffice Impress . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 445

64 Oracle: Commercial Database

447

64.1 Obtaining the Distribution . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 447

64.2 Oracle User and Groups . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 447
64.3 Oracle Installation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 448
65 Partitions

449

65.1 Sample Usage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 449

65.2 Suggested Partitioning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 450
65.3 Repartitioning MS-Windows . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 452
66 Passwords

455

66.1 Password File Sharing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 455

66.1.1 Using rdist . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 456
66.1.2 Simple tar . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 456
66.1.3 Using NIS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 457
67 PPP: Networking Over Modems

459

67.1 modemlights applet . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 460

68 Presentations

461

68.1 Beamer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 461

68.2 Prosper . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 461
68.3 OpenOffice Impress . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 461
68.4 KPresenter

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 462

69 Printing
69.1 CUPS - Common Unix Printing System

463
. . . . . . . . . . . . 463

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69.1.1 Add Printing to New Host . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 463

69.1.2 Using the Web Interface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 464
69.1.3 Installing a HP PSC 2210 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 465
69.1.4 Enabling a Printer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 465
69.1.5 CUPS Command Line Interfaces . . . . . . . . . . . . 465
69.2 Using lprng to Print on Remote Hosts . . . . . . . . . . . . . 466
69.3 Using rlpr to Print on Remote Hosts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 467
70 Python

469

70.1 Python Documentation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 469

70.2 Python and R: Python Interfaces to R . . . . . . . . . . . . . 470
70.2.1 Installing RSPython . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 470
70.2.2 Installing RPy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 471
71 R: Statistical Software

475

71.1 Graphs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 475

72 Rsync: Remote Files

481

72.1 Rsync Server . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 481

73 Samba

483

74 Scanning

485

74.1 Setup HP PSC 2210 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 485

74.2 Scanning Setup . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 486
75 Science

487

75.1 Chemistry . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 487

75.1.1 Periodic Tables . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 487

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76 Security

CONTENTS
489

76.1 Booting Linux . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 489

76.2 Checking Security with Nessus . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 489
76.3 Check Security with Chkrootkit . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 490
76.4 Identify Portscanners . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 494
76.5 Packages to Avoid . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 494
76.6 OpenPGP and Keys . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 496
76.7 Securing Your Network . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 499
76.8 Identifying Your System? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 501
77 Sketch

503

78 Sound Recording

505

78.1 Required Software . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 505

78.2 Hardware Connections . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 506
78.3 Mixer Settings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 506
78.4 Using Gramofile . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 507
78.5 Recommended Recording Process . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 508
78.6 Recordings Using the Gnome Sound Recorder . . . . . . . . . 509
78.7 Using Command Line Sound-Recorder . . . . . . . . . . . . . 509
78.8 Using Command Line Sox . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 509
79 Spell

511

80 SPlus: Statistical Software

513

81 Spruce: Email

515

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82 SSH: Secure Communications

517

82.1 Versions of SSH . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 517

82.2 Installation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 517
82.3 Remote Host Authentication . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 518
82.4 Simple Usage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 518
82.5 Public and Private Keys . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 519
82.6 SSH Agents . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 520
82.7 DSA Key Generation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 521
82.8 Changing Your Passphrase . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 521
82.9 SSH and Rsync . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 522
82.10SSH and the X Window System . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 522
82.11SSH Tunnelling . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 523
82.12SSH Access Denied . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 524
82.13SSH Terminal in a Browser . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 524
82.14SSH Version 1 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 525
83 SUDO: Root Access

527

84 Swap

529

85 Themes

531

85.1 Enlightenment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 531

86 USB

533

86.1 Mass Storage Devices . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 534

86.1.1 HP Photosmart 320 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 535
86.2 Mass Storage Devices (DVD Writer) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 535
86.3 USB Printer: HP LaserJet 1200 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 537

xxvi

CONTENTS

86.4 USB Printer: HP PSC2210 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 537

87 Video

539

87.1 Viewing Video . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 539

87.2 DVD Videos . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 539
87.2.1 Xine . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 540
87.2.2 Ogle . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 540
87.2.3 DVD Sound Track . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 540
87.3 Video Backups . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 542
87.3.1 Using The dvdrip GUI . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 542
87.3.2 Command Line Tools . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 543
87.4 DVD-AUDIO . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 545
87.5 Video from Photos . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 545
87.6 nVidia Video Driver . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 546
87.6.1 Compiling the Driver . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 546
88 Web: Serving, Accessing, and Mirroring

549

88.1 Browsing the Web . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 549

88.1.1 Epiphany . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 549
88.1.2 Galeon . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 549
88.1.3 Mozilla . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 549
88.1.4 Plugins . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 550
88.2 Web Server . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 550
88.2.1 User Web Pages . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 552
88.2.2 Bad Behaviour on Missing / . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 552
88.2.3 Password Protect Web Files . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 552
88.2.4 Renew SSL Certificate . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 554

CONTENTS

xxvii

88.2.5 Compressed HTML . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 554

88.2.6 Web Log Summaries . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 555
88.2.7 Server Side Includes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 556
88.2.8 Identifying the Web Server . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 556
88.3 Mirror Websites . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 556
89 Word: Processing and Printing

557

90 X: The Window System

559

90.1 Hand Crafting your XF86Config . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 560

90.2 The Basic X Window System Architecture . . . . . . . . . . . 562
90.3 Multiple X Window System Users, One Console . . . . . . . . 567
90.4 Getting Started with Gnome . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 567
90.5 GDM Startup . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 567
90.6 References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 568
90.7 Wheel Mouse . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 568
90.8 Window Managers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 569
90.9 XFree . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 569
91 XML

571

91.1 XSLT Processors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 571

xxviii

CONTENTS

Preface
Welcome to the world of GNU/Linux, liberating the computing desktop from
the shackles of proprietary interests.
The aim of this book is to get you up to speed with GNU/Linux and to
deliver a fun and productive environment. It guides you through the many
different regions of a GNU/Linux system with a focus on getting your desktop environment to do what you want it to do. It is comprehensive with
basic support for the user who installs and maintains the system themselves
(whether in the home, office, club, or school). It provides insights and stepby-step procedures that deal with specific tasks in setting your system up and
maintaining it. The book covers many of the core features of a GNU/Linux
system and you will gain the knowledge to enjoy and use one of the most
comprehensive and useful developments in the history of computing.
The details in this book are presented in the context of Debian GNU/Linux
the most open of the GNU/Linux distributions and the distribution setting
the standards for free software and collaborative developments. In general
the details translate directly to RedHat and other standard distributions
of GNU/Linux. A growing number of the applications (including StarOffice,
AbiWord, The Gimp, Dia and gPhoto, to name just a few) are cross-platform
developments and run also under MS-Windows. The chapters that cover
these applications in this book will also generally apply to those versions.
The structure of this on-line version of the book is basically alphabetical.
Each individual chapter aims to be a standalone reference. The book includes
an overview of GNU/Linux and its history, a guide to installing GNU/Linux,
introductions to the suite of GNU/Linux desktop productivity tools, and
recipes for tuning specific parts of a GNU/Linux system.
The book begins with an introduction to the world of GNU/Linux, Free Software, and the Open Source Software movement. Free software equals, and
often surpasses, the commercial offerings for the same or equivalent functionxxix

xxx

Preface

ality. We present historical and philosophical perspectives. Chapter 3 briefly

reviews GNU/Linux, the various distributions, the licensing issues, and the
freedom that GNU/Linux delivers.
There are many ways of obtaining GNU/Linux and we only cover the most
common approaches. Chapter 4 provides an overview of installing Debian
with detailed examples for a number of hardware platforms. Chapter 5 is a
brief introduction to some of the essential GNU/Linux utilities that you are
likely to come across soon. The Debian packaging system used to manage
(and take all of the hard work out of maintaining) packages is described in
Chapter 3.4. Setting up the X Window System is covered in Chapter 90. By
this stage you will have a system ready to take full advantage of. On a more
technical level Chapter 49 shows how simple it is to compile your own kernel
to suit your hardware requirements.
The remaining alphabetical chapters cover the Desktop Environment and
Debian GNU/Linux administration.
All of the major classes of desktop tools are covered, including word processing, spreadsheets, personal information management, graphics, databases
and, of course, games. Also included are chapters covering some of the tools
for developers, including emacs and glade. The aim is to set you well on the
road to using these tools at a level that is sufficient for many users. Of course,
each tool itself deserves, and often has available for it, a book or extensive
manuals.
The administration chapters cover very many different topics that let you
tune your GNU/Linux system to suit your needs. Not everything here is
relevant to everybody, but it brings together many recipes for many of the
typical tasks that users sometimes need to know about, again without going
into exhaustive detail (which is available elsewhere if you need it or are
interested).
So sit back and enjoy the freedom of free software and become part of the
community that is making computers and the applications they run a benefit
to society world wide, rather than a costly privilege.
Conventions Used Throughout The Book
Typography
Screen shots from the Galeon web browser are based on Galeon at 700x600.
Whats In A Name

xxxi
The phrase Microsoft Windows (and less informatively just Windows) usually refers to the whole of the popular operating systems, irrespective of which
version of Microsoft Windows is being run, unless the version is important.
But Microsoft Windows is just one of many windowing systems available,
and indeed, Microsoft Windows came on to the screen rather later than the
pioneering Apple Macintosh windowing system and the Unix windowing systems. We will simply refer to all varieties of Microsofts windowing systems
(Windows 95/98/NT/2000/XP) as MS-Windows. If the particular version
is important it will be referred to as MS-Windows/XP, for example.
We use the phrase GNU/Linux to refer to the GNU environment and the
GNU and other applications running in that environment on top of the Linux
operating system kernel. Similarly, GNU/Hurd refers to the GNU environment and the GNU and other applications running in that environment on
top of the GNU Hurd operating system kernel.
Debian is a complete distribution which includes many applications based
around a particular choice of operating system kernel (usually either GNU/Linux
or GNU/Hurd). Where the particular kernel is not important we will refer
to whole system as Debian.
The common windowing system used in Debian is a separate, but integral,
component that we will refer to as the X Window System.
Screen Shots
Through out the document screen shots are presented using a variety of
Gnome and KDE themes. The theme specifies what things look like inside
the windows that an application displays, and now also tend to specify what
the window frame looks likethat is, the area immediately surrounding the
applications window. There is an endless variety of themes to suit your
own preferences. Some favourites include the E-efm-GTK+ Gnome theme and
the QN-X11 and Crux Sawfish themes. Refer to the discussion of themes in
Chapter 85 for details, if interested.
About This Book
The book is copyright by the author (
but released under a license which allows it to be available somewhat freely.
You are welcome to read it on-line and even to download and print the whole
book yourself. You can also download the book (either PDF or HTML) to
have a local copy of the book on your system and make it available for others to access either locally or even globally. However, you are required to

xxxii

Preface

retain the copyright attributions and you are required to give appropriate
attribution for any material you use from the book.
Also, by taking a copy, or even simply using the book, you should feel obliged
to contribute to the book in some way, by sending corrections, comments, updates, suggestions, or even whole new chapters, to me at
Citations
Debian Weekly News pointed to this book in their 8th July 2003 edition.

Chapter 1
Advocacy
Why bother with open source software when Microsoft has the market sewn
up? The cost of GNU/Linux (it is freely available to whoever wants it) is not
always the primary issue! Usability, reliability, security, and developerability
are often just as, and for different users even more, important issues.
GNU/Linux offers a value proposition that money can not buy.
vestment in GNU/Linux is really an investment in human beings
to bring a better and coordinated solution to the organisation. A
that in the long run delivers more for less, without the traditional
proprietary systems.

The inworking
solution
tie-in of

We begin with a review of major decisions by governments and organisations

the world over, then review some of the key benefits.

1.1

Linux Adopters

The Swiss taxation office distribute a CDROM with the open source office
suite called Open Office. On the CDROM is an Open Office version of the
Tax form. Tax payers fill in the form and lodge their returns electronically.
In June 2003, at the Net World Order conference, held at the CeBIT trade
show in New York City, and sponsored by the Business Council for the United
Nations, Bruno Lanvin from the World Bank said
These countries need cheap and efficient technology to make the
giant leaps necessary to catch up with the rest of the world. Many
1

Advocacy
are now using Linux, which looks to become the No. 1 operating
system in China and India soon.

As of October, 2003, many local governments in Germany are taking the step
toward GNU/Linux

Usability
Usability has been a problem for GNU/Linux for a long time. It has not
been comparable to the ease of use of the MS-Windows system in terms
of being a common desktop environment. As we demonstrate in this book
though this issue has been well addressed and the time is now right for Debian
GNU/Linux on the desktop.

Reliability
GNU/Linux is a very stable operating system and system crashes are virtually unknown. GNU/Linux, like Unix before it, is designed to be a multi-user,
shared system. Simply because one user of the system runs an application
that crashes, other users of the same system should not be affected. Also,
most GNU/Linux applications have been in open development for many years
with many developers working on and looking over the code. Bugs of course
are not unknown, but they are usually quickly fixed within GNU/Linux,
leading to a very reliable system.

Security
The issue of security is crucial and will continue to grow as an important
concern for users.
An article in the 27 August 2001 issue of Interactive Week by Rob Fixmer
recalls a 1998 interview with then Symantec CEO Gordon Eubanks:
Everybody can see whats under the hood, so were on equal
footing with hackers. With proprietary systems intruders often

1.1 Linux Adopters

have illegal means of learning things about the underlying code

that are superior to the legal information at our disposaleven
though we get excellent cooperation and support from Microsoft.
Gartner Groups John Pescatore on 19 September 2001 had the following to
say in an advisory from the Gartner web site1 (emphasis is mine):
Gartner recommends that enterprises hit by both Code Red and
Nimda immediately investigate alternatives to IIS, including moving Web applications to Web server software from other vendors,
such as iPlanet and Apache. Although these Web servers have
required some security patches, they have much better security
records than IIS and are not under active attack by the vast number of virus and worm writers. Gartner remains concerned that
viruses and worms will continue to attack IIS until Microsoft has
released a completely rewritten, thoroughly and publicly tested,
new release of IIS. Sufficient operational testing should follow to
ensure that the initial wave of security vulnerabilities every software product experiences has been uncovered and fixed. This
move should include any Microsoft .NET Web services, which requires the use of IIS. Gartner believes that this rewriting will not
occur before year-end 2002 (0.8 probability)
Any one can scan the GNU/Linux code for vulnerabilities (and for inefficiencies and bugs) and as they are discovered the solutions quickly become
available for all to access. Of course, the unscrupulous can also scan the code
for opportunities to attack a system, unlike proprietary code where only a few
have access to the source code. But would you prefer security by obscurity
or security by peer review? It is a choice!

Developerability
MS-Windows provides many good environments for the development of software. However, GNU/Linux, and Unix before it, has a long tradition of
providing powerful environments for software development. Sophisticated
graphical interactive development environments (IDEs) were developed on
1

Actual document obtained from http://www3.gartner.com/DisplayDocument?doc_

cd=101034

Advocacy

Unix but took of on the Apple Macintosh and particularly on MS-Windows.

However, the focus is beginning to again turn to GNU/Linux as the most
flexible open source, free software, and commercial development environment.

Chapter 2
History: Unix, GNU, Gnome
A brief review of the history of Unix will place in context much of the terminology and philosophy of this operating system. Terms like Linux, GNU,
Unix, Gnome, Free Software, and Open Source Software get bandied around,
often with little understanding and usually with much misunderstanding.
A fundamental misunderstanding is the relationship between Linux and operating systems. Linux is the low level code that interacts with and controls
the hardware of the computer (whether it is an Intel 486, Pentium, Sun
Sparc, or a Merced). This is the kernel of the operating system, providing
routines to help applications talk to each other, allowing many applications
to share the CPU at the same time, and managing the use of memory, allowing many different applications to run at the same time without interfering
with other applications. Linus Torvalds wrote the first Linux kernel in 1991
and it continues to be actively developed today by Linus and a core team of
international developers.
While the kernel is crucial, it is the larger suite of software that sits on top
of the kernel that provides the functional operating system. Most of the
software applications at this level come from the GNU Project. These tools
include the command line utilities like ls, cp, find, bash, and the compilers like gcc. This collection of applications is usually considered to be
the actual operating system and hence we refer to the operating system as
GNU/Linux in recognition of the GNU software coupled with the Linux kernel. GNU/HURD is an alternative operating system using the GNU software
with the HURD kernel being developed by the GNU Project.
Sitting on top of this command-line level of the operating system is what we
5

History: Unix, GNU, Gnome

might refer to as the end user level of the operating system. This is typically
a graphical user interface (GUI) aiming to provide an intuitive, easy to use
system for both the general, non-technical user and the power user. Such an
interface is typically an application that sits on top of and makes considerable
use of the operating system. For GNU/Linux this is the X Window System.
The Window System provides a platform for GUI-based applications. Other
applications sit on top of the Window System to provide integrated platforms
with a common look and feel. Gnome, another GNU project, is one such
popular platform. All Gnome applications have a similar look and share
many components and can communicate with each other. KDE is a popular
alternative to Gnome and while it is not one I use, I will try to include
information about it whenever I can.
In this chapter we briefly review the history of Unix, GNU Software, the
GNU/Linux Operating System, Gnome, and Free and Open Source Software
and Documentation.

2.1

Unix

GNU/Linux is fashioned on Unix. Unix dates from 1969 when Ken Thompson at Bell Telephone Laboratories initiated work on this new operating
system. Others involved in the project included Dennis Ritchie and Brian
Kernighan. The name Unix is a pun on an alternative operating system
of the time called MULTICS (MULTiplexed Information and Computing
Service). MULTICS was developed by The Massachusetts Institute of Technology, General Electric and Bell Labs. Unix was originally spelt UNICS, an
acronym for UNiplexed Information and Computing Service!
Some of the basic ideas introduced by Multics and then Unix were the tree
structured file system, a program for command interpretation (called the
shell), the structure and nature of text files and the semantics of I/O operations. Some of the philosophy that rose with the development of Unix
included the desire to write programs that performed one task and to do it
well, to write programs that worked together to perform larger tasks, and
to write programs that communicated with each other using text from one
program to the other.
The advantages of Unix were quickly identified by many and quite a few varieties of Unix emerged over time. Sun Microsystems have pioneered many of

2.1 Unix

the developments in Unix, followed by such greats as the old Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC, which was swallowed by Compaq, which was swallowed by Hewlett-Packard), Silicon Graphics Incorporated (SGI), International Business Machines (IBM), and Hewlett-Packard (HP). A variety of
flavours have existed, including SunOS, Solaris, Ultrix, Irix, BSD, System V,
HPUX, and so on. Although computer programs written for one version of
Unix could sometimes be ported to other versions, it was not always an easy
task. The diversity of Unix implementations (more so than the proprietary
nature of most of them) made it difficult for Unix to become a commodity
operating system. The GNU project worked hard to free software development from nuances of each of the different Unix versions through providing a
common programming language environment (GNU C) and a sophisticated
packaging tool (autoconf and automake) to carefully hide the differences.
GNU/Linux has now become the most popular Unix variant and all the major Unix players support GNU/Linux in some way.
A particularly touted feature of Unix comes from a tools philosophy where
complex tasks are performed by bringing together a collection of simpler
tools. This is contrasted with the philosophy of providing monolithic applications that in one fell swoop solve all your problems, supposedly. The
reality is often different.
Most operating systems supply a collection of basic utility programs for managing your files (things like arranging your files into folders, trashing files,
and copying files from one place to another). Large applications then provide
the word processing, spreadsheet, and web browsing functionality.
Unix places less emphasis on the monolithic applications. Instead, tools
provide simple functionality, focusing on doing well what they are designed
to do. They simply pass their results on to another tool once theyre done.
Unix pipes provide the mechanism for doing this: one tool pipes its output
on to another tool. This allows complex actions to be performed by piping
together a collection of simpler commands.
A typical example is to determine the number of users logged on to your
system:

> who | wc -l

The who command will list, one per line, each user logged on. The wc
command will count the number of characters, words, and lines that it comes

History: Unix, GNU, Gnome

across, with the -l option only counting the number of lines. (GNU tools,
like Unix, introduce options with the minus sign.)
For various reasons though this tools philosophy was often overlooked when
large monolithic applications arose that did not adhere to the philosophy
they did not share components. Common tools such as Netscape, ghostview,
Acrobat, FrameMaker, and Star Office essentially share very little. Compare
that with the Microsoft community where, for example, an application like
Internet Explorer is component-based. This is now changing in the GNU
world with the operating system software and the Gnome project encouraging
component-based architectures.
Another feature of Unix is that Unix applications tend to use open file formats
allowing a variety of tools to collaborate to work on those open formats.
Indeed, this has been a key in recent developments to remove the stranglehold of Microsoft proprietary formats. Rather than electronic document
storage providing a longer term solution to the archival of documents, it
is delivering an even shorter lifetime than paper-based archives! How can
that be so? The formats created by proprietary software are often binary
and not fully publicly specified. How many packages today can read old
Word Perfect and Microsoft Word documents? The standardisation on open
formats, often text-based formats like XML that allow anyone to read them,
provides a solution to this problem.
So why Unix? It is a conceptually simple operating system facilitating creativity by not restricting the developer. Many have found it to be a fun
operating system to work with allowing many innovative developments to be
combined in new and even more innovative ways to deliver powerful ideas.
A very large world wide group of people willingly provide excellent, free support over the Internet. Anyone can learn more about the operating system
by studying the code itself. Anyone can contribute to porting the operating
system to their favourite computer.
And finally, the much touted stability. There is very little doubt that GNU
and Linux are extremely stable. The habit of rebooting your computer every time you come back to it is something Microsoft seems to encourage
because of its notorious instability and tendency for the operating system
not to carefully manage its use of memory. Also, install a new package under MS-Windows and chances are you need to reboot the computer. Most
Unix users rarely need to reboot their machine. Check the uptime and you
will generally find the machine has not been rebooted for months or years.
Installing packages invariably does not require rebooting. Indeed, the only

2.2 GNU

time it does is when you upgrade your Linux kernel!

2.2

GNU

The GNU Project1 was begun in 1984 by Richard Stallman of MIT with
the aim to develop a complete free (meaning free for everyone to look at, to
learn from, and to build upon) software operating system. In 1989 he codified
the terms under which this free software was released, producing the GNU
Public License (GPL) which is the basis on which much of the GNU/Linux
operating system is released. The license is often referred to as the copyleft
license in contrast to the restrictive practise of copyright.
By 1991 when Linus Torvalds wrote his Linux kernel GNU provided the
operating system. By combining the GNU operating system with the Linux
kernel the seeds for this most popular free operating system were sown.
Many users installed the GNU tools on many different computers as replacements for vendor supplied tools. This provided these users with a consistency
across the many different platforms they used. The tools even eventually appeared under MS-Windows, providing a Unix-like environment on a very
different operating system.2
The tools developed by the GNU project include such essential utilities as
the GNU file management utilities and the GNU text file processing utilities.
The GNU file management utilities include fundamental command line tools
like ls (to list information about files/documents), mkdir (to create new
directories/folders), mv (to move directories and files around), rm (to remove
files), and many more. The GNU text file processing commands include cat
(to concatenate files together), head (to preview the top few lines of a file),
sort (to sort the contents of a file), and wc (to count the number of lines,
words, and bytes in a file).
The toolkits developed by the GNU project are comprehensive. The following
table lists just some of the 200 or more packages that you can obtain freely
from http://www.gnu.org/software/software.html:
Package
aspell
1
2

Description
An interactive spell checker that suggests near misses to replace unrecognised words.

GNU stands for the recursive GNU is Not Unix.

http://www.cygwin.com

10
Package
awk
bash

binutils

chess
cvs
emacs

enscript
fileutils
findutils

gcc

gdb
ghostscript
gimp
gnome

gnumeric
gphoto

gnupg
gtk+
gzip

History: Unix, GNU, Gnome

Description
A powerful yet simple pattern-based scripting language.
The Bourne Again SHell is compatible with the traditional
Unix sh and offers many extensions found in csh and ksh. It
is similar in concept to DOS.
Consists of programs used to assemble, link, and manipulate
binary and object files. It is used in conjunction with a compiler and various libraries to build programs for Linux.
A state-of-the-art chess-playing program.
The Concurrent Versioning System used for version control
and management of software projects.
An extensible, customisable real-time display editor and computing environment. This editor is widely used by developers
and is more than just an editor. Emacs is capable of reading email, of providing integrated development environments,
and spreadsheets, to name just a few.
An ASCII file formatter generating PostScript for printing of
text documents on PostScript printers.
File management utilities.
The find utility is frequently used both interactively and
in shell scripts to find files which match certain criteria and
perform arbitrary operations on them.
A free compiler collection for C, C++, Objective C and other
languages. This compiler is used widely, on multiple platforms, including MS-Windows.
A source-level debugger for C, C++ and Fortran.
An interpreter for the Postscript and PDF graphics languages.
A sophisticated graphical image manipulation application.
The GNU desktop which provides a consistent graphical user
interface for common applications including everything from
spreadsheets to mail clients, and more.
A spreadsheet.
A graphical application for retrieving, organising, and publishing images in various graphics formats, from a range of
supported digital cameras.
A complete implementation of the OpenPGP Internet standard for providing pretty good protection through encryption.
A GUI toolkit for the X Window System. All Gnome packages
use this toolkit for their consistent look and feel.
GNUs program for compressing and decompressing files.

2.3 Linux
Package
kde

less

mtools
r
shellutils

tar
textutils
time
wget

11
Description
An alternative, and very popular desktop which provides a
consistent graphical user interface for common applications
including everything from spreadsheets to mail clients, and
more.
A display paginator similar to more and pg, but with various features (such as the ability to scroll backwards) that
most pagers lack.
Programs to allow Unix systems to read, write, and manipulate files on a DOS file system (typically a diskette).
A system for statistical computation and graphics.
Useful command line utilities including basename, date,
dirname, echo, groups, hostname, printf, pwd, uname, uptime, users, who, and whoami.
An archive utility.
A set of utilities for manipulating text.
A utility to report on the time taken to execute other programs.
A non-interactive web browser to retrieve files from the Internet using HTTP and FTP. See Chapter 88.3 for details.

Many of these GNU tools are command line tools but a growing number
of them are now also GUI-based, including Gnome, KDE, The Gimp, and
Gnumeric.

2.3

Linux

Unix was popular because, originally, the source code was practically free.
For various reasons the Unix license began to forbid the Universities from
using the source code in their teaching. This lead Andy Tannenbaum to
write MINIX which then inspired Linus Torvalds to write the Linux kernel
for his Intel 386.
Unix has a long heritage and the new GNU/Linux has the luxury of learning
from the success and failings of both Unix and MS-Windows. Of particular
importance is the component-based architecture that facilitates the sharing of
components among many applications. These are the focus of much modern
development for GNU/Linux. Gnome, for example, uses Bonobo (built on

12

History: Unix, GNU, Gnome

top of the international CORBA standard) for its component architecture to

support sharing.
CORBA is an object model defined by the Object Management Group. Its
use by Bonobo is based on ORBit, a thin and fast implementation of the
CORBA specification. Bonobo is then the Gnome architecture for creating
reusable software components and compound documents. It was designed
and implemented to support the needs of the free software community to
facilitate component reuse and to allow new applications to build on the
shoulders of those that went before them.
Dont be too concerned about the technicalities. You will see reference to
these terms so it is wise to be aware of them. The details are not so important
to the end user.

2.4

Gnome

Unix lead to the development of the GNU Project which needed a kernel
that was supplied by Linux to produce the GNU/Linux Operating System.
GNU/Linux and Unix are generally criticised for being hard to use for the
common userall those command line tools and all that fiddling with configurations placed them back in the MS-DOS days. The demand is for modern
intuitive interfaces similar to those pioneered by the Macintosh back in 1984.
Unix has had graphical user interfaces for a long time. The problem was that
Unix was provided by multiple vendors and those vendors had difficulty agreeing on a common way of doing things in the graphical user interface. There
were systems like NeWS, OpenWindows, Display PostScript, and the X Window System. There was also a multitude of windowing systems available for
the X Window System, including CDE, Motif, OpenLook, etc. They offered
tremendous flexibility which lead to great diversity! And great confusion.
Developers could chose different toolkits and get very different behaviours.
Different ways of interacting with applications lead to much confusion and
certainly no consistency: different ways of moving to the next text field;
different defaults for keyboard shortcuts; different mechanisms for cut and
paste between applications; etc. Apple, with the Macintosh, had a lot of control on how things should be done and developed guidelines for developers to
do things the right way. Later, Microsoft with MS-Windows/95 and beyond
also dictated standards for others to follow. This meant that once the user
had learnt the nuances of the interface they were set for life.

2.5 Free and Open Source Software

13

The Gnome Project pioneered by Miguel de Icaza in 1997 and progressed

by the free software company he founded with Nat Friedman in early 2000,
originally called HelixCode and then Ximian, has set the standards. The traditional Unix players, including Sun Microsystems, IBM, Hewlett-Package,
and Compaq joined the Gnome Foundation in August 2000 to help that standard become, well, standard.
Gnome is not the only standard. KDE, begun by Matthias Ettrich in 1996,
is a very respectable and popular alternative. KDE suffered in the early
days of its development by being dependent on a toolkit, Qt, that did not
meet the licensing criteria for Free Software. This one unfortunate blemish
lead to the development of the Gnome project. The fact that there are two
standard desktops is not a particular concern, despite the above discussion.
The friendly (but at times heated) competition drives the enthusiasts in both
camp. What we have to be careful about is that we learn from the past and
not allow this competition to destroy the common goals. Perhaps one will
live on, or perhaps both will live on. Either way, both are excellent products
developing easier to use GNU/Linux systems, and leaving the choice to the
user.

2.5

Free and Open Source Software

There is much confusion over the terms free software and open source. They
are not the same thing. Open source software is not necessarily free software.
Indeed, some open source software places considerable restrictions on what
you can do with the source code, thus rendering it non-free. GNU software is
open source software that is also free in the sense of freedom. This software
allows everyone to redistribute and modify the software, without restriction.
We contrast open and free software with proprietary software that we have
become familiar withthe software that we buy on trust from a vendor, trust
that it will work, but for which the vendor disowns any responsibility. When
you find it has bugs and is not fit for purpose you must buy the next version
to get something that works for you.
Proprietary applications for word processing, spreadsheets, presentations,
Web browsing and so on abound. In general they work pretty well today,
providing sophisticated functionality. However, probably because of their
proprietary nature, they generally do not work well together, particularly
products from different vendors. There is little motivation for vendors to

14

History: Unix, GNU, Gnome

make it easy for you to move away from their product to a competitors
product.
What makes this situation rather sad is that each of these proprietary applications have a lot of functionality in common. Today we have a pretty good
understanding of the common features we require in a product: open and
save files, cut and paste, spell checking, etc. They all provide this, often over
and over again. There will always be opportunity to innovate and do things
in different and possibly better ways, but why are we wasting resources on
the most basic of operations instead of innovating with new functionality?
This has been addressed on the major modern platforms by sharing toolkits.
But sharing of more substantial functionality has been slower to develop.
Another aspect is that open source software makes development cheaper
because more people are involved, the work load is shared, people with very
different skill levels can collaborate and help increase the overall skill level of
the whole community, bugs are caught quicker because there are more people
looking over the source and bugs are fixed quicker because of this.
Free software demands that the user be granted four kinds of freedom: freedom to run the program, for any purpose; freedom to study how the program
works, and adapt it to your own needs; freedom to redistribute copies so you
can help your neighbour; and freedom to improve the program, and release
your improvements to the public, so that the whole community benefits. A
pre-condition for this is the availability of the entire source code, so that
along with the freedom comes the responsibility to share your discoveries
with others.
Free software open source projects still need to be structured. Usually they
are conducted under the watchful eye of a project leader, commonly referred
to as the maintainer. Anyone can contribute to the project and decisions
are often discussed openly and decided by consensus after discussion of the
technical merits. Sometimes the project leader will need to cast the deciding
vote.
Finally, in addition to founding the GNU Project Richard Stallman founded
the Free Software Foundation to pioneer the cause of free softwarefree
software that gives individuals the opportunity to share their innovations
and through this to allow others to learn and to contribute their discoveries.

2.6 Free Documentation

2.6

15

Free Documentation

In March 2000 Richard Stallman (with Eben Moglen, a professor at Columbia

Law School) introduced the GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL).
Stallman identifies the GFDL as a means to enlist commercial publishers
to fund free document writing without surrendering any vital liberty.
The GFDL identifies the conditions relating to the copying and revision of
documents. Documents are more complicated than simply placing source
code on the Internet. The GFDL is consequently more complex, covering
the mass copying of the document, inclusion in collections, and specific issues
relating to the covers.
Two important concepts relating to the availability of the document are
introduced: transparent copies of the document and opaque copies of the
document. A GFDL document must be transparentthat is, available in a
format whose specification is available to the general public and which can
be read using free software. Formats such as LATEX (used for this book) and
XML (using publicly available DTDs) are fine. But making your document
available only in PostScript or PDF or Microsoft Word is not transparent.
These are opaque documents that might suffer the same old problems of
document rotafter a few years the documents may no longer be accessible
because the proprietor of the proprietary format might have gone out of
business and the knowledge of the format has been lost.

2.7

Freedom

The free software world aims to share their knowledge and software in order
for all to gain towards a common goal. The proprietary software world aims
to hoard their software, to hide their discoveries, to let others go through the
discovery process themselves rather than to innovate from the shoulders of
those who went before them.
Stallman characterises the view of the proprietary vendors as: If you share
with your neighbour, you are a pirate. If you want any changes, beg us to
make them.. If I enjoyed a piece of music or a novel, should I be inhibited
from lending the CD or the book to my neighbour?
Eric Raymond, in his Musings on Linux and Open Source in the book
The Cathedral and the Bazaar makes compelling arguments for Free and

16

History: Unix, GNU, Gnome

Open Source Software development. Some of his points, paraphrased, are:

The quality of the software is maintained by a simple strategy of releasing the software to the general public every week and receiving feedback
from hundreds of users within days: release early and release often.
Users can be cultivated into becoming developers if your software is
serving a need of theirs. They will add functionality to suit their particular goals, and this functionality is likely to be useful to others.

2.8
2.8.1

General Resources
Books

A Quarter Century of Unix by Peter H. Salus. 256 pages published by

Addison Wesley, 1994, ISBN 0-201-54777-5. This is a good review of the
history of Unix with many interesting insights. Well worth a read if you are
interested in where Unix came from and you can find a copy of the book.
The Cathedral and the Bazaar: Musings on Linux and Open Source
by an Accidental Revolutionary by Eric S. Raymond. 288 pages, published October 1999 by OReilly & Associates, ISBN 1565927249. Discusses
the free software business model. The author is an identity in the Open
Source movement and here captures a model of Open Source and Free Software development.
Linux in A Nutshell: A Desktop Quick Reference, Second Edition
by Ellen Siever. 632 pages, published February 1999 by OReilly & Associates, ISBN 1565925858. An excellent reference to many standard GNU and
Unix tools. An intermediate resource between this current book which aims
to get you started with the tools and fully fledged manuals.
The Linux Sampler: A Linux Resource Guide by Belinda Frazier and
Laurie Tucker. 240 pages, published November 1994 by Specialized Systems
Consultants, ISBN 0916151743. Presents an overview of Linux from the point
of view of where, how, and why it is being used, with a little technical help
thrown in.
Linux Rute Users Tutorial and Exposition by Paul Sheer. 500 pages,
published January 2002 by Prentice Hall, ISBN 0130333514. Presents an

2.8 General Resources

17

excellent guide to many aspects of the Linux operating system. Also available
from http://www.icon.co.za/~psheer/book/.

18

2.8.2

History: Unix, GNU, Gnome

Internet

For the GNU perspective on many of the issues mentioned here refer to http:
//www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-software-for-freedom.html. This article, titled Why Free Software is better than Open Source is written by
Richard Stallman and is an essential read on the topic. It explains why the
use of the term Open Source is not strong enough in the context of Free
Software.
Freshmeat (http://freshmeat.net/) is an index of a large collection of
GNU/Linux packages with up-to-date information on their status and links
to their home pages and related locations. The index can be searched or
browsed. Most of the GNU/Linux tools are included.
Gnome (http://gnome.org/) is the framework and associated toolkit used
by many of the graphical applications introduced in this book. The Gnome
web site includes a list of many of the major Gnome applications.
Linux Today (http://linuxtoday.org/) is a news service providing updates
on developments related to GNU/Linux. It has a good selection of articles
usually updated several times a day, and does not overwhelm the reader
with news. Summaries are presented with links to slightly more detailed
summaries, with links to the complete articles, wherever they appear on the
Internet. Slashdot (http://slashdot.org/) is another news service with a
Linux bent.

Chapter 3
Distributions
When you purchase a computer the chances are that it comes with MSWindows pre-installed. The version of MS-Windows has been tuned and set
up by the manufacturer or retailer to run well on the particular configuration
you have purchased. Drivers for the particular devices, such as audio, video,
and CD-ROM, will have been included in the installation. The computer is
ready to turn on and get started in MS-Windows. It will just work (usually)!
To run GNU/Linux instead of MS-Windows (or in addition to MS-Windows)
you need to install the system yourself. This entails obtaining a distribution
of GNU/Linux, installing it, and configuring the device drivers to suit your
particular setup. So some extra effort is usually required to get GNU/Linux
up and running.
The GNU/Linux Operating System is built upon the foundation that is the
Linux kernel. To install GNU/Linux on your PC you could start with installing the Linux kernel and then compiling and installing the GNU tools
and other essential software that you need. But this approach is not for the
light hearted. Luckily this is not the usual manner of installing a GNU/Linux
system!
Many people have put a lot of effort into packaging things together into distributions so that installing GNU/Linux is a more straightforward exercise.
GNU/Linux distributions typically provide the whole system as a collection
of packages from which you choose those that you want install. Some packages are mandatory, and form the base installation. Other packages are then
installed as you need them.
Until pre-installed GNU/Linux systems become more common chances are
19

20

Distributions

you will need to install a distribution yourself. The process is not trivial
but it is straightforward. In Chapter 4 we will highlight the steps with just
enough detail to get you through the installation process. In this chapter
we review the options available in selecting a distribution of GNU/Linux to
install.

3.1

Debian GNU/Linux Distributions

The reference distribution for this book, and my preferred distribution, is

Debian GNU/Linux, the Linux for the GNU Generation.
I originally started with Slackware in the early 90s but migrated through Red
Hat and then quickly on to Debian in 1995. Red Hat is a good distribution
and is quite popular but has limitations. Debian conforms to the open and
distributed development model making it a very open distribution where
even you can make a change to it if you so desired. Debian is the basis of a
number of commercial distributions and it also powers quite a few web sites
including Linux.com.
Distributions involving Debian GNU/Linux are listed at http://www.debian.
org/misc/children-distros and include:
Demo Linux This is a CD based GNU/Linux that allows one to run GNU/Linux
without installation or disk partitioning. See http://www.demolinux.
org/.
Gibraltar The Gibraltar project produces a Debian-based firewall/router
that runs entirely off of a bootable CD-ROM. See http://gibraltar.
vianova.at/.
Knoppix The Knoppix distribution, based on Debian, allows one to run
Debian without installing it! Just boot from the CD-ROM and Debian
will run from there. If you decide to then install Debian, you can
do so from the Knoppix CD-ROM. Knoppix works on most but not
all hardware, trying its best to automatically identify hardware and
set things up appropriately. See http://www.knopper.net/knoppix/
index-en.html.
Libranet Linux by Libranet packages commonly used applications onto an
easy to install CD and includes, for example, Gnome. See http://www.
libranet.com.

3.2 Advantages of the Debian Distribution

21

Linex A Debian-based distribution being developed by the regional government of Extremadura (Spain) with the goal of migrating all the
computer systems, from government offices, to businesses to schools
into Linux.
Morphix Morphix is a modular LiveCD derived from Knoppix, with install
images for Games, Gnome, KDE, and LightGUI. It is available from
http://www.morphix.org.
Stormix Storm Linux is built around Debian GNU/Linux, the most stable
and secure distribution available. See http://www.stormix.com/.
ThinkNIC This is a $200 new Internet computer (NIC) which runs from a
CD-ROM using Debian GNU/Linux. See http://www.thinknic.com.
TuxTops This distributor of laptops pre-installs Debian GNU/Linux on
their laptops. See http://www.tuxtops.com/.
Related distributions include Amirix (http://www.amirixlinux.com/), Embedded Debian (http://www.emdebian.org/), TimeSys for real time GNU/Linux
(http://timesys.com/products/linux.html) and the VA Linux Systems,
OReilly and SGI collaboration (http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/debian/
index.html).

3.2

Advantages of the Debian Distribution

Debian (http://www.debian.org) is an excellent distribution of GNU/Linux.

(A popular commercial alternative to Debian is Red Hat.) The releases of
Debian are rock solid stable and come highly recommended. The Debian
packaging system is well developed and acknowledge as an excellent piece
of work. You can purchase the CD-ROM distributions of Debian inexpensively (see http://www.debian.org/distrib/vendors for a list of vendors)
or burn your own CD-ROMs from images available on the net. This latter
option is explored in this chapter.
Here are some specific advantages and benefits that distinguish Debian from
other distributions:
As a non-profit organisation Debian is more of a partner than a competitor with other distributions. Anyone can sign up as a Debian developer and be granted the same privileges as anyone else. There are

22

Distributions
currently over 870 active Debian developers. New work developed for
Debian is available for all of the other Linux distributions to copy as
soon as its uploaded to the Debian servers.
The Debian Free Software Guidelines are a critical component from a
business standpoint. They specify the requirements for licenses of any
package that is to be included with Debian. Debian conforms to the
official GNU version of free software which means that every package
included in Debian can be redistributed freely.
Debian is driven by policy. The formal and publicly available Debian
policies have been developed over many years and are a mature response
to dealing with the large task of maintaining such a distribution in a
distributed manner. Various Debian tools (such as dpkg, apt-get, and
lintian) effectively implement the policy and provide a guarantee of
quality in the packaging.
Debian is an excellent choice for the development of software for all
distributions of GNU/Linux. Because Debians processes, in terms of
policies and packaging, are fair and visible and open standards conforming, Debian is a very clean and very carefully constructed distribution. Developments that occur on a Debian platform can thus easily
be delivered or transferred to other GNU/Linux (and Unix) platforms.
It is difficult to upgrade a system from one RedHat release to another.
Debian provides simple migration paths that are well trodden. No more
re-installing the operating system just to upgrade to the new release.
Debians tools have the ability to do recursive upgrades of systems.
Debian deals with dependencies and will identify the required packages
and install them and then install the package you want.
Debian packages can Suggest other packages to be installed, and it is
left to the user whether to follow the suggestions or not.
Multiple packages can Provide the same functionality (e.g., email, web
server, editor). A package might thus specify that it depends on a web
server, but not which particular web server (assuming it works with
any web server).
Debian has a utility to install RedHat packages if you are desperate!

3.3 Debian Distributions

23

Debian does not overwrite your config files nor does the packaging system touch /usr/local except perhaps to ensure appropriate directories
exist for local (non-Debian) installed data and utilities.
RedHat uses a binary database for its package data while Debian (dpkg)
uses text files. Debian is more robust (if a single file gets corrupted its
less of a problem) and it is possible to fix or modify things by hand
using a normal text editor if needed. (Debians apt-get uses a mixed
approach: it uses the same text files as dpkg but uses a binary cache
to also get the advantages of a binary database.
RedHat packages rarely fix upstream (i.e., original source of packages)
file locations to be standards compliant but instead just place files
whereever the upstream package happens to put them. Many upstream
developers do not know about or conform to the standards. A minor
example, the openssh rpms create /usr/libexec for the sftpd daemons,
but libexec is a BSD standard and the Linux standard1 says such things
should go in /usr/lib/program or /usr/sbin.
Generally speaking, Debian packages must be created by qualified
developers (and there are thousands of them) who are committed to
following Debians strict policies requiring such things as FHS compliance and never overwriting config files without permission. Only
packages from these developers become part of the Debian archives.
Debian runs on more hardware platforms than any other distribution.
The Debian packaging philosophy is to keep packages in small chunks
so that the user can choose what to install with a little more control.
See also http://www.infodrom.org/Debian/doc/advantages.html.

3.3

Debian Distributions

Debian provides a rock solid, stable, distribution which is highly recommended for those running servers that must be reliable. This distribution
1
The Filesystem Hierarchy Standard (FHS) is described at http://www.pathname.
com/fhs/. It consists of, to quote the site, a set of requirements and guidelines for file and
directory placement under UNIX-like operating systems. They thus encourage the interoperability of applications, system administration tools, development tools, and scripts as
well as greater uniformity of documentation for these systems. More GNU/Linux specific
is the Linux Standard Base (LSB) with information at http://www.linuxbase.org/.

24

Distributions

has been thoroughly tested. Software included in this distribution is not

leading edge, but instead it is mature software, unlikely to crash, ever!
But many people like to stay up-to-date with the latest and greatest. An
alternative Debian distribution, the unstable distribution, is where you will
find the latest and the greatestit is a pretty solid distribution (and is particularly suited to those who live at the bleeding edge). The testing distribution
is a compromise between stability and bleeding edge. Packages in this distribution have not been through the rigorous testing of the stable distribution,
but are generally stable enough to not have serious bugs reported against
them.
Administering a Debian system and maintaining up-to-date package installations is easy with Debians apt-get and dpkg tools. A lot of effort has been
devoted to ensuring the system works as a whole, rather than providing a lot
of glitz.
The name Debian comes from Deb and Ian Murdoch. A LITTLE MORE
HISTORY OF DEBIAN HERE. First appeared in 1993, pre-dating RedHat
and many other distributions.
Debian satisfies the needs of both system administrators who require rock
solid software and hobbyists who like to live at the cutting edge and dont
mind the occasional bumpy road. The stable releases have proven to be
extremely stable. Only packages that have been thoroughly tested by the
Debian team become part of a stable release. These releases are sometimes
called dinosaurs even before they get released. By the time they are released
the rest of the GNU/Linux world has moved on (often to introduce new bugs).
You can be confident, though, that you will have a solid Linux installation.
And if you want to have the latest and greatest, or even just update some
packages to their latest release, you simply ask Debian to go grab it and
install it for you.
The stable distribution of Debian is found at http://www.debian.org/
releases/stable/ and the unstable distribution, where you will find the
latest and the greatest, is found at http://www.debian.org/releases/
unstable/. Despite its name, the unstable distribution is very stable, although at times you might find an aberrant package in transition, but it
wont be there for long! Administering the system and maintaining up-todate package installations is easy with Debians apt-get and dpkg tools.
With these tools and the Debian package structure a lot of effort has been
devoted to ensuring the system works as a fully integrated whole, rather than
providing a lot of glitz.

3.4 Debian Packages

3.4

25

Debian Packages

Debian has a carefully planned and controlled release program and has a
number of releases available at any time. The releases have code names
(originally from the Toy Story movies), release names, and versions. This
may sound complicated, but it is actually quite simple and effective. The
officially released and current version of Debian is referred to as the stable
release. This release is regularly highlighted as the most stable GNU/Linux
distribution available.

3.5
3.5.1

Debian Releases
Naming The Releases

There are three ways of referring to a particular release: name (e.g., woody),
state (e.g., stable), and number (e.g., 2.2). The name and number refer to
the same static release with a number only being issued when the release
is finalised (i.e., it becomes stable). The state (stable, testing, or unstable)
shifts from release to release, and a given release will cycle through these
states. The special name sid always refers to unstable.
The release names come from the Toy Story movies (bo, hamm, slink, potato,
woody, sid, . . . ).
The states are stable, unstable, testing, and frozen.
The unstable release is where new packages and updates to old packages
appear. You access this distribution if you want the latest and greatest, and
are comfortable with the occasional glitch.
For those who want the latest and greatest but not the risk the testing release
lags behind the unstable release by a few weeks to include only packages that
dont appear to have any problems.
When a new release is being prepared it evolves from the unstable release
through the testing release onto the frozen release. A frozen release goes
through a thorough testing phase to ensure all packages in the distribution
work together and there are no outstanding bug reports. This process can
take six months or more.

26

Distributions

Once this testing is complete the release is then renamed as stable and may
remain the current stable for up to eighteen months. The stable release is
just that, stable. It is often regarded as the most stable distribution of
GNU/Linux available. Packages in this release are not the most recently
available and sometimes thought to be quite out of date, but that is the cost
of rock solid stability.
In summary, the stable release is best suited to production servers, while the
adventurous power user can run unstable on a desktop with only the rare
mess up.
An advantage of this system is that a user can track either a specific release
(slink, potato, woody, sid) or a state (stable, testing, unstable) simply by
specifying the appropriate name in /etc/apt/sources.list.
The fact that the states can change quite dramatically (e.g., when a new stable release is made) is a little problematical as people may suddenly find that
their system wants to upgrade everything to a new release. One suggestion
is to choose the release name and stay with that until you decide yourself to
upgrade.
Thus, to stay with a given release use the release name. To keep up-to-date
with a stable system then use the stable release. To be at the bleeding edge
and relatively stable then use testing. To live at the absolute bleeding edge
use unstable.
Version
2.0
2.1
2.2
3.0

Name Testing
bo
hamm
slink
potato
woody 2001/08
sid

Frozen

Stable

1998/11/03
2000/01/16

1999/03/10
2000/08/22

Table 3.1: A selection of Debian releases.

3.5.2

Recording Your Choice

There are over 75 Debian mirrors world-wide and over 7300 packages available
for unstable which you can browse at http://www.debian.org/Packages/
unstable/allpackages.html. Check for a mirror near you by trying http:

3.5 Debian Releases

27

//ftp.au.debian.org/ where you replace au with your country code. The

following are likely to exist: au Australia If you dont find one then
stay with the master Debian site or check for another mirror listed in http:
//www.debian.org/distrib/ftplist. If you do find a suitable mirror then
edit /etc/apt/sources.list (as root user) and add in the appropriate net
address. For example, if you are in Australia you might and want to install
from the potato archive then your /etc/apt/sources.list might look like:
deb http://ftp.au.debian.org/debian
potato
main contrib non-free
deb http://ftp.au.debian.org/debian-non-US potato/non-US main contrib non-free

(If you are familiar with Debian slink or earlier, you will notice that the
format of the non-US entry changed starting with potato.)
Finally, if you want to go the commercial (and sometimes less hassle) CDROM distribution path a nice looking one based on Debian is Libranet.
The apt-setup command will run a simple interface to help set up your
/etc/apt/sources.list.

3.5.3

Other Flavours

Another key benefit of Debian is that the distribution is packaged for multiple
architectures, including Alpha, ARM, HP PA-RISC, Intel x86, Intel IA-64,
Motorola 680x0, MIPS, MIPS (DEC), PowerPC, IBM S/390, and SPARC!
Thats quite a choice.
And even more interestingly, Debian is not tied to the Linux kernel! Theres
also a Linux-free Debian called Debian/Hurd (hurd-i386) and, surprisingly
there is even discussion of a Debian/Cygwin which runs Debian packages on
legacy MS-Windows platforms via the Cygwin compatibility toolkit. Now
that will be something to see!

3.5.4

Package Basics

Debian distributions are based on over 4400 packages. Your task is to select
those you wish to install! This is made easier with task packages which are
virtual packages that depend on a collection of other packages. Selecting
one of these task packages results in that collection of other packages being

28

Distributions

installed. An example is the task-tex package that will install the TEX and
LATEX packages and related utilities.
Task packages are presented to the user on an initial install. As the name
indicates a task package is intended to deliniate a specific task you might
use a computer for, like a web server, an X workstation, or perhaps an X
workstation using Gnome or KDE.
Individual packages are installed and updated using http://www.debian.
org/Packages/stable/base/dpkg.html dselect (with a basic GUI), or http:
//www.debian.org/Packages/stable/base/dpkg.html dpkg (for manual
installation of deb files), or http://www.debian.org/Packages/stable/
admin/apt.html apt-get (for automatic download and install, including installation of other required packages).
Using dselect is at first confusing but allows you to easily update and install
new packages with an ease that leaves you confident that all difficulties have
been carefully hidden through extensive dependency and consistency checking. If network connection is interrupted, the downloads will be resumed from
where they got to. The dselect learning curve will pay dividends. My installation has always been left in a consistent and stable state after installing
packages from the Debian archives on the Internet.
As you gain confidence and know what you are after, move on to apt-get if
you prefer a command-line interface. This takes care of dependency checking
automatically (unlike dpkg) and will retrieve the required packages from the
Debian archives.
Each individual package can Suggest, Recommend, and Depend on other
packages. A subtle difference between dselect and apt-get is that the latter
ignores Suggest and Recommend dependencies whereas dselect will offer
Suggested packages for the users attention and will select Recommended
packages automatically.

3.6

Using dselect

Running dselect you will be lead through these simple steps:

Access the archives using the apt access method. You will be offered
the chance to edit the file /etc/apt/sources.list but I always answer

3.7 Debian on CD

29

N since it seems to wipe out my comments. I prefer to hand edit the

file and to update my comments.
Update my machines picture of the world. This reads the Packages
files (which is the master list of packages available from the Debian
archive) found at those sites listed in /etc/apt/sources.list and
updates the information for dselect on my machine.
Select any packages you want to install. This will also highlight any
packages that dselect thinks you probably should install, including dependencies and security updates.
Install will then figure out what has to be done and tells you what it
will need to download. You can tell it to go ahead or if you get cold
feet you can pull out here and go back and change your selections. If
you go ahead the packages are pulled from the Net and installed.
Config is mostly a null operation for me. It seems to just double check
things.
Remove is also mostly a null operation. It also seems to just double
check things.
Quit when Im all done.
Simple. The Select stage can be a little confusing when you get conflicts so
read the help screens carefully.
Once youve got things going with dselect you may find the convenience of
the command line based wajig useful.

3.7

Debian on CD

You dont need to install Debian GNU/Linux from CD-ROM. You can obtain
all of the Debian packages from the international network of Debian mirrors
by simply using the Debian package tools (often based around the apt-get
package and including those that provide more user-friendly interfaces to
apt-get including capt, gnome-apt, and aptitude).
Of course, if you do not have ready access to the Internet you may want
to burn your own CD image of the distribution (assuming you have enough

30

Distributions

access to download the images!). Or if you are installing Debian GNU/Linux

on multiple machines then the CD-ROM installation is the best option.
Burning your own CD-ROM is a straightforward process using tools supplied
by Debian specifically to build, as a file, an image of the CD so that you can
then burn the image directly to CD using CD writers on any platform you
may have access to.
The recipe presented here uses a Solaris host (but can be any other Unix or
MS-Windows host) with good Internet access. You will need to install ncftp
version 2.4.3 (dont use the more experimental version 3beta of ncftp as it
has a different behaviour that does not work with the Debian tools discussed
herethis may of course be fixed in more recent releases.) You will also need
wget. These are both freely available on the Internet (check freshmeat.net).

3.7.1

Build or Download the CD Image?

You may be wondering why you should go through a process of building a

CD image yourself rather than simply downloading the appropriate images
from a Debian CD image mirror somewhere. The answer has been that there
are many Debian mirrors world-wide that store the complete collection of
Debian packages. If these mirrors were to also store the CD images the extra
space required is essentially wasted space and so many of the Debian mirrors
do not keep the CD images.
There are a smaller number of Debian hosts on the Internet that do maintain
CD images. These hosts are often not local and the amount of bandwidth
required to download the images from these smaller number of mirrors is
quite significant.
According to the Debian GNU/Linux CD Images Frequently Asked Questions page (http://cdimage.debian.org/faq.html) by using a distributed
approach based on the network of Debian package mirrors the required bandwidth to the CD image mirrors is reduced by over 99%!
Nonetheless, today you may find local Debian hosts mirroring the CD images
also. If that is the case then it is easier to simply download the actual images
rather than building the images as described in the rest of this chapter.
In Australia, for example, the primary Debian mirror also mirrors the CD
images (from http://cdimage.debian.org/cd-images/. So for those in .au
and .nz it is perhaps easiest to simply download one of the following:

3.7 Debian on CD

31

> wget http://mirror.aarnet.edu.au/pub/debian-cd/3.0_r1/i386/debian-30r1-i386-binary-1_NONUS.iso

> wget http://mirror.aarnet.edu.au/pub/debian-cd/3.0_r1/i386/debian-30r1-i386-binary-1.iso

Then burn the image to CD using whatever tools you have at your disposal.
For release 3 there are 7 CDs. The NONUS alternative (which contains items
that can not be exported directly from the US) is only relevant to the first
CD.

3.7.2

Obtain The Debian Pseudo-Image Kit

If you dont have good access to a well connected CD image host then it
is best to follow the following recipe to build the CD images. It is quite
straightforward.
The first step is to obtain the appropriate Debian tools to build the CD image.
Again, recall that the scenario here is to build the image on a Solaris machine,
but the procedure should be similar for any GNU/Linux or Unix machine.
The pseudo-image-kit package can be obtained from a number of locations
listed at http://cdimage.debian.org/~costar/pseudo-image-kit/. We
use one of these locations here:
>
>
>
>

wget http://panic.et.tudelft.nl/~costar/pseudo-image-kit/pseudo-image-kit-2.0.tar.gz
tar zxvf pseudo-image-kit-2.0.tar.gz
cd pseudo-image-kit-2.0
perl -pi -e s|^#! /bin/sh|#! /usr/local/bin/bash| make-pseudo-image

The last operation here changes the location at which the script makepseudo-image expects to find the installed version of the bash shell. Under
GNU/Linux it is /bin/sh but under Solaris it may be installed in /usr/
local/bin/bash.

3.7.3

Listing of CD Image Contents

The next step is to obtain a list of files that will make up the contents of the
CD. This is obtained from an appropriate CD image archive. For the binary
distribution of Debian (2.2) there are three CDs. We download the list of
contents for each:

32

Distributions

> wget http://www.uk.debian.org/debian-cd/cd-images/2.2_rev0/i386/binary-i386-1.list

> wget http://www.uk.debian.org/debian-cd/cd-images/2.2_rev0/i386/binary-i386-2.list
> wget http://www.uk.debian.org/debian-cd/cd-images/2.2_rev0/i386/binary-i386-3.list

For Australia you can get them locally:

> wget http://mirror.aarnet.edu.au/debian-cd/2.2_rev0/i386/binary-i386-1.list
> wget http://mirror.aarnet.edu.au/debian-cd/2.2_rev0/i386/binary-i386-2.list
> wget http://mirror.aarnet.edu.au/debian-cd/2.2_rev0/i386/binary-i386-3.list

3.7.4

Download Debian Packages

Now download from a local server the actual packages that will make up the
contents of the CD-ROM:
> ./make-pseudo-image binary-i386-1.list ftp://ftp.au.debian.org/debian

This takes quite a while! The end product is a file called pseudo-image. All
the other pseudo-image* files can be removed (theyre used to keep track of
where things were up to in case the download is interrupted).
This download is called the pseudo image because its an approximation of
the real image! Its pretty close, but not yet guaranteed perfect. It is a
simple process to now turn it into an official image:
> mv pseudo-image binary-i386-1.iso
> rsync --verbose --progress --stats --block-size=8192 \
mirror.aarnet.edu.au::debian-cd/2.1_r4/i386/binary-i386-1.iso .

This uses rsync to synchronise your CD-ROM image with the official one.
When this is complete you can burn this CD-ROM image directly to CDROM. Most CD-ROM burning software supports burning iso images directly.
Some other useful rsync commands allow you to hunt around the directory
structure of an rsync server. Some useful commands are:
List contents of the rsync servers root directory
> rsync mirror.aarnet.edu.au::

3.8 Other Distributions

33

List the contents of another directory

> rsync --dry-run mirror.aarnet.edu.au::debian-cd/2.2_rev0/*

3.7.5

CD-ROM Packages from APT

You can tell apt-get to obtain packages from a selection of CD-ROMs with
the following:
# apt-cdrom add

3.8

Other Distributions

GNU/Linux is all about choice. Other distributions of GNU/Linux have

their devotees, and each in its own way contributes significantly to the
overall development of GNU/Linux. Other distibutions include Red Hat,
Mandrake, SuSe, and Slackware. There are many distributions indexed at
http://www.linux.org/dist/index.html. An early distribution, still being maintained is Slackware available from http://www.slackware.com/.
Clearly, Red Hat, available from http://www.redhat.com/, is an excellent
distribution responsible for gaining a lot of exposure for GNU/Linux.
While we use Debian GNU/Linux in this book as the underlying distribution
what we say here applies to most distributions most of the time.

3.8.1

Moving From Red Hat

When converting from RedHat to Debian all of the configuration files in /etc
should be kept (e.g., burn them to CD-RW). Both distributions use many of
the same configuration files, although sometimes they are in slightly different
places.
Another approach is to create a parted boot disk (or use a Knoppix CD
knoppix has parted installed) and then create a new partition on your machine onto which you install Debian. This allows you to keep a functioning
RedHat install while you set up Debian. Once you have the Debian installation up to scratch you can wipe the RedHat partition and reclaim it for

34

Distributions

use in Debian (perhaps as /var, /usr). Otherwise delete the partition with
parted and enlarge your Debian partition.

Chapter 4
Installation
Installation of GNU/Linux is generally straight forward except when you hit
some new or obscure hardware. In comparison, MS-Windows generally comes
pre-installed when a PC is purchased, hiding the effort that went into fine
tuning the installation of the operating system for that particular hardware.
Until GNU/Linux is commonly available pre-installed we will continue to be
faced with issues relating to installation by novices (and experts!). Nonetheless, the situation is improving dramatically with the introduction of LiveCDs
running Debian GNU/Linux. These allow a user to boot GNU/Linux from
CD and to actually run GNU/Linux without installing anything! The user
can then have the option to install if they like what they see.
For Debian GNU/Linux, installation instructions are provided by the Debian Installation Guide available from http://www.debian.org/releases/
stable/i386/install. An alternative guide is available from http://www.
polaris.net/~dwarf/. These provide considerable detail and are well worth
the effort. Be familiar with the installation processtry it out once or
twiceit doesnt hurt to practise!
In this chapter we review the installation process through examples using a
number of platforms. These include common desktops, laptops, and even a
different type of CPU (Sun SPARC). The aim is to install a minimal stable 1
release from CD-ROM and then to upgrade to the unstable 2 release. If you
1
The stable release of Debian GNU/Linux is a solid distribution which has been very
extensively tested. It generally contains older releases of software that have proven to be
quite stable.
2
While the unstable release sounds, well, unstable, it contains the most recent versions
of all packages and is usually quite a stable product. Occasionally it suffers from a buggy

35

36

Installation

are not connected to the Internet then you will be installing a full system
from CD-ROM. This will leave you with a complete system ready for most
tasks.

4.1

Quick Start

It is quite reasonable to want to skip all the details and to simply get started
with GNU/Linux. In this section we will get you up and running with
GNU/Linux real soon! There are two alternatives. The first will use a
LiveCD and is good for a quick test that things will work on your system.
The second, recommended, approach will do a standard Debian install.

4.1.1

LiveCD Install

Obtain a LiveCD distribution, such as Morphix, from http://www.morphix.

org. See Section 4.3.3 for details and Section 3.1 for other distributions of
Debian GNU/Linux. Boot your computer from this CD and you will have a
running system (but not yet installed). Then ask Morphix to install itself.
You will end up with an installed Debian GNU/Linux system, but it will
have some subtle differences to a standard Debian install.

4.1.2

Quick Debian Install

Instructions are current as of 15 March 2004, using the beta3 release of

the Debian Installer, identified as Sarge i386 Netinst. Further details are
available from http://www.debian.org/devel/debian-installer.
We cover two boot methods: CD and Floppy/USB. After booting the remainder of the install process is the same.

Booting from CD
First, download (or otherwise obtain) the ISO disk image and burn it to a
blank CD:
package or two but are usually quickly fixed.

4.1 Quick Start

37

> wget http://gluck.debian.org/cdimage/testing/sarge_d-i/i386/beta3/\

sarge-i386-netinst.iso
> cdrecord -data sarge-i386-netinst.iso

Place the CD into the CD drive and turn the computer on. Ensure your
computer has booting from CD-ROM enabled (this is a function of the BIOS
so you made need to go into the BIOS setup program at boot time). You
will be asked to press Enter to boot Debiando so.
Booting from Floppy with USB
First, download (or otherwise obtain) the floppy disk boot image and write
it to a floppy disk:
> wget http://http.us.debian.org/debian/dists/testing/main/\
installer-i386/current/images/floppy/boot.img
> dd if=boot.img of=/dev/fd0 bs=1024 conv=sync ; sync

Place the Floppy into the Floppy drive and turn the computer on. Ensure
your computer has booting from Floppy enabled (this is a function of the
BIOS so you made need to go into the BIOS setup program at boot time).
You will be asked to press Enter to boot Debiando so. This will stop with
a request for a root floppy or a USB stick.
Now obtain the USB image and the CD ISO image to be placed on the USB
stick (see http://d-i.pascal.at/ for further information):
> wget http://http.us.debian.org/debian/dists/testing/main/\
installer-i386/current/images/hd-media/boot.img.gz
> zcat boot.img.gz > /dev/sda1
> wget http://gluck.debian.org/cdimage/testing/sarge_d-i/i386/beta3/\
sarge-i386-netinst.iso
> mount /dev/sda1 /flash
> cp sarge-i386-netinst.iso /flash
> umount /flash

Then plug the USB stick into the new machine and press Enter to continue.
System Install
Choose, for example, English (USA). If there is no DHCP on the local network set up a static network (e.g., IP=105.229.8.158, NetMask=255.255.255.192,

38

Installation

Gateway=105.229.8.190, DNS=125.83.72.15 125.83.72.1). Choose the defaults for all options unless you know better. There should only be one or
two questions. You will eventually be asked to remove the CD and reboot.
Configure the time zone (e.g., Australia/ACT). Add Root and User accounts.
Dont do any task selection for now. For the email set up choose local delivery.
Note that to reconfigure, run the base-config program.
And that is it. The system is ready to use! The user account is quite spartan
and there arent many applications installed, so these are the next steps.

Account Configuration
Set up a basic system with ssh, wajig, emacs21, less, most, zile:

# apt-get install ssh wajig emacs21 less most zile

Now copy a standard /etc/apt/sources.list from somewhere and get

things on the road:

#
#
#
#

cp /etc/apt/sources.list /etc/apt/sources.list.original
scp ktw:/etc/apt/sources.list /etc/apt/sources.list
wajig update
wajig dist-upgrade

Use visudo to set up wajig usage for a user:

Cmnd_Alias APT = /usr/bin/apt-get, /usr/bin/apt-cache, /usr/bin/dpkg, \

/usr/sbin/dpkg-reconfigure, /usr/bin/dpkg-repack, \
/etc/init.d/*, /usr/sbin/update-alternatives, \
/usr/lib/apt-move/fetch, /usr/bin/dselect, \
/usr/bin/alien, /usr/sbin/apt-setup

kayon ALL=(ALL) APT

Set up, for the user account, ssh for access to remote accounts if you like, to
avoid repeatedly typing a password:

4.2 Hardware Compatibility

39

> ssh-keygen -t dsa

...accept the default file location
...enter a pass phrase - not too long
> scp .ssh/id_dsa.pub ktw:.ssh/id_dsa.new
> ssh ktw; cd .ssh; cat id_dsa.new >> authorized_keys
> ssh-agent bash
> ssh-add
Enter passphrase for /home/kayon/.ssh/id_dsa:
Identity added: /home/kayon/.ssh/id_dsa (/home/kayon/.ssh/id_dsa)

Now copy setup files from remote hosts:

> scp ktw:{.bashrc,.bash_profile,.emacs,.emacs-custom,.emacs-kayon} .
> scp ktw:{.xsession,.Xresources} .

Copy the same files for root.

Applications
Install ntpdate and ntp to set the system clock accurately from a reliable
server (e.g., ntp.ktware.com).
Get X Windows working with the graphics card by installing x-window-system
gnome gdm gdm-themes
Now populate your machine with other applications using tasksel to install
groups of packages. I also like to add in xmms vrms.

4.2

Hardware Compatibility

While a number of hardware manufacturers support GNU/Linux, not all do,

or else they are slow about it. This is the cause of most difficulty in installing
GNU/Linux yourselfyou suddenly find that your hardware is not supported
out of the box. However, this is fairly rare today, and when you find yourself
in such a situation there is generally a wealth of support available within the
GNU/Linux community to solve the problem. Most devices will, however,
simply work without any effort under GNU/Linux. We look at some specific
cases below. The Linux Hardware HowTo is also a very useful resource.
Network interface cards (NICs) come in many difference designs and there
are numerous clones. Sometimes there is very little technical information

40

Installation

made available by the manufacture available and open source drivers may
be hard to come by. This is only likely though for very recent new cards
or very specialised cards (like Gigabit Ethernet). Any PCI Ethernet or Fast
Ethernet NIC should work out of the box with GNU/Linux.
Modems that indentify themselves as Windows only or designed for Windows
are so-called software modems which rely on the CPU doing some of the
work for them. Some of these will not work with GNU/Linux. However, all
external modems work with GNU/Linux.
For graphics cards, avoid the absolute latest releases until youve checked
their driver status under GNU/Linux (check with the retailer or vendor).
For example, for nvidia graphics cards the NVidia Gnu/Linux binary driver
web site has a README that lists the supported cards, which generally includes
everything but the absolute latest top-of-the-line cards (support for which is
generally only a matter of time).
There is an excellent web site for checking GNU/Linux compatibility for
printers (http://www.linuxprinting.org). Generally, most Epson and HP
inkjet printers are well supported.
There is a similar web site to check for CD recorder compatibility. In general,
any ATA CD-RW and DVD-RW/-RAM/+RW drive should work just fine
with GNU/Linux since they are controlled by the ATAPI driver.

4.3

Getting the Installation Media

You can install Debian GNU/Linux in a number of ways. Here we review a

CD-ROM installation (although floppy install is also covered for some older
installations). CD-ROM is the current recommended approach (although
DVD-ROM is now also available and will soon become the recommended
approach). However, floppy disk install is still feasible, if a little tiresome.
LiveCD install is becoming a preferred alternative, and is also discussed.

4.3.1

Floppy Distribution

A collection of floppy disks (sixteen for Debian 2.2, for example) is required to begin the floppy-disk installation. The raw floppy disk images can
be retrieved from http://ftp.debian.org/debian/dists/stable/main/

4.3 Getting the Installation Media

41

disks-i386/current/images-1.44/. The required images are: rescue.bin

(the Rescue Disk ); driver-1.bin to driver-4.bin (the Drivers Disks); and
base-1.bin up to base-11.bin (the Base Disks). These can be written to
floppy disks using the rawrite2 executable for MS-Windows (available from
http://ftp.debian.org/debian/dists/stable/main/disks-i386/current/
dosutils/):
C:\> rawrite2 -f resc1440.bin -d a:

4.3.2

CD-ROM Distribution

The available CD-ROMs include the main distribution (currently version

3.0 woody CD-ROM), the network install3 (netinst) CD-ROM (version 3.0),
and other CPU specific CD-ROMs (e.g., the Sparc 3.0 woody CD-ROM).
The CD-ROM images can be obtained from, for example, http://mirror.
aarnet.edu.au/pub/debian-cd/current/ and similar archives (this Australian mirror is only available to Australian hosts). For CD-ROM only
installations you may need to obtain multiple CD-ROMs. For the netinst
approach the CD-ROM images are generally around 100MB.
Grab the CD-ROM image from a web site and burn to CD (preferably CDRW!):
# cdrecord -v speed=4 dev=1,1,0 -data cdimage.raw

The recommendation is to use the netinst approachthe base packages are

provided on one CD-ROM and from there the rest of the system is installed
over the network. Debian supplies netinst CD-ROM images as does Progeny.
The Debian version is the familiar and well tried installation process while
Progeny uses the new PGI (piggy) interface which is quite a bit nicer and is
likely to become the standard Debian interface in the future.

4.3.3

LiveCD Distributions

Morphix is a modular distribution of Debian GNU/Linux with LiveCD support. Thus, you simply burn the CD image onto a CD-ROM and boot from
3

The netinst, or network install, distributions are Debian CDs with a bare installer.
The base OS and any additional packages you choose to install are downloaded from a
Debian mirror.

42

Installation

the CD to have a working GNU/Linux system, with no hard disk installation.

The advantage is that you can try out GNU/Linux without touching your
current data. If you like what you see, then installing Morphix on a hard
disk is straightforward. Simply click on the icon on the desktop (or choose
the installer from the morphix/babytux submenu). But note that Morphix is
still experimental and no guarantees are given, so use Morphix at your own
risk for now.
To obtain the ISO image to burn to your CD visit http://morphix.sourceforge.
net.

4.4

Boot

Boot from the suitable bootable CD-ROM. This might be one of the network installer single CD-ROMs from Progeny or Debian, or disk 1 of the Debian CD-ROM set (e.g., it might be called the Debian GNU/Linux Binary1
(nonUS) CD-ROM) or even the Rescue floppy disk. For different hardware
boot from the appropriate mediafor example for a SPARCStation boot
from the Sparc CD-ROM.

4.4.1

SPARCStation Boot

Cepheus (Section 4.10.21) is a SPARCStation. At boot time SPARCstations

are under the control of the Sun OpenBoot. Obtain the OpenBoot prompt
with the keyboard L1 (which might be labelled Stop)and A simultaneously.
The prompt is a simple ok. Note that the prompt can even be obtained
from within SILO (the Linux Loader for Sparc) or using the halt command
in SILO. Then boot the machine from CD-ROM with:

ok boot cdrom

At the boot prompt choose s (SCSI) and the system then boots from the
CD-ROM. To boot single user simply use boot -s.

4.5 Installation

4.4.2

43

BIOS Not Supporting CD-ROM

On some older machines, like Prefect (Section 4.10.17), the BIOS cannot boot
direct from CD-ROM so the machine needs to be booted from floppy disk
using MS-Windows Millenium Startup floppy. This recognises the CD-ROM
drive as drive D:. So simply run the BOOT command on the CD-ROM:
DOS> D:
> CD INSTALL
> BOOT

4.5
4.5.1

Installation
Debian Install

For Debian 3.0 choose to install the 2.4.18 kernel, at the boot prompt enter:
boot: bf24

4.5.2

PGI Install

Some advantages:
Much simpler than the laborious Debian install.
Uses the newer grub boot loader.
Uses discover to find hardware and to configure the hardware.
Some caveats:
Cant think of any yet.
Install of base takes about 1 hour, depending on network connection. Install
of all additional packages can take quite some time, depending on network
connection. Connected to a local Debian mirror with high throughput took
1 hour.

44

Installation

The default for PGI is to use DHCP (an automated mechanism for obtaining
an IP address from a DHCP server) to automatically obtain network information. If you dont have a DHCP server available then tell the installer
using the nodhcp option:

boot: install nodhcp

The PGI install process proceeds to running gnome-tasksel. You can choose
not to run this, or else select the tasks you would like installed and leave it
to do so from the Progeny archive.
Once completed update the installation with defaults for gdm.conf and apts
/etc/apt/sources.list. Your are then ready to ensure all appropriate
packages are installed. Install synaptic to select further packages (after a
dist-upgrade).
The configuration figlets used by PGI include:
dexlet
etherconf

4.6
4.6.1

X Server configuration
Configure the network: wajig reconfigure etherconf

Base Install
Keyboard

Choose qwerty/us.

4.6.2

Partitions

Partitioning of hard drive(s) can be tricky for the new user. The Debian
Installer provides options to partition your disk in a number of ways. It
recommends a simple, single partition, which is a good choice, unless you
know what you are doing. For a fuller discussion of Disk Partitioning see
Chapter 65.

4.6 Base Install

4.6.3

45

Configure Devices

This section of the install essentially identifies modules that you want to
be loaded whenever the machine is booted. The modules you identify will
be listed in /etc/modules. You can always add the modules there yourself
later. If using a pre-3.0 Debian install be sure to add a network module (or
else ppp if you are connected via a modem through an ISP) so that Debian
knows to set up the network.

4.6.4

Networking

During an install you will be asked whether to try DHCP to obtain your
network information from a DHCP server. This (usually) requires that you
identify your host as a host that your DHCP server knows or relies on the
DHCP server allocating the next available IP address. Do so just to see if
there is a DHCP server available to you.
If a DHCP server is not available then you will be prompted for appropriate
network information.
Generally you need the following, where some sample addresses are supplied:

IP
Netmask
Gateway
Domain
DNS

155.229.8.165
255.255.255.192
155.229.8.190
ktware.com
183.44.72.1

The information is recorded in /etc/network/interfaces and /etc/resolv.

conf. Later on edit /etc/resolv.conf to add search ktware.com so that
you can refer to your local machines by their name, without fully specifying
the domain.
Some useful commands for trouble shooting are:

# netstat -n
# ifconfig -a

46

4.6.5

Installation

Time Zone

Generally choose GMT for a GNU/Linux only machine and NO GMT for
dual boot machines.

4.6.6

Floppy Boot Disk

It is recommended to create a floppy boot disk if asked as a security blanket

during the Debian installation process (you will be asked).

4.6.7

Reboot and User Accounts

Once the base system is installed you are asked to reboot the system. Remove
the floppy disk and CD-ROM and reboot the machine. Keep the floppy in
if this is how you plan to boot into Linux (otherwise you are probably using
LILO to book directly into Linux).
You will be asked to enter a password for the root account and to create a
user account. Do so. In general it is best to log in as a user then use the
su command to set the user to be root as needed (e.g., to install packages or
modify files in /etc).

4.6.8

Package Selections

You will be asked to install a collection of selected packages.

Generally I delay until Ive got the system basically functioning, then use my
own devices to update and install all the packages I want, and hence I skip
this step. See Section ?? for details.

4.6.9

EMail: Setup Exim

The default email server for Debian is exim. This can be set up in one
of several ways, depending on how you will access your email. The exim
configurator will list the options.

4.7 Installing Packages

47

Generally, for a networked machine (e.g., Altrop (Section 4.10.20)) that is not
acting as a mail server, but using a remote smarthost (SMTP server) to send
email, yet still delivering email locally (which is obtained using fetchmail, for
example, from an IMAP server), you will choose option 2.
The information you then supply is:
visible name
other names
domain rely
network relay
smarthost
root email sent to

altrop.ktware.com
none
none
none
mailhost.ktware.com
kayon

This means that mailhost.ktware.com is used for sending email. Any email
sent from Altrop (Section 4.10.20) to an unqualified address (i.e., no @) will
have altrop.ktware.com appended to it and delivered locally.

4.7

Installing Packages

To get started install these from CD-ROM or the Internet:

# apt-get install wajig

# wajig install ssh emacs21 less finger mtools

4.7.1

Update To Newest Distribution

Add the local server (I add a local mirror plus an Australian mirror at aarnet)
and the US server to /etc/apt/sources.list:

deb
deb
deb
deb
deb
deb

http://datamining.csiro.au/pub/debian unstable main contrib non-free

http://datamining.csiro.au/pub/debian unstable/non-US main contrib non-free
ftp://mirror.aarnet.edu.au/pub/debian unstable main contrib non-free
http://ftp.debian.org/debian unstable main contrib non-free
http://non-US.debian.org/ unstable/non-US main contrib non-free
http://security.debian.org/ stable/updates main contrib non-free

48

4.7.2

Installation

Upgrade

Use the following commands to upgrade your system:

# wajig update
(Update list of available packages)
# wajig dist-upgrade (Update all installed packages and dependencies)

4.7.3

New Packages

New packages can be installed one at a time or as part of a collection using

the task selection tool tasksel or gnome-tasksel. A nice graphical alternative
in synaptic. Below is a list of packages I commonly install. Place the following
list into a file called install:
acroread alien apt-listchanges apt-utils aspell
aspell-doc aspell-en auctex autoconf automake autotools-dev
balsa bsdmainutils bsdutils bzip2
catdoc cdrdao cdrecord cdtool communicator cpio cpp cvs
dc debconf debconf-doc debconf-utils debhelper debianutils deborphan
defoma devhelp-books dialog docbook docbook-dsssl docbook-utils
docbook-xml dpkg-dev
ebook-dev-ggad eeyes eject elvis-tiny emacs21 emacs21-el enscript eog
evolution
fakeroot fdutils file finger fortune-mod fortunes-min fping ftp
g++ g77 galeon galeon-common gaspell gawk gcc gconf-editor gcvs gdm
gedit gettext-el gimp gkdebconf gkrellm gkrellm-gnome gkrellm-volume
gkrellmms glabels glade-gnome gnome-applets gnome-audio
gnome-commander gnome-common gnome-control-center gnome-core
gnome-games gnome-gv gnome-help gnome-help-data gnome-media
gnome-office gnome-panel gnome-pim gnome-session gnome-spell
gnome-terminal gnome-users-guide gnome-utils gnumeric-doc gnumeric-gda
gnumeric-python gnuplot gpaint grep grip groff groff-x11 gs
gs-pdfencrypt gsfonts gsfonts-x11 gthumb gtimer gtk-engines-begtk
gtk-engines-cleanice gtk-engines-cleanice2 gtk-engines-eazel

4.7 Installing Packages

49

gtk-engines-flat gtk-engines-gtkstep gtk-engines-icegradient

gtk-engines-mac2 gtk-engines-metal gtk-engines-notif
gtk-engines-pixmap gtk-engines-raleigh gtk-engines-redmond95
gtk-engines-thinice gtk-engines-xenophilia gtkgraph gtkhtml gzip
hdparm hostname html2text hwdata hwtools
ifupdown indent info
jade jadetex java-common jdk1.1 jdk1.1-dev
less lprng lynx lyx
make man-db manpages mime-support mkisofs modconf modutils most
mozilla mpage mpg321 mtools mutt muttprint
nano nautilus-suggested net-tools netbase netpbm nfs-kernel-server
ntp-simple nvi
openoffice.org
patch pciutils perl perl-doc perl-tk playmidi plotutils powermgmt-base
powershell
prosper psfontmgr psgml psmisc pstoedit psutils python python-apt
python-dev python-doc python-elisp python-gdk-imlib python-glade
python-gnome python-gtk python-mysqldb python-numeric python-optik
python-soappy python-xml
qemacs
r-base r-base-dev r-doc-html r-doc-info r-doc-pdf r-gnome r-mathlib
r-nonlinear r-recommended rdist rep-gtk-gnome rep-xmms reportbug
rpm rstatd rstat-client rsync
samba sawfish scrollkeeper setserial sgml-data sgmlspl sharutils
sndconfig sox sp splay ssh ssh-askpass ssh-askpass-gnome sudo synaptic
sysutils
tasksel tcl8.3 tetex-bin tetex-doc tetex-extra tetex-src texinfo time
tk8.3 transfig
ucf unzip

50

Installation

vim
wajig wget whiptail whois
x-window-system x-window-system-core xclip xdaliclock xearth xfig
xfishtank xfonts-cyrillic xfonts-pex xfree86-common xfsprogs xfstt
xgalaga xine-ui xletters xloadimage xmeter xmh xmms xmms-alarm
xmms-bumpscope xmms-cdread xmms-crossfade xmms-dev xmms-flac
xmms-fmradio xmms-goodnight xmms-goom xmms-infinity xmms-jess
xmms-lirc xmms-liveice xmms-modplug xmms-msa xmms-osd-plugin
xmms-qbble xmms-shell xmms-sid xmms-singit xmms-status-plugin
xmms-synaesthesia xmms-volnorm xmms-wmdiscotux xmmsarts xmountains
xpdf xpdf-common xpdf-reader xpdf-utils xplanet xplanet-images
xscreensaver-gl xscreensaver-gnome xsltproc xsnow

Install them with:

> wajig install -f install

4.8

Kernel Upgrade: 2.2 to 2.4

Upgrading from a 2.2 version kernel to a 2.4 version kernel is straightforward.

If using lilo4 you will be required to add the following line to /etc/lilo.conf:
initrd=/initrd.img

You are reminded of this on each upgrade. This message can be turned off
by adding the following line to /etc/kernel-img.conf:
do_initrd=Yes

If using grub none of this is requiredthe kernel update is automatically

added to grubs menu.
4

The default boot loader for a Debian install is lilo, but a PGI install uses grub so no
need to fiddle here.

4.9 Initial Configurations

4.9

51

Initial Configurations

My initial configuration involves making the gdm login screen looking nicer
by adding my own graphic, turning off the title bar, editing the welcome
message, and adding the System menu. The relevant lines in /etc/gdm/
gdm.conf are:
TitleBar=false
Logo=/usr/local/share/pixmaps/tux.jpg
SystemMenu=true
Welcome=Togaware Australia\n\nWelcome to %n\n\nDebian GNU/%s %r %m

I have numerous file systems NFS mounted, as identified in /etc/fstab:

ktw:/home
ktw:/usr/local
ktw:/var/lib/cvs
ktw:/ktwnet/altrop

4.10

/home
/usr/local
/var/lib/cvs
/ktwnet/altrop

nfs
nfs
nfs
nfs

defaults
defaults
defaults
defaults

0
0
0
0

0
0
0
0

Target Machines

Below we illustrate various aspects of the installation and configuration of

Debian GNU/Linux on a number of different machines used for different
purposes. The sections are being reordered to match when they were installed
so that newest installations appear first.

4.10.1

Optima Super Vizon II 3600 Customised (Bartok)

Bartok (Section 4.10.1) is a custom built dual processor server with an inexpensive 20GB IDE hard disk (for Debian GNU/Linux install) and a 136GB
SCSI RAID disk (made up of 4 disks).
Debian GNU/Linux 2.2r2 was originally installed (kernel-image-2.2.18pre21)
from CD-ROM (4 December 2001). The SCSI RAID disk (Adaptec 2100s)
was not supported by the installed kernel thus Debian was first installed
on the IDE drive. A driver for the SCSI RAID was then obtained from

52

Installation

Adaptec (dpt i2o.o) and installed after Debian was upgraded to unstable and
running with kernel-image-2.2.19. A compile of kernel-source-2.4.16 produced
a dpt i2o.o suitable for use with kernel-image-2.4.16-686-smp. On 26 March
2003 a standard kernel-image-2.4.20-686-smp was installed to provide up to
date support for USB, adding a USB Printer. This was upgraded to kernelimage-2.4.25-1-686-smp on 23 March 2004. The SMP kernels supports the
dual processors and 4GB high memory.
Originally there were occasional I/O errors with the dpt i2o driver for the
Adaptec. Others (e.g., Ian Millsom) reported that the driver in the earlier
2.4 kernels were buggy and indeed Ian had a 2.2.19pre17 kernel patched
for the driver. However, running under kernel versions 2.4.16, 2.4.20, and
2.4.25 there have been no further problems. (The 2.4.16 kernel was compiled
with options p3, high memory, and SMP and the later kernels were standard
Debian kernels with SMP and HIMEM).
Original partitioning was 4GB for / and the rest for /home. After a couple
of years of use the 4GB for / became inadequate and things like /usr/share
started moving to other places!
A new install was performed (24 March 2004) with the beta3 Debian Installer
booting from CD-ROM. A default boot froze very quickly just after:

ENABLING IO-APIC IRQs

Setting 2 in the phys_id_present_map
...changing IO-APIC physical APIC ID to 2 ... ok.
..TIMER: vector=0x31 pin1=2 pin2=0

Booting by entering linux noapic on the Boot: line succeeded. Automatic

partition of the IDE disk was then accepted. When rebooting with Grub the
boot command had to be edited to add noapic to the end of the kernel line.

Bartok Specifications
From the lspci and lshw commands and /proc/cpuinfo:

4.10 Target Machines

CPU:
Bogomips:
Memory:
Network:
Disk:
Video:
Audio:
CDRW:
CDROM:
Hostname:
Domainname:
IP Address:
Netmask:
Broadcast:
Gateway:
DNS
Boot:
Kernel:

53

Dual Intel Pentium III (Coppermine) 1GHz

2 x 2005
1.3GB
Integrated Intel PRO/100+ Intel 82559 (eepro1000)
20GB IDE
140GB Adaptec 2100s RAID. 4 x Seegate Cheetah 10K 36GB
NVidia Riva Ultra 64
Mitsubishi CDRW 32x12x8
ATAPI-CD ROM-DRIVE-52MAX, ATAPI CD/DVD-ROM drive
bartok
ktware.com.au
105.229.8.158
255.255.255.192
105.229.255.255
105.229.8.190
125.83.72.15 125.83.72.1
Lilo
2.4.25-1-686-smp

Bartok Install Log

The IDE disk was originally partitioned into three: one for swap (2GB as
/dev/hda3), one for / (4GB as /dev/hda1) and the rest for /home (14GB as
/dev/hda2. Aftera year or two of use the / partition was full! Generally, use
the whole disk for / as is recommended by the Debian Installer.
The second install (23 March 2004) followed the standard path, but with
noapic.
Load RAID Driver During Install
The Adaptec PCI Ultra 160 Single Channel RAID Controller, also known as
the Adaptec 2100s, was an interesting challenge as drivers for this were not
available on the install media. Thus initially it was not possible to install
Linux. The initial boot with Debian GNU/Linx V2.2r2 CD-ROM failed
because the disks were not found!
After the Configure Keyboard step in the Debian install process there is
an opportunity to Preload Essential Modules from Floppy. This allows the

54

Installation

loading of modules that are required for particular devices that are otherwise
not provided in the kernel.
So the first attempt at installing Linux obtained the appropriate module/driver
from Adaptec by downloading dptdriver-2.4.tgz from linux.adaptec.
com. This gzipped tape archive generates /usr/adaptec/i2o_driver/:
> tar zxvf dptdriver-2.4.tgz
> cd usr/adaptec/i2o_driver/

The drivers for various versions of the kernel are then contained in dpt i2o prebuilt.cgz.
This is a gzipped cpio archive. To extract the archive:
$ mkdir tmp
$ cd tmp
$ gunzip < ../dpt_i2o_prebuilt.cgz | cpio --extract

The kernel installed was 2.2.18pre21 but there is not a corresponding dpt i2o.
The 2.2.18 version had undefined symbols and the machine froze. The 2.2.19
version worked. This was then copied onto a floppy for Debian to load:
$
$
$
$

mount /floppy
mkdir /floppy/boot
cp dpt_i2o.2.2.19 /floppy/boot/dpt_i2o.o
umount /floppy

Once dpt_i2o is installed you can create and initialise the disk partitions on
the RAID:
# cfdisk /dev/sda
# mke2fs /dev/sda1

(to create a single partition perhaps)

Later when configuring drivers and devices you can also add modules from
floppy, but they must now be in /floppy/lib/modules/scsi/dpt_i2o.o,
for example.
Now we come unstuck because we create a boot floppy yet there is no way
to install the RAID driver on the kernel on this boot floppy, so next reboot
the RAID is no longer available and the boot hangs with a Kernel Panic and
a message about block-major-8 and not being able to mount the root fs.

4.10 Target Machines

55

Install an IDE Hard Drive

It would appear that a sensible approach to building a computer with a SCSI
RAID is to install an IDE drive onto which Debian GNU/Linux is installed.
The appropriate driver for the SCIS RAID is then installed after Debian is
functioning. The driver for the SCSI RAID is dpt_i2o.o, obtained from the
dptdriver-2.4.tgz archive at linux.adaptec.com. The correct one (for
kernel 2.2.19) was copied to the appropriate modules folder after upgrading
the kernel to 2.2.19:
#
#
#
#
#

mount -r /dev/fd0 /floppy

cp /floppy/boot/dpt_i2o.o /lib/modules/2.2.19/scsi
umount /floppy
depmod -a
insmod dpt_i2o

Then dpt_i2o.o is listed in /lib/modules/2.2.19/modules.dep (thanks to

the depmod command) and the RAID disk is accessible. There were some
unresolved symbols but these seem not to affect the drive. (The choice of
kernel 2.2.19 was dictated by the available kernel-images in Debian and the
available drivers for specific kernels from Adaptec.)
To mount the drive add the following to /etc/fstab:
/dev/sda1

/raid ext2

defaults,errors=remount-ro

0 0

Then create /raid and mount the RAID disk:

# mkdir /raid
# mount /raid

Also add dpt i2o to /etc/modules so that the RAID is available when the
machine boots.
Kernel Compiles to Support HIGHMEM and SMP
Eventually the standard package kernel-image-2.4.20-1-686-smp was installed,
providing both SMP and HIMEM support.
Previous kernel compiles are outlined here.

56

Installation

#
#
#
#
#
#

wajig install bin86 kernel-package kernel-source-2.4.16 debconf-utils

cd /usr/src
tar jxvf kernel-source-2.2.16.tar.bz2
cd kernel-source-2.2.16
cp /boot/config-2.4.16-586 .config
make menuconfig
Processor Type and Features
CONFIG_MPENTIUMIII=y
CONFIG_HIGHMEM4G=y (originally off)
CONFIG_SMP=y (already set)
# make-kpkg clean
# make-kpkg --append-to-version -p3hmsmp --revision dha01
--initrd kernel_image

The aim was to have:

1. dpt_i2o provided by the kernel (2.4.14 on with CONFIG SCSI DPT I2O=m)
2. support for 2 CPUs (CONFIG SMP=y)
3. support over 1GB memory (CONFIG HIGHMEM4G=y)
With the new kernels the initrd (initial ram disk) is the default, so it is
worth moving to this. It requires changes to your /etc/lilo.conf to include
initrd lines. For example:
image=/boot/vmlinuz-2.4.16-p3hmsmp
label=2.4.16-p3hmsmp
read-only
initrd=/boot/initrd.img-2.4.16-p3hmsmp
append="noapic"

Note also that with the dual processor card in this machine (ASUS CUV4XDLS) the noapic option was required, otherwise there is a problem with
running out of IRQs and the boot hangs after the following message:
ENABLING IO-APIC IRQs
Setting 2 in the phys_id_present_map
...changing IO-APIC physical ID to 2 ... ok.
..TIMER: vector=0x31 pin1=2 pin2=0

4.10 Target Machines

57

An alternative to turning APIC off is to free up the IRQs used by the

PCI IDE devices. This is only useful if either the primary or secondary
IDE is not being used (for IDE hard disks and IDE CD-ROM). To turn it
off the secondary or both IDEs in the BIOS setup, go to AdvancedChip
ConfigurationOnboard PCI IDE and set it to either Primary or Disabled.

58

4.10.2

Installation

ASL (Cargo)

Cargo (Section 4.10.2) is a basic desktop used essentially as a terminal. It

has a 500MHz Celeron processor, 64MB memory, 10GB of disk.
The base install (22 March 2004) was with the beta3 Debian Installer, booting
from floppy, then using a USB Flash disk. Automatic partition of the disk
was accepted.

Cargo Specification
From the lspci and lshw commands and /proc/cpuinfo:
Machine:
Motherboard:
CPU:
Bogomips:
Memory:
Network:
Disk:
Video:
Audio:
CDRW:
Hostname:
Domainname:
IP Address:
Netmask:
Broadcast:
Gateway:
DNS
Boot:
Kernel:

Purpose built, ASL.0

Intel 810
Intel Celeron (Mendocino) 500MHz
1000
64MB
82557/8/9 [Ethernet Pro 100] (eepro100)
10GB QUANTUM FIREBALLlct10 10, ATA DISK (/dev/hda)
82810E DC-133 CGC [Chipset Graphics Controller] (i810)
82801AA AC97 Audio (i810 audio)
cargo
ktware.com.au
105.229.8.155
255.255.255.192
105.229.255.255
105.229.8.190
125.83.72.15 125.83.72.1
Grub
2.4.25-1-386

Cargo Install Log

The beta3 release of the Debian Installer with a boot floppy and USB Flash
disk for the netinst image were used.
Boot from the Floppy. When asked, insert the USB memory stick and continue. There is no DHCP on the local network so a static network was

4.10 Target Machines

59

configured.
Configure the time zone as Australia/ACT. Add Root and User accounts.
For apt choose HTTP. Dont do any task selection for now. No specific
exim4 options need be selected - set up as a local system.
Install ssh and then copy a master sources.list file, followed by apt-get
update (the CD is no longer required) and then apt-get install wajig to
get things going:
#
#
>
>
>
>

mv /etc/apt-get/sources.list /etc/apt-get/sources.list.orig
scp ktw:/etc/apt-get/sources.list /etc/apt-get/sources.list
apt-get update
apt-get install wajig
wajig update
wajig dist-upgrade

60

4.10.3

Installation

Custom (Wayfare)

This is a purpose built desktop used for development. It has a 1GHz Pentium
3 processors, 512MB memory, 20GB of disk and Rage M3 video.
A test run used Gnoppix to test basic Linux functionality. All was okay with
X running at 1152x864 75Hz.
The base install (2 Mar 2004) was with the beta2 Debian Installer, which
was under development for the next stable release of Debian. A partition of
12GB was used for / and 1GB for swap. (The rest was for a pre-installed
Windows2000 system, drives C and D using about 7GB there.)

Wayfare Specification
From the lspci and lshw commands and /proc/cpuinfo:
Machine:
CPU:
Bogomips:
Memory:
Network:
Disk:
Video:
Audio:
CDRW:
Hostname:
Domainname:
IP Address:
Netmask:
Broadcast:
Gateway:
DNS
Boot:
Kernel:

Purpose built, Award Medallion BIOS V6.0

Intel Pentium III (Coppermine) 1002MHz
2000
111MB
SiS 900 PCI Fast Ethernet (sis900)
20GB QUANTUM FIREBALLlct20 20, ATA DISK (/dev/hda)
Silicon Integrated Systems SiS630 GUI Accelerator+3D (sis)
C-Media Electronics Inc CM8738 (cmpci)
LG CD-RW CED-8080B
wayfare
ktware.com.au
105.229.8.165
255.255.255.192
105.229.255.255
105.229.8.190
125.83.72.15 125.83.72.1
Grub
2.4.25-1-686

Wayfare Install Log

The beta2 release of the Debian Installer (Netinst) was downloaded as an ISO
image from http://www.debian.org/devel/debian-installer/. The ac-

4.10 Target Machines

61

tual image might be found at http://gluck.debian.org/cdimage/testing/

sarge_d-i/i386/beta2/sarge-i386-netinst.iso
Boot from the CD-ROM. For the Debian install choose English (Australian).
There is no DHCP on the local network so a static network was configured.
The disk was partitioned with 19GB for / and 1GB for swap. Reboot.
Configure the time zone as Australia/ACT. Add Root and User accounts.
For apt choose CDROM. Dont do any task selection for now. No specific
exim4 options need be selected - set up as a local system.
Note that to reconfigure, run the base-config program.
The resolv.conf didnt include my usual search line so it was added:
search ktware.com

Install ssh and then copy a master sources.list file, followed by apt-get
update (the CD is no longer required) and then apt-get install wajig to
get things going:
#
#
>
>
>
>

mv /etc/apt-get/sources.list /etc/apt-get/sources.list.orig
scp ktw:/etc/apt-get/sources.list /etc/apt-get/sources.list
apt-get update
apt-get install wajig
wajig update
wajig dist-upgrade

Now the setup begins. Install emacs21 less most zile.

Set up, for the user account, ssh for access to remote accounts if you like, to
avoid repeatedly typing a password:
> mkdir .ssh
> scp ktw:.ssh/id_dsa .ssh/
> scp ktw:.ssh/authorized_keys2 .ssh/authorized_keys
> ssh-agent bash
> ssh-add
Enter passphrase for /home/kayon/.ssh/id_dsa:
Identity added: /home/kayon/.ssh/id_dsa (/home/kayon/.ssh/id_dsa)

Now copy setup files from remote hosts:

62

Installation

> scp ktw:{.bashrc,.bash_profile} .

> scp ktw:{.emacs,.emacs-custom,.emacs-kayon} .
> scp ktw:{.xsession,.Xresources} .

Copy the same files for root.

Use visudo to set up wajig usage for a user.
Install grub:
>
>
>
>

wajig install grub

sudo grub-install /dev/hda
sudo update-grub
wajig remove lilo

The configuration should be fine (finding /dev/hda3 as the Linux boot). For
convenience, add the following to /etc/kernel-img.conf:
postinst_hook = /sbin/update-grub
postrm_hook = /sbin/update-grub

Install kernel-image-2.4.25-1-686.
Install ntpdate to set the system clock accurately from a reliable server (e.g.,
ntp.ktware.com).
Get X Windows working with the Rage card by installing x-window-system
gnome gdm gdm-themes cinepaint xine-ui. Ive chosen a 1280x1024 resolution
for display on a Dell flat panel.
Install openoffice.org xmms apache
Run tasksel to install groups of packages.
Install vrms! And any other packages as appropriate.

4.10 Target Machines

4.10.4

63

Dell Latitude C600 (Inci)

This is a laptop used for developing and delivering presentations and for note
taking and working whilst travelling. It has a 1GHz Pentium 3 processors,
512MB memory, 18GB of disk and Rage M3 video.
The base install (27 Feb 2004) was with the beta2 Debian Installer, which
was under development for the next stable release of Debian. A partition of
12GB was used for / and 1GB for swap. (The rest was for a pre-installed
Windows2000 system, drives C and D using about 7GB there.)
Inci Specification
From the lspci and lshw commands and /proc/cpuinfo:
Machine:
CPU:
Bogomips:
Memory:
Network:
Disk:
Video:
Audio:
CDRW/DVD:
Hostname:
Domainname:
IP Address:
Netmask:
Broadcast:
Gateway:
DNS
Boot:
Kernel:

Latitude C600, BIOS A16

Intel Pentium III (Coppermine) 1.0GHz/700MHz
2000
512MB
3Com 3c556 10/100 Mini PCI Adapter (3c59x)
18GB TOSHIBA MK2017GAP, ATA DISK drive (/dev/hda)
Rage Mobility M3 AGP 2x 64MB 66MHz (ati/r128)
ES1983S Maestro-3i (maestro3)
Samsung CD-RW/DVD-ROM SN-308B, ATAPI CD/DVD-ROM drive
inci
ktware.com.au
105.229.8.156
255.255.255.192
105.229.255.255
105.229.8.190
125.83.72.15 125.83.72.1
Grub
2.4.24-1-686

Inci Install Log

The beta release of the Debian Installer, identified as Sarge i386 Netinst
and dated 26 Feb 2004, was downloaded as an ISO image from wgethttp://
gluck.debian.org/cdimage/testing/daily/i386/current/sarge-i386-netinst.
iso. This failed to install GRUB - it simply froze. Reverting to the beta2

64

Installation

release from wgethttp://gluck.debian.org/cdimage/testing/netinst/

i386/beta2/sarge-i386-netinst.iso succeeded.
Boot from the CD-ROM. For the Debian install choose English (Australian).
There is no DHCP on the local network so a static network was configured.
Configure the time zone as Australia/ACT. Add Root and User accounts.
For apt choose CDROM. Dont do any task selection for now. No specific
exim4 options need be selected - set up as a local system.
Note that to reconfigure, run the base-config program.
Install ssh and then copy a master sources.list file, follwoed by apt-get
update and then apt-get install wajig to get things going:
#
#
>
>
>
>

mv /etc/apt-get/sources.list /etc/apt-get/sources.list.orig
scp ktw:/etc/apt-get/sources.list /etc/apt-get/sources.list
apt-get update
apt-get install wajig
wajig update
wajig dist-upgrade

Now the setup begins. Install emacs21 less most zile python-glade2 pythongnome2.
The resolv.conf didnt include my usual search line so it was added:
search ktware.com

Set up, for the user account, ssh for access to remote accounts if you like, to
avoid repeatedly typing a password:
> mkdir .ssh
> scp ktw:.ssh/id_dsa .ssh/
> scp ktw:.ssh/authorized_keys2 .ssh/authorized_keys
> ssh-agent bash
> ssh-add
Enter passphrase for /home/kayon/.ssh/id_dsa:
Identity added: /home/kayon/.ssh/id_dsa (/home/kayon/.ssh/id_dsa)

Now copy setup files from remote hosts:

4.10 Target Machines

65

> scp ktw:{.bashrc,.bash_profile} .

> scp ktw:{.emacs,.emacs-custom,.emacs-kayon} .
> scp ktw:{.xsession,.Xresources} .

Copy the same files for root.

Use visudo to set up wajig usage for a user. Install grub:
>
>
>
>

wajig install grub

wajig remove lilo
sudo grub-install /dev/hda
sudo update-grub

Apart from adding a Windows2000 boot option to /boot/grub/menu.lst,

the configuration should be fine (finding /dev/hda3 as the Linux boot). For
convenience, add the following to /etc/kernel-img.conf:
postinst_hook = /sbin/update-grub
postrm_hook = /sbin/update-grub

Install kernel-image-2.4.24-1-686.
Install ntpdate to set the system clock accurately from a reliable server (e.g.,
ntp.ktware.com).
Get X Windows working with the Rage card by installing x-window-system
gnome gdm gdm-themes cinepaint xine-ui.
Install openoffice.org xmms apache
Run tasksel to install groups of packages.
Install vrms.
Ive chosen a 1024x768 resolution. This is not so nice since it can handle
1400x1050, but it does make plugging into data projectors easier. However, the screen goes into a funny mode which can be fixed by Fn-F7 (compress/uncompress). The chosen ranges are 30-100 kHz for hsync and 50-160
Hz for vsync. Simply use wajig reconfigure xserver-xfree86 to force choice of
1024x768 when required.

66

4.10.5

Installation

Compaq Presario 5740AP (Friends)

This is a web server with 2GHz Pentium 4 processor, 256MB memory, 80GB
of disk and 64MB NVIVIA GeFOrce2 with TV-OUT.
The base install was with the beta 3 Debian Installer (15 March 2004), which
was under development for the next stable release of Debian. A partition of
10GB was used for /, and 70GB for /home and 1GB for swap.

Friends Specification
From the lspci and lshw commands and /proc/cpuinfo:
Machine:
CPU:
Bogomips:
Memory:
Network:
(e100)
Disk:
Video:
nVidia
Audio:
CD/DVD:
Hostname:
friends
Domainname: ktware.com.au
IP Address:
105.229.8.165
Netmask:
255.255.255.192
Broadcast:
105.229.255.255
Gateway:
105.229.8.190
DNS
125.83.72.15 125.83.72.1
Boot:
Grub

Friends Install Log

The beta3 release of the Debian Installer, identified as Sarge i386 Netinst and
dated 15 March 2004, was downloaded as an ISO image from http://gluck.
debian.org/cdimage/testing/sarge_d-i/i386/beta3/sarge-i386-netinst.
iso
Boot from CD-ROM. For the Debian install choose English (USA). There is
no DHCP on the local network so a static network was configured. Sarge

4.10 Target Machines

67

was chosen as the mirror.

Configure the time zone as Australia/ACT. Add Root and User accounts.
For apt choose http with the US mirrors.kernel.org (testing). Dont do any
task selection for now. No specific exim4 options need be selected - set up as
a local system.
Note that to reconfigure, run the base-config program.
Now the setup begins. Install wajig ssh emacs21 less most zile.
The resolv.conf didnt include my usual search line so it was added:
search ktware.com

Set up, for the user account, ssh for access to remote accounts if you like, to
avoid repeatedly typing a password:
> scp ktw:.ssh/id_dsa .ssh/
> scp ktw:.ssh/authorized_keys2 .ssh/authorized_keys
> ssh-agent bash
> ssh-add
Enter passphrase for /home/kayon/.ssh/id_dsa:
Identity added: /home/kayon/.ssh/id_dsa (/home/kayon/.ssh/id_dsa)

Now copy setup files from remote hosts:

> scp ktw:{.bashrc,.bash_profile} .
> scp ktw:{.emacs,.emacs-custom,.emacs-kayon} .
> scp ktw:{.xsession,.Xresources} .

Copy the same files for root.

Set up apt appropriately:
#
#
>
>

mv /etc/apt-get/sources.list /etc/apt-get/sources.list.orig
scp ktw:/etc/apt-get/sources.list /etc/apt-get/sources.list
wajig update
wajig dist-upgrade

Use visudo to set up wajig usage for a user. Install grub. Install kernelimage-2.4.24-1-686.

68

Installation

Install ntpdate to set the system clock accurately from a reliable server (e.g.,
ntp.ktware.com).
Get X Windows working with the nVidia card by installing x-window-system
gnome gdm gdm-themes cinepaint xine-ui.
Install openoffice.org xmms apache
Run tasksel to install groups of packages.
Install vrms

4.10 Target Machines

4.10.6

69

Dell Precision 650 (Caravan)

This is a server with dual processors, 4GB memory, SCSI disk with a PERC
320/DC Adaptec controller with 440GB of disk (4 110GB drives).
The base install was with the beta Debian Installer (12 Nov 2003), which was
under development for the next stable release of Debian. The SCSI controller
was not recognised (although Knoppix had no problem with it, loading the
percraid module and identifying it as scsi2) but going to tty2 (C-A-F2) and
doing a modprobe aacraid (there was no percraid module) then a detect
hardware did the trick. A partition of 10GB was used for /, and 420GB for
/dmrnet and 10GB (far too much) for swap.
Caravan Specification
From the lspci and lshw commands and /proc/cpuinfo:
Machine:
CPU:
Bogomips:
Memory:
Network:
Disk:
Video:
Audio:
CD/DVD:
Hostname:
Domainname:
IP Address:
Netmask:
Broadcast:
Gateway:
DNS
Boot:

Precision WorkStation 650

2 x Intel(R) Xeon(TM) CPU 3.20GHz
6370
4GB
82545EM Gigabit Ethernet Controller (e1000)
PERC RAID5C Adaptec AAC-RAID 420GB (aacraid)
nVidia NV18GL [Quadro4 NVS AGP 8x] 128MB (nv)
Intel 82801DB AC97 Audio Controller (intel810 audio)
caravan
ktware.com.au
105.229.8.170
255.255.255.192
105.229.255.255
105.229.8.190
125.83.72.15 125.83.72.1
Grub

Caravan Install Log

The beta release of the Debian Installer, identified as Sarge i386 Netinst and
dated 9 Nov 2003, was downloaded as an ISO image from http://gluck.
debian.org/cdimage/testing/netinst/i386/sarge-i386-netinst.iso.

70

Installation

Booting from CD-ROM was arranged from the BIOS by going into the boot
device menu (F12) and choosing CD-ROM. For the Debian install choose
English (USA)choosing Australia results in a bad keyboard amp. There is
no DHCP on the local network so a static network was configured. Create
partitions: 9GB ext3 for /, 70GB ext3 for /home, and 1GB for swap. Sarge
was chosen as the mirror. The driver for the SCSI RAID was loaded by
going to another virtual terminal (C-A-F2) and loading it with modprobe
aacraid. Then C-A-F1 and Choose Detect Hardware. Now partition the
(420GB) into 10GB ext3 for /, 390GB ext3 for /home and 10GB for swap.
This is too much for swap - seems to only recognise 2GB. Choose to install
GRUB (on hd0), then reboot.
Configure the clock as GMT (although it might not be GMT at present, it is
the usual set up) and the time zone is Australia/ACT. Choose to use Shadow
Passwords. Add Root and User accounts. For apt choose http with the US
mirrors.kernel.org. Dont do any task selection for now. No specific exim4
options need be selected - set up as a satellite system.
Note that the hostname remained as localhost. I had to change this as below.
Now the setup begins. Install wajig ssh emacs21 less most. Use visudo to set
up wajig usage for a user. Install kernel-image-2.4.22-1-686.
Correct the host name with the command hostname caravan then emacs
/etc/hostname and emacs /etc/hosts.
Install ntpdate to set the system clock accurately from a reliable server (e.g.,
ntp.ktware.com). Install ntp-simple to regularly update the clock.
Set up ssh from remote accounts if you like:
> scp ktw:.ssh/id_dsa .ssh/
> scp ktw:.ssh/authorized_keys2 .ssh/authorized_keys

Similarly copy any setup files from remote hosts:

> scp ktw:{.bashrc,.bash_profile} .
> scp ktw:{.emacs,.emacs-custom,.emacs-kayon} .
> scp ktw:{.xsession,.Xresources} .

Set up apt appropriately:

# mv /etc/apt-get/sources.list /etc/apt-get/sources.list.orig

4.10 Target Machines

71

# scp ktw:/etc/apt-get/sources.list /etc/apt-get/sources.list

> wajig update
> wajig dist-upgrade

Get X Windows working with the nVidia card by installing x-window-system

gnome gdm gdm-themes cinepaint xine-ui.

72

4.10.7

Installation

Dell OptiPlex GX270 (Modern)

This is a desktop machine with modem access, a flat screen (with 4 USB
sockets), and a USB mouse.
Base install was with the beta Debian Installer (12 Nov 2003), which was
under development for the next stable release of Debian. A partition of 9GB
was used for /, 65GB from /home and 5GB for swap.
With a HP PS2210 all-in-one printer connected through USB the machines
BIOS (A02) stops for about 5 minutes trying to boot from the printer (presumably because it has a card reader and is being seen as a mass storage
device from which it might be able to bootbut without a memory card inserted). This can be turned off by entering BIOS setup (F2 at boot), choosing
Integrated Device (LegacySelect Options) and changing the USB Emulation
to No Boot.
With xfree86 4.3.0 multiple virtual terminals are not (always) supported for
the intel 865G graphics card. With kernel-image-2.4.22-1-686 multiple virtual
terminals are just fine. With kernel-image-2.4.23-1-686, starting a second X
server freezes the system with a black screen. There have been problems with
switching virtual terminals in that there is a 30 second delay after switching.
There is also a 30 second delay on start up. Clearly something is timing
out, and the suspicion is that it is something to do with USB. When hotplug
was installed and the module usb-uhci was removed from /etc/modules
the delay disappeared.

Modern Specification

Using lspci and lshw commands and /proc/cpuinfo:

4.10 Target Machines

Machine:
CPU:
Bogomips:
Memory:
Network:
Disk:
Video:
Audio:
CD/DVD:
Hostname:
Domainname:
IP Address:
Netmask:
Broadcast:
Gateway:
DNS

73

OptiPlex GX270
Intel(R) Pentium(R) 4 CPU 2.80GHz
5570
512MB
82540EM Gigabit Ethernet Controller (e1000)
ATA Disk 74GB /dev/hda (9G/60G/5G)
Intel 82865G Integrated Graphics Device (i810)
Intel 82801EB AC97 Audio Controller (intel810 audio)
SAMSUNG CDRW/DVD SM-348B
modern
ktware.com.au
105.229.8.170
255.255.255.192
105.229.255.255
105.229.8.190
125.83.72.15 125.83.72.1

Modern Install Log

This is identified as the Sarge i386 Netinst dated 9 Nov 2003, and the ISO image was downloaded from http://gluck.debian.org/cdimage/testing/
netinst/i386/sarge-i386-netinst.iso.
Simply boot from CD-ROM by going into the boot device menu (F12).
Choose English (USA)choosing Australia resulted in bad keyboard. There
is no DHCP set up on the local network so set up a static network. Choose
sarge as the mirror. Partition the 80GB disk into 10GB ext3 for /, 65GB
ext3 for /home, and 5GB for swap. Choose LILO (but should have chosen
GRUB). Reboot.
Now configure with GMT, Australia/ACT, using Shadow Passwords. Create
Root and User accounts. For apt choose the http US mirrors.kernel.org. For
configuring exim choose act.cmis.csiro.au, smarthost mailhost.act.cmis.csiro.au.
Problems included DHCP failing and requiring the user to skip menus over
to the set static network choice. The hostname remained localhost and had
to be reset later. The clock was really not GMT but I said it was because I
want it to be.
Now install wajig, ssh, emacs21, less, and most. Set up visudo for wajig
usage by users. Replace LILO with Grub using

74
#
#
#
#

Installation
grub-install /dev/hda
update-grub
wajig remove lilo
reboot

Add update-grub to /etc/kernel-img.conf:

postinst_hook = /sbin/update-grub
postrm_hook = /sbin/update-grub

and then install kernel-image-2.4.22-1-686. Correct the host name: hostname

modern; emacs /etc/hostname. Install ntp-simple to regularly check the time
against a network time server (e.g., ntp.ktware.com). Also install ntpdate to
initially set the time at boot time. Set up ssh scp ktw:.ssh/id dsa .ssh/
and scp ktw:.ssh/authorized keys2 .ssh/authorized keys. Copy setup
files .bashrc .bash profile .emacs .emacs-custom .emacs-kayon .xsession Copy
sources.list; wajig update; wajig dist-upgrade Get X Windows Working with
the nVidia card. Install x-window-system gnome gdm gdm-themes cinepaint
xine-ui.
Get X Windows working. It had an unknown chipset (82865G) so move to
xserver-xfree86 4.3.0-0pre1v4 from experimental. 8 bit worked, but from the
BIOS set graphic memory to report 16MB (not 1MB) and then 24 bit works!
To get the usb mouse working modprobe usb-uhci did the trick! With
hotplug installed the appropriate kernel modules will be automatically loaded.
Install x-window-system gnome gdm gdm-themes cinepaint xine-ui. Get
DVD stuff working: create /dvd, edit fstab to reflect, ln /dev/dvd to /dev/cdrom0,
add users to group cdrom to access dvd for view. Install ica client, and pppconfig.
With X multiple windows (C-A-F7, C-A-F1) there are problems (not supported). With 2 gdm screens the screen blanks every 10 minutes or so. Need
to C-A-F8 C-A-F7 to recover, but quite slow (seems like a 30 second time
out). So go back to one gdm and no problem (except 30 second delay on
startup and switching terminals)!
Just after a boot, using usbmgr, connecting a USB camera recognises it as
/dev/sdb1 (presumably because the printers card reader is seen as /dev/
sda1 initially). After disconnecting, the kernel module is unloaded and when
the camera is next connected it becomes /dev/sda1! Using hotplug instead
does the right thing (always loading it as /dev/sdb1. A USB flash drive

4.10 Target Machines

75

memory stick can be plugged in and is seen as /dev/sdc1 and mounted as

/flash.

76

4.10.8

Installation

Dell OptiPlex GX150 (Fairmond)

A trial run of Debian GNU/Linux 3.0 using the GNOPPIX GNU/Linux live
CD was attempted (25 Sep 2003). Booted just fine but the install to hard
disk is still under development. Also trialled both the sarge (testing) netinst
and the sid (unstable) install CD-1, but both failed. So used Debian 3.0r1
to install and upgraded immediately to unstable.

GNOPPIX 0.5.4-1
GNOPPIX version 0.5.4-1 was downloaded:

wget ftp://source.rfc822.org/pub/local/gnoppix/gnoppix-0.5.5-2.iso

Then booted with:

credativ lang=en wheelmouse screen=1280x1024

Works just fine. Choose to install to hard disk from the icon. This allowed
the disk to be partitioned and configured, but there were problems on reboot
with the tty1 printing / as -. So use a traditional install.

Sarge Netinst 25-Sep-2003 16:16

Try the current testing netinst:

wget http://gluck.debian.org/cdimage/testing/netinst/i386/sarge-i386-netinst.iso

Simply boot then choose English (Australia), us keyboard, cdrom, load kernel
modules, installer modules (none chosen), skip PCMCIA, find network and
configure, configure static network: fairmont, act.cmis.csiro.au, 125.83.72.15
125.83.72.1, 105.229.8.169, 255.255.255.192, 105.229.8.190, mirror http US
ftp.us.debian.org sarge, hardware and kernel drivers, partition (/dev/hda1 /
36GB ext2, Swap 1GB), create filesystems, base install, ERRORS....

4.10 Target Machines

77

Sid 09/21/03 00:58:00

wget ftp://ftp.fsn.hu/pub/CDROM-Images/debian-unofficial/sid/sid-i386-1.iso

Failed again in the installation process. Not ready yet!

Debian 3.0r1
Boot using Debian 3.0r1 CD-ROM with:
boot> bf24

Choose en, English (United States), qwerty/us, partition /dev/hda (/dev/hda1

/ 36GB ext2, Swap 1GB), initialise swap, initialise partitions, modules (kernel/net 3c59x), network (fairmond, 105.229.8.169, 255.255.255.192, 105.229.8.190,
act.cmis.csiro.au, 125.83.72.15 125.83.72.1), base system, bootable (lilo in
mbr), create a boot floppy, remove floppy and CD, reboot.
After reboot set up GMT, Australia/ACT, no md5 passwords, enable shadow
passwords, root password, normal user: kayon, remove pcmcia, no PPP, apt
from cdrom (insert 3.0r1 CD), no tasksel, no dselect, continue with package
installation with defaults, exim: 2, fairmond.ktware.com, none, none, none,
mailhost.ktware.com, kayon.
Base installation is complete. Install discover in case some hardware can still
be identified (like network cards).
Now set up the system. First, apt-setup to add other sources of packages, in particular, to add unstable, and then install wajig. Install grub
(grub-install /dev/hda; update-grub), remove lilo, and reboot. Then upgrade the whole distribution to unstable. Use tasksel to install Desktop (fails
with abiword/abiword-gnome conflict, so install gnome and x-window-system
instead), Linux Standard Base, File Server, Unix Server, Java, C/C++,
Python, LaTeX, Scientific. Might also need: cupsys acroread acroread-plugin
rubber.
Fairmond Specification
The lshw command (abbreviated) gives:

78

Hostname fairmond
Address
105.229.8.169
Netmask
255.255.255.192
Broadcast 105.229.255.255
Gateway
105.229.8.190
DNS
125.83.72.15,125.83.72.1
Domain
ktware.com

Installation

4.10 Target Machines

4.10.9

79

Dell OptiPlex GX240 (Bigdaddy)

Debian GNU/Linux 2.2r2 was installed from a Debian CD-ROM (2002) and
then upgraded to unstable 6 August 2003.

Bigdaddy Specification

The lshw command was used to obtain the following:

bigdaddy Dell OptiPlex GX240

capabilities: smbios-2.3 dmi-2.3
BIOS A03 (03/01/2002) 64KB (capacity: 448KB)
capabilities: isa pci pnp apm upgrade shadowing escd
cdboot bootselect edd int13floppytoshiba int5printscreen
int9keyboard int14serial int17printer
PU Intel(R) Pentium(R) 1.70GHz version: 15.1.2
1700MHz (capacity: 2400MHz) clock: 100MHz
capabilities: fpu fpu_exception wp vme de pse tsc msr pae
mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat pse36 clflush dts
acpi mmx fxsr sse sse2 ss ht tm
Internal L1 write-back Cache (data cache) 8KB
Internal L2 Cache 256KB
Memory 512MB (capacity: 1GB)
DIMM SDRAM Synchronous 133 MHz (7.5 ns) 64 bits 512MB
133MHz (7.5188ns)
PCI Network driver=3c59x irq=18
capabilities: bus_master cap_list
IDE ATA Disk MAXTOR 6L040L2 /dev/hda
version: A93.0500 37GB
capabilities: ata dma lba iordy smart security pm
configuration: mode=udma5 smart=on
IDE DVD reader SAMSUNG CDRW/DVD SM-308B /dev/hdc
version: T100
capabilities: atapi cdrom removable nonmagnetic
dma lba iordy audio cd-r cd-rw dvd

80
Hostname bigdaddy
Address
105.229.9.9
Netmask
255.255.255.192
Broadcast 105.229.255.255
Gateway
105.229.8.190
DNS
125.83.72.15 125.83.72.1
Domain
ktware.com

Installation

4.10 Target Machines

4.10.10

81

Dell OptiPlex GX260 (Vince)

Debian GNU/Linux 3.0 was installed from a Debian CD-ROM (15 Apr 2003).
This desktop machine is considered a production machine and so needs to
stay with the stable release. However this machine requires XFree 4.3. The
XFree86 documentation said the video chipset (Intel i845) was only supported
in version 4.3.0, which is only available in Debian packaged for the unstable
distribution.
The vesa driver in XFree86-4.1.0 is an option but has serious problems. Even
with the Debian testing release there were problems with the vesa driver.
The solution was better kernel support of the devices. But before considering
this option think about buying an extra video card or at least have a read of
http://support.intel.com/support/graphics/intel845g/screen.htm to
decide if the features on offer are going to be worth the trouble.
A first attempt was to install XFree86 4.3.0 from the tar files provided by
xfree86.org. This works but it lives outside the Debian package system and
might break your package management system at some stage down the track,
although this is usually easily managed.
Intel does provide some information from http://support.intel.com/support/
graphics/linux/index.htm Intel indicates that xfree86-4.2.0 is required,
which means using Debians testing distribution at the moment. See the Debian Reference for how to upgrade your distribution from stable to testing.
Some BIOS changes:
Video DAC Snoop
= ON
Legacy Video Memory = 8Mb
AGP window max
= 256Mb (the maximum available)

Get the appropriate drivers from Intel at http://support.intel.com/support/

graphics/linux.htm. The tarball is i830-2003030120-i386-linux.tar.gz
Before compiling the drivers
Get the kernel-headers. This is needed so the Intel driver code can fit correctly into your running kernel. The testing distribution of Debian uses kernel
2.4.20. For kernel 2.4.20, debian changed the layout of the headers package
it is no longer kernel-headers-2.4.20-686, but kernel-build-2.4.20/arch
and you get all the relevant architectures.

82

Installation

# cd /usr/src
# ln -s kernel-build-2.4.20/686 linux

Build the drivers

Now unpack the Intel driver tarball, anywhere you like. The tarball unpacks
to a directory called dripkg.
# cd dripkg
# sh ./install.sh

The install script prompts you for the information it needs, and keeps a log
of what it does. You need to run it as root.
The compilation can fail if the /usr/src/linux link is not pointing to the right
place (see above), or the kernel version is too old (less than 2.4.11).
As part of the install script, the newly built files are installed at the locations
shown below. Any preexisting files are moved to a file of the same name with
a .dri-old suffix.
dripkg/i830/i810_drv.o /usr/X11R6/lib/modules/drivers/i810_drv.o
dripkg/i830/i830_dri.so /usr/X11R6/lib/modules/dri/i830_dri.so
dripkg/drm/i830.o
/lib/modules/2.4.20-686/kernel/drivers/char/drm/i830.o
dripkg/agpgart/agpgart.o
/lib/modules/2.4.20-686/kernel/drivers/char/agp/agpgart.o
dripkg/core/libdri.a /usr/X11R6/lib/modules/extensions/libdri.a
dripkg/core/libdrm.a /usr/X11R6/lib/modules/linux/libdrm.a
dripkg/core/libpcidata.a /usr/X11R6/lib/modules/libpcidata.a
dripkg/core/libscanpci.a /usr/X11R6/lib/modules/libscanpci.a

(Note that the set of files and the locations will likely be different on your
system.)
The fact these modules replace ones provided by the packaging system may
break the packaging system to some extent, but to a far smaller extent than
installing XFree86-4.3 from a tarball or from source.
Configure your X server

4.10 Target Machines

83

This is quite simple once you have the correct hardware support. All you
really need is the line Driver i810 in the Device section. In the Screen
section, start with a default graphics depth of 16. This is what Intel recommend. It may help to specify a VideoRam size, but its not required.
Resolutions 1024x768 and 1280x1024 work at 16 and 24 bits and seems to
do the 3D graphics things (running glxinfo and glxgears to verify this).
VESA driver
Messing around with VESA modes in XFree86 4.2.1 did not help with this
chipset. The drivers only work for a little while. The failure was that once
you switch VTs or restart the X server, the screen goes black. Sometimes
the card seems to go into the correct video mode (verify this using the menu
buttons on the monitor) but when the screen is a uniform black you cant do
much useful work. There was one other mode of failure, where the screen had
strange colours. This may have been an incorrect pixmap depth problem, or
possibly a bad video modeline (though I find it hard to accept the latter, I
let vbe/ddc do its thing.)
The upgrade described in this note makes no real difference to these problems
with the vesa driver. Presumably this is because the upgrade doesnt affect
the relevant bits of the system.

84

4.10.11

Installation

Dell Optiplex GX260 (Festival)

Debian GNU/Linux 3.0 was installed from a Debian CD-ROM (29 Nov 2002).
This desktop machine is used for data analysis and desktop environment.
Lilo was replaced by grub.
The NIC (e1000) was not supported in the default 2.4.18 kernel. A kernelimage-2.4.19 was installed but again did not support the NIC. A kernelimage-2.4.20-pre11 was compiled for the machine (at the time the 2.4.20
was not released) and worked just fine. When it was released kernel-image2.4.20 was installed and worked just fine (and the NIC worked after insmod
e1000add e1000 to /etc/modules).
Installed ssh to get things started with standard configs, startup files and
passwd/group files copied from the server (Altrop (Section 4.10.20)). Installed
gdm and then run a simple script to place the standard setup files in the
appropriate locations. Installed wajig to get the show on the road!
The on-board video was at first run using vesa because XFree86 4.2.1 does
not have a driver for the 82845G AGP. It is supported in XFree86 4.3 (the i810
driver) which at the time was not released. The video works just fine. Until
4.3 is officially released you can add the following to /etc/apt/sources.
list:

deb http://www.penguinppc.org/~daniels/sid/\$(ARCH) ./

and then do the following:

> wajig update

> update upgrade

4.10 Target Machines

85

Festival Specification
CPU
BogoMIPS
RAM
Disk

Intel(R) Pentium(R) 4 CPU 2.40GHz

4771
512MB
80GB (/dev/hda)
75GB (/dev/hda1) ext2 root
5GB (/dev/hda2) swap
CDRW/DVD (/dev/hdc)
NIC
82540EM Gigabit Ethernet Controller Intel PRO/1000 (e1000)
Video
Intel 82845G/GL [Brookdale-G] Chipset (i810)
Audio
Intel 82801DB AC97 (i810 audio)

The lspci command gives:

00:00.0
00:02.0
00:1d.0
00:1d.1
00:1d.2
00:1d.7
00:1e.0
00:1f.0
00:1f.1
00:1f.3
00:1f.5
01:0c.0

Host bridge: Intel Corp.: Unknown device 2560 (rev 01)

VGA compatible controller: Intel Corp.: Unknown device 2562 (rev 01)
USB Controller: Intel Corp.: Unknown device 24c2 (rev 01)
USB Controller: Intel Corp.: Unknown device 24c4 (rev 01)
USB Controller: Intel Corp.: Unknown device 24c7 (rev 01)
USB Controller: Intel Corp.: Unknown device 24cd (rev 01)
PCI bridge: Intel Corp. 82820 820 (Camino 2) Chipset PCI (rev 81)
ISA bridge: Intel Corp.: Unknown device 24c0 (rev 01)
IDE interface: Intel Corp.: Unknown device 24cb (rev 01)
SMBus: Intel Corp.: Unknown device 24c3 (rev 01)
Multimedia audio controller: Intel Corp.: Unknown device 24c5 (rev 01)
Ethernet controller: Intel Corp.: Unknown device 100e (rev 02)

Festival Install
Hostname uramys1
Address
125.83.88.13
Netmask
255.255.255.0
Broadcast optional
Gateway
125.83.88.177
DNS
183.44.72.1
Domain
ktware.com

86

Installation

Install Kernel 2.4.20

At the time of installing the NIC card (e10000) was not supported by the
available Debian kernels. Kernel 2.4.20 fixed this. A kernel was compiled
from source and patched up to 2.4.20-pre11. The default .config (i.e.,
starting from no .config file) was the starting point. Below is recorded
the specific configurations added.
#
#
#
#
#
#
#

#
#
#
#

cd /usr/src
wget http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/v2.4/linux-2.4.19.tar.gz
wget http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/v2.4/testing/patch-2.4.20-pre11.gz
tar zxvf linux-2.4.19.tar.gz
cd linux-2.4.19
gzip -dc ../patch-2.4.20-pre11.gz | patch -p1 -N -F4
make menuconfig
Processor type and features
Processor family
CONFIG_MPENTIUM4=y
#General: Seem to get Cant get display ID errors
#
CONFIG_APM=y
#
CONFIG_APM_DO_ENABLE=y
#
CONFIG_APM_CPU_IDLE=y
#
CONFIG_APM_DISPLAY_BLANK=y
#
CONFIG_APM_RTC_IS_GMT=y
Block devices
RAM disk support
CONFIG_BLK_DEV_RAM=y
Initial RAM disk (initrd) support
CONFIG_BLK_DEV_INITRD=y
Network device support
Ethernet (1000 Mbit)
CONFIG_E1000=y
Sound
CONFIG_SOUND_ICH=y
make-kpkg clean
make-kpkg --append-to-version -gjw --revision edm01
--initrd kernel_image
cd ..
wajig install kernel-image-2.4.19-gjw_edm01_i386.deb

This works just fine and all standard drivers (CDROM and NFS) were included by default and the e1000 support included in the kernal. The result-

4.10 Target Machines

87

ing kernel is quite a bit smaller that the kernels supporting lots of hardware
(700K initrd cf 2.4MB and 56K modules cf 20MB)!

88

Installation

4.10.12

Dell Optiplex GX260 (Uramys1)

Debian GNU/Linux 3.0 was installed from a Debian CD-ROM (28 Nov 2002).
This desktop machine is to be used as a server for CVS, apache, and other
services. The NIC (e1000) was not supported in the default 2.4.18 kernel. A
kernel-image-2.4.20-pre11 was compiled for the machine. Lilo was replaced
by grub and
The on-board video is run using vesa because XFree86 4.2.1 does not have a
driver for the 82845G AGP. See Festival (Section 4.10.11) for further details.

Uramys1 Specification
CPU
BogoMIPS
RAM
Disk

Intel(R) Pentium(R) 4 CPU 2.40GHz

4771
512MB
80GB (/dev/hda)
6GB (/dev/hda5) ext2 root
2GB (/dev/hda6) swap
40GB (/dev/hda7) ext2
30GB (/dev/hda7) ext2
DVD/CDRW (/dev/hdc)
NIC
82540EM Gigabit Ethernet Controller Intel PRO/1000 (e1000)
Video
Intel 82845G/GL [Brookdale-G] Chipset (i810)
Audio
Intel 82801DB AC97 (i810 audio)
The lspci command gives:

00:00.0
00:02.0
00:1d.0
00:1d.1
00:1d.2
00:1d.7
00:1e.0
00:1f.0
00:1f.1
00:1f.3
00:1f.5
01:0c.0

Host bridge: Intel Corp.: Unknown device 2560 (rev 01)

VGA compatible controller: Intel Corp.: Unknown device 2562 (rev 01)
USB Controller: Intel Corp.: Unknown device 24c2 (rev 01)
USB Controller: Intel Corp.: Unknown device 24c4 (rev 01)
USB Controller: Intel Corp.: Unknown device 24c7 (rev 01)
USB Controller: Intel Corp.: Unknown device 24cd (rev 01)
PCI bridge: Intel Corp. 82820 820 (Camino 2) Chipset PCI (rev 81)
ISA bridge: Intel Corp.: Unknown device 24c0 (rev 01)
IDE interface: Intel Corp.: Unknown device 24cb (rev 01)
SMBus: Intel Corp.: Unknown device 24c3 (rev 01)
Multimedia audio controller: Intel Corp.: Unknown device 24c5 (rev 01)
Ethernet controller: Intel Corp.: Unknown device 100e (rev 02)

4.10 Target Machines

89

Uramys1 Install
Hostname uramys1
Address
125.83.88.13
Netmask
255.255.255.0
Broadcast optional
Gateway
125.83.88.177
DNS
183.44.72.1
Domain
ktware.com
Install Kernel 2.4.20
At the time of installing the NIC card (e10000) was not supported by the
available Debian kernels. Kernel 2.4.20 fixed this. A kernel was compiled
from source and patched up to 2.4.20-pre11. The default .config (i.e.,
starting from no .config file) was the starting point. Below is recorded
the specific configurations added.
#
#
#
#
#
#
#

cd /usr/src
wget http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/v2.4/linux-2.4.19.tar.gz
wget http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/v2.4/testing/patch-2.4.20-pre11.gz
tar zxvf linux-2.4.19.tar.gz
cd linux-2.4.19
gzip -dc ../patch-2.4.20-pre11.gz | patch -p1 -N -F4
make menuconfig
Processor type and features
Processor family
CONFIG_MPENTIUM4=y
General
CONFIG_APM=y
CONFIG_APM_DO_ENABLE=y
CONFIG_APM_CPU_IDLE=y
CONFIG_APM_DISPLAY_BLANK=y
CONFIG_APM_RTC_IS_GMT=y
Block devices
RAM disk support
CONFIG_BLK_DEV_RAM=y
Initial RAM disk (initrd) support
CONFIG_BLK_DEV_INITRD=y
Network device support
Ethernet (1000 Mbit)

90

Installation
CONFIG_E1000=y
Sound

CONFIG_SOUND_ICH=y
# make-kpkg clean
# make-kpkg --append-to-version -gjw --revision sis01
--initrd kernel_image
# cd ..
# wajig install kernel-image-2.4.19-gjw_sis01_i386.deb

This works just fine and all standard drivers (CDROM and NFS) were included by default and the e1000 support included in the kernal. The resulting kernel is quite a bit smaller that the kernels supporting lots of hardware
(700K initrd cf 2.4MB and 56K modules cf 20MB)!

4.10 Target Machines

4.10.13

91

Optima (Vivaldi)

Cargo (Section 4.10.2) is a basic server with significant disk storage. It is

used as a data server for a work group of researchers using a mixture of
MSWindows-2000 and Linux machines.
The base install (8 November 2002) was Debian GNU/Linux 3.0 from the
Debian CD-ROM. The NIC (eepro100) was not recognised. The additional
IDE CMD680s card were not recognised by kernel 2.4.18.
The main challenge was the fact that the machine had an ASUS P4B533VM motherboard with on board network interface card. It also had two
additional IDE cards (CMD680) for additional disks. This mother board is
best supported under kernel 2.4.20 and beyond. The default 2.4.18 installed
fine but the CMD680s were not recognised. Kernel 2.4.19 recognised the
CMD680s but not the on-board IDE so booting was a problem! Kernel
2.4.20 had not been released so a pre-release was compiled (pre11). That
worked just fine.
The on-board video was originally run as vesa because XFree86 4.2.1 does not
have a driver for the 82845G AGP. See Festival (Section 4.10.11) for further
details. However, even with newer kernels and XFree86 4.3 (23 March 2004),
whenever a users exists from X the screen remains blank forever! Seems to
require a reboot
Grub was installed but this resulted in a strange error:

root (hd0,0)
Filesystem type is ext2fs, partition type 0x83
kernel /Vmlinuz-2.4.20-pre11-p4 ro root=
[Linux-bzImage, setup=0x1400, size=0x10ea0d]
Error 28: Selected item cannot fit into memory

Reverting to lilo fixed the problem! However, at a later stage (27 June 2003)
a new kernel was installed (kernel-image-2.4.21-1-686) and the next reboot
stopped at LIL. To recover the system it was booted from a Debian CD
using a rescue kernel:

linux: rescbf24 root=/dev/hda1

92

Installation

Lilo could not be fixed easily so instead grub was again installed, and worked
just fine.
Another problem is that on occasions the power up gets no further than
checking the first IDE and reporting Primary master disk fails. This is
well before Linux even comes in to play and seems to indicate some serious
hardware problem.

Vivaldi Specification
CPU
BogoMIPS
RAM
Disk

CD-ROM
NIC
Video
Audio

Intel(R) Pentium(R) 4 CPU 2.00GHz

4023.91
512MB
80GB ST380021A, ATA DISK drive (/dev/hda)
80GB ST380021A, ATA DISK drive (/dev/hdd)
60GB ST360021A, ATA DISK drive (/dev/hde)
80GB ST380021A, ATA DISK drive (/dev/hdf)
60GB ST360021A, ATA DISK drive (/dev/hdg)
60GB ST360021A, ATA DISK drive (/dev/hdh)
(/dev/hdj)
ATAPI-CD ROM-DRIVE-52MAX, ATAPI CD/DVD-ROM drive (/dev/hdb)
Intel Corp. 82801BD PRO/100 VE (CNR)(eepro100)
Intel 845G Chipset 82845G/GL Brookdale-G (i810)
Intel ICH4 AC97 codec (i810 audio)

The lspci command gives:

00:00.0
00:02.0
00:1d.0
00:1d.1
00:1d.2
00:1d.7
00:1e.0
00:1f.0
00:1f.1
00:1f.5
01:08.0
01:09.0
01:0b.0

Host bridge: Intel Corp.: Unknown device 2560 (rev 01)

VGA compatible controller: Intel Corp.: Unknown device 2562 (rev 01)
USB Controller: Intel Corp.: Unknown device 24c2 (rev 01)
USB Controller: Intel Corp.: Unknown device 24c4 (rev 01)
USB Controller: Intel Corp.: Unknown device 24c7 (rev 01)
USB Controller: Intel Corp.: Unknown device 24cd (rev 01)
PCI bridge: Intel Corp. 82801BA/CA PCI Bridge (rev 81)
ISA bridge: Intel Corp.: Unknown device 24c0 (rev 01)
IDE interface: Intel Corp. 82801DB ICH4 IDE (rev 01)
Multimedia audio controller: Intel Corp.: Unknown device 24c5 (rev 01)
Ethernet controller: Intel Corp.: Unknown device 103a (rev 81)
RAID bus controller: CMD Technology Inc PCI0680 (rev 01)
RAID bus controller: CMD Technology Inc PCI0680 (rev 01)

4.10 Target Machines

93

Vivaldi Install
Hostname vivaldi
Address
155.229.8.158
Netmask
255.255.255.192
Broadcast optional
Gateway
155.229.8.190
DNS
125.83.72.1
Domain
ktware.com
For information on the AGP see http://www.intel.com/support/graphics/
intel845g/linux.htm and http://www.xfree86.org/~dawes/845driver.
html.

Install Kernel 2.4.20

Two IDE controllers (Silicon Image CMD680) were installed delivering disks
/dev/hde, /dev/hdg, /dev/hdh, and /dev/hdj.
At the time of installing the CMD680 IDE controller chip kernel 2.4.19 was
available as a Debian package but had did not recognise the IDE card on the
motherboard. Kernel 2.4.20 fixed this, but was not released nor available for
Debian. A kernel was compiled from source and patched up to 2.4.20-pre11.
The default .config (i.e., starting from no .config file) was the starting
point. Below is recorded the specific configurations added.
#
#
#
#
#
#
#

cd /usr/src
wget http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/v2.4/linux-2.4.19.tar.gz
wget http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/v2.4/testing/patch-2.4.20-pre11.gz
tar zxvf linux-2.4.19.tar.gz
cd linux-2.4.19
gzip -dc ../patch-2.4.20-pre11.gz | patch -p1 -N -F4
make menuconfig
Processor type and features
Processor family
CONFIG_MPENTIUM4=y
General
CONFIG_APM=y
CONFIG_APM_DO_ENABLE=y
CONFIG_APM_CPU_IDLE=y
CONFIG_APM_DISPLAY_BLANK=y

94

#
#
#
#

Installation
CONFIG_APM_RTC_IS_GMT=y
Block devices
RAM disk support
CONFIG_BLK_DEV_RAM=y
Initial RAM disk (initrd) support
CONFIG_BLK_DEV_INITRD=y
ATA/IDE/MFM/RLL support
IDE, ATA and ATAPI Block devices
CONFIG_BLK_DEV_CMD64X=y
CONFIG_BLK_DEV_CMD680=y
Sound
CONFIG_SOUND_ICH=y
make-kpkg clean
make-kpkg --append-to-version -p4 --revision dha01
--initrd kernel_image
cd ..
wajig install kernel-image-2.4.19-p4_dha01_i386.deb

This works just fine and all standard drivers (CDROM and NFS and EEPRO100)
were included by default. The resulting kernel is quite a bit smaller that the
kernels supporting lots of hardware (700K initrd cf 2.4MB and 56K modules
cf 20MB)!

4.10 Target Machines

4.10.14

95

Dell Precision 620 (Brick)

Debian GNU/Linux 3.0 was installed from a Debian netinst PGI CD-ROM
(2 October 2002). This machine is used as a database server.

Brick Specification
CPU
BogoMIPS
RAM
Disk

Pentium III (Coppermine)

1848.11
900MB
8GB (/dev/sda)
34GB (/dev/sdb)
(/dev/hdc)

DVD-ROM
CD-RW
NIC
3c905C-TX/TX-M [Tornado] (3c59x)
Video
nVidia Corporation NV10 (GeForce 256)
Audio
Crystal 4280/46xx + AC97 Audio (cs46xx)
The lspci command gives:
00:00.0 Host bridge: Intel Corp. 82840 840 (Carmel)
Chipset Host Bridge (Hub A) (rev 01)
00:01.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corp. 82840 840 (Carmel)
Chipset AGP Bridge (rev 01)
00:02.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corp. 82840 840 (Carmel)
Chipset PCI Bridge (Hub B) (rev 01)
00:1e.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corp. 82801AA PCI Bridge (rev 02)
00:1f.0 ISA bridge: Intel Corp. 82801AA ISA Bridge (LPC) (rev 02)
00:1f.1 IDE interface: Intel Corp. 82801AA IDE (rev 02)
00:1f.2 USB Controller: Intel Corp. 82801AA USB (rev 02)
00:1f.3 SMBus: Intel Corp. 82801AA SMBus (rev 02)
01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: nVidia Corporation NV10
[GeForce 256 SDR] (rev 10)02:1f.0 PCI bridge:
Intel Corp. 82806AA PCI64 Hub PCI Bridge (rev 03)
03:00.0 PIC: Intel Corp. 82806AA PCI64 Hub Advanced
Programmable Interrupt Controller (rev 01)
04:04.0 Multimedia audio controller: Cirrus Logic
CS 4614/22/24 [CrystalClear SoundFusion Audio Accelerator] (rev 01)
04:05.0 SCSI storage controller:
Adaptec AIC-7899P U160/m (rev 01)
04:05.1 SCSI storage controller:

96

Installation

Adaptec AIC-7899P U160/m (rev 01)

04:07.0 Ethernet controller:
3Com Corporation 3c905C-TX/TX-M [Tornado] (rev 78)

Brick Install
Hostname brick
Address
155.229.8.165
Netmask
255.255.255.192
Broadcast optional
Gateway
155.229.8.190
DNS
183.44.72.1
Domain
ktware.com

4.10 Target Machines

4.10.15

97

Dell Precision 620 (Atom)

Debian GNU/Linux 3.0 was installed from a Debian netinst PGI CD-ROM
(2 October 2002). This machine is used as a database server.

Atom Specification
CPU
BogoMIPS
RAM
Disk

Pentium III (Coppermine)

1854.66
1GB
8GB (/dev/sda)
34GB (/dev/sdb)
(/dev/hdc)

DVD-ROM
CD-RW
NIC
3c905C-TX/TX-M [Tornado] (3c59x)
Video
nVidia Corporation NV10 (GeForce 256)
Audio
Crystal 4280/46xx + AC97 Audio (cs46xx)
The lspci command gives:
00:00.0 Host bridge: Intel Corp. 82840 840 (Carmel)
Chipset Host Bridge (Hub A) (rev 01)
00:01.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corp. 82840 840 (Carmel)
Chipset AGP Bridge (rev 01)
00:02.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corp. 82840 840 (Carmel)
Chipset PCI Bridge (Hub B) (rev 01)
00:1e.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corp. 82801AA PCI Bridge (rev 02)
00:1f.0 ISA bridge: Intel Corp. 82801AA ISA Bridge (LPC) (rev 02)
00:1f.1 IDE interface: Intel Corp. 82801AA IDE (rev 02)
00:1f.2 USB Controller: Intel Corp. 82801AA USB (rev 02)
00:1f.3 SMBus: Intel Corp. 82801AA SMBus (rev 02)
01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: nVidia Corporation NV10
[GeForce 256 SDR] (rev 10)02:1f.0 PCI bridge:
Intel Corp. 82806AA PCI64 Hub PCI Bridge (rev 03)
03:00.0 PIC: Intel Corp. 82806AA PCI64 Hub Advanced
Programmable Interrupt Controller (rev 01)
04:04.0 Multimedia audio controller: Cirrus Logic
CS 4614/22/24 [CrystalClear SoundFusion Audio Accelerator] (rev 01)
04:05.0 SCSI storage controller:
Adaptec AIC-7899P U160/m (rev 01)
04:05.1 SCSI storage controller:

98

Installation

Adaptec AIC-7899P U160/m (rev 01)

04:07.0 Ethernet controller:
3Com Corporation 3c905C-TX/TX-M [Tornado] (rev 78)

Atom Install
Hostname atom
Address
155.229.8.164
Netmask
255.255.255.192
Broadcast optional
Gateway
155.229.8.190
DNS
183.44.72.1
Domain
ktware.com

4.10 Target Machines

4.10.16

99

Optima WorkPro (Bach)

Debian GNU/Linux 3.0 was installed from a Progeny netinst CD-ROM (28
June 2002). This desktop machine is to be used for data analysis by a
government department.
After installation a new IDE card was installed (CMD680) with two IDE
60GB hard drives. This required at least version 2.4.19 of the kernel. I have
also had feedback from another user at the University of London who has
three cards running on a machine with kernel 2.4.19.

Bach Specification
CPU
BogoMIPS
RAM
Disk

Intel(R) Pentium(R) 4 CPU 1.70GHz

3381
650M
ST360021A, ATA DISK drive 60GB (/dev/hda)
ST360021A, ATA DISK drive 60GB (/dev/hdb)
DVD-ROM SONY DVD-ROM DDU1621 S1.6 (/dev/hdc)
NIC
Intel Corp. 82820 (ICH2) Chipset Ethernet Controller (eepro100)
Video
nVidia Corporation NV6 [Vanta]
Audio
Intel 810 + AC97 Audio (i810, i810 audio, ac97 codec)
The lspci command gives:

00:00.0
00:01.0
00:1e.0
00:1f.0
00:1f.1
00:1f.2
00:1f.4
00:1f.5
01:00.0
02:08.0

Host bridge: Intel Corp. 82845 845 (Brookdale) Chipset Host Bridge (rev 04)
PCI bridge: Intel Corp. 82845 845 (Brookdale) Chipset AGP Bridge (rev 04)
PCI bridge: Intel Corp. 82801BA/CA PCI Bridge (rev 05)
ISA bridge: Intel Corp. 82801BA ISA Bridge (LPC) (rev 05)
IDE interface: Intel Corp. 82801BA IDE U100 (rev 05)
USB Controller: Intel Corp. 82801BA/BAM USB (Hub #1) (rev 05)
USB Controller: Intel Corp. 82801BA/BAM USB (Hub #2) (rev 05)
Multimedia audio controller: Intel Corp. 82801BA/BAM AC97 Audio (rev 05)
VGA compatible controller: nVidia Corporation NV6 [Vanta] (rev 15)
Ethernet controller: Intel Corp. 82801BA/BAM/CA/CAM Ethernet Controller (rev 03)

100

Installation

Bach Install
Hostname bach
Address
155.229.8.158
Netmask
255.255.255.192
Broadcast optional
Gateway
155.229.8.190
DNS
183.44.72.1
Domain
ktware.com
Passwords using MD5 was turned off (DES instead used) as I think this is
the same as the server of the network into which this host will connect.
The second IDE disk was formatted:
# cfdisk /dev/hdb ; mkfs.ext2 /dev/hdb1

Then /etc/fstab was updated:

/dev/hdb1 /ktnet/bach ext2 defaults,errors=remount-ro 0 0

After installing Debian a serious performance hit was noticed every time the
disks were busy. In the X Window System, for example, the mouse would
be extremely sluggish (for several seconds or more) and there was no hope of
typing. It turned out that the parameters for the hard disk required tuning.
Installing hdparm allowed the tuning to happen. Running hdparm with
/dev/hda showed the current parameters:
# hdparm /dev/hda
/dev/hda:
multcount
I/O support
unmaskirq
using_dma
keepsettings
nowerr
readonly
readahead
geometry
busstate

= 0 (off)
= 0 (default 16-bit)
= 0 (off)
= 0 (off)
= 0 (off)
= 0 (off)
= 0 (off)
= 8 (on)
= 7297/255/63, sectors = 117231408, start = 0
= 1 (on)

4.10 Target Machines

101

It turns out that the following fixes the problem. It turns on DMA (-d1), 16
multiple sectors (-m16), and 32 bit I/O support (-c1):
# hdparm -d1 -m16 -c1 /dev/hda
# hdparm -d1 -m16 -c1 /dev/hdb

To ensure these new settings are saved for each reboot install the package
hwtools and edit /etc/init.d/hwtools:
if command -v hdparm >/dev/null 2>&1; then
hdparm -q -d1 -m16 -c1 /dev/hda
hdparm -q -d1 -m16 -c1 /dev/hdb
fi

For further information see Section 25.3.

Install Kernel 2.4.19
A new IDE controller (Silicon Image CMD680) was installed delivering disks
/dev/hde and /dev/hdg.
At the time of installing the CMD680 IDE controller chip kernel 2.4.19 (which
supports this chip, but not kernel 2.4.18) was not available as a Debian
package but had just been released. A kernel was compiled from source
to get support for this new controller. The default .config (i.e., starting
from no .config file) was the starting point. Below is recorded the specific
configurations added.
#
#
#
#
#

cd /usr/src
wget http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/v2.4/linux-2.4.19.tar.gz
tar zxvf linux-2.4.19.tar.gz
cd linux-2.4.19
make menuconfig
Processor type and features
Processor family
CONFIG_MPENTIUM4=y
Block devices
RAM disk support
CONFIG_BLK_DEV_RAM=y

102

#
#
#
#

Installation
Initial RAM disk (initrd) support
CONFIG_BLK_DEV_INITRD=y
ATA/IDE/MFM/RLL support
IDE, ATA and ATAPI Block devices
CONFIG_BLK_DEV_CMD64X=y
CONFIG_BLK_DEV_CMD680=y
Sound
CONFIG_SOUND_ICH=y
make-kpkg clean
make-kpkg --append-to-version -p4 --revision dha01
--initrd kernel_image
cd ..
wajig install kernel-image-2.4.19-p4_dha01_i386.deb

This works just fine and all standard drivers (CDROM and NFS) were included by default. The resulting kernel is quite a bit smaller that the kernels supporting lots of hardware (700K initrd cf 2.4MB and 56K modules cf
20MB)!

4.10 Target Machines

4.10.17

103

Dell OptiPlex GXi 523M (Prefect)

This desktop machine is used primarily for testing new installations and new
software updates. Also serves as a spare desktop workstation when required.
Installed Debian GNU/Linux 3.0 from the Debian 3.0 beta netinst CD-ROM
of 14 May 2002 (26 June 2002).
Originally installed Debian GNU/Linux 2.2r2 from CD-ROM (July 2001).
After the install the system was immediately upgraded to unstable and other
packages from unstable were installed as required.

Prefect Specifications
CPU
RAM
Disk
Disk
CD-ROM
NIC
Video

Audio

Pentium MMX 232MHz

97MB
3GB Hard Drive QUANTUM FIREBALL
8GB Dard Drive
NEC CD-ROM DRIVE:288, ATAPI CDROM drive
3Com Corporation 3c905
MGA Power Desk Version 3.31
Matrox Millenium 11 Accel 2164W 4MB
1024x768 75Hz
Crystal Wave cs32BA11 1.51

The lspci command gives:

00:00.0 Host bridge: Intel Corporation 430HX - 82439HX TXC

[Triton II] (rev 03)
00:07.0 ISA bridge: Intel Corporation 82371SB PIIX3 ISA
[Natoma/Triton II] (rev 01)
00:07.1 IDE interface: Intel Corporation 82371SB PIIX3 IDE
[Natoma/Triton II]
00:0e.0 VGA compatible controller: Matrox Graphics, Inc. MGA 2164W
[Millennium II]
00:10.0 VGA compatible controller: S3 Inc. 86c764/765
[Trio32/64/64V+] (rev 44)
00:11.0 Ethernet controller: 3Com Corporation 3c905 100BaseTX
[Boomerang]

104

Installation

Prefect Install
For the Debian 2.2 install be sure to identify the network card when configuring devices. It is a 3c59x. This is not required for Debian 3.0. For the
Debian 3.0 install the Debian netinst was used since the PGI netinst did not
include INSTALL/BOOT nor LOADLIN.

4.10 Target Machines

4.10.18

105

Dell Precision 420 MT (Cleveland)

This dual processor desktop machine is to be used for software development.

Debian GNU/Linux 3.0 was installed from PGI 3.0 beta netinst CD-ROM
(24 June 2002).
Cleveland Specification
CPU
BogoMIPS
RAM
Disk
DVD-ROM
CD-RW
NIC
Video
Audio

Genuine Intel Pentium III (Coppermine) 800MHz

1592
512MB
34GB
NEC DV-5700A, ATAPI CDROM drive
SONY CD-RW CRX140E, ATAPI CDROM drive
3Com 3c905C Tornado
nVidia GeForce 256
Cirrus Logic CS 4614/22/24 CrystalClear

Cleveland Install
The network information for this host is:
Hostname
Address
Netmask
Broadcast
Gateway
DNS
Domain

cleveland
155.229.8.161
255.255.255.192
optional
155.229.8.190
183.44.72.1
ktware.com

For this dual processor a new kernel was installed (kernel-image-2.4.18-686smp). Since this was a PGI install the boot loader is grub and no further
action is required. On the next book a menu of alternative kernels was
presented.

106

4.10.19

Installation

Dell Optiplex GX240 (Cultus)

Debian GNU/Linux 2.2r2 was installed from CD-ROM (22 May 2002). The
network card was not recognised and so the kernel was upgraded to 2.4.6
which was available on a CDROM, requiring moving to the use of initrd and
resulting lilo configuration changes (see Sections 4.8 and 4.10.1). This kernel supported the ethernet card so that the installation could be upgraded
immediately to unstable. The graphics chip (ATI Rage 128 Pro TF) though
was not supported by the current XFree86 (4.1.0). An upgrade to the experimental XFree86 (4.2) fixed that.

Cultus Specifications
CPU
Intel(R) Pentium(R) 4 CPU 1.70GHz
BogoMIPS
3381
RAM
512MB
Disk
MAXTOR 6L040L2, ATA DISK drive 40GB IDE
CD-RW/DVD ATAPI 32X DVD-ROM CD-R/RW drive
NIC
3Com PCI 3c905C Tornado
Video
ATI Rage 128 Pro TF
Audio
Intel Corp. 82801BA/BAM AC97 Audio
The lspci command gives:

00:00.0 Host bridge: Intel Corp. 82845 845 (Brookdale)

Chipset Host Bridge (rev 03)
00:01.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corp. 82845 845 (Brookdale)
Chipset AGP Bridge (rev 03)
00:1e.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corp. 82801BA/CA PCI Bridge (rev 12)
00:1f.0 ISA bridge: Intel Corp. 82801BA ISA Bridge (LPC) (rev 12)
00:1f.1 IDE interface: Intel Corp. 82801BA IDE U100 (rev 12)
00:1f.2 USB Controller: Intel Corp. 82801BA/BAM USB (Hub #1) (rev 12)
00:1f.3 SMBus: Intel Corp. 82801BA/BAM SMBus (rev 12)
00:1f.4 USB Controller: Intel Corp. 82801BA/BAM USB (Hub #2) (rev 12)
00:1f.5 Multimedia audio controller: Intel Corp. 82801BA/BAM AC97
Audio (rev 12)
01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: ATI Technologies Inc Rage 128
Pro Ultra TF
02:0c.0 Ethernet controller: 3Com Corporation 3c905C-TX/TX-M
[Tornado] (rev 78)

4.10 Target Machines

107

Cultus Install Log

The disk was partitioned into two: one for swap (1GB as /dev/hda2) and
the rest for everything else (39GB as /dev/hda1).
The ethernet driver (3c59x) in this release (kernel 2.2.18pre21) does not support the 3Com 3c905C-TX card. The kernel needed to be upgraded to a 2.4.6
kernel on a more recent release (e.g., Debian 3.0 woody beta CD-ROMsee
Section 3.7.5 for details of making a CD-ROM available to apt-get):
# apt-get install

kernel-image-2.2.19

The networking began working just fine. In moving to the unstable release
(after a dist-upgrade) kernel-image-2.4.18-686 was installed without effort
(except for initrd addition to lilosee Sections 4.8 and 4.10.1)
Sound card support from the kernel required adding the following line to
/etc/modules.conf (by adding it to /etc/modutils/sndconfig then running update-modules:
alias sound-slot-0 i810_audio

A modprobe can then be used to load the module. Refer to documentation

in /usr/src/linux/Documentation/sound/ for details.
To ensure the module is loaded at boot time add i810 audio to /etc/
modules.

108

4.10.20

Installation

Dell Precision WorkStation 530 MT (Altrop)

Altrop is a dual processor, high-end server. Debian GNU/Linux 2.2r2 was

installed from CD-ROM, 23 November 2001. The network card was not
immediately recognised so a 2.2.19 kernel was installed. Altrop was then
upgraded to unstable over the internet. The kernel was then upgraded to
2.4.14-686-smp supporting dual processors. A custom kernel was compiled
to further support the extra memory through the HIMEM option.
Altrop Specifications
CPU
BogoMIPS
RAM
Disk

Dual Intell Xeon 1.5GHz

2 x 2988
2GB
FUJITSU MAN3735MP 73GB SCSI
SEAGATE ST373405LW 73 GB SCSI
DVD-ROM LITEON DVD-ROM LTD163
CD-RW
NEC CD-RW NR-7800A
NIC
3Com 3c905C-TX
Video
nVidia NV15 GL (Quadro2 Pro)
Audio
Intel Corp. 82820 820 (Camino 2) Chipset AC97
The lspci command gives:
00:00.0 Host bridge: Intel Corp. 82850 860 (Wombat)
Chipset Host Bridge (MCH) (rev 04)
00:01.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corp. 82850 850 (Tehama)
Chipset AGP Bridge (rev 04)
00:02.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corp. 82860 860 (Wombat)
Chipset AGP Bridge (rev 04)
00:1e.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corp. 82820 820 (Camino 2)
Chipset PCI (rev 04)
00:1f.0 ISA bridge: Intel Corp. 82820 820 (Camino 2)
Chipset ISA Bridge (ICH2) (rev 04)
00:1f.1 IDE interface: Intel Corp. 82820 820 (Camino 2)
Chipset IDE U100 (rev 04)
00:1f.2 USB Controller: Intel Corp. 82820 820 (Camino 2)
Chipset USB (Hub A) (rev 04)
00:1f.3 SMBus: Intel Corp. 82820 820 (Camino 2) Chipset SMBus (rev 04)
00:1f.4 USB Controller: Intel Corp. 82820 820 (Camino 2)
Chipset USB (Hub B) (rev 04)

4.10 Target Machines

109

00:1f.5 Multimedia audio controller: Intel Corp. 82820 820 (Camino 2)

Chipset AC97 Audio Controller (rev 04)
01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: nVidia Corporation NV15 GL
(Quadro2 Pro) (rev a4)
02:1f.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corp. 82806AA PCI64 Hub PCI Bridge (rev 03)
03:00.0 PIC: Intel Corp. 82806AA PCI64 Hub
Advanced Programmable Interrupt Controller (rev 01)
03:0e.0 SCSI storage controller: Adaptec 7892P (rev 02)
04:0b.0 Ethernet controller: 3Com Corporation 3c905C-TX
[Fast Etherlink] (rev 78)
04:0c.0 FireWire (IEEE 1394): Texas Instruments: Unknown device 8020

Altrop Install
There were no particular issues in the install except for the lack of support in
the 2.2.18pre21 kernel for the Ethernet card (3c905C-TX) in this machine.
The disk was partitioned into two: one for swap (2GB as /dev/sda2) and
the rest for everything else (65GB as /dev/sda1).
The NIC (ethernet card) driver (3c59x) in this release (kernel 2.2.18pre21)
does not appear to support the 3Com 3c905C-TX card. The kernel needed
to be upgraded to a 2.2.19 kernel on a more recent release (e.g., Debian 3.0
woody betasee Section 3.7.5 for details of making a CD-ROM available to
apt-get):
# apt-get install

kernel-image-2.2.19

The networking began working just fine. In moving to the unstable release
(after a dist-upgrade) kernel-image-2.4.14-686-smp was installed without effort (except for initrd addition to lilo)
Sound card support from the kernel required adding the following line to
/etc/modules.conf (by adding it to /etc/modutils/sndconfig then running update-modules:
alias sound-slot-0 i810_audio

A modprobe can be used to load the module. Refer to documentation in

/usr/src/linux/Documentation/sound/ for details.

110

Installation

To ensure the module is loaded at boot time add i810 audio to /etc/
modules.

4.10 Target Machines

4.10.21

111

Sun SPARCstation 5 (sun4m) (Cepheus)

Cepheus is an older Sun SPARCstation that serves as a testbed for installing

Debian GNU/Linux on very different hardware. Debian GNU/Linux 2.2r2
was installed from the sparc CD-ROM, 19 September 2001. It was immediately upgraded to unstable and maintained at unstable with weekly distupgrades.
Cepheus Specifications
CPU
BogoMIPS
RAM
Disk
CD-R
NIC
Video
Audio

Fujitsu MB86904 TurboSPARC 170MHZ

109
30MB!!!
2GB (1.7GB /dev/sda1 and .3GB swap on /dev/sda2)
TOSHIBA Model: XM-4101TASUNSLCD (SCSI)
LANCE
cgsix at 0.50000000 TEC Rev 4 CPU sparc Rev b [TurboGX]
CS4231

112

4.10.22

Installation

Toshiba Satellite 1800 (HAX)

HAX is a dual boot laptop used for development. Debian GNU/Linux 2.2r2
was installed (kernel-image-2.2.18pre21) from CD-ROM 12 December 2001. It
was immediately upgraded to unstable and running with kernel-image-2.4.16.

HAX Specifications
CPU
Intel Pentium III (Coppermine)
BogoMIPS 1697
RAM
196MB
Disk
14GB TOSHIBA MK1517GAP, ATA DISK
DVD-ROM DV-28E-B, ATAPI 24x CDROM
NIC
Integrated Intel PRO/100+ Intel 82559
Video
Trident CyberBlade/DSTN/Ai1
Audio
Acer Laboratories Inc. [ALi] M5451 PCI South Bridge Audio (rev 01)
The lspci command gives:
00:00.0 Host bridge: Acer Laboratories Inc. [ALi]:
Unknown device 1632 (rev 01)
00:01.0 PCI bridge: Acer Laboratories Inc. [ALi]
M5247 (rev 01)
00:02.0 USB Controller: Acer Laboratories Inc. [ALi]
M5237 USB (rev 03)
00:04.0 IDE interface: Acer Laboratories Inc. [ALi]
M5229 IDE (rev c3)
00:06.0 Multimedia audio controller: Acer Laboratories Inc.
[ALi] M5451 PCI South Bridge Audio (rev 01)
00:07.0 ISA bridge: Acer Laboratories Inc. [ALi] M1533
PCI to ISA Bridge [Aladdin IV]
00:08.0 Bridge: Acer Laboratories Inc. [ALi]
M7101 PMU
00:0a.0 Ethernet controller: Intel Corp. 82557
[Ethernet Pro 100] (rev 08)
00:11.0 CardBus bridge: Toshiba America Info Systems
ToPIC95 PCI to Cardbus Bridge with ZV Support (rev 32)
00:11.1 CardBus bridge: Toshiba America Info Systems
ToPIC95 PCI to Cardbus Bridge with ZV Support (rev 32)
01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: Trident Microsystems:
Unknown device 8620 (rev 5d)

4.10 Target Machines

HAX Install Log
kb
qwerty/us
disks
partition
swap
/dev/hda3
linux
/dev/hda2
root
mount
/dev/hda2
kernel from cd-rom /dev/hdc
devices net/eepro100
network host = hax
base
from cd-rom
config timezone
Australia ACT
NO GMT
Make Linux boot directly from hard disk MBR
Make boot floppy
Custom Boot
Reboot

113

114

Installation

4.10.23

IBM ThinkPad (Hukz)

HUKZ is a laptop used essentially as a stand-alone machine with Ethernet

connection. Debian 2.2r4 was installed 20 January 2002. It was upgraded to
unstable immediately.

HUKZ Specifications
CPU
Intel Pentium III (Coppermine) 500MHz
BogoMIPS 993
RAM
132MB
Disk
HITACHI DK23AA-12B, 11509MB w/512kB Cache
DVD-ROM TOSHIBA 24X DVD-ROM SD-C2302, ATAPI CDROM
NIC
3Com 3CCFE575CT Tornado CardBus
Video
Neomagic Corporation NM2360
Audio
Cirrus Logic CS 4614/22/24
The lspci command gives:
00:00.0
00:01.0
00:02.0
00:02.1
00:03.0
00:06.0
00:07.0
00:07.1
00:07.2
00:07.3
01:00.0
05:00.0

Host bridge: Intel Corp. 440BX/ZX - 82443BX/ZX Host bridge (rev 03)
PCI bridge: Intel Corp. 440BX/ZX - 82443BX/ZX AGP bridge (rev 03)
CardBus bridge: Texas Instruments PCI1450 (rev 03)
CardBus bridge: Texas Instruments PCI1450 (rev 03)
Communication controller: Lucent Microelectronics WinModem 56k (rev 01)
Multimedia audio controller: Cirrus Logic CS 4614/22/24
[CrystalClear SoundFusion Audio Accelerator] (rev 01)
Bridge: Intel Corp. 82371AB PIIX4 ISA (rev 02)
IDE interface: Intel Corp. 82371AB PIIX4 IDE (rev 01)
USB Controller: Intel Corp. 82371AB PIIX4 USB (rev 01)
Bridge: Intel Corp. 82371AB PIIX4 ACPI (rev 03)
VGA compatible controller: Neomagic Corporation NM2360
[MagicMedia 256ZX]
Ethernet controller: 3Com Corporation 3CCFE575CT Cyclone
CardBus (rev 10)

HUKZ Install Log

kb
disks

qwerty/us
partition

1GB

Linux hda6
Swap hda7

4.10 Target Machines

swap
/dev/hda7
linux
/dev/hda6
root
mount
/dev/hda6
kernel from cd-rom
devices ?
network host = debian
base
from cd-rom
config timezone
(skip the "Make Linux boot directly from hard disk")
Make boot floppy
Custom Boot
Reboot

115

116

4.10.24

Installation

Dell Latitude C600 (Inco)

Inco is a laptop with a docking station, used as a shared portable, primarily

for presentations (but previously as a desktop machine). It has a built-in
network card and modem plus another network card in the docking station.
It is a dual boot machine, although MSWindows-NT doesnt see much use.
Debian GNU/Linux 2.2r2 was installed from CD-ROM, 20 November 2001.
It was upgraded immediately to unstable. The kernel was upgraded to 2.4.14
early on but has keep up to date with Debian kernel releases. The built-in
modem is a WinModem which is not supported by Linux so a PCMCIA
modem is used.
Inco has two NTFS partitions (C and D drives) using about 7GB with the
remaining 13GB partitioned as 1GB swap and 12GB for linux:

Partition 12GB as linux ext2 /dev/hda3

Partition 1GB as linux swap /dev/hda4

Inco Specifications

From the lspci and lshw commands and /proc/cpuinfo:

4.10 Target Machines

117

Machine:
CPU:
Bogomips:
Memory:
Network:

Latitude C600 A16

Intel Pentium III (Coppermine) 1.0GHz/700MHz
1400
512MB
3Com 3c905C Tornado (docking station) (3c59x)
3Com 3c556 10/100 Mini PCI Adapter (3c59x)
Disk:
18GB TOSHIBA MK2017GAP, ATA DISK drive (/dev/hda)
Video:
Rage Mobility M3 AGP 2x 64MB 66MHz (ati/r128)
Audio:
ES1983S Maestro-3i (maestro3)
CD/DVD:
LG DRN-8080B, ATAPI 24X DVD-ROM drive
CDRW/DVD: Samsung CD-RW/DVD-ROM SN-308B, ATAPI CD/DVD-ROM drive
Modem:
3Com Mini PCI 56k Winmodem
Hostname:
Domainname:
IP Address:
Netmask:
Broadcast:
Gateway:
DNS
Boot:
Kernel:

inco
ktware.com.au
105.229.8.156
255.255.255.192
105.229.255.255
105.229.8.190
125.83.72.15 125.83.72.1
Grub
2.4.22-1-686

Inco Install Log

The basic install chose the qwerty/us keyboard. The disks were partitioned
as 12GB for a linux partition (hda3) and 1GB for swap (hda4). Root was
mounted from /dev/hda3. The kernel was installed from CD-ROM with devices selected including fs/autofs, fs/nfs, fs/nfsd, fs/ntfs, fs/vfat, net/3c59x,
misc/psaux and net/ppp. The network hostname was identified as inco. The
base system was installed from CD-ROM. Configuration involved setting the
timezone to Australia/ACT with the clock not set to GMT (since it is dual
boot). Initially skipped the Make Linux boot directly from hard disk,
but created a boot floppy. A Cusomt Boot was chosen and the system was
rebooted.
The built-in network card is eth1 when docked and eth0 when undocked. See
Section 60.9 to handle this.
Install i8kutils to control the Dell Latitude CPU fan, volume buttons, and
Fn-keys, and to report CPU temperature. Includes a little applet to include

118

Installation

a CPU temperature in the Gnome-Panel. You may need to load the module
i8k. (By the way, i8k stands for Insperion 8000.) The command line i8kctl
lists the current status of the fans.
Lilo was configured to boot MS-Windows/2000 by pointing it to /dev/hda1.
Later, lilo was replace with grub for booting.
Sound card support from the kernel required adding the following line to
/etc/modules.conf (by adding it to /etc/modutils/sndconfig then running update-modules:
alias sound-slot-0 maestro3

Refer to documentation in /usr/src/linux/Documentation/sound/ for details.

The video card has TV-Out but ATI is not supporting Linux on this yet,
unlike NVidia which supports TV with its XFree86-4 option:
Option "ConnectedMonitor" "TV".

Currently on Inco I have:

Option "Display" "BIOS"

which tells it to use whatever the BIOS recognises as connected (either CRT
or FP).
At one time I had a problem playing videos with xine. Starting xine on Inco
(Section 4.10.24) displayed just a blue screen, even when the video is playing.
If I choose the video driver to be xshm it works acceptably. Ogle fails to start
also, although mplayer coped. The problem was running with 16 rather than
24 bpp X server!

4.10 Target Machines

4.10.25

119

Dell OptiPlex GX1p (Plymouth)

Installed Debian GNU/Linux 2.2r2 from CD-ROM 21 (September 2001) then

immediately upgraded to unstable and installed packages from unstable as
required.
Plymouth is a single boot machine with no NTFS partitions and a single
10GB hard disk:

Partition 9.5GB as linux ext2 /dev/hda1

Partition 500MB as linux swap /dev/hda2
Write partition table

Plymouth Specifications
CPU
RAM 256MB
Disk
10GB
CD-R
NIC
3COM Ethernet Card 3C905B
Video ATI Technologies Inc 3D Rage Pro AGP 1X/2X (rev 5c)
Audio
The lspci command gives:

00:00.0 Host bridge: Intel Corporation 440BX/ZX - 82443BX/ZX

Host bridge (rev 02)
00:01.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 440BX/ZX - 82443BX/ZX
AGP bridge (rev 02)
00:07.0 ISA bridge: Intel Corporation 82371AB PIIX4 ISA (rev 02)
00:07.1 IDE interface: Intel Corporation 82371AB PIIX4 IDE (rev 01)
00:07.2 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82371AB PIIX4 USB (rev 01)
00:07.3 Bridge: Intel Corporation 82371AB PIIX4 ACPI (rev 02)
00:0f.0 PCI bridge: Digital Equipment Corporation DECchip 21152 (rev 03)
00:11.0 Ethernet controller: 3Com Corporation 3c905B 100BaseTX
[Cyclone] (rev 24)
01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: ATI Technologies Inc 3D Rage Pro
AGP 1X/2X (rev 5c)

120
Plymouth Install
Nothing particularly special in the install.

Installation

4.10 Target Machines

4.10.26

121

Dell Precision WorkStation 420 MT (Velox)

Installed Debian GNU/Linux 2.2r2 from CD-ROM (15 December 2000). Upgraded to unstable and installed packages from unstable as required.
Velox (Section 4.10.26) is a dual boot machine with the first partition kept as
NTFS (C: Drive). During the Debian install the second partition (originally
the D: Drive) was deleted and partitioned as:
Partition 8.2GB as linux ext2 /dev/sda2
Partition 500MB as linux swap /dev/sda3
Write partition table

Velox Specifications
CPU

Dual Processor Pentium III (Coppermine)

800MHz (979780 kHz)
BogoMIPS 1595
RAM
512MB (523840k)
Disk
SCSI Hard Disk Adaptec AIC 7899 SCSI BIO V25113
DVD-ROM NEC DV-5700A, ATAPI CDROM drive
CD-RW
SONY CD-RW CRX140E, ATAPI CDROM drive
NIC
3Com 3c905C Tornado
Video
nVidia GeForce 256
Audio
Cirrus Logic CS 4614/22/24 CrystalClear
SoundFusion Audio Accelerator
The lspci command gives:
00:00.0 Host bridge: Intel Corporation 82840 840 (Carmel) Chipset
Host Bridge (Hub A) (rev 01)
00:01.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 82840 840 (Carmel) Chipset
AGP Bridge (rev 01)
00:1e.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 82801AA PCI Bridge (rev 02)
00:1f.0 ISA bridge: Intel Corporation 82801AA ISA Bridge (LPC) (rev 02)
00:1f.1 IDE interface: Intel Corporation 82801AA IDE (rev 02)
00:1f.2 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801AA USB (rev 02)
00:1f.3 SMBus: Intel Corporation 82801AA SMBus (rev 02)
01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: nVidia Corporation GeForce 256 (rev 10)
02:04.0 Ethernet controller: 3Com Corporation 3c905C-TX
[Fast Etherlink] (rev 78)

122

Installation

02:06.0 Multimedia audio controller: Cirrus Logic CS 4614/22/24

[CrystalClear SoundFusion Audio Accelerator] (rev 01)
02:0e.0 PCI bridge: Digital Equipment Corporation DECchip 21152 (rev 03)
03:0a.0 SCSI storage controller: Adaptec 7899P (rev 01)
03:0a.1 SCSI storage controller: Adaptec 7899P (rev 01)

Velox Install
No particular trouble with the install. This is a dual boot machine with
MS-Windows/NT so do not install a boot loader - use NTs boot loader.

4.10 Target Machines

4.10.27

123

Dell OptiPlex GX110 (Mint)

Debian GNU/Linux 2.2r2 was installed from CD-ROM (15 December 2000)
and immediately upgraded to unstable. This is a desktop machine with an
external modem for network connection and acts as the Internet gateway for
a small network.
Mint is a dual boot machine with the first partition as NTFS (C: Drive).
The second partition (originally a D: Drive) was deleted during the Debian
install and partitioned as:
Partition 8.5GB as linux ext2 /dev/hda2
Partition 200MB as linux swap /dev/hda3

Mint Specifications
The lshw command was used to obtain the following:
mint.act.cmis.csiro.au
CPU Pentium III (Coppermine) version: 6.8.6 730MHz
capabilities: fpu fpu_exception wp vme de pse tsc msr
pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat pse36 mmx
fxsr sse
Memory 254MB
PCI VGA NV5M64 [RIVA TNT2 Model 64/Model 64 Pro]
capabilities: vga bus_master cap_list irq=9
PCI Network Ethernet controller 3c905C-TX/TX-M [Tornado]
capabilities: bus_master cap_list
configuration: driver=3c59x irq=5
IDE IBM-DTLA-307015 /dev/hda 13GB
IDE NEC DV-5700A /dev/hdc 1023GB
IDE LG CD-RW CED-8080B /dev/hdd 1023GB
Multimedia 82801AA AC97 Audio
capabilities: bus_master
configuration: driver=intel810_audio irq=10

Mint Install
kb
disks

qwerty/us
partition

124

Installation

swap
linux
root
mount
kernel from cd-rom
devices fs/ntfs net/3c59x
network host = inx
base
from cd-rom
config timezone
Australia ACT
GMT no
(skip the "Make Linux boot directly from hard disk")
Make boot floppy
Custom Boot
Reboot
IP
Netmask
Gateway
DNS

183.44.70.89
255.255.255.192
BLANK
183.44.72.1

4.10 Target Machines

4.10.28

125

Dell Latitude CPiD300XT (Inka)

Inka is a laptop used essentially as a stand-alone machine with modem connectivity. A docking station provided a 19inch monitor and external keyboard
and mouse. Debian GNU/Linux 2.1 was installed from floppies, 15 March
1999. It was upgraded to unstable sometime later.

Inka Specifications
CPU
RAM
Disk
Disk
Floppy
CD-ROM
NIC
Modem
Video
Audio

Pentium Pentium II 300MHz

128MB
6GB (MS-Windows/NT)
6GB (additional drive in the internal bay) /dev/hdc
Parallel port of the docking station
TOSHIBA CD-ROM XM-1802B, ATAPI CDROM drive
(docking station)
3COM Vortex 3C590/905-series (docking station)
PCMCIA 3COM 56K
NeoMagic MagicGraph 128XD (NM2160)
Crystal Semiconductor CS4237B Advanced Audio SRS 3D Sound

The lspci command gives:

00:00.0 Host bridge: Intel Corporation 440BX/ZX - 82443BX/ZX

Host bridge (AGP disabled) (rev 02)
00:02.0 VGA compatible controller: Neomagic Corporation NM2160
[MagicGraph 128XD] (rev 01)
00:03.0 CardBus bridge: Texas Instruments PCI1131 (rev 01)
00:03.1 CardBus bridge: Texas Instruments PCI1131 (rev 01)
00:07.0 Bridge: Intel Corporation 82371AB PIIX4 ISA (rev 01)
00:07.1 IDE interface: Intel Corporation 82371AB PIIX4 IDE (rev 01)
00:07.2 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82371AB PIIX4 USB (rev 01)
00:07.3 Bridge: Intel Corporation 82371AB PIIX4 ACPI (rev 01)
00:11.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 82380FB (rev 01)
01:05.0 IDE interface: CMD Technology Inc PCI0646 (rev 03)
01:07.0 SCSI storage controller: Adaptec AIC-7860 (rev 03)
01:08.0 Ethernet controller: 3Com Corporation 3c905 100BaseTX [Boomerang]

126

Installation

Inka Install Log

color
kb
disks
swap
linux
root
kernel
devices

qwerty/us
partition

6GB
Linux N P 6063 B T 83 B hdc1
128MB
Swap N P 125 T 82
hdc2
scan
scan
/dev/hdc1
Rescue Disk
Drivers Disk
psaux
ppp

W Q

/dev/hdc2
/dev/hdc1
mount
from /dev/fd0
misc
net
network host = debian
connected = no
base
from /dev/fd0
Base Disks 1-7
config timezone
Australia ACT
GMT no
(skip the "Make Linux boot directly from hard disk")
Make boot floppy
Custom Boot
Reboot

With the initial boot the extra internal bay hard disk drive had to be mentioned to the kernel with the following command line when the boot prompt
is displayed (you have about 10 seconds to begin typing):
boot: linux hdc=13424,15,63

(the numbers were eventually figured out one time when the drive was eventually auto-detected after a kernel upgrade).
ALSA Sound Configuration
Lindsay Haisley supplied the following configuration file for alsa:
# ALSA portion
alias char-major-116 snd
alias snd-card-0 snd-cs4236
alias char-major-14 soundcore
alias sound-slot-0 snd-card-0
# OSS/Free portion - card #1

4.10 Target Machines

alias
alias
alias
alias
alias

127

sound-service-0-0 snd-mixer-oss
sound-service-0-1 snd-seq-oss
sound-service-0-3 snd-pcm-oss
sound-service-0-8 snd-seq-oss
sound-service-0-12 snd-pcm-oss

# Set this to the correct number of cards.

options snd cards_limit=1

# Options for the Crystal sound card in the Dell Latitude CPi D300XT
options snd-cs4236 index=0 id=CARD_0 port=0x530 cport=0x210 mpu_port=0x330 fm_port=0x388 i
# OSS/Free portion
alias char-major-14 soundcore
alias /dev/mixer snd-mixer-oss
alias /dev/dsp snd-pcm-oss
alias /dev/midi snd-seq-oss

XF86 Configuration
Lindsay Haisley supplied the following configuration file (/etc/X11/XF86Config-4)
for xserver-xfree86. It is specific to the Dell CPi D300XT laptop with the
standard Neomagic Chipset and the example here is a combination of the
XF86Config-4 example provided with Gentoo Linux and Dell CPi D300XT
laptop details.
For the Dell CPi with the NeoMagic video we do not need to specify a specific
ModeLine settingthe X server determines that the VESA standard default
video mode for the Neomagic video system in the Dell Latitude CPi D300XT
should be as follows:
(**) NEOMAGIC(0): *Default mode "1024x768": 65.0 MHz, 48.4 kHz, 60.0 Hz
(II) NEOMAGIC(0): Modeline "1024x768"
65.00 \
1024 1048 1184 1344 768 771 777 806 -hsync -vsync

If you are using version 3 of the XFree86 server then the following modeline
might help out:
Modeline

"1024x768" 65 1024 1032 1176 1344 768 771 777 806 -hsync -vsync

128

Installation

The video system in this computer seems to be sufficiently flexible to accomodate either setting without apparent video alignment errors, however if
your display appears to be misaligned, use the older Modeline setting to see
if it solves your problem.
The options for the neomagic driver allow docked and external displays.
Internal and external displays dont work together so you need to manually
edit the XF86Config-4 file each time you change between the external and
internal display. It is reported that having both enabled can destroy the
internal display. It certainly makes it go pretty ugly momentarily.
Section "Files"
RgbPath
"/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/rgb"
FontPath
"unix/:7100"
FontPath
"/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/local/"
FontPath
"/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/misc/"
FontPath
"/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/75dpi/:unscaled"
FontPath
"/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/100dpi/:unscaled"
FontPath
"/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/Type1/"
FontPath
"/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/CID/"
FontPath
"/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/Speedo/"
FontPath
"/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/75dpi/"
FontPath
"/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/100dpi/"
ModulePath "/usr/X11R6/lib/modules"
EndSection
Section "Module"
Load
"dbe"
SubSection "extmod"
Option "omit xfree86-dga"
EndSubSection
Load "dbe"
# Double-buffering
Load "GLcore"
# OpenGL support
Load "dri"
# Direct rendering infrastructure
Load "glx"
# OpenGL X protocol interface
Load "extmod"
# Misc. required extensions
Load "v4l"
# Video4Linux
EndSection
Section "ServerFlags"
Option
"blank time"
"10"
# 10 minutes
EndSection
Section "InputDevice"
Identifier "Keyboard0"
Driver
"keyboard"

4.10 Target Machines

129

Option
"AutoRepeat"
"500 20"
Option
"Xleds" "1 2 3"
Option
"XkbModel"
"pc105"
EndSection
Section "InputDevice"
Identifier "Mouse0"
Driver
"mouse"
Option
"Protocol"
"PS/2"
Option
"Device"
"/dev/mouse"
Option
"Emulate3Buttons"
Option
"Emulate3Timeout"
"50"
EndSection
Section "Monitor"
Identifier "Dell SyncMaster 17GLi"
HorizSync
31.5 - 48.5
# multisync
VertRefresh 55-65
EndSection
Section "Device"
Identifier "NeoMagic"
Driver "neomagic"
BoardName "Unknown"
#
Option
"Rotate"
#
Option
"pciBurst"
#
Option
"ShadowFB"
#
Option
"NoStretch"
#
Option
"LcdCenter"
#
Option
"externDisp"
# Uncomment this for external video
Option
"internDisp"
# Uncomment this for internal video
Option
"overrideValidateMode"
#
Option
"noMMIO"
#
Option
"SWcursor"
#
Option
"NoAccel"
#
Option
"NoLinear"
#
Option
"XaaNoScanlineImageWriteRect"
#
Option
"XaaNoScanlineCPUToScreenColorExpandFill"
EndSection
Section "Screen"
Identifier "Screen0"
Device
"NeoMagic"
Monitor
"Dell SyncMaster 17GLi"
DefaultColorDepth 16
Subsection "Display"
Depth
16

130
Modes
"1024x768" "800x600" "640x480"
EndSubsection
EndSection
Section "ServerLayout"
Identifier
"XFree86 Dell CPi D300XT"
Screen
0 "Screen0" 0 0
InputDevice
"Mouse0" "CorePointer"
InputDevice
"Keyboard0" "CoreKeyboard"
EndSection

Installation

4.10 Target Machines

4.10.29

131

Dell Latitude XPi (Rose)

This older notebook PC has limited resources but works quite well with
a basic installation and on a network with a more powerfull server. At
the time the XWindows driver for the NeoMagic chip was not part of the
XFree86 distribution (it has been since version 3.3.3). This Dell Lattitude
XPi P133ST has a NeoMagic NM2070 chipset. The machine has 24MB of
memory and a 1.2 GB hard disk, using a PCMCIA modem card with PPP.
The 1.2GB hard disk was partitioned into two equal partitions, the first for
Windows95, the second for Linux. Windows95 offers less functionality, is
slower, has more bugs, and consumes considerably more disk space than the
Linux installation which includes X, TeX, and much more!
Originally installed Debian GNU/Linux 1.1 with individual package updates
as needed.
Checking NeoMagics web pages at the time found that NeoMagic does
not support Unix drivers, and cannot provide device/programming information to end-users, protecting their intellectual property rights. So for the
NeoMagic chipset there was no SVGA driver (800x600x8bpp 256 colors) in
XFree86 prior to version 3.3.3only the simple VGA16 driver (800x600x4bpp
16 colours) could be used. There was a RedHat rpm with a driver for this
chip with XFree86 versions prior to 3.3.3 available and a commercial (approximately US$250) X11 server from Xi Graphics with a NeoMagic driver
for Linux, with many positive reports.
Running an older version of XFree86 and of the kernel, you will find that the
VGA16 server from XFree86 version 3.1 works with the NM2070, giving just
16 colours. A trick is required to get the server to use the whole screen
(800x600) rather than the 640x480 default or the split screen effect. This
requires putting the monitor into 800x600 mode on bootup. A consequence
of this is that the normal console is turned off, and you will need to go directly
into XWindows, via xdm. This is not usually a problem.
Note that using the Neomagic 2070 xserver provided with XFree86 version
4 works fine with both 8bit and 16bit on 640x480 and 800x600 but causes
a corrupted screen (vanishing window content etc.) in all x-applications if
used with default settings. To fix the problem append both Xaa-options in
the screen-section of the x86config:
Option "XaaNoPixmapCache"
Option "XaaNoScreenToScreenCopy"

132

Installation

No further hacks or tricks were required on the from SuSE-Linux distribution

7.2 on a Dell Latitude xps p133st Bios rev. 11.
The simplest way to turn on the 800x600 mode is to use LILO and to change
vga=normal to vga=770 in /etc/lilo.conf (or to add it there if not
present as in Red Hat Linux). You can also create alternative lilo startups
so that you can choose to go with xdm or not with an append=4 or append=5 (an init 4 or 5 will start xdm depending on your setupRed Hat
uses init 5 for xdm).
A kernel patch could also be used to switch to 800x600 mode (notice that
770 is the decimal equivalent of 0x0302). The modification is to the file
/usr/src/linux/arch/i386/boot/video.S in the Linux kernel.
From:
mode_set:
mov
cmp
jz

bx,ax
ah,#0xff
setalias

To:
mode_set:
mov
mov
cmp
jz

ax,#0x0302
bx,ax
ah,#0xff
setalias

<- Insert this line

The Compaq Presario 1020 notebook (which also uses a NeoMagic NM2070
chip) requires no LILO switches nor kernel patches. Similarly the NEC Versa
4200 also uses the NeoMagic and no hacks are required to get it to run in
800x600x4bpp mode.
Rose Specifications
CPU
BogoMIPS
RAM
Disk
NIC
Video
Audio

Pentium 75+ 586

36
30MB
700MB

4.11 Resources

4.10.30

133

Generic 486/DX66 (Roast)

This much older machine demonstrates a basic install with limited resources.
The machine is networked and provides a limited but useful interface to
applications running on a more powerful server. Some basic applications
installed included emacs, ssh, and lynx.
Roast Specifications
CPU
486/DX66
BogoMIPS
RAM
12MB
Disk
420MB
NIC
Video
Audio

4.11

Resources

4.11.1

Books

There are many books that deal with the installation of Debian or RedHat.
Some of the Debian books include:
Debian GNU/Linux: A Guide to Installation and Usage by John
Goerzen and Ossama. 158 pages, published July 1999 by New Riders, ISBN
0735709149.
Learning Debian GNU/Linux by Bill McCarty. 360 pages, published
October 1999 by OReilly & Associates, ISBN 1565927052.
Debian GNU/Linux 2.1 Unleashed by Mario Camou, Aaron Von Cowenberghe, Aaron Van Couwenberghe. 1119 pages, published December 1999 by
Sams, ISBN 0672317001.

134

Installation

Chapter 5
Basic Survival
5.1
5.1.1

Basic Linux
File and Directory Protections

The setgid bit on a directory (in the group-execute portion represented as

an s or S) forces all files to be created in the directory with the group of the
parent directory rather then the users primary group. This is the BSD file
creation semantics rather than SYSV.
By default Debian uses a umask of 755. It is a long and well known Linux
tradition to create home directories world readable as it encourages a sharing environment. Users can always change the permissions on their home
directory or any subdirectory they want to keep private.
To change this default behaviour edit /etc/adduser.conf to change the
DIR_MODE option.

5.1.2

Background Jobs

The nohup command allows a command to be run that is immune to hangups.

That is, nohup runs the given command with hangup signals ignored, so that
the command can continue running in the background after you log out.
$ nohup COMMAND [ARG]...

135

136

5.2

Basic Survival

System Information

Debian Pacakges: lshw.

To find out information about the CPU do:
$ cat /proc/cpuinfo

Chapter 6
Wajig: Administering Debian
Wajig is an interface to many Debian administrative tasks. The name has no
particular meaning (sorry!). Written in Python, it uses traditional Debian
administration and user tools including apt-get, dpkg, apt-cache, wget, and
others. It is intended to unify and simplify common administrative tasks.
Wajig has evolved over many years and theres a small band of users. It
has some of the same aims as the feta package and I thought to wrap the
extra wajig features into feta, but a number of users suggested that wajig
should stay. So it was rewritten recently from being a shell script to a python
program. It is available under the GPL.
As wajig is simply my frontend to various other commands the goal of this
section is more than simply demonstrating how to manage your system with
wajig. Wajig may not be the answer you are looking for and that is fine.
So, where ever I illustrate a procedure with wajig I will also indicate the
underlying commands that are being used to effect the wajig command. You
can then use these underlying commands directly if you prefer.

6.0.1

History: Motivations For Wajig

If youve tried to remember all the different commands to get different information about different aspects of Debian package management and then
used other commands to install and remove packages then youll know that
it can become a little too much.
Swaping between dselect, deity, deity-gtk, aptitutde, apt-get, dpkg, gnome137

138

Wajig: Administering Debian

apt, apt-cache, and so on is interesting but cumbersome. Plus personally I

find dselect, deity, and aptitude confusing and even though Ive spent hours
understanding each of them, I dont think the time was particularly well
spent.
This Python script simply collects together what I have learnt over the years
about various commands! Clearly I have yet to learn all there is.
Another effort called feta has a similar goal of being a front end to APT and
I have extended and refined my wajig interface to match feta to some extent.
Wajig aims to offer more than just package management though.

6.0.2

Installing Wajig

Wajig is available in the Debian distribution. Alternatively Wajig can be

installed by adding http://togaware.com/debian to /etc/apt/sources.
list:
deb http://togaware.com/debian ./

and then as root:

# apt-get update
# apt-get install wajig

6.0.3

The Basic Debian Tools

The Debian package apt-howto is a good place to start with understanding

the apt (for Advanced Packaging Tools) suite of tools. Once installed browse
the file /usr/share/doc/apt-howto/en/index.html.
Also, see the Debian FAQ at http://www.debian.org/doc/FAQ/. In particular, Section 6 deals with the Packaging system. The Advanced Package Tool (apt) is the recommended way of managing packages under Debian. The command line interface is apt-get but it is also used within
dselect, deity, and aptitude. See http://newbieDoc.sourceForge.net/
system/apt-get-intro.html for a great introduction to apt-get. Also see
/usr/share/doc/apt/offline.html/index.html on your local Debian machine for using apt off line.

139

6.0.4

Wajig Overview

Wajig is designed to run as a normal user, using sudo as required. It can

also be run as root without any extra setup (i.e., without the need for sudo).
Using sudo requires a little setting up as described below in Section ??.
Try the help command for a list of common commands provided by wajig:
$ wajig help

Examples commands include:

$
$
$
$
$
$
$
$
$
$

wajig
wajig
wajig
wajig
wajig
wajig
wajig
wajig
wajig
wajig

update
install less
new
newupgrades
updatealts editor
restart apache
listfiles less
whichpkg stdio.h
whatis rats
orphans

(= apt-get update)
(= apt-get install less)
(list new packages since last update)
(list packages upgraded since last update)
(update the default "editor")
(restart the apache daemon)
(list the files supplied by the "less" pkg)
(what package supplies this header file)
(one line description of the package "rats")
(list libraries not required by other pkgs)

For a complete list of available commands increase the level of verbosity of

the help command:
$ wajig -v help
All wajig commands:
autoclean
bug
build
dist-upgrade
clean
describe
doc
editsources
findfile
force
help
hold
init

Remove all superseded downloaded deb files

Check for reported bugs in package using the Debian Bug Tacker
Retrieve/unpack sources and build .deb for the named packages
Upgrade to a new distribution (installed and new rqd packages)
Remove all downloaded deb files
Provide a description of package (-v and -vv for more detail)
Equivalent to help with -verbose=2
Edit the sources.list file which locates Debian archives
Search for a file within installed pacakges
Install package even if it overwrites files from other pkgs
Print documentation (detail depends on --verbose)
Place listed packages on hold so they are not upgraded
Initialise or reset the wajig archive files

140

Wajig: Administering Debian

install
integrity
lastupdate
list
listalts
listfiles
listnames
new
newupgrades
orphans
purge
reconfigure
reinstall
remove
repackage
reset
search
source
status
toupgrade
update
updatealts
upgrade
whatis
whichpkg

Install (or upgrade) one or more packages or a .deb file

Check the integrity of installed packages (through checksums)
Identify when an update was last performed
List the status of every known package
List the objects that can have alternatives configured
List the files that are supplied by the named package
List all known packages or those containing supplied string
List packages that became available since last update
List packages newly available for upgrading
List libraries not required by any installed package
Remove one or more packages and configuration files
Reconfigure the named installed packages
Reinstall each of the named packages
Remove one or more packages (see also purge)
Generate a .deb file for an installed package
Initialise or reset the wajig archive files
Search for packages containing listed words
Retrieve and unpack sources for the named packages
Show the version and available version of packages
List packages with newer versions available for upgrading
Update the list of downloadable packages
Update the default alternative for things like x-window-manager
Upgrade all of the installed packages
For each package named obtain a one line description
Find the package that supplies the given command or file

Command line options:

-h|--help
-q|--quiet
-t|--teaching
-v|--verbose=n

Print usage message.

Do system commands everything quietly.
Trace the sequence of commands performed.
Increase (or set) the level of verbosity (to n).

Run wajig -vv help for documentation.

6.0.5

Getting Started with SUDO

The aim of Wajig is to operate as a user command and to do super user

privileged commands as necessary. The easiest way to do this is to use
the sudo package which will ask you for your password and then run the
command as the super user. If you dont have sudo installed then wajig
will use su to run as super user, but you will need to enter the super user

141
password frequently. If sudo is installed but not set up for you to access
the appropriate APT commands you will see a permission denied message.
Installing sudo is straight forward. As root run the command visudo to edit
the configration file. Add the lines:
Cmnd_Alias

APT = /usr/bin/apt-get, /usr/bin/apt-cache, /usr/bin/dpkg, \

/usr/bin/editor, /usr/sbin/dpkg-reconfigure, \
/etc/init.d/*, /usr/sbin/update-alternatives, \
/usr/lib/apt-move/fetch /usr/bin/dselect, \
/usr/bin/alien

and
kayon

ALL=(ALL) APT

in the appropriate places. Then user kayon can run the APT and related
commands as the super user.
If you prefer user kayon not to need to enter their password every time you
could instead add the following:
kayon

ALL=(ALL) NOPASSWD: APT

This is not recommended as an unattended terminal may give someone else

access to root, although this access is limited to specific applications so the
risk is small.

6.0.6

Available Packages

The Debian packaging system relies on your local system having some idea of
what packages are available. This is initialised when you install your system.
You will generally need to update this list of packages with what is currently
available from the Debian archives for downloading. If you are staying with
the stable release you generally only need to update the list of available
packages once. The following command is used to update the information
about what is available for downloading:
$ wajig update

(dpkg update)

142

Wajig: Administering Debian

(In brackets after the wajig command is the underlying command that wajig
calls upon to perform the operation.)
This uses entries in the file /etc/apt/sources.list to know where to get
the list of available packages from and which release of Debian you wish to
follow. You can edit this file with:
$ wajig editsources

(editor /etc/apt/sources.list)

This will use the systems default editor, but you can change which editor is
the default with the command:
$ wajig updatealts editor

(update-alternatives --config editor)

(Use the command wajig listalts for a list of things for which alternatives
exist, and hence can be updated.)
You need to understand the format of the file /etc/apt/sources.list as
explained in the manual page:
$ man sources.list

It is pretty straightforward and we will see examples in the next section.

6.0.7

Finding Packages

Once the list of available packages is updated you can see what new packages
have recently been added to Debian with the command:
$ wajig new

Note that after the first time you use wajig update all packages will be
considered new! But after the next update the new packages are those that
were not in the available list from the previous update.
Some (and often many) of the packages that you already have installed on
your Debian system may have been upgraded in the archive since the last time
you performed an update. The following command will list these packages:

143
$ wajig newupgrades

For a complete list of the packages you have installed but for which there are
newer versions available on the archive use:
$ wajig toupgrade

To check the version of any installed package and also the version available
from the archive previously (last time, but one, you performed an upgrade)
and now (based on the last time you performed an update), and to also see
the so called Desired and Status flags of the package, use:
$ wajig status <package names>

(similar to dpkg -l)

Without a list of package names all installed packages will be listed.

To check for a particular package for which you might guess at part of its
name you can use:
$ wajig listnames <string>

(apt-cache pkgnames)

Without the string argument all known package names will be listed.
Each package installs some collection of files in different places on your system
(e.g., in /usr/bin/, /usr/man/man1/ and usr/doc/). Sometimes you like
to see where those files go or even just view the list of files installed. The
command to use is:
$ wajig listfiles <package name>

(dpkg --listfiles )

To list a one line dscription for a package use:

$ wajig whatis <package name>

And to find which package supplies a given command of file use:

$ wajig whichpkg <command or file path>

144

6.0.8

Wajig: Administering Debian

Installing Packages

To install a new package (or even to update an already installed package) all
you need do is:
$ wajig install <package name>

(apt-get install)

(Instead of install you could equivalently say update.)

You can list multiple packages to install with the one command.
The install command will also accept a .deb file. So, for example, if you have
downloaded a Debian package file (with the .deb extension) you can install
it with:
$ wajig install <.deb file>

(dpkg -i)

The .deb file will be searched for in both the current directory and in the apt
archive at /var/cache/apt/archive/.
You can list multiple .deb files to install.
If the .deb package file you wish to install is available on the internet you
can give its address and wajig will download then install it:
$ wajig install http://samfundet.no/debian/dists/woody/css/xine-dvd-css.deb

Sometimes you may want to install many packages by listing them in a file,
one per line. You can do this with:
$ wajig fileinstall <filename>

(apt-get install)

The file of packages to install can conveniently be created from the list of
installed packages on another system with:
$ wajig listinstalled > <filename>

You can upgrade all installed packages with:

(dpkg --get-selections)

145
$ wajig upgrade

(apt-get -u upgrade)

And you can upgrade all installed packages, remove those packages that need
to be removed (for various reasons, including issues to do with dependencies)
and install all newly required packages in the distribution with:
$ wajig dist-upgrade

(apt-get -u dist-upgrade)

Once a package is installed you can remove it with:

$ wajig remove <package name>

(apt-get remove)

Once again, you can list multiple packages to remove with the one command.
A remove will not remove configuration files (in case you have done some
configuration of the package and later re-install the package). To get rid of
the configuation files as well use:
$ wajig purge <package name>

6.0.9

(apt-get --purge remove)

Checking Whats Changed Before Installing

When you install an updated package it is sometimes useful to know whats

changed. The apt-listchanges package provides a mechanism whereby when
updating packages you will be given a chance to review the change log of
the package and then decide whether to continue with the upgrade. Simply
install the apt-listchanges package to turn this feature on.

6.0.10

Installing Alien Packages

RedHat is certainly the leader in terms of installed base. Many packages

come out in RedHat format (with the .rpm extension). These can usually be
installed in Debian with little effort. Use the alien package to convert from
the .rpm to the .deb format then install that package:
$ fakeroot alien -d gmyclient-0.0.91b-1.i386.rpm
$ wajig install gmyclient_0.0.91b-2_i386.deb

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6.0.11

Wajig: Administering Debian

Putting Packages on Hold

Occasionally, and particularly if you are following the unstable release, some
packages are broken for various reasons. This was the case with the package
cdrecord in unstable. This package was compiled with kernel 2.4.n and had
some kernel specific issues that were done differently with kernel 2.2.n. At
compile time one or the other options was chosen (but not both!). Thus the
newer binary versions of cdrecord would not run on a system using kernel
2.2.n. One solution is to build a Debian package of cdrecord using the wajig
build command. Another is to reinstall an older version that worked and
then place the package on hold with:
$ wajig hold cdrecord

A wajig upgrade would not try to upgrade this package.

6.0.12

Building Packages

Sometimes the binary distribution of the package is configured or compiled

with options that dont suit you. Or it may be compiled for a more recent
release than that which you are using and does not work for your release.
Normally you would then be left on your own to retrieve the source of the
package, configure and compile it, then install it into /usr/local/. This is
then outside of the Debian package management system, which is just fine.
But there is a better solution.
You can download the source code for any Debian package from the Debian
archive. You can then modify it and generate your own .deb file for installation. To download the source of a Debian package you will need deb-src
lines in your /etc/apt/sources.list file, such as the following:
deb-src http://ftp.debian.org/debian unstable main contrib non-free

Generally you can add the -src to copies of pre-existing deb lines.
To retrieve and unpack a source Debian package use:
$ wajig source <package names>

(apt-get source)

147
Note that you can list several packages and grab all of their sources.
The source command downloads a .tar.gz file and a .dsc file for the package. The .tar.gz file contains the source code and associated files. The
.dsc file contains test information that is used by the packaging system.
The source command will also extract the contents of the .tar.gz archive
into a subdirectory consisting of the package name and version.
To go one step further and also configure, compile and generate a default
Debian .deb package from source code (useful if you need to compile a package
for your setup specifically) then use instead:
$ wajig build <package names>

(apt-get source -b)

But, if you need to modify the source in some way and rebuild a package:
$
$
$
$
$

wajig update
wajig build ncftp
dpkg-source -x ncftp_3.0.2-3.dsc
cd ncftp-3.0.2
fakeroot dpkg-buildpackage -b -u

6.0.13

Managing A Local Package Archive

When packages are installed the corresponding .deb files are stored in /var/cache/apt/archive.
This can become quite populated with older versions of packages and we can
clean out these older versions with:
$ wajig autoclean

(apt-get autoclean)

Warning: It is sometimes useful to have older versions of packages hanging

around if you are tracking the unstable release. Sometimes the newer versions
of packages are broken and you need to revert to an older version which is
generally not available from the Debian archives, but might be in your local
download archive.
Nonetheless, if you get short of disk space then you might want to remove all
the downloaded .deb files (not just the older versions of downloaded files)
with:

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Wajig: Administering Debian

$ wajig clean

(apt-get clean)

To remove files immediately after they have been installed edit /etc/apt/
apt.conf:

// Things that effect the APT dselect method

DSelect
{
Clean "auto";
// always|auto|prompt|never
};

6.0.14

Mirroring With APT

6.0.15

Pinning Distributions

With the Debian packaging system you can specify that your packages come
by default from one distribution but you can override this with packages
from other distributions. The concept is called pinning and after it is set up
you can have, for example, testing as your default release and then include
unstable in /etc/apt/sources.list and install cdrecord from unstable with:

# apt-get install cdrecord/unstable

The following /etc/apt/preferences makes apt-get use testing unless it is

overridden, even though there are entries for unstable in /etc/apt/sources.
list:

Package: *
Pin: release a=testing
Pin-Priority: 900
Package: *
Pin: release o=Debian
Pin-Priority: -10

149

6.0.16

Cache Packages Locally

To set up a local debian cache of deb files that youve created or downloaded
separately:
#
#
#
#
>

mkdir -p /usr/local/cache/dists/local/local/binary-i386
cp *.deb /usr/local/cache/dists/local/local/binary-i386
cd /usr/local/cache
dpkg-scanpackages dists/local/local/binary-i386 /dev/null \
dists/local/local/binary-i386/Packages

Then add the following line to /etc/apt/sources.list:

deb file:/usr/local/cache local local

6.0.17

Reconfigure Packages

$ wajig reconfigure debconf

(dpkg-reconfigure

debconf)

An alternative where you can specify a particular front end to use for the
configurator is:
# dpkg-reconfigure --frontend=dialog debconf

6.0.18

Setting Default Applications

Debian has a system of alternatives for various commands (or functionalities).

For example, the editor command could be nano or nvi, or one of a large
number of alternative editors. You can update the default for this command
with:
$ wajig updatealts editor

(update-alternatives --config editor)

Another common alternative is x-window-manager. You can get a list of all

alternatives with:
$ wajig listalts

(ls /etc/alternatives/)

The information is maintained in the directory /etc/alternatives/.

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6.0.19

Wajig: Administering Debian

Bugs

If you find a problem with your system and think it might be a bug, use the
reportbug package to check it out. This package will allow you to view bugs
recorded against packages and also allow you to add a new bug report to the
Debian bug reporting system.
Otherwise visit the Debian email lists at http://lists.debian.org/ and
search for the problem there. The advice one gets here is generally of high
quality.
In the following sections I identify a number problems or issues that Ive not
yet resolved for some of my installations.

6.0.20

Managing Daemons or Services

In addition to managing the installed packages wajig also allows you to start,
stop, reload , and restart services (which are often provided by so called
daemonsprocesses that run on your computer in the background performing various functions on an on-going basis). The commands all follow the
same pattern:

$ wajig restart <service name>

(/etc/init.d/<service> restart)

The start and stop commands are obvious. The restart command generally
performs a stop followed by a start. The reload command will ask the daemon
to reload its configuration files generally without stopping the daemon, if
this is possible. The services you can specifiy here depend on what you have
installed. Common services include:
apache
cron
exim
gdm
ssh

Web server
Regular task scheduler
Email delivery system
The Gnome Windows Display Manager (for logging on)
The Secure Shell daemon

Generally, daemons are started at system boot time automatically.

6.1 Other Commands

6.1

151

Other Commands

These may work their way into wajig.

You can use the apt-getdownload-only option of apt-get to download the
files for an install without actually unpacking and setting up the packages.
For example:
# wajig update
# apt-get --download-only dist-upgrade

In this way you are able to leave the download unattended and when you are
ready you can monitor the unpacking and setup.
If things go wrong somewhere the apt may be able to help. The apt-get
fix-broken will do its best:
# apt-get --fix-broken dist-upgrade

but if things still dont work, you may need to use dpkg directly to remove
and isntall packages.

6.1.1

Maintaining a Distribution Archive

The apt method within dselect and the apt-get command (which the apt
mathod uses) place all downloaded files into /var/cache/apt/archive. You
can then use the apt-move command to move the archived files into a local
hierarchy that mirrors a standard distribution hierarchy. Then you can point
apt-get to this local archive by pointing to it from /etc/apt/sources.list
using the file:// format. You can also give the option apt-getdownloadonly to apt-get to download but not unpack nor install the package.
To set up a local machine as a local (partial) mirror of the Debian archive,
first install apt-move:
$ wajig install apt-move

Then edit /etc/apt-move.conf to add the sites that appear in /etc/apt/

sources.list (replacing slashes with underscores and the following may
need to all be on one line):

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Wajig: Administering Debian

APTSITES="mirror.aarnet.edu.au_pub_debian
ftp.debian.org_debian
non-US.debian.org
security.debian.org"

Then remove all architectures not of interest from the ARCHS variable and
DIST:
ARCHS="i386 sparc"
DIST=unstable

The apt-move command is then used to install any packages in your /var/
cache/apt/archives into the Debian mirror being created:
# apt-move update

You can also create a complete mirror with:

# apt-move mirror

These commands place the mirror into /mirrors/debian. To make it available on your web server simply:
# cd /var/www
# ln -s /mirrors pub

The /etc/apt/sources.list file can then be updated to point to the new

archive as the first place to check for packages (place these lines first in the
file):
deb http://togaware.com/pub/debian unstable main contrib non-free
deb http://togaware.com/pub/debian unstable/non-US main contrib non-free

All of this might happen on your server, yet your server is not likely to be the
most up to date machine. Suppose your experimental machine (always kept
up to date) is Inco (Section 4.10.24). You can rsync all packages in /var/
cache/apt/archives on Inco (Section 4.10.24) to your sever (e.g., Altrop),
then on Altrop run apt-move (and also remove the original files from the
archive on Inco (Section 4.10.24)):

6.2 Package Information

153

# rsync -v inx:/var/cache/apt/archives/* /var/cache/apt/archives/

# ssh inx wajig clean
(or apt-get clean)
# apt-move update
(soon to be wajig move)

6.1.2

Synchronising Two Installations

The package system maintains a list of all packages installed (and de-installed).
You can access this list, save it to a file, and use it to mark those same packages for installation (or deinstallation) on anther machine:
# dpkg --get-selections > dpkg-selections
# dpkg --set-selections < dpkg-selections
# apt-get dselect-upgrade

6.2

Package Information

The dpkg and apt-get commands are pretty useful and provide a lot of functionality. Heres some common things that you may want to do:
Search for the package that installed the file diff.info.gz
$ dpkg --search diff.info.gz

[alternative is -S]

List all packages installed (one line per package)

$ dpkg --list
$ dpkg --get-selections

[alternative is -l]

What is the (one-line) status of the diff package?

$ dpkg --list diff

List the information for any package with diff in its name
$ dpkg --list *diff*

List files associated with the package diff

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Wajig: Administering Debian

$ dpkg --listfiles diff

[alternative dpkg -L diff]

What packages mention diff ?

$ apt-cache search diff

Display information about a package

$ apt-cache show diff

[alternative is dpkg --print-avail]

What packages depend on diff ?

$ apt-cache showpkg diff
$ apt-cache depends diff

6.3

Alternative Applications

Debian has a mechanism for dealing with applications that provide the same
functionality. We describe here how this mechanism works and how you can
use it to tune your installation.
If you have more than one variant of emacs installed (e.g., emacs19, emacs20,
and xemacs) then you can configure which one you get by default with:
$ wajig updatealts emacs

You will be asked to choose from a list of alternatives.

To specify which window manager to use as the system default:
$ wajig updatealts x-window-manager

Suppose the window-manager you want to use as the default is not listed as
available. You can install it with:
# update-alternatives --install /usr/bin/x-window-manager \
x-window-manager /usr/bin/mywm PRIORITY

6.4 Building Debian Packages

155

Where PRIORITY is a number higher than the highest existing priority for
the x-window-manager alternative. You can get a list of priorities with:

# update-alternatives --display x-window-manager

To remove a Window Manager:

# update-alternatives --remove x-window-manager /usr/bin/mywm

6.4

Building Debian Packages

If you want to contribute to the distributed effort of maintaining Debian then

find a package that you use regularly and is not available under Debian and
package it up:

1. Read the developer documentation at http://www.debian.org/doc/

devel-manuals, probably starting with the New Maintainers Guide.
Most of these manuals can be installed as debian packages and read
offline.
2. Find a Debian developer that will sponsor you http://www.internatif.
org/bortzmeyer/debian/sponsor/
3. Your sponsor will have access to the debian machines and can test your
package on all the architectures with you.

Alternatively become a developer yourself.

When you want to create a new package, send a message to debian-devel with
a subject line ITP: mynewpackage. The ITP stands for Intend to Package.
The packaging manual is a reference on the Debian formats, installation
mechanism and standard tools (those in dpkg-dev). It doesnt talk about
the policies and isnt such a good guide for new maintainers.

156

6.5

Wajig: Administering Debian

Packages: Roll Your Own

Ive packaged up a tool Ive written called wajig which is a simplified front
end to the APT and DPKG suite of tools. It is a python program. I use
autoconf to manage the configuration.
I turned the tool into a Debian package using the steps outlined below.
A useful resource for this is the Debian Policy Manual at http://www.
debian.org/doc/debian-policy/

6.5.1

Prepackaging Development Environment

The Source Code

Lets assume I maintain the source code in wajig/development. Under this
directory there is a collection of information files, configuration files, and a
src subdirectory containing the python source code. This is a common GNU
setup although not so common for python source code.
Files
The files include some that are required by the GNU standards and some
that are required for the installation:
ChangeLog Record of changes to the tool.
configure.in Input for autoconf to generate configure.
COPYING License associated with the tool.
INSTALL
Simple instructions on how to configure, compile and install.
Makefile.in Template for the Makefile.
NEWS
A record of changes between versions.
wajig.1
Every tool should have a man page.
wajig.sh.in Generates the wajig executable.
src
A subdirectory called src holds all the python source code.

6.5 Packages: Roll Your Own

157

Building the Distribution

Using autoconf we need a configuration file configure.in which contains
the version number and other relevant information. See below for an example
configure.in
Each of the identified AC OUTPUT files will be generated by the configure
script from the corresponding files suffixed with .in by the ./configure
script which is in turn generated by the autoconf command which reads
information from configure.in
So, when you change the version number regenerate the configure script with:
$ autoconf

Next time you ./configure the new Makefiles and source code will contain
the updated information.
$ ./configure

The Makefile.in in the base directory includes a target to generate a tar

file for distribution:
$ make dist

The resulting tar file will be named something like ./wajig-0.1.1.tar.gz.

After making the distribution tar file move it to the parent directory for the
convenience of the Debian packaging tools:
$ mv wajig-0.1.1.tar.gz ..

configure.in
dnl Process this file with autoconf to produce a configure script.
AC_INIT(src/wajig.py)
PACKAGE=wajig
VERSION=0.1.1

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Wajig: Administering Debian

AC_PATH_PROG(PYTHON, python)
AC_SUBST(PYTHON)
AC_SUBST(PACKAGE)
AC_SUBST(VERSION)
AC_PROG_INSTALL
AC_PROG_MAKE_SET
AC_PROG_CC
AC_OUTPUT(Makefile src/Makefile src/const.py wajig.sh)

6.5.2

Initiating the Debian Package

The first task is to set up the information required for the Debian packaging
system. Extract the distribution:

$ tar zxvf wajig-0.1.1.tar.gz

to create the wajig-0.1.1 subdirectory. Change into this directory and then
run dh make to set things up for Debian:

$ cd wajig-0.1.1
$ dh_make -e [email protected] -f ../wajig-0.1.1.tar.gz

You will be asked what kind of package to create and since wajig is a single
binary package we choose s.
This has now created a debian subdirectory and copy of the original distribution in ../wajig-0.1.1.orig.
Now edit the files in the debian subdirectory to tell Debian the appropriate
information about the package.

6.5 Packages: Roll Your Own

159

control
copyright
changelog
rules
docs
Other Files

6.5.3

Building the Debian Package: First Time

Now you are ready to build and check the new package:
$ dpkg-buildpackage -rfakeroot
$ cd ..
$ lintian -i wajig_0.1.1-1_i386.changes

6.5.4

Adding the Package to Your Archive

Once the package is correctly built load it onto your Debian archive to provide
it for others to access:
$
$
$
$
$
$
$

cp wajig_0.1.1* /var/www/debian/
cd /var/www/debian/
chmod go+r wajig_0.1.1*
apt-ftparchive packages . > Packages
apt-ftparchive sources . > Sources
gzip -c Packages > Packages.gz
gzip -c Sources > Sources.gz

You will need to add the appropriate line to your /etc/apt/sources.list

file:
deb http://ktware.com/debian ./
deb-src http://ktware.com/debian ./

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Wajig: Administering Debian

If you are a Debian developer you would upload the package directly to the
Debian archives using the dupload tool instead of onto your own archive.

6.5.5

Updating the Debian Package

Updating From New Distribution

Suppose we have a new wajig-0.1.2.tar.gz and want to package this up.
Ensure this tar file is in the root directory, cd into the old source directory,
and ask Debian to update:
$ cd wajig-0.1.1
$ uupdate -u wajig-0.1.2.tar.gz

The updated source directory is ../wajig-0.1.2. We simply go there and

build the Debian package and install it in our archive:
$
$
$
$
$
$
$
$
$
$
$

cd ../wajig-0.1.2
dpkg-buildpackage -rfakeroot
cd ..
lintian -i wajig_0.1.2-1_i386.changes
cp wajig_0.1.2* /var/www/debian/
cd /var/www/debian/
chmod go+r wajig_0.1.2*
apt-ftparchive packages . > Packages
apt-ftparchive sources . > Sources
gzip -c Packages > Packages.gz
gzip -c Sources > Sources.gz

Then install the new package with:

$ apt-get update
$ apt-get install wajig

Of course, if you are already using wajig this becomes:

$ wajig update
$ wajig install wajig

6.5 Packages: Roll Your Own

161

Updating Debian Packaging

Make changes to any of the debian files and increment the Debian release
number (the number after the - in the version) using dch and regenerate
the Debian packages:
$
$
$
$
$
$
$
$
$
$
$

dch -i
dpkg-buildpackage -rfakeroot
cd ..
lintian -i wajig_0.1.2-2_i386.changes
cp wajig_0.1.2* /var/www/debian/
cd /var/www/debian/
chmod go+r wajig_0.1.2*
apt-ftparchive packages . > Packages
apt-ftparchive sources . > Sources
gzip -c Packages > Packages.gz
gzip -c Sources > Sources.gz

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Wajig: Administering Debian

Chapter 7
Audio
GNU/Linux provides tools for listening to, recording, and modifying audio.
Recording audio CDs is discussed in Section 14.3. Making sound recordings
and mixing is covered in Chapter 78. To extract audio from your DVD see
Section 87.2.3.
In this chapter we talk about setting up of audio chips under GNU/Linux,
and tools for manipulating audio files.

7.1

Configuring Your Audio Chip

Use the Debian package sndconfig to automatically identify your audio chip
and to add this information to /etc/modutils/sndconfig.
If the audio device is not supported then you will probably need to get a
newer kernel. Suppose you has an i810 audio chip (82801DB AC97). Get
this information from the lspci command:
> lspci
...
00:1f.5 Multimedia audio controller: Intel Corp. 82801DB AC97
...

The PCI ID here is 82801. Look this up in /usr/src/linux/drivers/

sound/i810\_audio.c and if its there, it should be supported.
163

164

7.2

Audio

Audio Not Working

If you notice that a user starts up Gnome and receives a message about Audio
not working the likely cause is that the user is not in group audio (as no users
are in group audio by default). You need to:
# adduser kayon audio

Next time user kayon logs on they will be able to use the audio device.

7.3

Audio File Information

Information about an audio file can be stored as part of the audio file itself
(at least in OGG or MP3 format). This can include track titles, artists,
album titles, genre, and more. You can view the information using the
vorbiscomment command:
> vorbiscomment -l track05.ogg
title=Mother
artist=Roger Waters
album=In The Flesh - Live
tracknumber=5
genre=Rock

Other useful tools for editting the audio information includes the terminalbased orpheus (not currently packaged for Debian as of 11 March 2004).

Chapter 8
AbiWord: Word Processor
Debian Pacakges: abiword
The Gnome Office Suite offers AbiWord for word processing. AbiWord can
import and export Micorsoft Word documents with quite a respectable degree
of compatibility. But for starting new documents it is a very good choice.
AbiWord is lightweight in terms of features when compared to Microsoft
Word but it has the features that 90% of the users need!
AbiWord is also distinguished by the fact that it runs on very many platforms,
including MS-Windows, BeOS (for both PPC and Intel hardware), Linux
(Intel, PPC and Alpha), FreeBSD, Solaris, AIX, SGI Irix, NetBSD, and
QNX. Because of its light weight use of computer resources (compared to
Microsoft Word) AbiWord is even popular on the MS-Windows platform.
The AbiWord user interface is very intuitive and in no time you will be
producing the documents you want. If you are familiar with Microsoft Word
then the AbiWord interface will be very familiar.

8.1

Export to LaTeX

A very useful feature of AbiWord is its export to LATEX. It does quite a good
job in generating a representation in LATEX.

165

166

AbiWord: Word Processor

Figure 8.1: Basic AbiWord interface is very familiar.

Chapter 9
APM: Power Management
Advanced power management (APM) is supported by the kernel1 but because some older machines have problems with it some Debian kernels have
it turned off by default. Thus, when you poweroff your machine (e.g., by
poweroff) the machine does not automatically power down.
To turn on apm, if apm is compiled into the kernel (i.e., not a module) then
simply add the following to the kernel configuration (often in /etc/lilo/
conf, assuming you are using lilo to boot your machine):
append="apm=on apm=power-off"

If you have apm as a module then use the following when you load the
module:
# modprobe apm power_off=1

Or for a more persistent approach add the following line to /etc/modules:

apm power_off=1

Some relevant kernel configurations are:

1

Current Debian kernels have CONFIG APM as a module but CONFIG APM DO ENABLE is not set.

167

168

APM: Power Management

CONFIG_APM=y
CONFIG_APM_DO_ENABLE=y
CONFIG_APM_CPU_IDLE=y
CONFIG_APM_DISPLAY_BLANK=y
CONFIG_APM_RTC_IS_GMT=y
CONFIG_APM_IGNORE_MULTIPLE_SUSPEND=y
CONFIG_APM_IGNORE_SUSPEND_BOUNCE=y

This configuration allows, for example, the suspend feature to function on

laptops (so that when you close the laptop lid the OS suspends). The laptop
will beep then turn itself off. Simply open the laptop lid to resume. This
works for both console logins and X sessions.
You can also eject the laptop from a docking station to achieve the same
effect. When the laptop lid is opened, or the laptop is inserted back into a
docking station, the system resumes. It seems advisable to do this only when
in console mode (that is, not while you have an X session running - its not
quite there for X sessions yet).
It is also suggested to install the apmd package which provides the apm
command. This produces a more human readable output than a simple cat
/proc/apm and can suspend your laptop from the command line:
# apm
AC off-line, battery status high: 56% (2:27)
# apm -s

A suspend while connected to power within a docking station does not seem
to suspend the machine completely. It sends it to sleep but it does not beep
and power down.
Some useful commands related to rebooting are:
# poweroff
# reboot

(shutdown and turn off the computer)

(shutdown and reboot the computer)

After installing the apmd package the suspend maintains the clock correctly
between a suspend and a resume. (Although I seem to be losing a few seconds
each time.)
Note that a suspend will disconnect your modem!

169
PROBLEMS When you eject the laptop from a docking station while running an X session it does not come back properly when the laptop is reinserted
into a docking station. Sometimes the display is half off the screen. Sometimes simply get streaks across the screen. If this happens, you can go back
to a console as usual with CTRL-ALT-F1, or exit from the X session with
CTRL-ALT-BACKSPACE. If you eject while running an X session and open the
laptop lid you will not get the proper display, and may damage the display.
It can also freeze the laptop.
Suspend maintains RAM with the battery. Hibernate saves everything to
disk. Standby powers down disks and the lcd display.

170

APM: Power Management

Chapter 10
Backup
Computers crash, disks become corrupt, data is lost, security is compromised.
Today computers are pretty reliable and it is rare to lose data but it can
happen and usually when it is most inconvenient! Important work should
always be backed up.
In this chapter we review approaches to backup. We begin with a simple approach which uses another backed up host on a network that you can access.
In this approach you simply copy files across to that other host. This is useful
in an environment where you often work from home and have a good backup
system in the office. The second approach uses the commercial backup system called Legato NetWorker (also known as the Solstice NetWorker).

10.1

Backup To Other Computers

Consider the situation of a collection of Debian boxes with no backup facilities

as such, but there is an accessible machine with a proper backup regime.
Access to the backed up machine is via ssh. The backup can be performed
using a backup script which you create in /etc/cron.daily so that it will
be executed each day (by default, 6:25am). The contents of the script are:
#!/bin/sh
#
# Script for /etc/cron.daily
#

171

172

Backup

LOGFILE="/root/BACKUP.log"
RSYNC="/usr/bin/rsync"
DEST="[email protected]:backup/$(/bin/hostname)"
OPTS="--rsh=ssh --cvs-exclude --archive --compress "
OPTS=${OPTS}"--delete --delete-excluded --verbose"
INCFILE="/etc/backup.include"
echo "===================================================" >> ${LOGFILE}
date >> ${LOGFILE}
echo "$RSYNC $OPTS --include-from ${INCFILE} / ${DEST}" >> ${LOGFILE}
$RSYNC ${TESTING} $OPTS --include-from ${INCFILE} / ${DEST} >> ${LOGFILE}
date >> ${LOGFILE}
echo "^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^" >> ${LOGFILE}

The file /etc/backup.include might contain:

#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
+

Identify specific file types to exclude

*.mp3
*.rpm
*.deb
*.wav
*.avi
*.mov
*.temp
*.tmp
*.cdr
Exclude paths that contain
.thumbnails
.xvpics
cache
skins
thumbnails
Now specify specific trees to back up
/etc

10.2 Legato NetWorker

+
+
+
+
+
#
#
#
-

173

/home
/root
/usr/local
/var/mail
/var/backups
And exclude everything else
/*

Since this is using ssh (OpenSSH, ssh protocol 2) and it is a cron job (i.e.,
you can not supply a password or passphrase), create a ssh public key for
adding to kayon@caravans authorized keys file:
modena# ssh-keygen -t dsa -N ""
Generating public/private dsa key pair.
Enter file in which to save the key (/root/.ssh/id_dsa):
Your identification has been saved in /root/.ssh/id_dsa.
Your public key has been saved in /root/.ssh/id_dsa.pub.
The key fingerprint is:
ce:b3:e5:82:ab:72:3d:50:2e:96:65:e0:15:a3:4e:de root@velox
modena# scp .ssh/id_dsa.pub [email protected]:.ssh/authorized_keys.n
modena# ssh kayon@caravan
caravan$
caravan$
caravan$
caravan$

cd .ssh
cat authorized_keys.n >> authorized_keys
rm authorized_keys.n
exit

Then the ssh connections will go straight through to kayon@caravan without

the need to supply a password (or passphrase).

10.2

Legato NetWorker

Legatos NetWorker is a network based backup system. A typical situation

is to have the NetWorker server running on a Solaris backup server and
installing the Legato client on your Debian workstation. Your workstation
can then be backed up daily as part of the servers schedule.

174

Backup

To install the client software and the manual pages (available as Red Hat
packages) on your Debian workstation mount the supplied CD-ROM (which
might be called the Solstice Backup 6.1: Servers, Clients and Storage Nodes,
Volume 1 ) and then:
$ wajig rpminstall /cdrom/LINUX86/LGTOclnt/lgtoclnt-6.1-1.i386.rpm
$ wajig rpminstall /cdrom/LINUX86/LGTOman/lgtoman-6.1-1.i386.rpm

A daemon needs to be listening for connections to the workstation from the

backup server. The daemon is called nsrexecd and to set things up in the
Debian way create the following as /etc/init.d/networker:
#!/bin/sh
case "$1" in
start)
echo -n "Starting NetWorker daemons: "
if [ -f /usr/sbin/nsrexecd ]; then
echo -n " nsrexecd"
#
# Allow access from only the specified hosts.
#
/usr/sbin/nsrexecd -s nsrhost
fi
if [ -f /usr/sbin/nsrd ]; then
echo " nsrd"
/usr/sbin/nsrd
fi
echo "."
;;
stop)
echo -n "Stopping NetWorker daemons:"
if [ -f /usr/sbin/nsr_shutdown ]; then
echo -n " nsr_shutdown -a -q"
/usr/sbin/nsr_shutdown -a -q
fi
echo "."
;;
restart|force-reload)
$0 stop
$0 start

10.2 Legato NetWorker

175

;;
*)
echo "usage: basename $0 {start|stop|restart|force-reload}"
exit 1
;;
esac
exit 0
Make sure it is executable:
# chmod a+rx /etc/init.d/networker

Now you can start the daemon and check that it is running (you will get 2
nsrexecds running):
> wajig start networker
> ps uaxxc | grep nsr
root 3275 0.0 0.0 2356 564 ? S Oct10 0:00 nsrexecd
root 3285 0.0 0.0 2496 1020 ? S Oct10 0:00 nsrexecd

To have the daemon start and stop at boot and shutdown time create the
following symbolic links:
#
#
#
#

cd
ln
cd
ln

/etc/rc2.d
-s ../init.d/networker S95networker
/etc/rc0.d
-s ../init.d/networker K05networker

Note that in the init script above reference is made to nsrhost. This is the
host name of the backup server (on the local network it might actually be
called nsrhost). Replace this with the host name of your own backup server.
Now to recover a file run the graphical interface nwrecover.

176

Backup

Chapter 11
Command Line: Bash
When Bash is invoked as an interactive login shell it first reads and executes
commands from the file /etc/profile, if that file exists. After reading that
file, it looks for ~/.bash\_profile, ~/.bash\_login, and ~/.profile, in
that order, and reads and executes commands from the first one that exists
and is readable. When a login shell exits Bash reads and executes commands
from the file ~/.bash\_logout, if it exists.

177

178

Command Line: Bash

Chapter 12
Booting
Booting is simply the process of starting up the system when the computer is
powered on. The computers BIOS (the Basic Input/Output System which
is programmed into the hardware of the computer) takes charge and decides
what is to be done. Usually the BIOS first runs a Power-On-Self-Test (POST)
and then looks for boot information which typically resides in the Master
Boot Record (MBR) of the hard drive (or in general the boot sector of any
available device).
For a GNU/Linux system the MBR contains a boot loader like lilo of grub.
These will give you choices of operating systems to boot whenever you reboot
your computer. To install a boot loader you will either overwrite the master
boot record with one that will start up lilo, or, for MS-Windows/NT, you will
add extra information in a configuration file to identify, for MS-Windows/NT,
how to boot into GNU/Linux. The grub boot loader is quite a bit more
flexible than LILO and is often a good choice.
Lilo is the traditional GNU/Linux boot manager (and silo is the boot manager for Sparc GNU/Linux). A newer alternative that may replace lilo is the
GNU grub (GRand Unified Bootloader). Grub can be set up to automatically identify newly installed kernels, making the installation of new kernels
quite straightforward. Another emerging alternative is xosl, the extended OS
loader.
If you are using a GNU/Linux boot loader such as Grub then the Grub
code will be loaded into memory and executed. Grub takes on the task of
then loading an operating system, such as the GNU/Linux kernel. More
information about the process is available from http://www.tldp.org/LDP/
179

180

Booting

sag/index.html.
In this chapter we also explore issues around dual booting. See Chapter 45
for what happens once the Linux kernel starts booting.

12.1

Lilo

Lilo can be installed into the Master Boot Record (MBR) or as the first
part of some other disk partition. That is, you have the choice of the BIOS
starting up lilo or some other program in your MBR. The MBR program that
cames with Debian is installed when you run the command install-mbr. To
overwrite the part of lilo that is installed on the MBR you simply install
something else in the MBR!
When lilo overwrites the MBR it keeps a copy of the old MBR in case you
find you need to restore it for any reason.

12.1.1

Large Disks

On Velox (Section 4.10.26) lilo fails because the disk is too big. Use lilo
-L (or add lba32 to /etc/lilo.conf), then:
# lilo -L
Added 2.2.18pre21 *
# dd if=/dev/sda of=/root/bootsect.lnx bs=512 count=1
# mcopy /root/bootsect.lnx a:
# lilo -u /dev/sda
# reboot (into NT)

Then as above in Section 12.5 to update the MS-Windows/NT boot loader.

Remember: Be sure to run the lilo command after you update /etc/lilo.
conf or the changes will not be in effect.

12.1.2

Kernel Images

Note that new kernel images go into /boot/vmlinux. The old is put into
/boot/vmlinux.old. Thus you can have a /etc/lilo.conf like:

12.2 GRUB: The Grand Unified Boot Loader

181

image=/vmlinuz
label=linux
root=/dev/hda2
image=/vmlinuz.old
label=linux.old
root=/dev/hda2

Note also that /vmlinux is a symbolic link into the actual file stored in /boot.

12.2

GRUB: The Grand Unified Boot Loader

Debian Pacakges: grub.

Grub (the GRand Unified Bootloader) is a boot loader designed to address the
limitations of lilo. It makes up for numerous deficiencies in many PC BIOSs
while providing full-featured command line and graphical interfaces. Grub
recognises fdisk partitions, can dynamically read Linux ext2fs, and MS-DOS
FAT16 and FAT32 filesystems, and can boot multiboot-compliant kernels
(such as GNU Mach), as well as standard Linux and MSWindows kernels.
A good introduction to grub is available from http://www.gnu.org/software/
grub/grub.html and a good guide to multi-boot setup is http://www.tldp.
org/HOWTO/Multiboot-with-GRUB.html. This latter resource looks at multibooting four operating systems although the information is still useful if all
you want is to multiboot just two.
To switch from lilo to grub simply install it with:
# wajig install grub
# grub-install /dev/hda
# update-grub

This creates a /boot/grub/menu.lst file which you might like to review just
to make sure it looks okay. For most simple situations it should be fine.
For a dual boot with MS-Windows/NT on the first partition and Linux on the
second (like Mint), you may need to change the default locations of Linux.
Look at /boot/grub/menu.lst to see if the following two lines have been
changed:

182

Booting

# kopt=root=/dev/hda1 ro
# groot=(hd0,0)

to
# kopt=root=/dev/hda2 ro
# groot=(hd0,1)

Also, add to the end of the file:

title
rootnoverify
makeactive
chainloader

Windows NT
(hd0,0)
+1

Once it looks okay, run update-grub then reboot!

When installing new kernels you can have the new kernel automatically added
to the menu by adding the following lines to /etc/kernel-img.conf (and
in fact making the file look the same as) :
# Turn off Lilo stuff
do_symlinks = no
do_bootloader = no
# Initrds are OK for GRUB
do_initrd = yes
# Run cool GRUB stuff
postinst_hook = /sbin/update-grub
postrm_hook = /sbin/update-grub

If you start having problems booting, at the grub menu type c to get the
command line. Try:
root (hd0,4)
(/dev/hda5)
kernel /boot/vmlinuz-2.4.18-bf2.4 root=/dev/hda5 ro
boot

12.3 Secure Boot

12.3

183

Secure Boot

Disable booting from floppy in BIOS, password protect LILO.

12.4

Dual Boot: Multiple Operating Systems

Some operating systems, including MS-Windows, provide limited and sometimes inflexible support for multiple choices at boot time. GNU/Linux, on
the other-hand, is well-equipped for booting multiple operating systems as
is its philosophy of not restricting what one can do and encouraging choice
and freedom.
If you want to include MS-Windows on your system it is generally best to
install it first. MS-Windows/NT, for example, has a boot loader that likes to
be in control and MS-Windows/98 is not so clever with multiple operating
systems. Installing them first allows them to have the control they sometimes
demand.
GNU/Linux provides a variety of tools for maintaining multiple operating
systems on your one computer. There are plenty of options. In particular
you can keep MS-Windows and install GNU/Linux as well. This will give
you some sense of security in case GNU/Linux does not meet your needs.
If GNU/Linux becomes your choice you can later remove MS-Windows and
use the recovered disk space for GNU/Linux.
Dual boot is a little misleading since theres really no inherent limit (except
for available resources) to the number of operating systems you might install
on your PC. Generally its two or sometimes three, but could be four or more!
These might include MS-Windows/2000, MS-Windows/XP, and one or two
versions of GNU/Linux!

12.4.1

Dual Boot with MS-Windows/NT

MS-Windows/NT has its own boot loader that likes to be in charge. Thats
okay. One solution is to simply tell the MS-Windows/NT boot loader what to
do if you want to boot into GNU/Linux. This means copying the GNU/Linux
boot code into a file, transferring that file to a MS-Windows/NT partition,
and then adding a menu item for the MS-Windows/NT boot loader to select
the GNU/Linux boot if required. Using grub we dont need to do this as

184

Booting

grub supports chain loaders that allows you to choose to load up the MSWindows/NT boot loader.
If you wish MS-Windows/NT to remain in control, the do the following:
Boot from floppy disk into GNU/Linux. Log in as the root user. Check
where the boot sector of your GNU/Linux partition is:
# rdev /vmlinuz Root device /dev/hdc1
So on this particular machine the boot sector is on the second hard drive
(/dev/hdc).
When installing dont let lilo install a boot loader over the existing master
boot record on your hard drive (usually /dev/hda) unless you wish to wipe
out the original NT For dual boot using the MS-Windows/NT boot loader
see the http://www.tldp.org/HOWTO/Linux+NT-Loader.html Linux with
NT Loader mini HOWTO, but I detail the steps below. Use LILO You then
copy the Linux boot sector to floppy disk, reboot to NT, and copy the Linux
boot sector onto the NT hard disk. The NT boot loader is then told where
to find the file (edit C:\boot.ini). It is all very clearly documented in the
above mini HOWTO. On bootup you can then choose between GNU/Linux
and Windows NT.
# editor /etc/lilo.conf
root=/dev/hdc
boot=/dev/hdc
append="hdc=13424,15,63"
# /sbin/lilo
Warning: /dev/hdc1 is not on the first disk
Added Linux *
# dd if=/dev/hdc1 of=/root/bootsect.lnx bs=512 count=1
# mcopy /root/bootsect.lnx a:
# reboot (into NT)
C:\>copy a:\bootsect.lnx c:\bootsect.lnx
C:\>attrib -s -r c:\boot.ini
C:\>notepad c:\boot.ini
[boot loader]
timeout=30
default=C:\bootsect.lnx
[operating systems]
C:\bootsect.lnx="Linux"
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINNT="Windows NT Workstation ...
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINNT="Windows NT Workstation ...

12.5 MS-Windows/NT or MS-Windows/2000

185

C:\>attrib +s +r c:\boot.ini
C:\>reboot (into Linux)

Note the inclusion of the append line above in my lilo.conf. This ensures
/dev/hdc is found. Otherwise, sometimes it is not.
After you install a new kernel under Linux (either from a kernel-image package on the Debian archive or else your own compiled kernel-image) you will
need to rerun LILO. By default lilo.conf identifies the image to boot as /vmlinuz. This is a symbolic link to, for example, /boot/vmlinuz-2.0.36.

12.4.2

Boot NT from LILO

A simple trick to avoid using the MS-Windows/NT boot loader is to ensure

that the primary MS-Windows/NT partition is less than 2GB in size. Then
when you install GNU/Linux let LILO take control as normal and create
LILO entries for both MS-Windows/NT and GNU/Linux.
In all cases MS-Windows boots from /dev/hda1 (or perhaps /dev/sda1 for
a SCSI disk) which is drive C a primary partition and the active partition.
Add to /etc/lilo.conf:
image=/dev/hda1
label=Windows2000

12.5

MS-Windows/NT or MS-Windows/2000

Set up MS-Windows/NT or MS-Windows/2000 and it will automatically set

up a dual boot for any DOS or MS-Windows/95 system installed. If you
install MS-Windows/95 after installing MS-Windows/NT it will break the
MS-Windows/NT boot mechanism and youll have to repair it.
Next install Linux but dont let lilo install a master boot record (although
in my recipe below I do). Instead have it install a boot record to the root
partition. You probably also want to create a boot floppy so you can boot
your Linux system the first time after installation.
MINI and Velox (Section 4.10.26): After compiling the kernel set up dual
boot. Use LILO to install boot sect in MBR. On MINI /etc/lilo.conf is:

186

Booting

boot=/dev/hda
root=/dev/hda2

Run lilo:
# lilo
Added 2.2.18 *

After running lilo (if you overwrite the master boot recordMBR) you can
no longer boot into MS-Windows/NT immediately. But, lilo stores a backup
MBR in /boot/boot.0300, so dont despair. Copy the lilo boot sector to file
then restore the MS-Windows/NT MBR using lilo -u.
The recipe is:
# dd if=/dev/hda of=/root/bootsect.lnx bs=512 count=1
# mcopy /root/bootsect.lnx a:
# lilo -u /dev/hda
# reboot (into NT)
C:\>copy a:\bootsect.lnx c:\bootsect.lnx
C:\>attrib -s -r c:\boot.ini
C:\>notepad c:\boot.ini
[boot loader]
timeout=5
default=C:\bootsect.lnx
[operating systems]
C:\bootsect.lnx="Debian GNU/Linux"
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINNT="Windows..."
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINNT="Windows..."
C:\>attrib +s +r c:\boot.ini
C:\>reboot (into Linux)

12.6

The Booting From Floppy Alternative

You dont need to use any special boot programs if you are not comfortable
with the process of using a boot loader and modifying the computers master
boot record. Instead, all you need is to boot GNU/Linux from a boot floopy
that will be created when you install GNU/Linux. You simply insert the

12.6 The Booting From Floppy Alternative

187

floppy whenever you boot your computer into GNU/Linux and make sure it
is not inserted if you want to boot into the original operating system. Booting
from floppy is a little slower than booting from hard disk but otherwise
functionally equivalent.

188

Booting

Chapter 13
Cameras
Debian Pacakges: gphoto2

13.1

Setup of HP Photosmart 320

See Section 86.1.1 for information on setting up the camera through a USB
connection.
One time after deleting photos from the camera after mounting the camera
as a USB Mass Storage Device and deleting all photos the camera thought
it had no memory left and yet knew that it had no photos! Had to reformat
the memory!

13.2

Accessing Photos

Use gphoto2:
# gphoto2 --get-all-files

189

190

Cameras

Chapter 14
CD-ROM
A clean install of Debian GNU/Linux is most likely to find your CD-R, CDRW, and DVD drives without the need for you to do anything. If not, then
see Section 14.1. The simplest way to burn a CD is with the Naultilus CD
Creator described in Section 59.3. Other approaches are details below.

14.1

Setup

To make use of a CD-ROM device you need to know what device it is mapped
to. Lets assume it is /dev/hde (but look through the output of the dmesg
command to see which it is). If the device /dev/hde does not exist (for
modern versions of Debian it usually does exist as the devices where identified
at boot) you will need to create it with MAKEDEV as root:
# cd /dev
# ./MAKEDEV hde

As a common convenience /dev/cdrom points to the physical device /dev/

hde using a symbolic link:
# ln -s /dev/hde cdrom

You can then mount any data CD-ROM:

191

192

CD-ROM

# mount /dev/cdrom /cdrom

# ...
# umount /cdrom

If users can not mount the CD-ROM device then they probably dont have the
right permissions. To allow general access to the CD-ROM edit /etc/fstab
to add the following line.
/dev/cdrom

/cdrom

auto

defaults,noauto,users,ro,nohide

0 0

Any user can then mount and unmount /cdrom, irrespective of who mounted
it. Also note that the standard CD-ROM format is iso9660 and the auto in
the above could have been this. However, as DVDs become more common
using auto allows the udf format to also be recognised with no extra effort.
The Gnome mount applets allow a user to mount and unmount the CDROM. Make sure you unmount the CD-ROM before you physically remove
the media. (For most drives the eject button is disabled while the CD is
mounted.)
The various options in the /etc/fstab line above are: ro which mounts the
file system as read-only; users which lets all users mount and unmount the
file-system; noauto which means that the file-system is not automatically
mounted at boot time; and nohide which shows hidden and associated files.
With the above entry in /etc/fstab the command line mounting of the
partition becomes:
# mount /cdrom

By default the CD-ROM device belongs to group disk. For audio CD access
the user will need to be a member of the group to which the device belongs.
But do not add users to the group disk because this will give them read/write
access to raw devices for all disks meaning that they can directly read the
bits off the hard disk and effectively ignore file system permissions. Instead
change the Unix group of /dev/hde from disk to cdrom and add users who
need access to the drive to the group cdrom:
# chgrp cdrom /dev/hde
# adduser kayon cdrom

14.1 Setup

193

Next time user kayon logs on they will be in group cdrom in addition to
the other groups they were already in. They will then have access to the
CD-ROM device.

14.1.1

CD Writer as a SCSI Device

CD writing software for GNU/Linux (prior to kernel 2.6) targets SCSI devices, so you will need to install appropriate drivers so that your ATAPI IDE
CD-RW (and your CD-R/DVD if you wish) pretends to be a SCSI device.
It will then be identified as /dev/scd0 rather than /dev/hdd.
Turning a IDE CD-RW into a SCSI CD-RW is pretty straightforward. First
ensure the appropriate kernel modules are loaded (you need sg and ide-scsi ).
Use the command lsmod to list the modules currently loaded in the kernel,
and the commands modconf or insmod to load the modules. If you already
have the drive under the control of ide-cd then you need to get rid of it (as
below).
You can ensure these happen at boot time, and the appropriate dependencies
between kernel modules are identified, by creating /etc/modutils/cdrw:
#
# As suggested in CD Writing HOWTO
#
# This assumes IDE-CD is a module rather than copmiled into kernel.
#
options ide-cd ignore="hdc hdd"
alias scd0 sr_mode
pre-install sg
modprobe ide-scsi
pre-install sr_mod
modprobe ide-scsi
pre-install ide-scsi
modprobe ide-cd

Note here that we are telling the IDE CD module to ignore the disk which
we want the ide-scsi module to handle. The ide-scsi module wont touch any
disks already being driven. Change the hdd to the appropriate one of hda,
hdb, hdc, or hdd. To check which one to ignore look through the output of
the dmesg command for the CD-RW line which identifies the driver, which
on Altrop (Section 4.10.20) is:
hdd: ATAPI 40X CD-ROM CD-R/RW drive, 2048kB Cache

194

CD-ROM

Thus ide-cd should ignore hdd. If you want all CD drives to be SCSI (useful
for some cases like cdrdao when asked to copy a disk) then dont include
either of the lines that mention ide-cd!
Now update the modules.conf file with:
# update-modules

Finally, tell the kernel to load the modules at boot time by adding the following to /etc/modules
sr_mod
sg
ide-cd

You will now probably need to reboot to have the new configuration take
effect. Also, dont include ide-cd if you want all your drives recognised as
SCSI.
Once set up cdrecord can be used to identify the SCSI device on which the
CD writer sits:
For example, on Mint (Section 4.10.27) the device is 0,1,0. The LG CD-RW
CED-8080B 1.04 on this host is identified using:
# cdrecord -scanbus
scsibus0:
0,0,0 0) _NEC
DV-5700A
3.07 Removable CD-ROM
0,1,0 1) LG
CD-RW CED-8080B 1.04 Removable CD-ROM

On Velox (Section 4.10.26) the device is 2,0,0. The SONY CD-RW CRX140E
on this host is identified using:
# cdrecord -scanbus
scsibus0:
0,0,0
0) QUANTUM ATLAS10K2-TY184L DA40 Disk
scsibus2:
2,0,0 200) SONY CD-RW CRX140E 1.0n Removable CD-ROM

14.1 Setup

195

Altrop (Section 4.10.20) and Velox (Section 4.10.26) have DVD drives (which
remain as IDE devices as /dev/hdc) and a CD-RW writer (which with the
above set up becomes /dev/scd0). Mint (Section 4.10.27) also has two drives
but both are run as SCSI devices.
If you are having problems with CD drives being found try adding ide-probe-modbefore
ide-scsi in /etc/modules.
A line that someone suggested to be added to lilo.conf:
append = "apm=on apm=power-of idebus=N hdc=ide-scsi hdd=ide-scsi max_scsi_luns=1"

Ive not used this.

14.1.2

Docking Station CD-ROM

Incx (Section ??), a laptop, has a CD-ROM located in the Docking Station.
You will need a recent version of the kernel (at least post 2.2.15) so that it
will be recognised on boot, displaying the following message:
CMD646: IDE controller on PCI bus 01 dev 28
CMD646: chipset revision 0x03, MultiWord DMA Force Limited
CMD646: 100% native mode on irq 10
ide2: BM-DMA at 0xfcc0-0xfcc7, BIOS settings: hde:pio, hdf:pio
ide3: BM-DMA at 0xfcc8-0xfccf, BIOS settings: hdg:pio, hdh:pio
...
hde: TOSHIBA CD-ROM XM-1802B, ATAPI CDROM drive
...
ide2 at 0xfcf8-0xfcff,0xfcf2 on irq 10
..
hde: ATAPI 24X CD-ROM drive, 128kB Cache
Uniform CDROM driver Revision: 2.56

14.1.3

LG CED-8080B Problems

On Mint (Section 4.10.27) this hardware seems to have some bad firmware.
Others report a similar problem and yet others say they have no problem at
all. If I knew how to obtain an update to the firmware and how to install
it, no doubt it would all work! The problem is only for writing TAO. DAO
seems just fine.

196

CD-ROM

# cdrecord -v speed=8 dev=0,1,0 -pad -audio -dummy *.wav

...
Track 01:
0 of 29 MB written.cdrecord:
Input/output error. write_g1: scsi sendcmd: retryable error
CDB: 2A 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 1B 00
status: 0x2 (CHECK CONDITION)
Sense Bytes: 70 00 05 00 00 00 00 0A 00 00 00 00 64 00 00 00
Sense Key: 0x5 Illegal Request, Segment 0
Sense Code: 0x64 Qual 0x00 (illegal mode for this track) Fru 0x0
Sense flags: Blk 0 (not valid)
...
cdrecord:
Input/output error. mode select g1: scsi sendcmd: retryable error
CDB: 55 10 00 00 00 00 00 00 10 00
status: 0x2 (CHECK CONDITION)
Sense Bytes: 70 00 05 00 00 00 00 0A 00 00 00 00 24 00 00 00
Sense Key: 0x5 Illegal Request, Segment 0
Sense Code: 0x24 Qual 0x00 (invalid field in cdb) Fru 0x0
Sense flags: Blk 0 (not valid)

Bill Unruh ([email protected]), posting on comp.os.linux.misc in January 2001, had the same problem with a 8080B compatible and mentioned
that it works okay in DAO mode but not TAO. This is expected to be a
transient problem as the driver catches up with the drive.

14.1.4

cdrecord Problem: Cannot . . . Bytes on /dev/zero

Under Debian, cdrecord version 1.10a18 was compiled with kernel version
2.4.x which has some incompatibilities with kernel version 2.2.x, resulting in
an error in trying to mmap on /dev/zero.
The typical scenario is:
# cdrecord -dummy -v dev=2,0,0 -data test.iso
Cdrecord 1.10a18 (i686-pc-linux-gnu)
Copyright (C) 1995-2001 Jorg Schilling
TOC Type: 1 = CD-ROM
cdrecord: Invalid argument.
Cannot get mmap for 4198400 Bytes on /dev/zero.

and again:

14.2 CD Software

197

# mkisofs -r cdr/ | cdrecord speed=8 dev =0,1,0 tsize=281056s -data Cdrecord 1.10a18 (i686-pc-linux-gnu) Copyright (C) 1995-2001 Jorg Schilling
cdrecord: Invalid argument. Cannot get mmap for 4198400 Bytes on /dev/zero.

The solution is simply to recompile it:

$ wajig build cdrecord

or
$ wajig build cdrtools

Alternatively, install an older version of cdrecord that might be available on

your machine in the archive of downloads:
$ wajig install /var/cache/apt/archive/cdrecord_3%3a1.9-1_i386.deb

14.2

CD Software

Once you have set up your CD-R, CD-RW, or DVD driver you may be
interested in packages like cdrecord, cdrdao, mkisofs, cdmaster, and videodvdrip.

14.2.1

cdrdao

The cdrdao package provides, by far, the simplest interface for burning CDs.
By default cdrdao must be run as root, which is best set up for users through
the use of sudo. If you trust all with access to your machine the you may
want to allow anyone to run the program:
# chmod u+s /usr/bin/cdrdao

The first step is then to find out where on the scsi bus your CD writer is and
cdrdao does this with:

198

CD-ROM

$ cdrdao scanbus

Then create /home/kayon/.cdrdao, or /etc/default/cdrdao, with the following contents (replacing the 0,0,0 with your SCSI device address as identified by cdrdao scanbus, and the driver with the appropriate one for your
CD writer - see the cdrdao man pages):
write_device: "0,0,0"
write_driver: "generic-mmc"

The following cdrdao commands can be specified on the command line without the need to identify the device each time:
show-toc
toc-info
toc-size
read-toc
read-cd
read-cddb
show-data
read-test
disk-info
msinfo
unlock
blank
scanbus
simulate
write
copy

14.2.2

prints out toc and exits

prints out short toc-file summary
prints total number of blocks for toc
create toc file from audio CD
create toc and rip audio data from CD
contact CDDB server and add data as CD-TEXT to toc-file
prints out audio data and exits
reads all audio files and exits
shows information about inserted medium
shows multi session info, output is suited for scripts
unlock drive after failed writing
blank a CD-RW
scan for devices
shortcut for write --simulate
writes CD
copies CD

gcdmaster

Gcdmaster provides a Gnome GUI for cdrdao. For cdrdao be sure to create
the following link:
# cd /dev
# ln -s cdrw cdrecorder

But gcdmaster failed for some reason (after cdrdao read the CD and then
requested a RETURN!) and so why not just use the command line to copy
a CD as described below!

14.3 CD Audio

14.2.3

199

xcdroast

This might be okay as a CD burner but gcdmaster seems to be easier to use.

Note the following message that comes from xcdroast:
I have installed xcdroast normally, so only root can run it. If
you want non-root users to run it you can make it setuid. If you
have suidmanager installed and use suidregister to make xcdroast
setuid you will not need to do this again when you upgrade
xcdroast.
Please read /usr/doc/xcdroast/README.nonroot.gz before making xcdroast setuid.

14.2.4

MP3 Encoders

MP3 encoders are entwined in legal issues that are too complex to get into
here. Recording your personal CDs to listen to the music youve already paid
for appears reasonable.
The encoder of choice is call lame. The Debian package is available at
http://hive.me.gu.edu.au/ and the source is also at http://www.sulaco.
org/mp3/.
The issue with MP3 is that the MP3 codec is patented by Fraunhofer in
Germany, and a license is required to use it. To address this a free audio
format has been developed called Ogg Vorbis. There are many utilities that
will rip CDs to Ogg Vorbis format.

14.3

CD Audio

14.3.1

Duplicate Audio CD Using cdrdao

Because Mint (Section 4.10.27) has no working cdrecord (at least for recording
audio) we need to use cdrdao. The cdrdao package can be used to duplicate
both data and audio CD-ROMs.
To directly record an audio CD (or a data CD) from the SCSI device then
burn it on the same device using cdrdao, add the following to /home/kayon/.cdrdao

200

CD-ROM

(replace the 0,1,0 with your SCSI device address as identified by cdrecord
-scanbus, and the driver with the appropriate one for your CD writer):
write_device: "0,1,0"
write_driver: "generic-mmc"

Then:
$ cdrdao copy

Youll be asked to insert a new CD-R once the reading is complete and it is
ready to write.
The use of the .cdrdao file is simply to avoid having to specify the command
line options of cdrdao which require --device and --driver.
If you have both a CD drive (or perhaps a DVD drive) and a CD writer both
as SCSI devices (see Section 14.1) then you can use cdrdao to record direct
from the reader to the writer:
$ cdrdao copy

To do a copy step-by-step, specifying the device and driver explicitly and

using cdrdao you can do the following:
$ cdrdao read-cd
--device 0,1,0 --driver generic-mmc audiocd.toc
$ cdrdao read-cddb --device 0,1,0 --driver generic-mmc audiocd.toc
$ cdrdao write
--device 0,1,0 --driver generic-mmc audiocd.toc

The read-cddb will look up the CDDB web database to find track information for the audio CD and generates a suitable table of contents that will be
written to the CD-R if the CD writer supports CD-TEXT.
To just create a table of contents for an audio disk:
$ cdrdao read-toc --device 0,1,0 --driver generic-mmc audiocd.toc

To add CD-TEXT to the TOC from CDDB (not supported on many CD

writers, including the LG)

14.3 CD Audio

201

$ cdrdao read-cddb --device 0,1,0 --driver generic-mmc audiocd.toc

The cd image is assumed to be in data.wav. Read the image (this command

from gcdmaster):
$ cdrdao read-cd --remote -v0 --read-raw --device 0,1,0
--driver generic-mmc --paranoia-mode 3
--datafile audiocd.bin audiocd.toc

14.3.2

Duplicate Audio CD Using cdrecord

On Altrop (Section 4.10.20) and Festival (Section 4.10.11) we can use cdrecord
(which fails on Mint (Section 4.10.27)) to duplicate an audio CD in Disk
At Once mode. The SCSI device for the CD-RW is 1,1,0 on Altrop (Section 4.10.20) and 0,0,0 and Festival (Section 4.10.11).
First extract the audio from the source CD into individual WAV files:
# cdda2wav -v255 -D /dev/hdc -B -Owav

Record the individual WAV files to CD:

# cdrecord -v speed=8 dev=2,0,0 -dao -useinfo *.wav

Using cdrecord to record Track At Once mode (with a resulting 2 second gap
between each track)
# cdrecord -v speed=4 dev=0,1,0 -pad -audio -dummy *.wav

14.3.3

Audio CD From Collection of MP3s

We can use cdrdao to create an audio CD from a colleciton of mp3 files. On

Mint (Section 4.10.27) this is the way to do it since cdrecord fails. The only
complication is the need for a table of contents file, but it is easy to produce.
There are issues to do with gaps but this can safely be ignored. Either wav
or cdr files can be written by cdrdao to a CD-R disk.
Put the following into /usr/local/bin/mkcdrtoc:

202

CD-ROM

#!/bin/sh
for i in *.mp3; do
if [ ! -e $(basename $i .mp3).cdr ]; then
mpg123 --cdr - $i > $(basename $i .mp3).cdr;
fi
done
printf "CD_DA\n" > disk.toc
for i in *.cdr; do
printf "TRACK AUDIO\nFILE \"$i\" 0\n" >> disk.toc
done
printf "\n========== disk.toc ==================\n"
cat disk.toc
printf "========================================\n"
printf "\n>>>>>>>> Now run \"cdrdao write disk.toc\" <<<<<<<<<<\n"

Then the following two steps will convert all mp3 files in the current directory
to cdr, then burn them to a CD-R or CD-RW. If you want to change the
order of the tracks, simply edit disk.toc.
> mkcdrtoc
> cdrdao write disk.toc

We can alternatively use cdrecord:

> for i in *.mp3; do mpg123 --cdr - $i > $(basename $i .mp3).cdr; done
> cdrecord -v dev=0,1,0 -audio -pad *.cdr

14.4

Grip: CD Audio Extraction

Debian Pacakges: Package[]grip

Recording an audio CD to your hard disk allows you to listen to your music
(which you have presumably purchased in order to listen to) without having
to tie up the CD-ROM drive. To do this first extract the tracks from your
audio CD (they are WAV files). These will take up to 600MB for each CD,
quite a bit of hard disk storage, especially if you have a large CD collection.
This is where MP3 and OGG come in. A 600MB audio CD can be encoded
as a 50MB OGG file, allowing the storage of the equivalent of 12 WAV CDs
in the space of a single DATA CD with OGG.

14.4 Grip: CD Audio Extraction

203

Figure 14.1: grip-tracks

Debian provides grip to handle this process for you.

Grip is able to obtain information about your CD from the Free CD Database
automatically over the web. This information includes the tack details and is
displayed under the Tracks tab (see Figure 14.1). You may need to ensure the
configuration for the Free CD Database server is set upsee Figure 14.2 for
an example configuration. If the CD information is already available locally
(because grip or some other CD utility has previously updated the database
of disks in ~/.cddb) then it will be displayed.
The process of reading the WAV tracks from an audio CD is called ripping.
A popular GNU/Linux ripper is cdparanoia and Grip includes cdparanoia so
you do not need to install the package separately. Also supported are the
separately installed rippers cdparanoia and cdda2wav. See Figure 14.3 for an
example configuration.
The process of converting the WAV encoding to OGG is called encoding
and again there are many alternatives. For MP3 encoding supported Debian
packages include lame, bladeenc, l3enc, xingmp3enc, mp3encode, and gogo.
The lame encoder is a good choice. Once again, see Figure 14.3 for an example
configuration.
Grip will rip and encode a CD in separate processes allowing the encoding to
happen while the next track is being ripped.

204

CD-ROM

Figure 14.2: Here grip is configured to query the Free CD database server to
find information about the CD. If this query fails then the non-free database
is searched. If the CD information is found in the non-free database and
not in the free database you will given the opportunity to update the free
database with the information.

Figure 14.3: Configuring grip is straightforward. This setup uses cdparanoia

to read the Audio CD data and lame to convert the resulting WAV files to
MP3. Note also that a track number (%t) has been added to the file name.

14.4 Grip: CD Audio Extraction

205

Now we are ready to rip and encode an audio CD. Insert your CD into the
CD-ROM drive.
The Tracks tab should list the available tracks. If what you get is a list
like that in Figure 14.4 then for some reason the information is not available
(probably because you are not connected to the internet or the CD is not
know to the databases). In this case, enter the information yourself. This is
useful because the information is then recorded in the MP3 file as the ID3
tag. This is used by various MP3 players to display track information. To
enter the information yourself click on the Toggle disk editor button (the
pencil icon along the bottom row of buttons). This will open up an area
for you to enter the relevant information (see Figure 14.4). Once you have
enetered the information be sure to share it by clicking on the Submit disc
info button with the letter icon.

Figure 14.4: Grip is unable to find the information for this disk.
Next select the tracks you wish to encode. Click in the Rip column heading
to select all tracks. Go to the Rip tab and click on the Rip+Encode button.
Sit back and wait. This process takes quite a while and is quite resource

206

CD-ROM

intensive (so your games may be slow while you wait). The progress bars on
the Rip tab show how things are going.
For each CD a playlist is created in ~/mp3 and for each track two files are
created, usually somehwhere in ~/mp3 as well, depending on the settings
in Figure 14.3. You set the location of the playlist in the Config tab under MP3 Options (where you can also tell grip to automatically delete the
temporary WAV files). The playlist is identified as an M3U file. The example configuration places both the temporary WAV file and the MP3 file
in ~/mp3/\%a/\%d/\%t.\%n.wav and ~/mp3/\%a/\%d/\%t.\%n.mp3 respectively. That is, a folder is created having the same name as the artist (%a),
and a sub-folder of this having the disc name (%d). Into this sub-folder all of
the tracks are stored with names consisting of track number (%t) and track
name (%n). So, for example, you might have:
~/mp3/pink_floyd/a_saucerful_of_secrets/04.corporal_clegg.mp3

This scheme works quite nicely but of course use whatever scheme suits you.
If there are problems accessing the CD make sure /dev/sg0 has the correct
permissions:

# ls -l /dev/sg0
crw------1 root
root
21,
0 Mar 15
# chgrp cdrom /dev/sg0
changed group of /dev/sg0 to cdrom
# chmod g+rw /dev/sg0
mode of /dev/sg0 changed to 0660 (rw-rw----)

14.5

2002 sg0

Copy a CD image to Disk

> dd if=/dev/cdrom of=/tmp/cdimage.iso

14.6

CD Data

Nautilus provides by far the simplest approach to burning data CDs. See
Section 59.3 for details.

14.6 CD Data

14.6.1

207

Intermediate Image

First build the iso9660 image:

$ mkisofs -r -o cdimage.raw /home

Check that it looks okay:

$ mount -t iso9660 -o ro,loop=/dev/loop0 cdimage.raw /mnt/tmp

$ ls /mnt/tmp
$ umount /mnt/tmp

Write the CD:

# cdrecord -v speed=8 dev=1,1,0 -data cdimage.raw

# cdrecord -v speed=8 dev=0,1,0 -data cdimage.raw
# cdrecord -v speed=16 dev=0,0,0 -data cdimage.raw

14.6.2

Altrop
Mint
Festival

No Intermediate Image

The output of mkisofs can be fed directly into cdrecord if the CPU is fast
enough (better than 400MHz). Note that the default installation requires
cdrecord to be run as root.
The first step is to determine the image size:

# IMG_SIZE=$(mkisofs -R -q -print-size /home 2>&1 | sed -e "s/.* = //")

# echo $IMG_SIZE

Then write the data CD:

# [ "0$IMG_SIZE" -ne 0 ] &&

> mkisofs -r /home |
> cdrecord speed=8 dev=0,1,0 tsize=${IMG_SIZE}s -data -

208

14.6.3

CD-ROM

Direct Copy Data CD from /dev/cdrom to SCSI

burner

This works for Altrop (Section 4.10.20), Mint (Section 4.10.27) and Festival
(Section 4.10.11) and only for root (unless cdrecord is configured to install
setuid ), by default.
# cdrecord -v dev=1,1,0 speed=8 -isosize /dev/cdrom
# cdrecord -v dev=0,1,0 speed=8 -isosize /dev/cdrom
# cdrecord -v dev=0,0,0 speed=16 -isosize /dev/cdrom

14.6.4

(Altrop)
(Mint)
(Festival)

Copy Video CD

To copy a Video CD (these use audio CD disksthe common CD-R) the

following should do the trick:
$ cdrdao read-cd --paranoia-mode 2 --read-raw data.toc

There are other tools including readvcd, vcdimager, and vcdgear.

14.7

CD Mixed Data Audio

With the following disk.toc:

CD_ROM
TRACK MODE1
DATAFILE "cdimage.raw"
TRACK AUDIO
FILE "drumnbass.wav" 0

was able to write a CD with 2 tracks, the first being data and the second
being audio. The audio can be played on a CD. The CD can be mounted to
read data. Swapping order on Mint (Section 4.10.27) did not allow the CD
to be mounted? Perhaps need newer kernel? But first audio track could be
played okay.

14.8 CD-RW

14.8

209

CD-RW

Rewritable CDs (identified as CD-RWs) can, obviously, be rewritten. While

they remain a little more expensive that CD-Rs (perhaps twice the cost) they
can be reused many times. But note that not all home audio CD players can
read CD-RWs. One that can is the Marantz CD5000.
Burning a CD-RW is essentially no different to burning a CD-R. In fact
cdrdao identified the CD-RW correctly and dropped its recoding speed down
to 4x to suit the CD-RW, all automatically.
To re-record the CD-RW you need to blank it first. With cdrdao this is done
with:
> cdrdao blank

Although the command returns quite quickly the blanking process continues
for quite some time while it performs a long write (you can instead do a minimal blank with the option --blank-mode minimal. After this has completed
you can burn to the CD-RW as if it were a new blank CD-R.

14.9

Multi Session CDs

First burn:
> mkisofs -r -o cdimage.raw files
> cdrecord --scanbus
> cdrecord -v -multi speed=4 dev=0,0,0 -data cdimage.raw

You may want to add some other options to mkisofs. Check out:
> mkisofs

-pad -l -r -J -v -V "CD Label" -b base/boot.img

-c base/boot.cat -hide -rr -moved -o cdimage.raw files

Second burn:
$ NEXTTRACK=cdrecord -msinfo dev=0,0,0
$ mkisofs -r -o cdimage.raw -C $NEXTTRACK -M /dev/cdrom files
$ cdrecord -v -multi speed=4 dev=0,0,0 -data cdimage.raw

210

14.10

CD-ROM

CD Labels

The package cdlabelgen provides a useful tool to quickly put together covers
for CD:
$ cdlabelgen -c "Debian GNU/Linux" -s "Version 2.2r2 (potato) netinst" \
-D -e openlogo-nd.eps -S 0.8 -f contents.list | gv -

The main title is Debian GNU/Linux with subtitle Version 2.2r2 (potato)
netinst. No date will be written, but the front cover will include the image
from the file openlogo-nd.eps, scaled by 0.8. The back cover will contain
the text from contents.list. Once it looks okay in Ghostview (gv) replace
the gv - with lpr.

Chapter 15
Chinese
Get chinese fonts showing up in Epiphany: install ttf-arphic-bsmi00lp ttfarphic-bkai00mp ttf-arphic-gbsn00lp ttf-arphic-gkai00mp x-ttcidfont-conf
Then restart xserver!

211

212

Chinese

Chapter 16
ChRoot: Multiple Distributions
The chroot allows multiple installs on the one machine without rebooting! In
this way you can then keep an older stable release that some applications
might require, and run those applications as in:
sudo chroot /path/to/chroot /bin/sh
Set it up with (from http://www.debian.org/doc/manuals/reference/
ch-tips.en.html#s-chroot):
# cd /
# mkdir /sid-root
# debootstrap sid /sid-root http://ftp.debian.org/debian/
... watch it download the whole system
# echo "proc-sid /sid-root/proc proc none 0 0" >> /etc/fstab
# mount proc-sid /sid-root/proc -t proc
# cp /etc/hosts /sid-root/etc/hosts
# chroot /sid-root /bin/bash
# apt-setup # set-up /etc/apt/sources.list
# vi /etc/apt/sources.list # point the source to unstable
# dselect # you may use aptitude, install mc and vim :-)

I tried with a local mirror but failed:

# debootstrap sid /sid-root http://mirror.aarnet.edu.au/debian/
I: Retrieving http://mirror.aarnet.edu.au/debian/pool/main/g/
glibc/libc6_2.3.2-4_i386.deb
E: Couldnt download libc6

213

214

ChRoot: Multiple Distributions

Chapter 17
Clock: An Explanation
There are two clocks in your computer: a system clock and a hardware
clock. The system clock is maintained by the running operating system
(Debian). It is also said to be maintained by the kernel. The date command
talks to the system clock. The hardware clock is part of the actual hardware
of the computer and is usually battery backed up. The hwclock command
talks to the hardware clock.

17.0.1

Timezones

With a dual boot system it is often best to set the clock to local time. If, on
the otherhand, GNU/Linux is the only operating system installed then using
GMT (Greenwich Mean Time) is recommended as the standard approach for
Unix.
To change the timezone use the tzconfig command. You also have to change
the line in /etc/default/rcS which states the CMOS clock configuration.

17.0.2

System Clock Drift

Some system clocks do not run all that accurately. Some hints on dealing
with clock problems can be found in the Clock mini HOWTO at http://
www.tldp.org/HOWTO/Clock.html, but the hwclock and adjtimex manual
pages tend to be an easier read!
Be warned though, the Debian suggestion is not to fiddle with hwclock. It is
215

216

Clock: An Explanation

highly recommended that you install the ntp-simple package (to run a daemon
that checks regularly to keep your clock in sync) and/or ntpdate (to update
your clock at each boot or to manually run a command to update your clock)
to keep your clock accurate. These are discussed in more detail below.
If you install both ntp-simple and ntpdate and you manually set up cron to
run ntpdate every hour then you will probably receive email every hour to
tell you that ntpdate cant get the ntp socket (because the ntpd daemon
from ntp-simple is probably using it!):

6 Oct 09:08:02 ntpdate[23856]: the NTP socket is in use, exiting

Just install one of them!

Using NTP
The Network Time Protocol (NTP) daemon provided by the ntp-simple package is by far the easiest way to manage the accuracy of your clock, particularly
if you are connected to the internet (even if only intermittently).
The ntp-simple daemon (ntpd) effectively sets the cock by speeding it up or
slowing it down depending on its natural drift so that it gets in sync and
stays there. This avoids a sudden shock to the system with a dramatic
change to the time, although mostly the system can handle it.
The primary configuration required is to identify an NTP server. Look at
the lists at http://www.eecis.udel.edu/~ntp/, for example.
After running ntpd for a little while your clock will be set to an accurate time
and will maintain an accurate time. However, if the amount of difference is
too great then ntpd will not modify the clock. After setting up ntp-simple
you can install ntpdate and on install (and reboot) the clock will be updated
to the correct time according to the server you have chosen for ntp-simple.
With ntp-simple installed on one of your hosts, Velox (Section 4.10.26) for
example, on the local network you can now use Velox (Section 4.10.26) as a
ntp server simply by installing ntp on each machine and pointing them to
Velox (Section 4.10.26) as the server.

217
ntpdate
If you only have irregular access to the Internet then ntpdate is useful. The
package provides the ntpdate command to query an NTP server and to
update your clock. You can do this manually as you see fit with:
$ ntpdate ntp.ktware.com

The advantage is that you will not have regular net transmissions as with
the NTP server. This could save you up to 4MB per day. This could also be
done as a cron job, for example.
For irregular access through a modem using PPP though, a good idea is to
create a script file in /etc/ppp/ip-up.d called ntpdate containing:
#!/bin/sh
#invoke ntpdate to set time from system clock
if [ -x /usr/sbin/ntpdate ]; then
/usr/sbin/ntpdate -s -t 5 ntp.ktware.com
/sbin/hwclock --systohc
fi

Make sure the script is executable:

# chmod a+rx /etc/ppp/ip-up.d/ntpdate

Then each time you connect the local clock will be synchronised with the
NTP server.

17.0.3

chrony

For dialup connections the suggestion is to use the chrony package. This does
the same thing as ntp but works well with a dialup. The default installation
installs the necessary script and the default configuration works out of the
box (but you should change the default timeserver to one near you).

218

Clock: An Explanation

Using adjtimex
The adjtimex command can be used to counter systematic drift in the system
clock. It is tricky to fine tune, and it is recommended that you use ntp
instead if you can.
To set the system clock do:
# date -s "13 Jun 2001 10:10:00"

Then monitor how the system (and hardware) clock varies over 24 hours.
The adjtimex command communicates with the kernel to change the number
of ticks in a day (default is 10000 which corresponds to about 8.64 seconds
per tick) and the frequency (default is 0) of the system clock. In Debian
you can use the command adjtimexconfig to automatically tune the tick
and frequency to match the accuracy of the hardware clock (assumed to be
accurate) and so that the change has effect on each boot. Alternatively,
override the automatic settings by editting /etc/adjtimex.conf.
INDY The system clock was losing (very) roughly 1 second per hour. (The
hardware clock seemed to lose nearly one second each day.) Not too much
on the face of it but considering the machine is rarely rebooted this can
become a significant drift. For this machine a tick of 10002 and a frequency
of 4000000 set the clock accurately:
# adjtimex --tick 10002 --freq 4000000

On an old 486/DX66 the system clock was gaining about 22 seconds in 24

hours and the hardware clock gaining about 10 seconds in 24 hours. Removing 3 ticks had the dramatic effect of making the system clock pretty
accurate.
# adjtimex --tick=9997

Velox (Section 4.10.26) The system clock was losing about 1 second every
hour (16 seconds in 24 hours). The hardware clock was very accurate as best
I could tell. I Installed adjtimex then:
# adjtimexconfig

219
This claims to adjust the ticks for the system clock against the hardware clock
which is assumed to be, and generally is, accurate. However, after 24 hours
the system clock was still about 5 seconds slow. I noticed the hwclock was
also a few seconds out after a weekend (fix that another time). I decided to
set the parameters myself by editting /etc/adjtimex.conf. Before I started
it contained:
TICK=10000
FREQ=1653461

At 1pm, 4 Jun, reset the clocks and reset the adjustment:

# adjtimex --tick 10002 --freq 0

See how it goes. If it works then update /Path/etc/adjtimex.conf to match

this.
At 4pm, 5 Jun, the clock was 10 seconds slow? Reset the clock and try (in
the absence of understanding):
# adjtimex --tick 10002 --freq 4000000

At 2pm, 6 Jun (22 hours later) the clock was 9 seconds too fast. So lets half
the freq and see where that gets us. Really need to set things back to base
(tick 10000 and freq 0) and do the actual calculations for the value.
# adjtimex --tick 10002 --freq 2000000

17.0.4

Hardware Clock Drift

The hwclock command provides the interface to the hardware clock. If you
are wanting to ensure the correct time then with a default Debian set up it
is recommended that you use ntp instead if you can. When you reboot the
system will save the current correct time to the hardware clock.
Anyhow, the --adjust option of the hwclock command checks information
stored in the configuration file /etc/adjtime and makes an actual correction
to the time stored in the hardware clock to account for the drift that it (the

220

Clock: An Explanation

hwclock utility) has been monitoring. (Each time you set the hardware clock
with the hwclock command the current time is compared to the previous
time it was corrected to determine the amount of drift.) Thus, when setting
the system clock from the hardware clock it is advisable to do the following:
# hwclock --adjust
# hwclock --hctosys

When updating the hardware clock from an accurate system clock do:
# hwclock --systohc

Chapter 18
Commercial
While the focus is on free systems in this book it would be unfair not to
include some great commercial software. Free open source software may not
always serve your needs. You have two options: implement (or pay someone
to implement) what you need yourself on top of the base already provided by
the open source software; or buy an off-the-shelf solution. The former will
give you plenty of kudos in the GNU/Linux world, but the latter might be
more practical.
Here we do not delve into the individual products, but rather catalogue what
is available.

18.1

Corel WPO Office Alternative

GNU/Linux thrives on the idea of independent, yet collaborative, tools. Micorsoft Office, on the other-hand is an integrated monolithic offering. Such
tools are also available for Linux, commercially, and the premier offering is
Corels WPO.

221

222

Commercial

Figure 18.1: Corels Word Perfect Office

Chapter 19
Configuration
19.1

System Configuration in /etc

/etc/debian\_version
Contains the debian version.
/etc/exports
This file contains information to tell NFS (Network File Systems) which
partitions are to be shared with other systems.
/etc/fstab
This file lists filesystems, possibly spread over multiple drives, partitions, and
remote hosts, that can be mounted. At boot time, partitions identifed as auto
mount will be auto mounted. Other convenient mount rules for CD-ROMS,
DVDs, Floppy drives, etc., are usually also included.
/etc/hosts.allow
This file, and its companion /etc/hosts.deny control access to your computer. The file /etc/hosts.allow lists hosts that are allowed to access the
system. If empty then no restrictions apply. Similarly, /etc/hosts.deny is
a list of hosts that are not allowed to access the system.
/etc/inetd.conf
This file is the internet server configuration database and is used to identify
services like ftp and ssh which should be started. As a security measure it is
223

224

Configuration

advisable to comment services which you do not use.

/etc/inittab
This file specifies the processes that are started at bootup and at different
runlevels.
/etc/motd
This file (message of the day) is displayed when a user logs on.
/etc/passwd
This file contains user information including login name, password, default
shell, and home directory. Because this file is readable (and needs to be
readable) by everyone on the system, the password field usually contains an
x indicating that the encrypted password is actually located in /etc/shadow,
which is only readable by the root user. See Section 66.1 for details of sharing
this information across multiple hosts.
/etc/profile
This file contains common user configurations for interactive shells, such as
global environment variables.
/etc/services
This file contains a list of network services and identifies which port a service
mentioned in /etc/inetd.conf will use.
/etc/securetty
This file lists the terminals (ttys) on which root is allowed to login.
/etc/shells
This file contains the pathnames of all shells installed in the system. A user
is allowed to select one of these shells as their default login shell.

Chapter 20
CRON: Regular Tasks
All Unix systems have a mechanism for running certain applications regularly.
The mechanism is through a daemon called crond.
Debian uses cron in a very neat and stylised fashion. Scripts to be run
regularly are maintained in one of /etc/cron.daily/, /etc/cron.weekly/,
or /etc/cron.monthly/. The entries in /etc/crontab then simply run any
scripts in these directories on a regular basis. The daily scripts, by default,
are run at 6:25am each day. The weekly scripts are run each Sunday at
6:47am and the monthly scripts are run at 6:52am on the first day of each
month. The default /etc/crontab essentially contains just the following
lines:
25 6
47 6
52 6

* * *
* * 7
1 * *

root
root
root

test -e /usr/sbin/anacron || run-parts --report /etc/cron.daily

test -e /usr/sbin/anacron || run-parts --report /etc/cron.weekly
test -e /usr/sbin/anacron || run-parts --report /etc/cron.monthly

The first line is read as: 25 minutes past 6am on every day of the month and
every month of the year and every day of the week as user root run the rest of
the line. The rest of the line tests to see whether anacron is installed and
if not runs the scripts found in /etc/cron.daily/. If anacron is installed
then it is used instead to ensure the scripts are run. The anacron package is
a replacement for cron that does not assume the local host is always powered
on (Unix and GNU/Linux systems rarely require rebooting and are happy to
remain powered on indefinitely) and will ensure the regular scripts still get
run appropriately when the local host is powered on.
If the default times for cron dont suit (e.g., you like to work early in the
225

226

CRON: Regular Tasks

morning and get annoyed by the sudden disk whirling each morning at 6:25
am) then simply change the times in /etc/crontab. Unlike traditional versions of cron, the newer versions do not require the running of the crontab
command to install the new version when you edit /etc/crontab.

Chapter 21
CVS: Concurrent Versioning
Debian Pacakges: cvs cvs-doc viewcvs
CVS (Concurrent Versioning System) is the standard tool for allowing several
developers or authors to work together on a shared set of documents. CVS
maintains a central repository of all files associated with a project, including
a history of all changes made to each file. Users checkout copies of the central
repository (either on to a local machine or else any machine on the network),
edit documents locally, then commit changes back to the repository. Multiple
users can be working on the same project concurrently. All older versions of
the documents can be retrieved, if required.

21.1

Managing a Project

21.1.1

Initialising your own Repository

You can create a CVS repository for yourself . Simply create a directory to
hold the repository then initialise it:
$ mkdir /home/kayon/cvs
$ cvs -d /home/kayon/cvs init

You can then create new projects within this repository with
$ cvs -d /home/kayon/cvs import wajig kayon start

227

228

CVS: Concurrent Versioning

You can check out projects from there with either of the following, the first
for local hosts (which mount the file system via NFS perhaps) and the second
for network hosts:

$ cvs -d /home/kayon/cvs checkout project/debian

$ cvs -d :ext:[email protected]:/home/kayon/cvs checkout wajig

21.1.2

Creating a New Project

To create a new project consisting of all files in the current working directory
use:

cvs import -m "Initial import" wajig kayon start

No commit is required after an import. Note that the files and subdirectories
in the current directory will then be recognised as src/docs/spec. You can
now remove the directory and use CVS to create a new one for you, with the
new one now under CVS control:

cvs co src/docs/spec

This will create the whole directory hierarchy as well so be sure to be at the
root of the hierarchy where you want this new hierarchy to live.
To checkout a project from a remote host use:

cvs -d :ext:[email protected]:/var/lib/cvs checkout src/docs

This will use rsh (set CVS RSH to ssh to use ssh instead) to access the CVS
server and checkout the src/docs directory.
To check out a project and give it a different local name:

cvs checkout -d mydocs src/docs

21.1 Managing a Project

21.1.3

229

Adding Files to a Project

You mark files to be added to the CVS repository with, for example:
cvs add <filename>.py

The files will be added to the repository when you next commit.
If you are adding binary files then you probably dont want keyword expansion and youll want to let the repository know that they are binary files:
cvs add -kb <filename>.png

21.1.4

Updating Your Project Copy

You can edit the files you have checked out. It is useful to regularly ensure
you are working on the latest copies by doing:
cvs update

This will update your copy of the files from the archive. Any updates made
to the archive by others will appear in your copy. If there are any conflicts
you will be warned about them and will need to find and resolve them in the
files updated. CVS will tell you of conflicts:
Merging differences between 1.42 and 1.43 into main.py
rcsmerge: warning: conflicts during merge
cvs update: conflicts found in main.py

CVS will actually modify your file which ends up with both versions of the
conflict:
<<<<<<< main.py
def detect_outlier(limit, score)
=======
def detect_outlier(maximum, score)
>>>>>>> 1.43

230

CVS: Concurrent Versioning

Here I added a limit variable to the method whereas someone else added
maximum. I need to choose one or the other.
To add any new directories that have been added to the repository to your
local checked out copy, and to prune any directories that are empty from the
local checked out copy, use:
cvs update -dP

21.1.5

Identifying Changes

To see the differences between a file you are working on and the current
version in the archive use:
cvs diff -c0 main.py

You can also view changes between particular versions:

cvs diff -c0 -r 1.24 -r 1.32 main.py

21.1.6

Removing Files from a Project

To remove a file from the repository first remove it from your directory then
use:
cvs remove stubs.py

The file is removed when you next commit.

If youve removed and committed the remove but want to restore the file,
then find the version of the removed file:
$ cvs status stubs.py
===================================================================
File: no file stubs.py
Status: Up-to-date
Working revision: No entry for stubs.py
Repository revision:
1.3
/var/cvs/projects/kton/Attic/stubs.py,v

21.2 Tuning

231

So this is version 1.3. We restore it using:

$ cvs update -j1.3 -j1.2 stubs.py
U stubs.py

21.1.7

Committing Changes

Once you are happy with your changes (and youve made sure the program
still works or the document is still printable) then it is time to update the
repository with all changes you have made. You need to give a short message
to describe briefly what has changed:
cvs commit -m "Describe the changes you made"

21.1.8

Tagging a Release

You can tag a collection of files in a repository so that you can later restore
all of the current versions of the files together. This is useful when you have
a stable release of your software. Tag all the files and then start breaking
the code again! To tag all files in the current directory and below simply:
$ cvs tag release-0-2

21.2

Tuning

21.2.1

Location of Repository

Debian GNU/Linux uses /var/lib/cvs/ as the default system wide CVS

repository. You only need to know the location of the repository the first
time you checkout a project from it. You can set your environment variable
CVSROOT to point to this when you check out new projects. Alternatively use
the -d option to the cvs command.
Once a CVS project has been checked out there will be a subdirectory called
CVS in each newly created directory that contains the relevant information

232

CVS: Concurrent Versioning

about the repository (so you wont need the CVSROOT environment variable
or the -d option for any other cvs commands within this project).
It may be convenient (but not necessary) to have a default CVSROOT defined in your /home/kayon/.bashrc:
export CVSROOT=/var/lib/cvs

21.2.2

Using ssh Rather Than rsh

Set the environment variable CVS RSH to ssh to use ssh instead:
$ setenv CVS_RSH ssh
$ export CVS_RSH=ssh

21.2.3

if using csh
if using sh or bash

Notify Users of Changes

Add to the file \$CVSROOT/CVSROOT/loginfo a line like:

^debbook mail -s "CVS update of

21.2.4

Debian book" [email protected]

Ignoring Files

The file /var/lib/cvs/CVSROOT/cvsignore can be created to list patterns

of filenames to ignore for all users. Individual users can place their additions
in /home/kayon/.cvsignore. The environment variable CVSIGNORE can
also be used. An example to ignore many of the temporary files created by
LATEX is:
*.glo
*.idx
*.toc
*.ilg
*.ind
*.pyc
*.log
*.aux

21.3 CVS for NT

233

*.out
*.pdf
*.cut
.thumbnails
tmp_*.png

21.3

CVS for NT

A packaged version of CVS for NT is available from http://www.cvsnt.

org/.

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CVS: Concurrent Versioning

Chapter 22
Desktop
gnome (http://www.gnome.org/) is a Desktop and Session Manager. sawfish
(http://sawmill.sourceforge.org/) is a Window Manager. kde (http:
//www.kde.org/) is a gnome alternative and windowmaker and enlightenment
are alternatives to sawfish.
Both gnome and kde provide a desktop environment and an application development framework. A desktop environment usually consists of a window
manager, task bar, and perhaps a file manager and documentation browser.
A development framework provides libraries and a GUI toolkit for application
development.
Applications like windowmaker, and enlightenment are desktop environments
which tend not to provide development frameworks. They do, however, tend
to provide session management. While you can use these with desktop environments like gnome and kde their functionality sometimes overlap, and may
even conflict.
XFCE provides a simple and very small desktop requiring minimal resources
but providing a sufficient feature set for the genral user. XFCE is actually
based on the GTK+ toolkit as is the Gnome desktop.

235

236

Desktop

Chapter 23
DIA: Charts and Diagrams
Dia is a vector-based drawing tool similar to Win32 OS Visio. It is suitable for graphical languages such as dataflow diagrams, entity-relationship
diagrams, organisation flow charts, universal modelling language (UML) diagrams, electronic circuit diagrams and much more. It is ideal when the
diagram has shapes that recur and are connected by lines.
Dia is extensible through the use of sheets which contain collections of shapes
for use in diagrams. The ER sheet, for example, has shapes for different types
of entities, attributes and relationships as required when drawing entityrelationship diagrams for database design.
Dia also runs under Win32 OS (see http://hans.breuer.org/dia) providing a free cross platform tool. Storing its diagrams natively as XML documents means that they are accessible on multiple platforms and from other
applications. You could even edit the dia XML diagrams by hand. Some
applications also generate dia diagrams.
In this chapter we begin with some basics and then a walkthrough that should
get you started with dia. We then review the functionality of dia. And we
end with a walkthrough creating your own shape library.

237

238

23.1

DIA: Charts and Diagrams

Basic Operation

The main dia tools window allows you to create new canvases, select the
tools you wish to use, and set your preferences. The application preferences
are accessed through FilePreferences. Options include compression of saved
files, the default size of new canvases, and characteristics of the grid displayed
on the canvas (including its visibility and whether objects snap to the grid).
These choices take effect from the next canvas that is opened (but not for
currently opened canvases) and are saved in ~/.dia/diarc.
The first step in drawing is to start a new canvas with FileNew Diagram.
You then select objects, lay them out on the canvas, add the lines to connect
the objects, and add relevant text.
The tools available on the main dia window fall into four distinct areas. The
Pointer and Standard Shapes generally occupy the top half of the window.
The Sheets area is next with an option menu that may be showing UML as
the currently selected sheet. Below this (in a scrollable window if required)
are the actual shapes provided by this sheet. The next area selects the pen
colour and type. Finally, line types are selected with the final row of buttons.
If you are unsure of the purpose or intent of a shape or button simply move
the mouse pointer to hover over the corresponding button and a tooltip will
remind you. Click the left mouse button on the tool button to activate the
tool.

23.2

Walkthrough: Creating Simple Diagrams

A new diagram is initiated through FileNew Diagram. This will pop up

a window containing an empty canvas ready for drawing, similar to that in
Figure 23.1.
The canvas is decorated with a grid to guide the drawing. The default grid
is drawn every centimetre in both directions. Page borders are also shown as
blue grids (the darker lines in Figure 23.1). Change the page margins for new
diagrams with FilePage Setup.... Information on the current zoom level is
displayed in the lower left.
We are ready to create our diagram. A simple entity relationship (or ER)
diagram will serve to illustrate the process. An ER diagram illustrates the

23.2 Walkthrough: Creating Simple Diagrams

239

Figure 23.1: The default new canvas ready for a new diagram. The right
mouse button clicked over the canvas contains a menu of all the operations.

structure of a database and is an important tool in database design. The

basic diagraming elements of an ER diagram are the entity (a rectangle), the
relationship (a diamond) and the attribute (an oval). There are variations
to each of these that identify different interpretations. These elements are
connected with either single or double lines. All these diagramming elements
are supplied by the ER sheet.
Lets put together a design for a Movies database that will store information
about movies and their stars. We have two entities in our database: Movies
and Stars. Entities are represented pictorially as rectangles containing text
that names the entity. To create the entity Movie click on the Entity button
of the ER sheet. Then move the mouse pointer to the canvas and click again
(with the left mouse button) to place a rectangle containing a default label
(Entity). You will now want to change the name of the entity to Movie. To
do this double click this entity with the left mouse button to bring up the
Object properties window. Now double click the word Entity that appears
in the Name: text field and type Movie. Click the Apply button and you will
see the entity name change on the canvas. You can click on OK or Close to
close the Object properties window if you wish.
Next we will create the attributes of this entity: a Movie has a Title, the Year
in which the movie was made, and the Length of the movie. The procedure
for creating attributes is the same as for all shapes. Select the Attribute tool
(the oval) from the ER sheet and click on the canvas where you would like to

240

DIA: Charts and Diagrams

place the Attribute. Double click this to edit the Object properties to change
the Name of the attribute to Title. This attribute is also going to be the
attribute by which we uniquely identify every movie in the database. This
is called Key, so select the Key checkbox. Click on the OK or Apply button
for this change to take effect.

Figure 23.2: Sample entity-relationship diagram.

Another diagram (Figure 23.3) uses UML shapes although it is not itself a
formal UML diagram.

Figure 23.3: Sample diagram.

23.3

Reference: Command Line Options

Before we get into the details it is useful to review the dia command line options. Dia supports all of the usual Gnome, GTK+ and Session Management
options which are listed with the --help option. In addition dia has just a
single option, --export, abbreviated as -e. This will generate an exported

23.4 Reference: The Tools Windows

241

Figure 23.4: Sample diagram saved as a graphic and imported into this book.

graphic of the supplied dia diagram in one of the supported export formats.
The particular export format is determined from the supplied filename extension. Thus,
dia --export survey-chart.eps survey-chart.dia

generates an Encapsulated PostScript image while

dia --export survey-chart.png survey-chart.dia

generates a Portable Network Graphics image.

23.4

Reference: The Tools Windows

23.4.1

Pointer, View, and Text Objects

The top section of the main dia window contains the pointer and a collection
of standard shapes. The pointer (the top left icon with the arrow) allows you
to select objects on the dia canvas.
Next to the pointer are the zoom and scroll buttons. The zoom tool will
enlarge (zoom in on) the diagram each time you click the left mouse button
somewhere within the diagram. By holding down the Shift key when using
the zoom tool the diagram will be zoomed out. The scroll tool will scroll
the diagram when you hold the left mouse button down within the diagram.
This mimics moving the scroll bars. By holding down the Shift key when

242

DIA: Charts and Diagrams

using the scroll tool you can grab (as with a hand) the diagram and scroll
the diagram around in this way.
The fourth button selects the Create Text tool allowing text to be added to
your diagram.

23.4.2

Standard Shapes

The second collection of four buttons on the main window consist of the
standard shapes of a Box, Ellipse, Polygon, and a Beziergon.
The next group of five buttons are line drawing tools consisting of a Line,
Arc, Zigzagline, Polyline and Bezierline.
The final button allows you to import graphics from other applications.
Double click the left mouse button on the tool button to set the object
defaults for that object (not all objects have defaults). For example, double
clicking the Create Text tool button will bring up a window to set defaults for
the alignment of the text, the font, and the font size. The Box object defaults
include whether the background is drawn and how the corners are rounded.
The Ellipse, Polygon, and Beziergon object defaults allow for turning off of
the drawing of the background. The only other standard shape with object
defaults is the Image tool which can identify a default image file, whether
a resize of the image should keep the aspect ratio, and whether to show a
border around the image. Objects from the various sheets may also offer
object defaults.

23.4.3

Handles and Connection Points

All objects have handles that generally allow the object to be resized. The
usual handles are small boxes with a green fill. You can move these handles
by dragging them with the mouse. This will resize the object. If the handles
have a dark blue fill instead then the object can not be resized. This is typical
of boxes that resize automatically as you enter text into the box.
Lines have handles at each end that are also green (but also have a small
internal cross identifying it as a connection pointsee below). Once again
you can resize the line simply by grabbing these handles with the left mouse
button and moving the handle around.

23.4 Reference: The Tools Windows

243

Some lines (e.g., a polyline) have internal handles that are coloured orange.
These handles have restricted movement and may also move as you move the
line end-points.
Most objects also have connection points that identify locations on the shape
to which lines can be snapped. (An Arc, for example, does not have any
connection points.) They are identified as the small blue crosses on the
edges of the objects. The handles on the end of lines also have crosses
identifying connection points. A lines connection point becomes attached
to the connection point of an object, as indicated by the lines green handle
becoming red. Moving the object will also move all of the attached lines.
The Line shape can have extra connection points added to it through the
middle mouse button menu. Each new connection point is added to evenly
space all of the connection points along the line.

23.4.4

Sheets

The next section of the main dia window begins with a choice of sheets (i.e.,
shape libraries). Many are included by default and new ones can be added
(see Section 23.7). Selecting one of the available sheets (by choosing from the
pull-down menu that is labelled UML for the Universal Modelling Language
in the above sample window) will display a collection of shapes associated
with the particular sheet. (The sample window includes the shapes useful
for drawing UML diagrams.) Some shapes, when selected and placed onto
the canvas, have text associated with them and will grow in size depending
on the text you type. An example is the Text box button.
Increasing the height of the main dia window will often allow you to see all
of the available shapes of any of the sheets at one time.

23.4.5

Pen

The lower section of the window contains the pen colour chooser.

23.4.6

Lines

The line thickness and line types. These affect the standard shapes rather
than shapes from the sheets. The smallest line width is 0pt (hairline).

244

DIA: Charts and Diagrams

A variety of lines are supported. You can add arrows to the lines by clicking
on the button at the bottom right (or bottom left for backwards pointing
arrows) of the Dia control window. Figure 23.5 shows the button before and
after selecting an arrow.

Figure 23.5: Selecting the arrow and line type for the various line drawing
tools. The first shows the default Dia window with undecorated lines (as
indicated by the bottom three buttons being straight lines). We have chosen
the straight line tool in the top half of the window. An arrow is added in
the second, a backward arrow with a hollow head in the third, and the line
is changed to a dotted line in the fourth.

23.5

Reference: The Right Mouse Button Menu

The right mouse button anywhere on a canvas will bring up a diagram specific
menu. From here all of the operations are available, including those to save,
print and export the file, to cut and paste, to select various objects or regions,
to group objects and to layer objects, to operate on objects with various tools,
and to edit the object properties and layout.
The middle mouse button will bring up an object-specific menu. Double
clicking an object will bring up the properties editor for that object.

23.5.1

The File Menu

The File menu provides the usual New diagram, Open..., Save, and Save As
operations. Once again F3 (open) is the keyboard shortcut to open a dia-

23.5 Reference: The Right Mouse Button Menu

245

gram from a file and Ctl+S (save) is the shortcut to save a diagram to a
file.

Preferences
With the Preferences... menu item you set the various options allowed by dia
(this is the same as selecting FilePreferences from the main dia window.
These options affect new diagrams only, not currently open diagrams. To
change options like Snap To Grid for a currently open diagram, use the right
mouse button View menu.
The three categories of preferences for new dia diagrams are shown in Figure 23.6.

Figure 23.6: Setting preferences.

Under the User Interface the first option indicates whether the tools in the
main window are reset to their defaults after creating a new canvas. The
native dia save format uses XML which can be quite verbose. As with many
Gnome applications it is common to compress the saved document (using the
gzip format) and you can control this behaviour here. dia supports only a
limited number of undo levels which can also be set here. Finally, reverse
dragging, when enabled here, allows you to drag-select from the right to
the left (unlike normal dragging which usually goes left to right) to have a
different effect. It selects all objects that intersects the dragged rectangle
rather than just those that are fully contained in the dragged rectangle.
View Defaults controls the size and initial magnification of the new window
when you create a new canvas. You can also control whether the connection
points (the blue crosses) are visible.

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DIA: Charts and Diagrams

Grid Lines can be turned on and off. Objects can be made to snap to the
grid (i.e., when you place or move objects they will move automatically to
the nearest grid when placed). The size of the grid (both along the x and
y axes) can be changed as can the colour and style of the grid lines. Page
borders can be displayed on the grid using different colours and line styles.

Export
Export... is used to generate output suitable for other applications with a
variety of formats supported. The format is either specified using the option
menu or else determined by the filename extension:
Computer Graphics Metafile
Native Dia Diagram
Drawing Interchange File: This format is used by other vector graphics applications such as the computer aided design
packages like AutoCAD and QCad.
eps
Encapsulated PostScript
hpgl Hewlett-Packard Graphics Language
png
Portable Network Graphics: This is the standard free graphic
format for the Internet.
svg
Scalable Vector Graphics
tex
TeX PSTricks macros: Diagrams in this format can be used
directly in TEX and LATEX documents.
wpg
WordPerfect Graphics
cgm
dia
dxf

Export to the common gif format is not supported because of licensing

restrictions placed on users of applications that produce gif images. The use
of gif images is not encouraged in the free software community because of
this restriction. The png format is a superior replacement.

Export to TeX PStricks TEX is a sophisticated document typesetting

system. The PSTricks TEX packages provide considerable support for PostScript
within TeX. This export filter generates a tex file for processing by TEX (although usually LATEX, an easier to use macro package written in TEX, is
used). To include the diagram in your LATEX document you will need to import the pstricks package for LATEX and input the actual diagram (as saved
in diagram.tex for example:
\include{diagram}

23.5 Reference: The Right Mouse Button Menu

247

Depending on the version of LATEX and PStricks you are using, you may need
to uncomment some macro definitions in the diagram file. If LATEX gives you
the error something like:
! Undefined control sequence.
<recently read> \setfont

You will need to remove the initial percent sign (LATEXs comment command)
from the definitions in diagram.tex and it is best to rename the newcommand
to providecommand in all three cases (to avoid problems when including more
than a single diagram in the one LATEX document:
\newcommand{\setlinejoinmode}[1]{}
\newcommand{\setlinecaps}[1]{}
\newcommand{\setfont}[2]{}

All should then work.

Printing
When dia is compiled it will be compiled with either internal print support
or support through the Gnome printing library. An alternative to printing is
to export the diagram as PostScript which can then be printed.
You can scale the diagram to fit the page when printing through the use of
the FilePage Setup... menu. Here you can also set up the size of the page,
orientation, and the page margins.
Quitting
The usual Close and Exit items are part of the File menu with their common
keyboard shortcuts of Ctl+W (close) and Ctl+Q (quit) respectively. Close
will close the current document while Exit will exit from dia completely.

23.5.2

The Edit Menu

The Edit menu allows you to Copy, Cut, Paste and Delete objects with the
common keyboard shortcuts of Ctl+C (copy), Ctl+X (cut), Ctl+V (paste),

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DIA: Charts and Diagrams

and Ctl+D (delete), respectively. Edit operations can be undone and redone. The number of undo levels is controlled by an option in FilePreferences
as we saw in Section 23.5.1. The default is 15. That is, you can recover from
the last 15 actions!

23.5.3

The View Menu

The View menu affects how you view the diagram. Zoom In enlarges the
viewed diagram and Zoom Out contracts the viewed diagram. Particular
scales can be chosen with the Zoom submenu. The Diagram Properties. . .
menu allows the background colour to be changed and the grid characteristics
(spacing and visibility) to be modified. These changes affect the current
diagram only and are saved with the diagram.
Various features can be turned on or off with the following option items.
New View pops up a new canvas showing the same objects. Editing any
object in any of the views will affect that object in all of the views.
Show All zooms the diagram to fill the viewable area of the canvas.

23.5.4

The Select Menu

The Select menu provides shortcuts for selecting objects. All objects can be
selected or None. Those currently not selected can be selected in place of
those that are selected (Invert). For any selected objects you can cause those
objects directly connected to them to also be selected (Connected). Doing
this repetitively results in all connected objects being selected, which is the
same as selecting Transitive. Finally, you can select all objects that are of the
same type as the currently selected object.
Selecting same type actually works even if objects of different types are selected.
The following five check buttons modify how new objects are selected. Usually a new selection replaces the old selection as the final set of selected objects. With Union the final set of selected objects consists of the previously
selected object plus the newly selected objects. Intersection results in those
object that were previously selected and now selected again to be in the final
selection, but no others. Remove removes from the old set of selected objects

23.5 Reference: The Right Mouse Button Menu

249

those that are newly selected. And Invert causes those objects newly selected
to have their state of selection invertedthat is, those previously selected
and now newly selected be no longer be selected, and those not previously
selected but included in the new selection will become selected.

23.5.5

The Objects Menu

The Objects menu allows you to layer objects and to group and align objects.
Objects can be selected individually with the left mouse button by clicking
on the object. This allows a single object to be selected at a time. To select
multiple objects you can hold down the Shift key while you click the left
mouse button. Selecting with the left mouse button actually toggles the
selected state of the object. You can also select a group of objects simply
by dragging the left mouse button (hold the left mouse button down and
move the mouse around) on the canvas to define a rectangular area. When
you release the left mouse button all objects in the rectangular region will
be selected. Of course, you can also use the Select menu described above to
select objects.
Once you have objects selected the menu items in the Objects menu become
available. Send to Back and Bring to Front have the obvious meaning. Figure 23.7 shows the effect of selecting a Text object which is on top of a Box
object and sending it to the back. The Box object ends up occluding the
Text object.

Figure 23.7: Demonstration of Send to Back: The Text object is selected

and then sent to the back, being occluded by the Box object.

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23.5.6

DIA: Charts and Diagrams

The Tools Menu

The Tools menu simply provides menu access to all of the tools located on the
upper area of the main window. You will find the pointer (Modify), Magnify,
and Scroll tools. Remember, Shift with Magnify or Scroll changes their behaviour. See Section 23.4.1 for details. Next comes the four standard shapes
(Box, Ellipse, Polygon, and Beziergon) followed by the five lines (Line, Arc,
Zigzagline, Polyline, and Bezierline). Finally Image objects can be selected.
There is a significant reason for repeating the Tools here: keyboard shortcuts
can be easily assigned to each of the tools through this menu. Simply move
the mouse to highlight one of the menu items and type the keystrokes you
which to associate with that tool (e.g., Ctl+Alt+E for the Ellipse). The
shortcut should appear on the menu.

23.5.7

The Dialogs Menu

The Dialogs menu allows the Properties of the selected object to be modified
(if it has modifiable properties). For shape objects you can, for example,
select line width, colour, and style and a fill colour. The fill can be made
transparent (by specifying that the background should not be drawn).
You can also edit the Layers.

23.6

Reference: Sample Sheets

We describe some of the sheets that are supplied with dia. For each we
list the collection of shapes (objects) provided and give an example diagram
made from the shapes. The specification of each sheet is an XML document
usually located in /usr/share/dia/sheets/.

23.6.1

Chronogram

The Chronogram sheet contains just two shapes, but with functionality that
allows a considerable variety. XXXX Check samples/chronograms.dia for a
trailer and require a lot of explanations to be usable.

23.6 Reference: Sample Sheets

23.6.2

251

Circuit

The Circuit sheet contains shapes useful for drawing electrical and electronic
circuit diagrams. The sheet includes, in order, a Vertical Resistor, Horizontal
Inductor, Vertical Inductor, and a Horizontal Resistor as the first row with
their European counterparts as the second row. Then Horizontal and Vertical Capacitors, npn and pnp Bipolar Transistors, Horizontal and Vertical
Diodes and Zener Diodes, Ground Point, Operational Amplifier, Horizontal
and Vertical Fuses and Power Sources, Lamp, Speaker, Horizontal and Vertical LEDs, NMOS and PMOS Transistors, and a Horizontal Jumper. All
objects have object defaults accessible by double clicking the left mouse button on the corresponding object within the sheet. In general you can set the
default text padding, alignment, font, and font size for each object.

23.6.3

ER

Entity-relationship diagrams are commonly used to design relational databases.

The basic elements of an ER diagram are provided, including an Entity, Weak
Entity, Relationship, Attribute, and Participation.

23.6.4

Flowchart

The Flowchart sheet provides the diagram elements usually associated with
drawing flowcharts of all types. All elements allow text to be included and
the object properties can be used to set the fonts and for boxes to set the
corner rounding. The elements supplied are a Box, Parallelogram, Diamond,
Ellipse, Display, Transaction File, Off Page Connector, Document, Manual
Operation, Preparation, Manual Input, Predefined Process, Terminal, Magnetic Disk, Magnetic Drum, Magnetic Tape, Internal Storage, Merge, Extract, Delay, Summing Junction, Collate, Sort, Or, Punched Card, Punched
Tape, Transmittal Tape, and Offline Storage.

23.6.5

FS

The FS sheet provides support for Function Structure Diagrams. There are
three shapes: A Flow, an Orthogonal Polyline Flow, and a Function.

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DIA: Charts and Diagrams

The Flows have object defaults where default labels (text) and flow types
can be identified. These can also be changed by double clicking a Flow or
Orthogonal Polyline Flow object on your canvas. The different flow types
(Energy, Material, and Signal) change the properties (colour and type) of the
line. The text label can be grabbed by the mouse and moved around.
The Function object is a box with a text label. It has object properties
with which the Function can be identified as a Wish Function and/or a User
Function. A Wish Function has a dotted box and a User Function has a
double box.

Figure 23.8: A sample of the Function Structure (FS) Diagram sheet objects.
This is not a true function structure diagram, but does illustrate the variety
of shapes.

23.6.6

GRAFCET

GRAFCET charts have been standardised outside of France as Sequential

Function Charts (IEC848). THey are often used to describe the mandated
behaviour of sequential automates. They are in fact an offspring of Petri
nets but oriented towards specification of actions and mandated evolutions
rather than simple descriptions of state and possible evolutions. XXXX Grab
sample chart from dias samples directory.
The supplied shapes of the GRAFCET sheet include a Regular Step, Initial
Step, Macro Entry Step, Macro Exit Step, Macro Call Step, Macro SubProgram Call Step. These are essentially variations of the same shape and
one can be changed to another by editing the object properties. Next are an
Action, Condition, Transition, OR Vergent, AND Vergent, and an Arc. The
first nine shapes have object defaults for setting the font, font size and pen
colour. The Arc can have arrow heads.

23.6 Reference: Sample Sheets

23.6.7

253

Ladder

Ladders are used as a pseudo-electric representation of boolean expressions.

They are used by some vendors of industrial automats (including Schneider/Telemecanique and Siemens).

23.6.8

Networks

Network diagrams include local area networks (LANs) and wide area networks (WANs). The Network sheet provides a collection of shapes often used
in network diagrams. The sheet includes, in order, a Computer, Monitor,
Storage, Ethernet Bus, Printer, WAN Connection, Hub, Modular Switch,
RJ45 Wall-Plug, scEAD Wall-Plug, Modem, Antenna (for wireless transmission), Network Cloud, Router Symbol, Switch Symbol, and an ATM Switch
Symbol.

23.6.9

Pneumatic/Hydraulic

The Pneumatic/Hydraulic sheet provides tools to draw pneumatic and hydraulic schematics. Its a very incomplete sheet, and there are some tricks
to using distributors properly.

23.6.10

SADT

SADT stands for Structured Analysis and Design Technique which is a trademarked and copyrighted by Softech Inc. A SADT model is a collection of
diagrams organised in a tree structure. Each SADT diagram is composed
of Boxes (representing activities) connected by Flows (arrows) representing
flows of materials, data or information.
The SADT sheet provides the three basic components required for drawing
SADT diagrams: Activity/Data Flow, Activity/Data box, and Flow Annotation. The activity/data flow can be one of several styles, including Normal,
Import Resource, Imply Resource, Dotted Arrow, or with Disabled Arrows.
The default is Normal but can be changed in the Object Defaults window
(double click the Activity/Data Flow button).

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DIA: Charts and Diagrams

Figure 23.9: A sample of the SADT digram objects.

Flows have different roles in relation to the activities. The middle mouse
button (or control right click on Windows) is used to add or remove segments.
The default flow is Vertical-Horizontal-Vertical. It is sometimes useful to
do a bit of middle mouse button clicking to build a Horizontal-VerticalHorizontal variant which can then serve for copy-and-paste in your diagram.
A non Vertical-Horizontal-Vertical flow will be shown in black instead of the
default grey. While this is not in the original SADT specification it is often
handy to untangle a heavily loaded sheet (with more than 4 or 5 functions
though these sheets should be avoided).
Connections points can be added to or removed from the sides of an SADT
box by clicking the middle mouse button. Function identifier (A0, A1, etc.)
can be changed by opening the box properties. The associated function (the
contents of the box) is changed by simply selecting the box and typing any
text.

23.6.11

Sybase

The Sybase sheet provides various objects for the design of Sybase replication
domain diagrams. The sheet includes a Dataserver, Replication Server, Log
Transfer Manager or Rep Agent, Stable Storage Device, Client Application,
and a Replication Server Manager.

23.7 Walkthrough: Creating Your Own Shapes

23.6.12

255

UML

Support for the Universal Modelling Language (UML) includes all of the
static structure diagram elements specified in the UML specifications. The
sheet includes, in order, a Class, Template Class, Note, Dependency, Realization (implements a specific interface), Generalisation (class inheritance),
Association, Aggregation (one class is part of another), Implements (class
implements a specific interface), Constraint, Small Package, Large Package,
Actor, Usecase, Lifeline, Object, Message, Component, Node, Class Stereotype Icon, State Machine, and a Branch.

23.7

Walkthrough: Creating Your Own Shapes

You can create your own shapes and include them in your own sheet simply
be defining the shapes in XML (using a subset of SVG, the scalable vector
graphics format based on XML). Installing a new shape is simply a matter
of installing it into ~/.dia/shapes.

23.7.1

Simple Example

A shape consists of at least a name and a SVG element. That is, every shape,
at a minimum, has a name and a description:
<?xml version="1.0"?>
<shape xmlns="http://www.daa.com.au/~james/dia-shape-ns"
xmlns:svg="http://www.w3.org/TR/2000/03/WD-SVG20000303/DTD/svg-20000303-stylable.dtd">
<name>Sample - Minimal Shape</name>
<svg:svg width="10" height="10">
<svg:polygon points="0,0 10,0 5,10"/>
</svg:svg>
</shape>

You can place this in a subdirectory of your own dia shapes directory, perhaps
called Sample as in ~/.dia/shapes/Sample/minimal.shape. The actual
filename in which the shape is stored (minimal.shape) is not so important
dia will find the file.

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DIA: Charts and Diagrams

Now you need to create a sheet into which this shape is placed. Again, a
sheet is specified using XML. This example is placed in the file ~/.dia/
sheets/Sample.sheet:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="iso-8859-1"?>
<sheet xmlns="http://www.lysator.liu.se/~alla/dia/dia-sheet-ns">
<name>Sample</name>
<description>A collection of sample shapes.</description>
<contents>
<object name="Sample - Minimal Shape">
<description>The most minimal of shapes</description>
</object>
</contents>
</sheet>

Now start up dia and you should see this new sheet, called Sample, containing
a single button with a default icon.
You can now create a new canvas and add this shape to your canvas. Note
that dia takes care of the resizing of the shape and the other characteristics.
The XML describing the shape begins with the usual xml meta element
followed the actual shape element, identifying the appropriate XML namespaces (xmlns). The shape has a unique name used to identify the shape by
dia. Next we have the actual SVG description of the shape which is 10 by
10 in size (actually these are ignored by dia but are required by the SVG
format), and consisting of a single polygon. The shape is a simple triangle (a
polygon with three points) pointing downwards. The polygon is drawn from
the top left corner (0,0) to the top right (10,0) then to the bottom middle
(5,10) and then back to the top left to finish off the polygon.
The XML for the sheet then identifies this shape as belonging to the Sample
sheet, which contains just one object, the Sample - Minimal Shape shape. The
description for the object is used as the tooltip for the resulting button.

23.7.2

Shape Elements

An icon can be associated with the shape through the icon element. An
example is:

23.7 Walkthrough: Creating Your Own Shapes

257

<icon>minimal.xpm</icon>

which comes after the name element. The specified X pixmap file is used
as the icon in the dia toolbox. The filename can be relative to the shape
file (e.g., icons/minimal.xpm or ../icons/minimal.xpm). When no icon is
specified a default icon is used.
Connection points can be added to the shape with the connections element
which allows any number of point elements. For example you can add two
connection points to the above Minimal Shape by inserting the following after
the icon element (or after the name element if there is no icon element):
<connections>
<point x="5" y="0"/>
<point x="5" y="10"/>
</connections>

This adds a connection point to the top and another to the bottom of the
triangle. The coordinate system used for connection points is the same as
for the shape itself.
Next an aspectratio element can be specified to indicate how the shape is
to be distorted. The default is as if the following was specified:
<aspectratio type="free"/>

This indicates that there is no restriction on the aspect ratio (i.e., you can
stretch the shape arbitrarily in the X and Y directions independently). A
fixed aspect ratio requires Y to change in the same proportion as X, and
vice versa. A range can be specified, with two attributes, min and max,
identifying a range of allowable amounts of distortion. For example,
<aspectratio type="range" min="4" max="8"/>

A textbox element can appear next. This is used to provide a box that
automatically adjusts the size of the shape to fit the supplied text. The
location of the text box is specified using the same coordinate system:
<textbox x1="2" y1="1" x2="8" y2="5"/>

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23.7.3

DIA: Charts and Diagrams

SVG Support

From SVG the supported elements are: line, polyline, polygon, rect, circle,
ellipse, path and g. For the path element only the M, m, L, l, H, h, V,
v, C, c, S, s, Z, and z commands are supported. User units are supported
but not CSS units (only a limited set of the CSS attributes are supported).
Transformations are not supported.

23.7.4

Sheet Elements

23.7.5

Installing New Sheets

Sheets are often distributed as compressed tar files (having the filename extension of .tar.gz). To install the sheet (assuming the tar file has been
created properly) open the tar file in the Gnome archive tool (guitar). Select
all files in the archive (Ctl+A or ArchiveSelect all) then click the Extract
button. You will be asked where to extract the files tochoose the .dia
folder in your home directory.
Next time you start up dia the new sheet will be available.

23.8

Reference: The dia Save Format

23.9

Acknowledgements

dia was written by Alexander Larsson. It is being actively developed by further by James Henstridge and Lars R. Clausen with significant contributions
from Fredrik Hallenberg, Emmanuel Briot, Francis J. Lacoste, Alejandro
Aguilar Sierra, Jerome Abela, Cyrille Chepelov, Henk Jan Priester, Jacek
Pliszka, Steffen Macke, and Hans Breuer.
Cyrille Chepelov implemented the Ladder, Pneumatic/Hydraulic, Chronograms, and Grafcet sheets and provided the descriptions included in this
chapter.
The dia home page (http://www.lysator.liu.se/~alla/dia/) provides
background information, a features list, and a pointer to Harry Georges
on-line tutorial introduction.

23.9 Acknowledgements
Lars R. Clausen has provided valuable commentary on this document.

259

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DIA: Charts and Diagrams

Chapter 24
Directories: Linux Folders
A basic user operation expected from a computer is to be able to manage
documents, to place them into folders, open them to view, edit, or print
them, and to share the documents with others. While the Apple Macintosh
had Finder Unix has had a variety of File Managers. MS-Windows of course
has the MS-Windows Explorer. Linux shares the Unix file managers and
more. But the crowning glory of GNU/Linux is Nautilus, a file manager that
builds on many of the great ideas that have been demonstrated in previous
file browsers.
Before introducing Nautilus we begin with a review of the standard GNU/Linux
directory structure. Having a basic understanding of how GNU/Linux organises directories (also commonly known as folders) will uncover some of
the basic concepts of Unix and GNU/Linux.

24.1

The Standard Linux Directory Structure

Debian can install files almost anywhere within the filesystem, except for
/usr/local. The Debian Policy Manual and the FSB (Filesystem Base)
definition provide guidelines on what goes where.
/usr/local contains programs and data files that have been added
locally to the system, independently of the particular GNU/Linux distribution. These are intended to be kept separate from the main system
directories that are managed by the distribution.
261

262

Directories: Linux Folders

/var contains administrative files (such as system logs) and data that
changes frequently (such as spool directories and caches like incoming
mail and news).
Other file managers for GNU/Linux are also available, including the KDE
offering, Konqueror, and the Midnight Commander which has a long history
and provides both a Gnome interface and a terminal interface (for those not
into GUIs).

Chapter 25
Disks
25.1

New Disk Setup

Use cfdisk to partition. Use mkfs.ext2 /dev/sdb1 to format.

25.2

Ext2 to Ext3

Converting from a standard ext2 disk format to a journalled ext3 format is

easy, since it simply involves adding a journal file. It can be done while the
system is running with:
# tune2fs -j /dev/hda1

Then change ext2 to ext3 in /etc/fstab and unmount/mount for it to take

effect. If /dev/hda is your root partition, then youll need to reboot for it to
take effect.

25.3

Disk Parameters

After installing Debian on Bach (Section 4.10.16) a serious performance hit

was noticed every time the disks were busy. With the use of hdparm the
263

264

Disks

hard disk parameters could be set and with hwtools we could ensure the
parameters were set on each reboot. See Section 4.10.16 for an example.
To test your current performance (this one shows results after tuning):
# hdparm -Tt /dev/hda
/dev/hda:
Timing buffer-cache reads:
Timing buffered disk reads:

128 MB in 0.56 seconds =228.57 MB/sec

64 MB in 1.60 seconds = 40.00 MB/sec

Heres one before tuning:

# hdparm -Tt /dev/hdg
/dev/hdg:
Timing buffer-cache reads:
Timing buffered disk reads:

128 MB in 0.55 seconds =232.73 MB/sec

64 MB in 49.39 seconds = 1.30 MB/sec

To determine the current settings for a disk drive use:

# hdparm /dev/hda
/dev/hda:
multcount
= 0 (off)
I/O support = 0 (default 16-bit)
unmaskirq
= 0 (off)
using_dma
= 0 (off)
keepsettings = 0 (off)
nowerr
= 0 (off)
readonly
= 0 (off)
readahead
= 8 (on)
geometry
= 116301/16/63, sectors = 117231408, start = 0
busstate
= 1 (on)

Then to get information about a disk drive use:

# hdparm -i /dev/hda
/dev/hda:
Model=ST360021A, FwRev=3.19, SerialNo=3HR0VNYY

25.3 Disk Parameters

265

Config={ HardSect NotMFM HdSw>15uSec Fixed DTR>10Mbs RotSpdTol>.5% }

RawCHS=16383/16/63, TrkSize=0, SectSize=0, ECCbytes=4
BuffType=unknown, BuffSize=2048kB, MaxMultSect=16, MultSect=16
CurCHS=16383/16/63, CurSects=16514064, LBA=yes, LBAsects=117231408
IORDY=on/off, tPIO={min:240,w/IORDY:120}, tDMA={min:120,rec:120}
PIO modes: pio0 pio1 pio2 pio3 pio4
DMA modes: mdma0 mdma1 mdma2 udma0 udma1 udma2 udma3 udma4 *udma5
AdvancedPM=no WriteCache=enabled
Drive Supports : Reserved : ATA-1 ATA-2 ATA-3 ATA-4 ATA-5

Various parameters can be set, such as turning on direct memory access

(-d1), 16 multiple sectors (-m16), and 32 bit I/O support (-c1):
# hdparm -d1 -m16 -c1 /dev/hda

Be careful though as some settings may cause the disk to stop responding!
This may require a hard reboot after which the default settings are returned.
For example, on Bach an additional IDE controller (a CMD680 from Silicon
Image) with 2 ST360021A disks, identical to the disk on the PIIX4 IDE
controller, but setting the parameter -d1 hangs the shell on a test with -Tt.
Also see http://linux.oreillynet.com/pub/a/linux/2000/06/29/hdparm.html
for further introductory explanations.

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Disks

Chapter 26
Documentation
Documentation for Linux abounds but finding it is sometimes a little challenging. Sometimes you find it as a man page, sometimes as an infotex
document, sometimes as a html document, and sometimes as a Gnome
document. And thats just on your local systemsearching the Internet for
documentation is often very fruitful.
To read documentation see dhelp or browse
http://localhost/doc/HTML/index.html file://localhost/usr/share/doc/HTML/index.html

26.1

Debian doc-central

Debian has a central utility to view all locally installed documentation, called
doc-central. Other Debian packages for browsing Debian documentation include dwww and dhelp. The newer doc-central has several improvements over
the previous tools, with an improved interface and requiring no further effort
than installing the doc-base package.
Doc-Central is a collection of scripts that give you a convenient way to browse
the documentation installed on your Debian system.
Doc-Central uses a local http server (like apache) to present a list of all registered documents. Depending on the type of document other tools are used to
view the document: for info files we use info2www. All other types are currently linked to directly. To get the list of installed documentation the docbase registration entries as used. For more information on doc-base please
267

268

Documentation

install the doc-base package and read the documentation in /usr/doc/docbase.

it uses doc-base registrations for documentation. This means that unless
maintainers register the documents for their pacakges doc-central wont know
about them. So please check your packages to see if you register all the
documentation.

Chapter 27
Email
Numerous tools work together to set you up with email.
Fetchmail can retrieve email from multiple POP/IMAP servers and deliver it
to your (possibly local) MTA. Exim, postfix, qmail, and sendmail are MTAs
they will dispatch email to users. Procmail can sort incoming email into
different mailboxes for a user.

27.1

Setting up EMail

Suppose your local machine is called misty. In /etc/hosts you will see:

127.0.0.1 misty

localhost

In /etc/hostname you would see:

misty

The host misty does not exist outside of my local network.

Externally my email comes through [email protected].
You can set up your mail in /etc/exim.conf to include:
269

270

Email

qualify_domain = ktware.com qualify_recipient = rose.ktware.com

local_domains = localhost:rose.ktware.com host_accept_relay =
localhost

This will ensure all outgoing mail appears to come from [email protected].
Local mail is delivered locally without leaving rose. All incoming mail is
collected by fetchmail, detected by Exim and delivered.

27.1.1

Exim

The default email server for Debian is exim. This can be set up in one
of several ways, depending on how you will access your email. The exim
configurator will list the options. The newer exim4 will become the default
at some time and its configuration is somewhat simpler. To configure it:
> wajig reconfigure exim4-config

The file /etc/exim4/update-exim4.conf.conf contains the simple configuration information which is used to generate the more complex exim4 configuration files.
The file /etc/email-addresses can be used to generate a From: address for
each user (so that the From address will not be the default of the user@host).

27.2

Retrieving and Filtering Email

27.2.1

Fetchmail: Collect Mail from Remote Hosts

The fetchmail package will retrieve email from remote hosts (via POP or
IMAP, for example) and have it delivered locally.
The following scenario for user kayon with the following .fetchmailrc will
use ssh to tunnel to POP to avoid sending clear text passwords, and to also
encrypt all the communications.
poll localhost with proto POP3 and port 5110:
user kayon there with password XXXX is kayon here

27.2 Retrieving and Filtering Email

271

preconnect "ssh -2 -f -a -C -L 5110:pophost:110 lynx sleep 5"

keep

A similar example using IMAP instead and some other options:

set postmaster "kayon"
set bouncemail
set no spambounce
set properties ""
poll localhost with proto IMAP and port 5143:
user kayon@NEXUS there with password XXXXX is kayon here
preconnect "ssh -2 -f -a -C -L 5143:imaphost:143 merak sleep 20s"
fetchall

This gives user kayon access from their desktop Linux machine to the host
lynx (Section ??) which might be inside the company firewall and which has
access to the mail server imaphost (Section ??). Kayons email comes from
an MS Exchange server (called imaphost (Section ??)) on the same company
network with IMAP enabled. But for security reasons the company network
does not allow IMAP access externally.
Then start fetchmail with one of the following:
> fetchmail
> fetchmail -v
> fetchmail -d30

(Show what it does)

(Run fetchmail every 30 seconds)

An alternative is to have a tunnel up all the time:

altrop> ssh -2 -N -f -a -C -L 5143:mailhost:143 lynx

The -N indicates that no command should be run on the remote host, which
is suited to tunnelling where the connection is required to simply sit there.
This will link localhost:5143 to mailhost:143. You can confirm connection by
trying:
> telnet localhost 5143
Trying ::1...

272

Email

Trying 127.0.0.1...
Connected to localhost.
Escape character is ^].
* OK Microsoft Exchange IMAP4rev1 server version 5.5.2655.37
(saab-bt.ktware.com) ready

Now run fetchmail with something like the following in .fetchmailrc:

poll localhost with proto IMAP and port 5143:

user kayon@NEXUS there with password XXXX is kayon here

The fetchmail-ssl package is SSL-enabled for POP3, APOP, IMAP. Perhaps

this is a better solution, but does it require SSL support from the POP3
server?

27.2.2

Procmail to Filter and Split Email

A sample .procmailrc:

# DEBIAN
:0:
* ^Resent-Sender.*[email protected]
lists/debian-devel
:0:
* ^Resent-Sender.*[email protected]
lists/debian-user

The :0 begins a recipe. The following : ensures the mail file is locked. A line
beginning with * begins a condition. You can have multiple conditions within
a recipe. The condition ^Resent-Sender.*[email protected]
captures email sent to the debian-devel mailing list. This matches messages
that include Resent-Sender: [email protected]
in their header. The final line of a recipe is the mailbox into which procmail
will send the mail.

27.2 Retrieving and Filtering Email

27.2.3

273

IMAP: Mail Server

To set up an IMAP mail server install task-imap which installs wu-imap.

IMAP will then be running.
A sample IMAP session:
> telnet imaphost 143
Trying ::1...
Trying 127.0.0.1...
Connected to localhost.
Escape character is ^].
* OK Microsoft Exchange IMAP4rev1 server version 5.5.2655.37
(imaphost.act.cmis.CSIRO.AU) ready

27.2.4

POP Mail Server

You can manually interact with a POP server to perhaps manually delete an
email that your mail too is having trouble downloading, or simply to check
things out. Heres a sample manual session:
> telnet pop.ktware.com 110
Trying 203.95.38.50...
Connected to pop.ktware.com.
Escape character is ^].
+OK Hello there.
USER kayon
+OK Password required.
PASS Secret
+OK logged in.
LIST
+OK POP3 clients that break here, they violate STD53.
1 2269
2 1498
3 2816
4 2113
.
RETR 1
+OK 2269 octets follow.
Return-Path: <[email protected]>
Delivered-To: [email protected]

274

Email

...
.
DELE 1
+OK Deleted.
QUIT
+OK Bye-bye.
Connection closed by foreign host.

27.3

Reading Email

An excellent graphical tool for reading email is evolution. A separate chapter

(Chapter 29) covers this. A powerful alternative without all the gloss is mutt.
If you live within emacs then gnus or vm might be the way to go.

27.3.1

Mutt

Mutt is a fast, flexible, console-based (meaning remote access is easy) email

tool. It has many handlers and mail management capabilities with built-in
cryptography and signing capabilities. It supports scoring, multiple mailbox
formats, and many handy accelerators.
Usage:
Select all messages dated July: T~d 1/7-31/7
To execute a command on all tagged mesages (e.g., delete using d), preceed
it with ;.

27.3.2

Gnus

To incorporate a file (inbox.old that contains old email messages in Unix

mbox format:
1. Go to the group buffer.
2. G f inbox.old <enter> creates nndoc group.
3. <space> enters the group.

27.4 Email Tools

275

4. M P b process mark all articles.

5. B r nnml <enter> respools all the process marked articles.
6. q

27.4

Email Tools

27.4.1

Grepmail: Search mail archives

Grepmail searches mailboxes to build a new mailbox with all emails containing the results, so that they can be reviewed with your favourite mail tool.
The default is to search for the pattern in both the head and body of the
email. Only email headers are searched if you specify -h; search is restricted
to email bodies with -b. To be case insensitive use -i and to ignore MIMEencoded blocks use -M. Date searches are effected with -d which allows a date
string in a variety of formats, including -d yesterday, -d "5/18/2001" for
email since 18 May 2001.
The basic use is:
$ grepmail <string> [<mbox>] > <newmbox>

So, for example, you might search for the email containing that meeting:
$ grepmail -RMi "that meeting" ~/mail > meeting.mbox

This takes about 10 minutes to search my 2GB of mail files.

But perhaps you want just a report of files in which the email appears:
$ grepmail -RMir "that meeting"

More complex patterns are possible:

$ grepmail -RMih "^From.*Freddy" ~/mail

And to search specific headers:

$ grepmail -RMiY (^TO:|^From:) [email protected] ~/mail

276

Email

27.4.2

EMail Attachments

27.4.3

MS-TNEF attachments

Have a look at http://freshmeat.net/appindex/1999/10/13/939847359.

html

27.4.4

Uuencode and Uudecode in Mail

Before the development of the MIME standard a common way to include

attachments within an email message was to transform 8bit data format into
a 7bit US-ASCII text format using the uuencode command.
To decode the attachment you need to use the uudecode command. This
command can be applied to the whole mail message and it will find the
relevant sections and extract the encoded attachments into the files they
specify. One way to effect this is to save the mail message to a file (say
message.uu), then do:
$ uuencode message.uu

You may want to do this in a temporary directory to deal with the potential
of uuencode overwritting pre-existing files.

27.4.5

Mailing Lists

Debian Pacakges: mailman

Install mailman. Run mmsitepass to set the site password. Visit http://ktware.com/cgibin/mailman/admin/
However, a simple use of /etc/aliases on the machine may sometimes suffice
for a small local network. Then use rdist to distribute the aliases file to the
local machines.

27.5

Spam

Debian Pacakges: spamassassin

27.6 Viruses

277

The spamassassin package is extremely useful for dealing with unwanted

emails.
If your arriving email has already been passed through spamassassin (by your
ISP or else through using fetchmail yourself), then you simply have to check
for the appropriate header field in the email (i.e., check if X-Span-Flags exists
and contains YES). Set up an evolution filter to do this. Select ToolsFilter
and click on Add. The search criterion will be to look at a Specific header
(X-Spam-Flag) and to check that it contains YES. For the action choose a
folder into which the identified spam should be placed (rather than deleting
it, just in case spamassassin gets it wrong). Click OK and thats it.
To call spamassassin for use within evolution create a script file (perhaps in
/home/kayon/bin/spam-filter.sh with:
spamassassin -e

The -e option indicates that we should run spamassassin and return an

exit code that indicates whether the email looks like spam. Make the script
executable with:
> chmod u+x /home/kayon/bin/spam-filter.sh

Now tell evolution to filter you email with this script. So, create a new
filter with ToolsFilter and click on Add. Call the new filter something
like SpamAssassin. Select Pipe Message to Shell Command as the first
part of the criteria. Then fill in /home/kayon/bin/spam-filter.sh as the
command to run. Set Does Not Return and 0 for the other fields. For
the action choose a folder into which the identified spam should be placed
(rather than deleting it, just in case spamassassin gets it wrong). Click OK
to close the filter and then OK to close the filter editor. You are now done!

27.6

Viruses

Debian Pacakges: clamav clamav-freshclam

The clamav package can be used to monitor arriving email for viruses. The
virus data will be updated automatically if clamav-freshclam is installed. Can
be used with procmail by using a script (in this case, clamfilter.pl from ) to
run clamscan on each message with a procmail entry like:

278

Email

:0fw
| clamfilter.pl
:0:
* ^X-Virus-Found: yes
clam-date +%Y-%m

27.7

SMTP Direct

You can talk directly to an SMTP server, for example to test that it actually
works for you. Heres a sample interaction.
> telnet mailhost.act.ktware.com.au 25
Trying 105.83.2.11...
Connected to mailhost.act.ktware.com.au.
Escape character is ^].
220 mailhost.act.ktware.com.au ESMTP Postfix
helo modern.act.ktware.com.au
250 mailhost.act.ktware.com.au
mail from: [email protected]
250 Ok
RCPT TO: [email protected]
250 Ok
data
354 End data with <CR><LF>.<CR><LF>
Subject: Testing manually through telnet to mailhost
This is the body
.
250 Ok: queued as 42DDE139919
quit
221 Bye
Connection closed by foreign host.

Chapter 28
Eye of Gnome: Image Viewer
The Eye of Gnome is an image viewing and cataloging program. It can deal
with large images, and zoom and scroll while keeping memory usage constant.
You can drag a collection of filenames into a window and EOG will open
each of them.

279

280

Eye of Gnome: Image Viewer

Chapter 29
Evolution: GNU Personal
Information Manager
Personal Information Managers (PIMs) provide address books, calendars,
to-do lists, and email readers. Evolution, from Helix Code, is the Gnome allin-one PIM similar to Microsofts Outlook. Evolution provides an integrated
desktop environment providing a mail client, address book, and calendar.

29.1

Managing Email

29.1.1

Using Virtual Folders

Virtual Mail Folders is a concept familar to many GNU/Linux users, but

often not found in the Win32 OS. A virtual folder groups together email
messages into separate folders, using canned queires. The folders dont actually exist as physical folders on the file system at allthe original inbox is
maintained. Through this mechanism the mail in the inbox can be separated
according to the mailing list that it originates from, or a group of colleagues
working on a project, etc. A significant advantage of virtual folders is that
you can easily change the organisation of your inbox without actually physically reorganising your inbox or extracting messages from your inbox into
other physical folders. You can delete a virtual folder without actually deleting the messages in it!
281

282

Evolution: GNU Personal Information Manager

Figure 29.1: The Evolution Welcome Screen showing some email from the
Evolution development team at Helix Code.

29.2

Contacts and Address Book

29.3

Managing Your Calendar

29.4

Tracking Your Tasks

Chapter 30
File Systems
The default GNU/Linux file system (which defines how data is stored on
a storage device like a hard disk) is call the ext2fs. Ext2fs is an inode
(information node) based filesystem. Inode based file systems store pertinent
file data in inodes. Such file systems have been around since the early days
of Unix. Other inode-based file systems include XFS and BSDs UFS.
Ext3fs extends ext2fs with journaling. Thus, when you reboot without properly shutting down the machine, for example, no more messages about non
clean un-mounts of the file system.
ReiserFS is a very different file system based on fast-balanced trees. It was
proposed by Hans Reiser who took the theoretical concept of AVL-trees to
the task of a filesystem.

283

284

File Systems

Chapter 31
Firewalls
THIS IS OLD. USE IPTABLES NOW.
Debian Pacakges: bastille
A firewall can be set up on a machine connected to the Internet and can then
relay network traffic to machines connected on a local network.
The bastille package provides both a firewall and Network Address Translation (NATalso referred to as IP Masquerading). When installing the
package use the defaults and all should be just fine.

31.1

IPMASQ

To set up your Debian GNU/Linux machine as a firewall use:

wajig install ipmasq

Then set up your /etc/network/interfaces file and ipmasq will set up

firewall and routing tables automatically.

31.2

IPCHAINS

With a update to the klogd package (or perhaps it was an update to the
netbase package which contains ipchains, I started getting the following log
285

286

Firewalls

messages written to my console (in addition to /var/log/syslog and in

dmesg!):
Packet log: input DENY ppp0 PROTO=88 125.83.4.1:65535 224.0.0.10:65535
L=60 S=0xC0 I=0 F=0x0000 T=2 (#11)

These packets are coming from actdial.ktware.com (125.83.4.1my connection to the internet) and their CISCO router sending regular EIGRP (PROTO=88)
packets. Nothing untoward about this but for some reason the log messages
were appearing on the consoles! Every 4 seconds!
Looking at the current ipchains rules we see rule 11 is the default catch-all:
DENY

all

----l-

anywhere

anywhere

n/a

With the following ipchains command the log messages are stopped:
# ipchains -I input 11 -i ppp0 -d 224.0.0.10 -j DENY

So that rules 11 and 12 of the input chain are now:

DENY
DENY

all
all

---------l-

anywhere
anywhere

IGRP-ROUTERS.MCAST.NET n/a
anywhere
n/a

Note that you can save the current rules using:

# /etc/init.d/ipchains save

which places the saved rules into /etc/ipchains.save. Load them in again
with:
# /etc/init.d/ipchains load

It seems to be okay to flush the old ones when asked.

Unfortunately, this rule is lost each time ppp restarts!
But the actual problem has been found: The log messages have a log level
of less than 7, meaning they are more than debug messages. The klogd
logger will display messages with a log level less than 7 to the console! This
is fixed by changing, in the file /etc/init.d/klogd the line that says:

31.2 IPCHAINS

287

KLOGD=""

to
KLOGD="-c 5"

The messages are now gone from the console, but still remain in dmesg and
/var/log/syslog. Indeed, /var/log/syslog gets filled with these so it still
may be best to turn them off with the ipchains rule.

288

Firewalls

Chapter 32
Floppy Disks
The floppy disk device (i.e., the code that knows how to deal with the floppy
disk drive) is usually /dev/fd0. Under MS-Windows this would be referred
to as drive a:.
In this chapter we cover topics relating to using floppy disks on a GNU/Linux
system.

32.1

Floppy Drive Access Permissions

In some installations users might not, by default, have access to the floppy
drive. Generally the floppy device (/dev/fd0) belongs to group floppy and
the administrator may need to add a user to this group to grant them access.
This can be done simply with the Gnome interface from ApplicationsSystem
ToolsUsers and Groups. Refer to Chapter 42 for details on managing groups.
Alternatively, from the command line the following has the same effect:
# adduser kayon floppy

32.2

Format a Floppy

The Gnome tool to format a floppy disk is gfloppy, as shown in Figure 32.1.
This can be accessed from ApplicationsSystem ToolsFloppy Formatter.
289

290

Floppy Disks

Figure 32.1: The Gnome floppy formatter.

From the command line there are several options. You can format the floppy
with:
$ superformat /dev/fd0

Similarly the command:

$ fdformat /dev/fd0

will also format a floppy, but does not create an file system. A file system can
be created with mkdosfs. You could put, instead of a MS-DOS file system
on the floppy, a Linux file system with:
$ mkfs -t ext2 /dev/fd0

32.3

Using DOS-Like Commands

This user, guest, can then use the mtools commands to access the floppy
disk. These are tools that mimic the Microsoft DOS commands: mdir, mcd,
mcopy, mdel.

32.4

Mounting Floppy Disk Device

Edit /etc/fstab to add the following line to allow any user to mount /mnt/
floppy which is particularly convenient from the Gnome mount applets which

32.4 Mounting Floppy Disk Device

291

you can click on to cause a mount or unmount. Or create symbolic links for
Gnome from your ~/.gnome-desktop directory to /floppy. Then Gnome
seems to magically do the mounting for you when you open them (they
will appear on your Gnome desktop and you can change the icons to more
appropriate symbols such as a floppy). I guess you better make sure you
unmount the floppy before you physically remove the media.
/dev/fd0

/mnt/floppy

auto

defaults,noauto,users,rw

292

Floppy Disks

Chapter 33
Fonts: X Window System
33.1

Setting Up Fonts in X

Lets assume you are not using a font server.

A good guide to setting up fonts in X is available from http://egads.
ertius.org/~rob/font_guide.txt. The following provides a summary!
We assume you are using xserver-xfree86 version 4.1 or later.
First install x-ttcidfont-conf and defoma.
Then add the following to the top of the Files section of /etc/X11/XF86Config-4,
so that TrueType fonts are available.
FontPath

"/var/lib/defoma/x-ttcidfont-conf.d/dirs/TrueType"

After installing any new TrueType fonts while in X be sure to run

$ xset fp rehash

to ensure the new ones get noticed.

The order of fonts in the Files section has an impact on what fonts are used
by XFree86. Be sure to give Type1 fonts (often rendered poorly in XFree86)
a low priority by placing the following line at the end of the list of FontPaths:
FontPath

"/usr/lib/X11/fonts/Type1"

293

294

Fonts: X Window System

Another trick is to avoid XFree86 rescaling fonts by giving a higher priority

to the unscaled fonts, by placing the following two lines relatively higher in
the lits of FontPaths:
FontPath
FontPath

"/usr/lib/X11/fonts/100dpi:unscaled"
"/usr/lib/X11/fonts/75dpi:unscaled"

Direct from the above web page:

Now that its all setup, install some font packages. ttf-bitstream-vera
is a rather nice set of fonts, and is Free
(http://www.debian.org/intro/free) enough to go into Debian itself.
Its not in woody yet, but you can download the .deb from
http://http.us.debian.org/debian/pool/main/t/ttf-bitstream-vera/ttf-bitstream-vera_
(or your local mirror) and install it with "dpkg -i
ttf-bitstream-vera_1.10-3_all.deb" (as root). sid and sarge users are
just an "apt-get install ttf-bitstream-vera" away from it. Another
option is ttf-freefont, which is in all three current versions of
Debian.
For Japanese and other non-roman languages, you might want to try these
fonts: tfm-arphic-bsmi00lp, tfm-arphic-bkai00mp, tfm-arphic-gbsn00lp,
tfm-arphic-gkai00mp, hbf-jfs56, hbf-cns40-b5, hbf-kanji48, ttf-baekmuk
and ttf-thryomanes.
Another alternative is to install Microsofts Corefonts. They removed
the fonts from their website, but the msttcorefonts package will
download them for you from a mirror. Note that these are NOT Free (in
the Debian sense), but youre permitted to at least use and download
them.
Both of these packages (and the other ttf-* packages in Debian) should
now Just Work, and appear available to all X programs that use the
regular "core" font system. This includes things like xterm, emacs and
most other non-KDE and non-GNOME applications.
Now, run "xfontsel" and select either "Microsoft" or "Bitstream" in the
fndry menu (click on the word "fndry"). Now look at the ungrayed out
entries in the "fmly" menu. You should have a bunch of either Microsoft
fonts (Verdana, Trebuchet, etc) or some Bitstream ones (or both).
For KDE2.2 and GNOME1.4 (with libgdkxft0, which is a hack to get GTK

33.2 Fonts are too Large

295

1.2 to do anti-aliased font rendering), you need to setup Xft1, as

well. Xft1 is highly deprecated, and is basically only used by
GNOME1.4 and KDE2.2. For GNOME2 and KDE3, you need to setup
"fontconfig" which Xft2 uses to find fonts. Ill get to that in a
minute.
Edit /etc/X11/XftConfig and add a line like
dir "/var/lib/defoma/x-ttcidfont-conf.d/dirs/TrueType"
before the other dir lines. I dont have any xft1 stuff on my machine
anymore, so Im not sure if you need to restart X or not before this
change will take effect. I seem to remember that "xftcache" would
update the Xft1 cache, but itd be good if someone could confirm that
for me.
Now, for fontconfig, which does *not* exist in woody. You shouldnt
need to install anything extra for this, since all the packages using
fontconfig will Depend on it (indirectly) already. First, look in
/etc/fonts/fonts.conf. There should be a line like the one below. If
not, open up /etc/fonts/local.conf and add this
<dir>/var/lib/defoma/x-ttcidfont-conf.d/dirs/TrueType</dir>
just after the <fontconfig> line.
Fontconfig should pick these up immediately, and "fc-list" should list
your new fonts. Another neat feature of fontconfig is that you can just
drop fonts in ~/.fonts/ and all your fontconfigified programs will have
access to them immediately.

33.2

Fonts are too Large

Depending on your setup you might find that the default fonts used by the
X Window System are too big. Generally, the default setup is good for
1024x768 resolution but on laptops and older hardware that only support
800x600, for example, it is best to use smaller fonts. To achieve this simply
edit your /etc/X11/XF86Config file so taht the 75dpi (dots per inch) fonts
come before the 100dpi fonts. A snippet from a typical installation is:
Section "Files"

296
RgbPath
FontPath
FontPath
FontPath
FontPath
FontPath
FontPath
FontPath
FontPath
FontPath
FontPath
FontPath
EndSection

Fonts: X Window System

"/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/rgb"
"/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/local/"
"/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/misc/"
"/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/75dpi/:unscaled"
"/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/100dpi/:unscaled"
"/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/Type1/"
"/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/Speedo/"
"/usr/lib/ghostscript/fonts/"
"/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/75dpi/"
"/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/100dpi/"
"/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/freefont/"
"/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/sharefont/"

Chapter 34
Ghemical: Chemical Modelling
Ghemical is a package for computational chemistry being developed at the
Department of Chemistry, University of Kuopio, Finland. The package supports all-atoms molecular mechanics and reduced protein models. Geometry optimisation, molecular dynamics, and visualisation tools are available.
Ghemical can be directly linked into the quantum chemistry program MPQC
for quantum-mechanical calculations, effectively serving as a graphical frontend for the MPQC program, thus providing various 3D-plots for electron
densities, molecular orbitals, and molecular orbital densities.

297

298

Ghemical: Chemical Modelling

Figure 34.1: The Gnome Chemistry Modeller

Chapter 35
GIMP: Image and Photo
Manipulation
The GNU Image Manipulation Program (the GIMP) is the open source image and photo manipulator which gives Adobes very popular and powerful
Photoshop a serious run for its money. GIMP is a very powerful tool for
editing images and creating impressive graphics. It is one of the highlights of
all open source software, and demonstrates the quality that can be achieved
through open source development.
This chapter provides a number of recipes for some common tasks using the
GIMP. Many excellent books that unleash the full power of the GIMP are
available and some are mentioned in Section 35.3.

35.1

Remove Red Eye

Use the lasso selection tool to select the red eye region (zoom in first). Then
bring up the Channels dialogue and de-select Green and Blue. Then from
the menus choose Desaturate a few times. That should fix it.

35.2

Image Quality

Image resolution (dots per inch or just dpi) is an indication of the quality
of an image. It is less important for screen images but more so for print299

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GIMP: Image and Photo Manipulation

Figure 35.1: Sample GIMP screenshot.

35.3 Gimp Resources

301

ing. Common image resolutions include 72, 120, 300 and 600 dpi (dots per
inch). When producing graphics for web pages or for viewing on the screen
then 72dpi is generally the more popular resolution (and keep the images to
less than about 30K). For scanning and printing, 400dpi is a good quality
resolution.
For printing 100dpi is generally exactly 100 dots per inch. On screen however
this is not always so, as it depends on the resolution of the monitor (so a 72
pixel wide image on a 17 monitor at 640x480 might come out at about an
inch but at 1280x1024 it will be half the size, and so about 144dpi).
When scanning or printing dpi is something that becomes important.
For images meant for display on a screen, as in web design it is the pixel dimension that is more important. Consider two images that are both 100x100
pixels, but one is say 100dpi and the another is 300dpi. They will be exactly
the same size on your monitor but when printed the first image will be 3
times larger then the second.
The GIF format doesnt store any dpi informationonly the pixel dimensions
so when the GIMP saves to GIF you lose your printer settings! When
opening a GIF the resolution will be set to 72dpi.
When designing for screen display of images consider what monitor size will
you want to design for (640x480, 800x600, 1024x768, etc). Then ensure your
final image is not any larger then your screen. You will also need to take into
account that the actual area of your browser is smaller then the screen and
so you should keep images as small as possible.

35.3

Gimp Resources

GIMP Visual Quickstart Guide by Phyllis Davis. 306 pages, published

May 2000 by Peachpit Press, ISBN 0201702533.
Gimp for Linux Bible by Stephanie Cottrell Bryant, Tillman Hodgson, and
Bryan Livingston. 728 pages, published April 2000 by DG Books Worldwide,
ISBN 0764533983.
Grokking the Gimp by Carey Bunks. 352 pages, published February 2000
by New Riders Publishing, ISBN 0735709246.
Sams Teach Yourself GIMP in 24 Hours by Joshua Pruitt and Ramona

302

GIMP: Image and Photo Manipulation

Pruitt. 334 pages, published March 1999 by Sams, ISBN 0672315092.

Arists Guide to the GIMP by Michael J. Hammel. 340 pages, published
December 1998 by Specialised Systems Consultants, ISBN 1578310113.

Chapter 36
Glade: GUI Builder
Glade is a graphical user interface (GUI) builder for creating applications
using the GTK+ and Gnome toolkits. It provides a visual tool (c.f. Visual
Basic) to interactively create the GUI on a canvas from components (widgets)
provided by the toolkits. Interfaces can be rapidly developed and source
code in a variety of languages can be automatically generated. Glade directly
generates C source code with support for C++, Ada95, Python, Perl, and
Eiffel available within Glade via external tools. Alternatively, LibGlade can
be used to dynamically create the user interface directly from the XML data
at run time.
As with many Gnome products Glades native save format is XML (gzip
compressed) allowing the interface to be modified, transformed, and viewed
by many other XML tools (or even edited manually in your favourite text
editor if desired). Independent applications that allow differently structured
C source code to be generated directly from the XML data, for example,
exist.
In this chapter we begin with an overview of using Glade. We then proceed through the development of a sample Glade application by way of a
walk-through that will build the interface. This is followed by walk-throughs
that will turn this interface into a fully functional application. These walkthroughs begin with a C implementation and include packaging the application for distribution using the GNU packaging tools (automake, autoconf, and
tar). We then walk through the use of the LibGlade library as an alternative
for C. Versions of the application in Python and C++ are also presented.
We complete this chapter with reference sections covering all aspects of Glade
and some basics of the Gtk+ and Gnome toolkits.
303

304

36.1

Glade: GUI Builder

Using Glade

Together with the GTK+ toolkit Gnome provides an extensive collection of

user interface building blocks called widgets. These are components like text
fields, labels, numeric entries, check buttons, menus, and so on.
In your programming language of choice you access these widgets to compose
a graphical user interface for your application. This often involves careful
programming to place your widgets correctly and to associate code with
actions that are performed on the widget (such as clicking on a button).
Glade simplifies this task by providing a GUI-based GUI-builder. With Glade
you choose widgets from a graphical palette of available widgets and place
them onto your evolving application window (the canvas). You edit the properties associated with the widgets through another graphical interface where
you also add the appropriate connections between your widgets and externally written code. This is done by identifying the names of functions that
will be called when a widget receives a signal. For example, you can associate
a function that you might call on button1 clicked with the clicked signal
associated with a button). These functions (callbacks) you code up in your
programming language of choice, whether that be C, C++, Ada95, Python,
Perl, or Eiffel.
When you are happy with how the interface looks you will either generate
the source code that implements the interface you have created or else you
will use a library (LibGlade) that directly loads the saved description of the
interface at run time and dynamically creates it.
Your main coding task is to write your callbacks (the functionality behind
the interface) and the associated support functions.

36.2 Glade Walkthroughs

36.2

Glade Walkthroughs

36.2.1

Building the GUI

305

We will use a simple application to illustrate Glade in action. Our sample

GUI will be for a tool to count the number of lines, words and bytes in a
filenothing complex but suitable for demonstration.
The Glade Windows
Start Glade from the ProgramsDevelopment menu of the Gnome desktop (or
else use Ctl+F2 and then type in glade to start the application). You will
see three new windows popup. These constitute the Glade interface.

The left most window above is the main Glade window which will list the
windows and dialogs of your own project. Currently it is empty. The middle window is the Palette window from where you choose the user interface
widgets to include in your interface. The right window is the Properties
window where you can edit the properties of each widget such as its size,
behaviour, and signals it responds to. There are two other Glade windows
not shown but which can be displayed by selecting them from the main windows ViewShow Widget Tree and ViewShow Clipboard menus. We will
see them later.

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Glade: GUI Builder

Project Options
Our first task is to start a
project by editing the Project Options through the Options button of the main Glade window
(or else through the FileProject
Options menu).
By default
the Project Directory listed is
set to /home/guest/Projects/
project1 (where guest is the
current usernameit will be your
username in your case). In the
figure on the right the user has
edited this to replace the default project1 sub-directory with gwordsa
more descriptive name for this application. Note that the Project Name, Program Name and Project File have automatically changed to reflect the change
in the Project Directory. We will leave these defaults as they are since they
represent good choices. See Section 36.3.4 for details.
The remaining options we wont change either. Again they are generally
good choices. Note in particular though that we have the Enable Gnome
Support option turned on. You can take a look at the other two option tabs,
C Options and LibGlade Options, to get an idea of what else you can configure
(see the Reference sections later for details). When satisfied simply click the
OK button. The main Glade windows title will have changed to be Gwords,
the name of our application, replacing the previous <untitled>.

The Gnome Application Window

Now we are ready to start building our Gnome interface. We first need to create our main Gnome Application Window which will be the window displayed
when our application starts up. Select the Gnome button of the Palette window to display in the palette the Gnome widgets (which are extensions to the
GTK+ Basic widgets which are displayed by default). Identify the Gnome
Application Window widget by hovering the mouse over the various widgets
to display their tool tips. It is the top left widget in the palette. Simply click
on it with the left mouse button to create one.
There are many other widgets available on this Gnome palette. They include

36.2 Glade Walkthroughs

307

dialog boxes, message boxes, a standard Gnome About Dialog, file entry field
with a browse button, a pixmap entry field with built-in preview, and a druid.
Well see some of these later and all of them in the reference sections. For
now we simply create the Gnome Application Window.
You will be presented with a new window that has many of the characteristics
of a Gnome application window. There
is the menu bar along the top with the
usual File, Edit, View, Settings, and Help
menus, most including standard menu
items within them. This is followed by
the default toolbar with the New, Open,
and Save buttons. Below this is the canvas area where you will construct your interface. At the bottom is the status bar
and a progress monitor. Note that not all
menus and toolbar buttons will be useful for your application and you will
have others in mind that you may wish to add. Feel free to click around the
window and see the menus by clicking the menu twiceonce to select the
menu itself then once to open up the menu to show its sub-items. Also note
how widgets are identified in the Properties window as you select the widgets.

Adding Widgets
For now lets ignore the excess of decoration. Instead we will build the
basic interface components. Theres not much that we need in the interface.
Certainly we need to identify the file to be word counted. Also we want to
identify whether to just count the words or also the lines and bytes.
We go back to the GTK+ Basic palette for one of the layout widgets. These
are towards the bottom of the palettethird row from the bottom in fact.
Hover the mouse over each of them to find the Horizontal Box, Vertical Box,
Table, and Fixed Positions. Click on the Vertical Box layout. Now on the
central canvas area of your Gwords interface click the left mouse button. You
will be asked for the number of rows for your boxthe default of 3 will do
for now so just click on the OK button. Your canvas will be divided into 3
rows. Each one of the 3 rows can now be constructed independentlyeach
can contain a different widget, including further layout widgets.
We will use the first row to identify the name of the file whose contents we

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will be counting. We will use a file entry box to allow for the entry of the
filename. We will also add a label so that we know what the file entry box
is for. That means two widgets and all we have is a single rowso we need
to add a Horizontal Box with two columns. Find the Horizontal Box on the
GTK+ Basic palette, click it with the left mouse button and then click in the
top row of the three rows of our canvas. When prompted select just 2 (rather
than the default 3) columns for this Horizontal Box.
Labels should probably go to the left of the entry
box so we will place the label first. Select the
Label widget from the GTK+ Basic palettethe
first item on the second row. Now click in the
top left box of our canvas (this is the left most of
the two cells we have just created). A GtkLabel
widget should now appear with the label label1
(and some resizing of the cell might occur). This
is now our first real widget. Of course we dont
want the label to read label1 (even though we
might leave its nameas distinct from its label
textas label1 for now). We can change the label text through the Properties window where you
will find the fields relevant to this widget (assuming it is still the selected widget). Change the Label field to be File: (replacing label1). For good measure set the X Pad field to be 10 (so that the
widgets wont look so cramped). You will see the effect of these immediately.
To summarise so far. A basic Gnome Application
Window has been created with the default menu
bar and toolbar and a Gnome Application Bar at
the bottom. We have added a 3 row Vertical Box
and in the top row of this a 2 column Horizontal
Box. In the resulting top left cell we have added a
Label widget and changed the text to be File:.
It also has its X Padding set to 10 to give a less
cramped layout.
Removing Widgets
You can remove widgets easily through the menu on the right mouse button.
First click on a widget with the left mouse button to select it. The right
mouse button will then list the actions you can perform on this widget,

36.2 Glade Walkthroughs

309

including cut and delete. Note also the list of parent widgets all the way
up to the root widget which is called app1. Before proceeding lets explore
this widget pathway in a little more detail.

The Widget Tree

All widgets in an interface are organised into a tree viewable directly through
the ViewShow Widget Tree menu of the
main window. When a widget on your
canvas is selected the right mouse button menu allows you to view the path up
the tree from this selected widget to the
root widget. The path from the filename
label (label1) above consists of hbox1,
vbox1, dock1, and finally app1. Each of
these have submenus from which you can
choose to perform actions on those widgets. For example, if you delete vbox1
then that widget and all of its children
will be deleted from the canvasso be
careful!
We can see the Widget Tree window expanded above. Thus, app1 contains
dock1 which is made up of three sub-components: dockitem1 contains the
menu bar; dockitem2 contains the toolbar; and vbox1 is the Vertical Box that
we added above. The Widget Tree window provides an alternative mechanism
for selecting widgets.

Gnome File Entry

Now we add the widget for entering the filename. The one we will use is
the one provided by the Gnome palette. We could use the text entry field of
the GTK+ Basic palette and add a Browse button ourselves, but the Gnome
palette Gnome File Entry widget does it all for us, and more. Click on this
widget in the palette then click in the top right cell of your canvas. The
browse button might look a bit strange (stretched out) but dont worry, it
will sort itself out!

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Glade: GUI Builder

You can save the work youve

done so far by clicking on the
Save button of the main Glade
window (not the Save button of
the window youre working on
though!). Then, for fun, open
the project againload /home/
guest/Projects/gwords/gwords.
glade. Then, on the main Glade
window double click the app1 widget. You may like to change the Border
Width property of fileentry1 to be 10 (using the Properties window after
selecting the file entry widget in the canvas). This makes it appear less
cluttered.
Tooltips
Where possible you should think about tooltipsthose small popup frames
that appear while you hover the mouse over some item and contain useful
information about the item. Tooltips provide the basic reminders that help
the user ignore the applications written documentation. Tooltips should be
just a little verbose, perhaps taking up 3 or 4 lines of text. Aim to inform
with the minimum number of words.
You add tooltips to widgets by first selecting the widget. Select the text area
of your fileentry1 widgetthis will select something called combo-entry1
which is contained within the Gnome File Entry widget. Then in the Properties
window click on the Basic tab. On that page you will see the Tooltip text
entry about halfway down. Simply type in the required text, such as:
Name of the file whose contents is to be counted.
Now hover the mouse over the file entry field on your canvas and the tooltip
should pop up.
An interesting question is whether the tooltip should be associated with the
file entry field as we have done or with the label of the field, or both? The
answer is left as an exercise for the reader! We prefer to associate the tooltip
with just the entry field itself since that is where the mouse will be hovering
while you are thinking about it. On the other-hand Glades own interface
associates the tooltips with the labels.

36.2 Glade Walkthroughs

311

Check Buttons

We will now add a label and 3 check buttons to the next row of our canvas.
This will be used to indicate what we want counted: words, lines, and bytes.
So we need space for 4 widgets which we achieve with the Horizontal Box
widget of the GTK+ Basic palette. When prompted change the default 3
columns to 4 columns.
Add a Label to the first cell of this row and change the text of the label to
What to count:. This label is called label2 in our collection of widgets.
You may like to set the X Pad field to 10.
Now add a check button for Words in the next cell of this row. The
check button widget is the third widget of the third row of the GTK+ Basic
palettethe third row contains 4 different types of buttons. Select the Check
Button from the palette with the left mouse button then click the left mouse
button in the second cell of the second row of your canvas. This creates a new
widget called checkbutton1. Change the Label: text field in the Properties
window for this new checkbutton to read Words. Similarly add check buttons for Lines and Bytes. That is, select the Check Button on the palette
again then click in the next cell of your canvas. Note that after you place
a widget on your canvas the selected widget button on the palette becomes
in-active and the left mouse button reverts to being used for selection.
By default we will only count
words so the Words button should
be on by default. This is easily achieved by editing the widget
properties. Select the Words button on your canvas. Then in the
Properties window under the Widget tab click on the button that
says No alongside the Initially On
label. This will change this propertys button to be indented and to read Yes
and the corresponding check button on your canvas is now also turned on.
Also add tooltips for each check button, selecting each of the check buttons,
in turn, and adding text to the Tooltips field of the Basic tab of the Properties
window.

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Glade: GUI Builder

Removing a Row
We now realise that we didnt really need 3 rows for vbox1. Two are sufficient.
Select the third row. You may notice that the Properties window goes blank
and from the right mouse button menu this row of our canvas is nothing
more than a Placeholder. The right mouse button menu Delete will remove
it for us. You could put it back anytime (or indeed place any row within
vbox1) through the right mouse button menu. Select any widget within
vbox1 (e.g., the Words check button checkbutton1) and then with the right
mouse button traverse the menu to select vbox1Insert After.

Editing the Toolbar

The Run and Stop Buttons and the on run button activate callback.

Editing Menus
We will now tidy up the menus, removing those that dont apply, and adding
a new one to perform the actual word count.

Adding an About Dialogue

File Not Found Dialogue
Display Results
After the words, lines, and bytes have been counted we will write the results
to the Status Message area of the Gnome Application Bar at the bottom of
the window.

Running Your Interface

You can now run your interface, even though you have yet to write the code
to perform the counting. Each of the following walkthroughs begins with the
minimum required to run the interface without any actions behind it. Youll
want to give this a try just to make sure you can!

36.2 Glade Walkthroughs

36.2.2

313

Building the C Code

Once you have your basic user interface constructed tell Glade to save the
project (using the Save buttonthis updates the file that contains the XML
description of the interface) and then to build the project (using the Build
button).
Start up a terminal window, such as the gnome-terminal, and change to the
project directory. There you should see an executable file called autogen.
sh. This shell script takes care of the initial configuration of your package,
running automake to automatically generate the appropriate support files for
the configuration. It also runs the appropriate automake components leaving
you with a collection of Makefiles.
$ cd Projects/gword
$ ./autogen.sh
**Warning**: I am going to run configure with no arguments.
If you wish to pass any to it, please specify them on the
./autogen.sh command line.
processing .
deletefiles is
Creating ./aclocal.m4 ...
Running gettextize... Ignore non-fatal messages.
You should update your own aclocal.m4 by adding the necessary
macro packages gettext.m4, lcmessage.m4 and progtest.m4 from
the directory /aclocal
Making ./aclocal.m4 writable ...
Running aclocal -I macros ...
Running autoheader...
...
creating
creating
creating
creating
creating
creating
Now type

Makefile
macros/Makefile
src/Makefile
intl/Makefile
po/Makefile.in
config.h
make to compile the package.

You can now simply run the make command to perform the compilation

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Glade: GUI Builder

(making use of the generated Makefiles). Once completed, run the command
src/gword to start up your application.
$ make
$ src/gword

And thats all there is to it.

The GNU Package Management Tools

The first time you build the project all of the necessary files and sub-directories
are created. From then on each time you build only the relevant files that
need to be changed as a result of changes in the interface are modified.
Glade generates all the necessary files to be GNU compliant and to essentially run your application immediately (although without any callbacks
the application wont do much). The primary location for your C source
code is in a subdirectory called src. In there you will see 3 header files
(support.h, interface.h, and callbacks.h) and 4 source files (support.c,
interface.c, callbacks.c, and main.c). Of these you should never edit
support.h, support.c, interface.h, and interface.c. The first pair contain code that Glade supplies to support your application and the latter two
are the actual interface code. Glade manages these files. You will be making
changes primarily in callbacks.c to add the code for each callback. Glade
will add new callbacks to the bottom of callbacks.h and callbacks.c.
Now that you have built your interface (perhaps without any callback code
just yet) you are in a position to configure, compile and run your application.
The GNU automake and autoconf packages are used to simplify the management of the configuration, compilation, and installation of your application.
These packages are a great help in the task of managing software projects.
Discuss the files generated by the build and how they conform to the GNU
Standards.

Counting the Words

Now on to the code to actually do the word count and the appropriate callbacks.

36.2 Glade Walkthroughs

315

To recompile we simply run make again, either directly in the src directory
or else in the gword directory.
Packaging For Distribution
Describe the make dist and make dist-check functionality.

36.2.3

Using Libglade C

Counting the Words

36.2.4

Using Libglade with Python

Using LibGlade with python is an excellent option for rapid prototyping and
even build full strength applications. Like the use of LibGlade in C there
is never any need for you to convert the .glade file (containing the XML
description of the interface) into Python code. Instead, LibGlade reads the
XML and directly builds the interface using the LibGlade library (written in
C but with an interface for Python).
The basic code is:
#! /usr/bin/env python
import gtk
import libglade
import gnome.ui
def init_app ():
"Initialise the application."
global wTree
wTree = libglade.GladeXML ("gwords.glade", "app1")
dic = {"on_quit_button_clicked"
: gtk.mainquit,
"on_exit1_activate"
: gtk.mainquit}
wTree.signal_autoconnect (dic)
def main ():
init_app ()
gtk.mainloop ()

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Glade: GUI Builder

if __name__ == __main__: main ()

Here we have linked the interface callback on exit1 activate to the library
callback gtk.mainquit. The on exit1 activate is associated through Glade
with the Exit menu item and is supplied by default by the Gnome Application
Window.
Save this code into a file called gwords.py in your /home/guest/Projects/
gwords directory. Make the file executable with chmod u+x gwords.py.
Then run the program with ./gwords.py. Your interface should come to
life.
Problems arise if you dont have the appropriate packages installed. At a minimum make sure you have python-gnome installed (this package will depend
on various other python and gnome packages which should be automatically
installed by choosing to install python-gnome if you are using Debian).
You may also need to ensure that the PYTHONPATH environment variable
includes the gnome and gtk modules, but check this only if you have problems
running your Python program.

Counting the Words

Now we need to write some Python code to perform the counting of the words.
This will not be much of a challenge though as weve already got the logic of
the algorithm under control! Its now just a task of knowing the appropriate
Python syntax.

36.2.5

Using Libglade with Perl

In this section we cover some of the commonly used functions and concepts
you need to know about when writing code to add functionality to your
interface.

36.3 Glade Reference

36.3

Glade Reference

36.3.1

Writing Your Code

317

Finding Your Widget

If you use Glade to generate source code for your interface (rather than using
LibGlade) you should make use of the lookup widget() function that Glade
defines for you (in support.c) to access your widgets. You pass this function
a pointer to any widget in a window and the name of the widget that you
want to get (where the name is a string and is the same as the Name in the
Properties dialog for the widget). The function will return a pointer to the
widget whose name matches the string you supply.
The lookup widget() function relies on you giving a pointer to any other
widget in the same tree (perhaps a pointer to the root of the widget hierarchy
for that particular application window or dialog). Usually in a signal handler
(the callbacks that you write in callbacks.c) you can use the first argument
to the signal handler as the first parameter to lookup widget(). For example
you may have a button in you window called button1 and when it is clicked
you may want to access some text entry field that has the name entry1.
In callbacks.c you may have a callback:

void
on_button1_clicked

(GtkButton
gpointer

*button,
user_data)

{
GtkWidget *entry1;
entry1 = lookup_widget (GTK_WIDGET (button), "entry1");
...
}

Internally Glade uses gtk object set data() for storing pointers to all the
widgets in a window using the names set in the property editor as the key.
Then, inside lookup widget(), gtk object get data() is used to retrieve
the pointer indexed by this key. These two functions are also available to the
developer for their own purposes.

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Glade: GUI Builder

Using Libglade If you are using LibGlade to create the interface for you
dynamically you will make use of glade xml get widget() to access you
widgets. The LibGlade approach stores its widget pointers differently.
Using the GTKExtra Libraries
To make use of these libraries you will need to add the appropriate libraries to
your src/Makefile.in and make appropriate modifications to autogen.sh
and configure.in. Or perhaps you ONLY need to add to the appropriate
LIBS line in src/Makefile.am. This seems more likely.
Global and Local Pointers
An eternal issue in GUI development is how to get hold of the pointer to the
individual widgets when you need them. Should they be accessed from global
pointers that then restrict you to a single instance (or a known number of
instances) of the widgets a priori, or is there a better mechanism?
Global Top Level Widgets One solution is to have the top level widgets
global. This then allows all child widgets to be accessed using lookup widget()
provided by Glade.
Nothing Should be Global This is a pretty fundamental goal in programming and should be followed whenever possible. Here we identify how
to avoid having globals.

36.3.2

Command Line Options

Normally you construct your GUI interactively with Glade and then choose
to build the C code for the interface with the Build button. It is sometime
inconvenient to fire up Glade just to build the C source code from the Glade
XML file. Instead you can do the conversion from the command line with:
$ glade --write-source <gladefile>

If the command line option is not supplied, but a gladefile is supplied,

then Glade will start up and load the specified project.

36.3 Glade Reference

36.3.3

319

The Menus and Toolbar

We now explore each of the menus in

a systematic and comprehensive way.
There are five main menus and four of them (excluding View) should look
pretty familiar to the Gnome desktop user: File, Edit, Settings, and Help.
The toolbar provides a shortcut to some
of the menu items. Rather than specifically covering them separately we identify
their functionality below with their corresponding menu action.

The File Menu

The File menu provides the usual New Project, Open..., Save, and Exit operations. In common with all Gnome applications F3 is the keyboard shortcut
to open a project from a file, Ctl+S is the shortcut to save a project to a file,
and Ctl+Q is the shortcut to quit from Glade.

New Project The New Project returns the project options to their default
values (the same as when you start Glade without providing it a project file
name). You will be asked to confirm that you wish to start a new project.
Be sure you have saved the current project (if there is one) before you start a
new project. Click the Cancel button on the popup if you have not yet saved
the current project and wish to do so. Then choose New Project again. Click
on the OK button to proceed.

Open If you have an existing Glade project you can Open it through this
menu item, or through the Open button of the toolbar, or through the F3
shortcut, or else on the command line if you start glade from a gnometerminal. Via the menu, button, or keyboard shortcut you will be presented
with a File Selection Dialog to choose the Glade project file.
Like all Gnome (actually all Gtk+) applications tab-completion is active in
the File Selection Dialog. Thus you can type Pr<tab> and it will be completed to Project/gwords if that is the unique completion. For non-unique
completions you will see a list of possible completions in the File list.

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Save Glade currently does not keep tabs of whether you have saved your
project. Be sure to do so with the Save menu item or the Save button or
the Ctl+S keyboard shortcut. You can do this anytime and it is useful to
be in the habit of saving your project regularly. Saving the project writes
the current interface to a Glade project file which stores the interface in a
compressed (gzip) XML format. See Section 36.3.7 for details of the save
format.
The first time a project is saved (when no project file already exists) Glade
will present the Project Options dialog. This gives you an option to set the
location of the project files and to set various source code options.
Each time Glade saves the project the previous version is saved into a backup
file (e.g. gwords.glade.bak). Only the most recent backup is kept.
Build Source Code The FileBuild Source Code menu item (and the
Build button and the Ctl+W keyboard shortcut) will generate the source code
that implements the interface.
The language code generated is chosen from the Project Options dialog under
the General options tab (see section 36.3.4). The default is C source code
which is supported natively by Glade. Generation of C++, Ada95, Perl,
and Eiffel is effected through helper applications from the packages glademm
(for the glade program), gate, glade2perl, and eglade respectively. These
need to be available on your system if you are to build the interface in these
languages. If Glade can not find the appropriate helper application it will pop
up an explanatory window and show the message Error writing source
in the main window status bar.
See Section 36.3.3 for a description of the files generated by a build for C.
When you select to build your project source code if you have not previously
saved the project the Project Options dialog will be displayed allowing you
to set the project paths and other options. Otherwise Glade will silently
generate the source code.
Project Options The FileProject Options... item will bring up the Project
Options dialog. See Section 36.3.4 for details.
Exit To exit Glade choose the FileExit menu or else the Ctl+Q keyboard
shortcut. Glade will ask for confirmation (but it has no indication of whether

36.3 Glade Reference

321

you have saved the projectmake sure you have saved your project).

The Edit Menu

Glade has a cut and paste facility, placing widgets into the a clipboard. The
clipboard can be viewed by choosing ViewShow Clipboard. Note the shortcuts are the standard Ctl+X for Cut, Ctl+C for Copy, and Ctl+V for Paste.

Cut The EditCut menu item (and its Ctl+X keyboard shortcut) will remove the selected widget (and all of its children widgets) from the canvas.
The widget (together with its children) will be placed on the clipboard as a
single item. Later on you can select this widget on the clipboard and paste
it onto your canvas.

Copy The EditCopy menu item (and its Ctl+C keyboard shortcut) is
similar to Cut in placing the widget (and its children) on the clipboard,
except that the widget is not removed from the canvas.

Paste After cutting or copying a widget the EditPaste menu item (and its
Ctl+V keyboard shortcut) will place that widget onto the canvas to replace
whatever is currently selected. This may mean that a currently selected
widget will be replaced by the pasted widget. To avoid this ensure that what
is currently selected is an empty place holder.
What is actually pasted at any time depends on what is selected in the
clipboard. By default the most recently cut or copied widget is selected in
the clipboard. You can change the selected widget in the clipboard simply
by clicking on it.

Clear The EditClear menu item will delete the selected widget from the
canvas. The widget is not saved on the clipboardit is removed permanently.

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The View Menu

The Settings Menu
The Help Menu
The Help menu provides access to three useful reference documents and the
mandatory About... dialog. (Note that the reference documents are only
available, currently, with the Gnome version of Glade.)
The HelpQuick-Start Guide is a short document that reviews the main
Glade interfaces and what happens when Glade generates source code. The
HelpManual is under development but provides details of all interfaces. The
HelpFAQ contains a collection of typical questions asked by new users of
Glade.

36.3 Glade Reference

323

The HelpAbout... menu item

brings up the About dialog which
identifies the version of Glade.
This is useful if you need to report
bugs or problems you are having.
The copyright message identifies
the owner of Glade. The authors
name and email address then appear followed by a short description of the what Glade is and a
ULink for its home page. The
Glade About dialog is a good example of how to use the Gnome dialogs.

36.3.4

Project Options

The Project Options dialog allows you to tune many aspects of the project
you are developing with Glade. The types of options fall under three tabs:
General, C Options, and LibGlade Options.

General
The General options cover the
project location, project names,
programming language, and if to
support Gnome.

Basic Options The Project Directory lists the directory in which

the saved project file will be
stored. This is also where the
built source code will be written.
Use the Browse button to identify
a directory using a File Selection Dialog (which allows you to also create directories if you wish). As you change the Project Directory the Project Name,
Program Name, and Project File values will also change, unless you have already changed these other fields separately to give them a different name.

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When you save or build a project the directories will be silently created as
needed.
The Project Name is the name of your project. This will be used as the title
of the main application window you create (the Gnome Application Window).
The name can have spaces and other characters. As you change the name
of the project the Program Name, and Project File fields also change to reflect your project name (with spaces and other non-alphanumeric characters
converted to dashes).
The Program Name is the name by which the final executable program will
be known. This is used by Glade to name the output executable file in the
Makefile it generates. Once again, as you change this field the following field
(Project File) automatically changes to be the same. The previous fields do
not change.
The Project File is then the file located in the Project Directory in which the
interface is saved. This file has the extension .glade and is a gziped XML
document that records all of the project information. See Section 36.3.7 for
details.

Subdirectories The Subdirectories fields indicate where Glade should place

source code files it generates (Source Directory) and where Glade should place
any pixmaps (graphics) used in the project (Pixmaps Directory). These subdirectories are located in the Project Directory and are silently created by
Glade when it builds the project.

Language A choice of languages is available under Language. Only one

can be chosen at a time. The choice tells Glade what to do when the Build
button or menu is chosen. See Section 36.3.3 for details. The choices are
C, C++, Ada95, Perl, and Eiffel. Note that this is not relevant when using
LibGlade as the conversion is effectively performed at run time.

Gnome The Enable Gnome Support check button causes Glade to generate
the appropriate calls to initialise a Gnome application (rather than a Gtk+
application). For a Gnome project this should always be enabled.

C Options

36.3 Glade Reference

325

The C Options dialog relates

specifically to the generation of
C source code for your project.
Here you set various options relating to the generated code, the
files that are to be generated, and
their names.
General Options The first general option indicates whether
Glade should generate code to support the GNU gettext library so as to support internationalisation. It is a
good idea to leave this on (which is the default). Internationalising your
application is an important step in making your application user friendly.
The Set Widget Names check button is used to tell Glade to generate code
to set the names of all widgets in your interface. This is relevant if you find
that you want to use the Gtk+ function gtk widget path().
The Backup Source Files check button will cause Glade to copy files to .bak
backup files before overwriting them. This applies to the .glade file and also
to the source code files.
File Output Options
Interface Creation Functions
Signal Handling & Callback Functions
Support Functions
LibGlade Options
The LibGlade Options includes just
two parameters: whether to save
translatable strings into a separate C source file, and if so, what

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Glade: GUI Builder

file to save them in. This will

facilitate the translation of interfaces loaded by LibGlade. This option is important if you are using
LibGlade and you wish to internationalise your application. Details
here

36.3.5

Widget Properties

36.3.6

Widget Palettes

List all of the widgets provided by each palette and basic description and
functionality.

The GTK+ Basic Widgets

The GTK+ Additional Widgets
The Gnome Widgets
The GnomeApp
The GnomeApp widget is the basic Gnome application root window. It provides some standard menus, toolbar buttons and a status bar. The canvas
area between the toolbar and the status bar is where you will layout your
application. See page 307 for an example of the GnomeApp.

The GnomeDruid
The GnomeDruid is the Wizardlike widget that has a sequence of
windows with Next and Back buttons and a Finish button on the final window of the sequence. The
GnomeDruid widget has a stylised
start page (GnomeDruidPageStart

36.4 Glade Resources

327

widget) and a stylised finish

page (GnomeDruidPageFinish widget) and in between is a collection
of pages where information from
the user can be obtained (GnomeDruidPageStandard widgets).
On the start and finish pages you can only supply a title and some text. These
pages are information pages and are not used to obtain responses from the
user. The pages in between include a GtkVBox in which you can add your
own widgets.

36.3.7

The Glade Save Format

36.4

Glade Resources

Once you get into writing code you will need the GTK+/Gnome API documentation and might find the tutorial at http://www.gtk.org/tutorial/
and the API documentation at http://developer.gnome.org/doc/API/
api-toc.html useful.
You can find an introductory article on using LibGlade with Python at http:
//www.linuxfocus.org/English/July2000/article160.shtml.
Some useful books include:
Beginning GTK+ and Gnome Programming by Peter Wright. 613
pages, published May 2000 by Wrox Press, ISBN 1861003811. Covers glib,
Gtk+, and Gnome. Also covers Glade but rather skimpily. Suitable for the
beginner.
GTK+/Gnome Application Development by Havoc Pennington. 492
pages, published August 1999 by New Riders, ISBN 0735700788. Provides
extensive coverage of the GTK+/Gnome APIs and is a good guide to getting
up and started with Gtk+/Gnome.
Developing Linux Applications with GTK+ and GDK by Eric Harlow. 512 pages, published February 1999 by MacMillan, ISBN 0735700214.
Provides a basic introduction to using the GDK and GTK+ toolkits, but not
the Gnome toolkit.
Teach Yourself Gtk+ Programming in 21 Days by Donna Martin, et

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Glade: GUI Builder

al.
GTK+/Gnome Application Development by Havoc Pennington.
Gnome/Gtk+ Programming Bible by Arthur Griffith.
Linux Application Development by Michael K. Johnson, Erik W. Troan.

36.5

Acknowledgements

Glade was written by Damon Chaplin.

The Glade home page (http://glade.gnome.org/) provides basic information, features list, download, links to the email discussion lists and related
packages, and a list of the many applications developed using Glade.
The Glade Reference Manual is being written by Michael Vance. Damon
Chaplin has put together the Glade FAQ and Paul Drongowski has put together the Glade Turbo-Start guide. All three documents are available directly in Glade from the Help menu (only for the Gnome version of Glade at
present but this may change).

36.6

Using Napster

FROM http://www.funky-penguin.co.uk/index.php
Multimedia : Napster on Linux
If you havent heard of Napster then you have been sitting in from of your
Linux box staring at Emacs/vi (no arguments please). Napster is a file
sharing system which can be used for pointing users towards other users
who have the file the first user was looking for. The client that the user runs
contacts the server and sends it a list of the files available for download, when
a user does a search for a file the server searches through its database of users
and files and gives the user a list of other users the file could be downloaded
from. No files are stored on the server, it just acts a matchmaking system.
The Napster system started as a client for Wintel systems, but the protocol
was reversed engineer and many new clients and servers have been coded,
many are open source.

36.6 Using Napster

329

There are plenty of Linux/BSD clients available we will cover gnapster in

detail and I will run over some of the others. Gnapster as its name suggests
is a gtk/Gnome client, clients also exist for the console and KDE.
Gnapster (see bottom for download information) looks very much like the
official Napster client but thats inevitable I suppose, it has full support for
all download types, refinement of search based on bitrate/connection, able
to browse a users mp3 collection, and has a nice implementation of the chat
facilities of Napster. After you have downloaded an rpm, apt-got a deb or
built from the tarball, the configuration of gnapster is extremely simple, you
can create your account via the preferences dialog shown below.

Figure 36.1: Gnapster01

To create an account enter a username and password and ensure the new
account option is selected. Select your connection type and where files you
are willing to serve are stored and where you want files you have downloaded
put, I have these put in a different directory from the rest of my collection.
Before you close the window click Build mp3 list and a database of all the
files in your upload directory will be recorded. When you have finished your
configuration click OK and you will be able to connect to a Napster or
Opennap server. The shot below shows a list of Napster servers you can
connect to. The first time you login an account will be created for you.
Using gnapster is extremely simple, after you have connected and read the

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Glade: GUI Builder

Figure 36.2: Gnapster02

MOTD (Message Of The Day). Goto the seach tab and enter a search phrase,
shortly a list of files matching your search will be displayed. Right click over
the file you wish to download and select Dowload File. You will notice that
the text of the download tab goes white, this indicates something has changed
whilst you are not looking at it. The download tab shows the files you are
downloading and and the upload tab shows the files people are downloading
from you. There are many cool features available in the download and upload
sections which are beyond the scope of this document, have a fiddle and find
out for yourself what they do.
One area where I will go into detail is the console/chat section of the client.
If you havent changed the default settings then when you connect you will
automagically be dropped into the channel gnapster (shown below). You can
join a channel using /join channel-name and leave a channel /part channelname. You can have multiple channel windows open and even chat with a
person 1 to 1 using the /query username command. The chat system is very
close to IRC and some other IRC commands are also supported /help gives
you a full list.
If the official Napster network has been closed down when you read this then
dont worry as a network of interconnected Opennap servers is available for
your use, your client will most likely provide you with a list of these.

36.6 Using Napster

331

Figure 36.3: Gnapster03

Figure 36.4: Gnapster04

332

36.7

Glade: GUI Builder

Gnome Hack

Gnome hack is a game that lets you have an adventure. First you choose
who you want to be. You can be any character like an elf, wizard, caveman,
knight etc. Then you read the history and your mission. Then you use the
arrow keys to move your character. If you find something on the ground you
go to the tool bar and then go to action and click on get.
Sometimes jackal and bugs and gobiens can atak so you go to action if you
dont have any thing to throw go to kick if you do have something to throw
then you go to throw/shoot and then it will say in which direction [ when
you pick up something it will have letter when you want to use your item
press the letter after you click on what you want to do with it]

Chapter 37
Gnome: The Desktop
Gnome is desktop for Unix and GNU/Linux delivering a high level of usability and interoperability. The Gnome Foundation, initiated in August 2000,
brought together many of the major Unix vendors, including Sun Microsystems, IBM, HP and Compaq, to support the further development of Gnome.
Sun, for example, has identified the Gnome desktop as the standard for Solaris, one of the most popular commercial versions of Unix.
Gnome, an abbreviation for the GNU Network Object Model Environment, is a
component-based system built around standards such as XML and CORBA.
It offers a standard for look-and-feel and provides a platform for applications to share resources (like including graphics generated using the Guppi
application in a spreadsheet within Gnumeric).
While we refer to a common look-and-feel for Gnome there is much more.
While all Gnome applications have the same look-and-feel, you can choose
the look-and-feel (usually referred to as the theme) to suit your own style.
The variety of different themes is extensive and includes themes that can
make your desktop appear like MS-Windows or Apples Macintosh, to name
just two. Once you choose a theme all of the Gnome applications will use
that theme immediately. You can change themes (using the Toolbox) at any
time. The theme used in this book is the Default theme that is similar to
the HeliX theme but using a lighter grey in the background (and hence more
suitable for the screen images used here).
In this chapter we begin with the basics of the Gnome desktop and walk you
though interacting with Gnome applications, including menus, toolbars and
dialogs. This is followed by reference sections identifying Gnome applications.
333

334

37.1

Gnome: The Desktop

Using Menus

Menus in Gnome applications work in much the same way as other applications. The left mouse button is used to select a menu. You can either click
the mouse button on the menu or else hold the mouse button down over the
menu. In both situations the menu will stay until you make a choice or else
click somewhere else on the window.
Generally there are four types of menu items. The first have a right pointing
arrow and lead to further sub-menus. The second type may have a small icon
and some text followed by three dots. These items lead to dialogues that ask
for further information. The third type also may have a small icon followed
by some text but no dots. These items perform their action immediately on
selection. Finally, some menu items represent options that can be turned on
and off.
All Gnome applications have at least a File menu and a Help menu. The
File menu contains at least an Exit with keyboard shortcut to Ctl+Q. The
Help menu contains an About item which opens a dialogue that identifies the
application, author, version and date.

37.1.1

Tear-Off Menus

Gnome applications have tearable menus. Thats tearable

menus, not terrible menusmenus that can be torn off
and come up in a floating window of their own, and thus
persist until you want to remove them. The menus that
are tearable have an extra, and often overlooked, menu
item: it is the first item in the menu and consists of a
sequence of dashes. For example the figure on the right
shows the bluefish HTML editors File menu after it has
been torn off. Tear-off menus are useful to access common menu functions quickly. The original menu is still
accessible.
The menu can be removed by either selecting the first item again (the dashed
menu item with the leading arrow) if it exists, or else simply by closing the
window in the usual manner (usually the windows rightmost button).
Such tear-off menus are useful but their state is not recorded by the system
so that next time you start up an application for which you have torn-off

37.1 Using Menus

335

menus this fact is lost and you will need to tear them off again.

37.1.2

Shortcuts

Menus will often have combinations of keys that can be used as a shortcut.
These keyboard shortcuts will usually appear to the right within the menu
itself as a reminder. The associated keyboard shortcut is usually a combination of keys beginning with Control or Alt. Pressing the specified key
combinations has the same result as choosing the menu item. For example,
if the Edit menu has a Cut choice with a keyboard shortcut of Ctl+X then
holding down the Control key while you type the X key has the same effect
as choosing the Cut menu item.
Many shortcuts are in common usage amongst Gnome applications and will
be familiar to users of the Win32 OS. These include:
New
Open
Save
Print
Close
Quit

Ctl+N
Cut
Ctl+O or F3 Copy
Ctl+S
Paste
Ctl+P
Select All
Ctl+W
Undo
Ctl+Q
Redo

Ctl+X
Ctl+C
Ctl+V
Ctl+A
Ctl+Z
Ctl+R

Find
Replace

F6
F7

A powerful feature is that you can choose your own shortcuts whenever you
wish. To do this, simply move the mouse over the menu item whose shortcut
you wish to redefine (or to define if it currently does not have one) and
type the keyboard shortcut you wish to associate with that menu item. For
example, to map Cut to Shft+Ctl+Alt+X simple move the mouse to the Cut
menu item and press all four keys at the same time. This is probably not
a very useful binding, but its unlikely to be used for anything else, so its
a save choice to play with! Note that if the new shortcut previously was
associated with another menu item, the previous binding is lost.
If you use Shft+X as a shortcut it will be accepted but may not be useful. If
the context is a text editor then Shft+X will be captured to capitalise the x
rather than passed on as a shortcut. Other combinations involving the Shft
key work just fine, such as Shft+Alt+X and Shft+Ctl+X. Some applications
(e.g., nautilus) automatically save your shortcuts so that next time they will
appear. Others (e.g., bluefish) provide an option for you to save them if you
decide they are suitable.
Finally, some shortcuts might be identified by the applications as immutable

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Gnome: The Desktop

so that you are not able to re-bind them.

37.2

Toolbars

37.2.1

Floating Toolbars

Toolbars (and menubars) can float. The left end of each toolbar and menubar
contains a raised dotted image like that above. By placing the mouse over it
and holding the left mouse button down you can drag the toolbar to wherever
you like before releasing the mouse button.
Unlike floating (or tear-off) menus a floating toolbar or menubar does not
remain in the main window. You will have at most just a single instance of
a toolbar.
A toolbar or menubar can be returned to the parent window simply by dragging it back there. You can even drag the toolbars to the bottom of the
parent window if thats where you like them to be.

37.3

Dialogues

37.3.1

Filename Completion and Hidden Files

When prompted to load or to save files the dialog does not show any hidden
directories (those beginning with a period). To get them displayed, simply
enter a period in the Selection text field and press TAB.

37.4

Gnome Applications

There are many Gnome applications freely available either from the Internet
or else available for purchase from distributors. We identify here a selection

37.4 Gnome Applications

337

Figure 37.1: Toolbars and menubars can often be torn away from the main
window or even located elsewhere within the main menu. Here, the dia
application menubar is moved to the bottom of the main window and then
out of the window altogether.

of these applications, sorted by category. Many of these applications are

documented in this book.

File Managers
nautilus: See Chapter 59.
mc

HTML Editors
See Chapter 43.
bluefish: See Section 43.1.
quanta.
screem.

338

37.4.1

Gnome: The Desktop

Other Applications

Personal Information Managers

evolution
Web Browsers
galeon
Email Clients
banksia
balsa
spruce
grin
News Readers
pan
Word Processing
abiword
staroffice
Spreadsheets
gnumeric
Presentation Tools
presentation
Graphics Tools
dia
gimp
gnuplot

37.4 Gnome Applications

imagemagick
sketch
xfig
sane
gphoto
eog
gqview
xzgv
Music
grip
gnapster
Finance
gnucash
Database Management

339

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Gnome: The Desktop

Games
gnomehack
memblocks
Educational
gperiodic
ghemical

37.5

Desktop Managers

Gnome (http://www.gnome.org) is a Desktop and Session Manager. Sawfish

(http://sawmill.sourceforge.org) is a Window Manager. KDE (http:
//www.kde.org) is a Gnome alternative and WindowMaker and Enlightenment
are alternatives to Sawfish.
The LBX (Low Bandwidth X) server extension is useful for increasing the
responsiveness of remote X applications. Remote Emacs windows are now
being delivered to my desktop over a 33 K connection at about 3 times more
quickly! (Also more quickly than my LBX connection from MS-Windows/NT
using Exceed!)

37.6

Window Managers

There is an enormous variety of window managers for the X Window System.

A good index of window managers and desktop enviroments under the X
Window System can be found at http://www.plig.org/xwinman/.

37.7

Other Desktops

Both Gnome and KDE provide a desktop environment and an application

development framework. A desktop environment usually consists of a window
manager, task bar, and perhaps a file manager and documentation browser.
A development framework provides libraries and a GUI toolkit for application
development.

37.7 Other Desktops

341

Applications like WindowMaker, and Enlightenment are desktop environments

which tend not to provide development frameworks. They do, however, tend
to provide session management. While you can use these with desktop environments like Gnome and KDE their functionalities sometimes overlap, and
may even conflict.

37.7.1

KDE

The one thing that significantly held back the wide acceptance of the excellent
KDE desktop was the fact that it used the QT+ toolkit for its graphical
user interface development. For many years this toolkit did not meet the
requirements of the General Public License (GPL) and so could not legally
be included in many distributions. Indeed, because of this the Gnome project
was begun. By September 2000 when it was announced that the new version
of QT+ (2.2) would be released under the GPL Gnome was already catching
up to KDE in its development and many of the major Unix players had
decided to adopt Gnome.
Nonetheless, KDE remains a good alternative to Gnome providing a collection of well developed applications. It should be noted though that all of
these applications can run under any desktop, including Gnome (but perhaps
losing some functionality such as drag-and-drop between applications). And,
conversely, Gnome applications can also run under KDE. The significance of
the desktop is the look and feel of the associated applications and underneath how they inter-operate. Otherwise they are simple X Window System
applications and can run whether you are running the corresponding desktop
application or not.
We will review some of the KDE applications as alternatives to the related
Gnome application in the relevant chapters of this book.

37.7.2

XFCE

The aim of XFCE is to provide a simple and very small desktop requiring
minimal resources but providing a sufficient feature set for the genral user.
Xfce is actually based on the GTK+ toolkit as is the Gnome desktop.

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Gnome: The Desktop

37.8

Troubleshooting

37.8.1

Locked File

If you have your home directory NFS mounted and log onto Gnome multiple times, make sure ORBIT can talk TCP/IP to communicate with your
other gconf daemons. To enable this uncomment the following line in /etc/
orbitrc:
ORBIIOPIPv4=1

Restart gconf with:

$ gconftool-2 --shutdown

37.9

Gnome Resources

37.9.1

Gnome Books

Mastering Gnome by Bryan Pfaffenberger. 880 pages, published December

1999 by Sybex, ISBN 0782126251.

Chapter 38
GnuCash: Finances
This software might be useful for running a business.

343

344

GnuCash: Finances

Chapter 39
Gnumeric: Spreadsheet
From humble beginnings the spreadsheet has become one of the most useful
tools on the computer desktop. Serving very many different purposes, all
essentially dealing with numbers, spreadsheets provide a platform for tabulating numbers and automatically peforming operations on those numbers.
Spreadsheets today provide a comprehensive array of functions for all kinds
of purposes, together with impressive graphical reporting facilities.
The Gnome desktop supplies the gnumeric spreadsheet modeled on Excel.
When you start gnumeric for the first time you will get an empty spreadsheet
ready for your to work with, as in Figure 39.1.

Figure 39.1: Initial gnumeric screen with an empty spreadsheet.

A simple spreadsheet is used to illustrate the basic functionality of gnumeric.

345

346

Gnumeric: Spreadsheet

The spreadsheet acts as a simple timesheet to monitor time spent on particular tasks and to keep an accumulated total earned. You might imagine
your child keeping track of their pocket money!

Figure 39.2: A simple gnumeric spreadsheet illustrating thew basic operation

of the spreadsheet.

The Gnumeric spreadsheet is part of the Gnome desktop environment: a

project to create a free, user friendly desktop environment. As every other
component of Gnome, Gnumeric is free software (Some other people like to
call this OpenSource software) and it is licensed under the terms of the GNU
GPL.
Gnumeric will import your existing Excel, 1-2-3, Sylk, XBase and Oleo files.
If you are a developer and you want to contribute new importers (or polishing
and perfect existing importers) we welcome your patches.
Gnumeric is intended to be a replacement for a commercial spreadsheet, so
a lot of effort and work has still to go into it, but I believe we have the right
framework to do it.

39.1 Other Spreadsheets

Figure 39.3: Sample Gnumeric screen

39.1

Other Spreadsheets

39.1.1

The StarOffice Calc

39.1.2

KSpread

39.1.3

ApplixWare Spreadsheet

347

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Gnumeric: Spreadsheet

Figure 39.4: Sample Calc from StarOffice

39.1 Other Spreadsheets

Figure 39.5: Sample Calc from StarOffice

349

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Gnumeric: Spreadsheet

Chapter 40
GQView: Viewing Images
You can use gqview for presentations where your presentation is a collection
of images (one image for each slide!). Click the button to go to full screen.

Figure 40.1: Sample gqview screen.

351

352

GQView: Viewing Images

Chapter 41
Graphics
Graphics packages available include:
eog: Eye of Gnome
gthumb: A graphics file browser that displays thumbnail images.
Also see R and Python for other graphics information.

41.1

Graphics Editors

Graphics editors include:

gimp: The GIMP is an Adobe PhotoShop equivalent for sophisticated

image manipulation and graphics creation. It is one of the most respected GNU/Linux tools. See Chapter 35 for details.
sodipodi: Edit SVG (Scalable Vector Graphics) figures.
xfig: A older, but very versatile and powerfull vector graphics editor.
Highly recommended.
353

354

41.1.1

Graphics

Xfig: Vector Graphics Editor

With xfig figures are drawn using objects such as circles, boxes, lines, spline
curves, and text. Images can be imported, supporting formats such as gif,
jpg, and eps.
Xfig saves its figures in its native Fig format that may be converted into
various formats such as eps, gif, and jpg
Other applications can produce output in the Fig format, including gnuplot
and xgraph, both of which can generate graphs direct from the corresponding
data. Alternatively, pstoedit can generate input suitable for editting with
Xfig.

Figure 41.1: Xfig is an older Unix-based vector graphics tool. It has been
quite popular and although its interface is showing signs of its age, it remains
a useful and powerful vector graphics editor.

41.2 Common Operations

41.2

Common Operations

41.2.1

Charts and Plots

355

Many fine packages provide plotting capabilities. See Chapter 71 for plotting
capabilities in the R statistical package.
Gnuplot
Examples using gnuplot:
gnuplot>
gnuplot>
gnuplot>
gnuplot>
gnuplot>
gnuplot>
gnuplot>
gnuplot>
gnuplot>
gnuplot>

plot [0:1] (1-x)/x, log((1-x)/x)

set log y
plot [0:1] (1-x)/x, log((1-x)/x)
set nolog y
set terminal svg
set output "log1mxox.svg"
plot [0:1] (1-x)/x, log((1-x)/x)
set terminal postscript eps enhanced
set output "log1mxox.eps"
plot [0:1] (1-x)/x, log((1-x)/x)

GDChart
This charting toolkit with bindings for Python is available from http://
athani.pair.com/msteed/software/gdchart/. However, for sophisticated
plotting the R statistics package is recommended, particularly through its
Python interface RPy. See Chapter 71.
Some of the required packages include: python2.1-dev zlib1g-dev libpng2-dev
libjpeg62-dev.
Installation is straightforward. (Note that there is not currently a Debian
package for python-gdchart so need to compile and install it. The installation
is in /usr/local because of this.)
$ wget http://athani.pair.com/msteed/software/gdchart/gdchart-py-0.6.tar.gz
$ tar zxvf gdchart-py-0.6.tar.gz
$ cd gdchart-py-0.6

356
$
$
$
#
#
#
#

Graphics
perl -pi -e s|local/include/python2.0|include/python2.1| Makefile
make
su
cp gdchart.so /usr/local/lib/python2.1/site-packages/
chown root.staff /usr/local/lib/python2.1/site-packages/gdchart.so
chmod o+rx /usr/local/lib/python2.1/site-packages/gdchart.so
exit

Ggobi
The Debian ggobi package is a GTK+ version of xgobi, an interactive dynamic
data visualisation program. There is a Python interface to ggobi. However,
for sophisticated control over the generation of plots and graphs, see the R
statistics package (Chapter 71), particularly with its Python interface RPy
(Section 70.2.2).

41.2.2

Screen Capture

At times one comes across the need to capture the screen. That is, to save
what you see on your display, or in a window on your display, into an graphics
file. Perhaps you want to impress your colleagues with how youve managed
to settle upon a wonderful combination of Gnome and Sawfish themes (Section 85).

Gnome Screen-Shooter
An excellent solution is the Gnome Screen-Shooter applet. This little applet
sits in your gnome panel and is ready to take a snat at your whim.

Using ImageMagick
Try imagemagick with screenshot...I think or something like that ...its part
of the Gnome desktop environment

41.3 Conversions

357

Using xv

41.2.3

Thumbnails

Webmagick builds HTML and imagemap graphics of collections of graphics.

Gthumb browses thumbnails of graphics, as does nautilus.

41.2.4

Transparent PNG Images

Suppose you have a PNG graphics file that you want to place on your web
page but its background is white, whereas your web page is blue. Make the
PNG background transparent with:

$ convert -transparent white example.png exampleT.png

41.3

Conversions

Using the imagemagick package:

$ convert -page a4 *.jpg pages.pdf

41.3.1

PostScript

A useful tool for converting from PostScript to other editable formats (including vector formats like fig and svg) is pstoedit.
To convert from PostScript to XFig placing the output into example.fig:
$ pstoedit -f fig example.ps

To convert from PostScript to SVG placing the output into example.svg:

$ pstoedit -f plot-svg example.ps

358

Graphics

EPS to Encapsulated PDF

Use:
$ epstopdf image.ps

Strip Excess Postscript Border

Some applications (e.g., Splus) seem to place extra white space around the
encapsulated PostScript that they generate. This is a problem when importing into other packages, such as LaTeX. A simple solution is:
$ ps2eps < original.eps > new.eps

This determines an accurate bounding box and trims the image to that box.

Chapter 42
Groups: Managing Access
Permissions
Every file and folder in a GNU/Linux system belongs to a group. Each user
is also a member of a group. Groups are used to control collections of users
who may have access to particular files and folders.
A Debian GNU/Linux system creates some standard groups and users. The
system administrator can also create new users and may also create new
groups. Groups can be managed using the Gnome users-admin tool, accessed from ApplicationsSystem ToolsUsers and Groups. By default this
shows only users, but you can access groups by selecting the More Options
button. This allows you to add new groups and to add and remove users
from groups.

Figure 42.1: Gnome interface for managing GNU/Linux groups.

We list below the standard groups and users, but the reader is referred
to /usr/share/doc/base-passwd/users-and-groups.html for further details.

359

360

Groups: Managing Access Permissions

Group
root
daemon
bin

gid
0
1
2

sys

adm

tty

disk

lp

mail

news

uucp
proxy
kmem

10
13
15

dialout

20

fax
voice
cdrom

21
22
24

Description
This is roots primary group.
A group for non-root daemons.
This group exists for historical reasons and some programs wont run without it.
This group exists for historical reasons and some programs wont run without it.
Most of the log files (in /var/log) are group readable
by users who belong to his group. You can add users
who need to monitor such log files to this group. Note
though that sometimes private information can be accidentally included in logs, like passwords when connecting via PPP over a Modem. This should not happen
(the scripts that write the logs should identify these as
not being echoed) but the potential for mistakes is there.
The terminal devices with names beginning with /dev/
tty are group accessible to group tty. Programs such as
write and wall need access to /dev/tty and they set
their group id (sgid) to tty.
The disk device nodes are group accessible to disk so
that programs that need access to them are sgid disk.
Jobs associated with the lp (printer) daemon (lpd) are
group accessible to the lp group so that lpd can access
them without being root.
mailbox spool directories belong to group mail, MUA
software runs setgid mail. This makes dot locking possible. Also, mailboxes must be writeable by group mail
(Policy Manual, 3.1.1.1, 5.6).
standard group for user news. Why does news have its
own group, and many of the other daemon uids dont?
uucp jobs are group accessible to uucp.
web cache files are group accessible to proxy.
/proc/kmem is group accessible to kmem. Programs
that need access are sgid kmem.
ppp- and isdn device nodes are group accessible to dialout. Include users allowed to initiate dialout in this
group.
fax jobs are group accessible to fax.
voice messages are group accessible to voice (vgetty)

361
floppy
tape

25
26

sudo
audio

27
29

dip

30

majordom

30

postgres

32

www-data

33

backup
msql

34
36

operator
list
irc

37
38
39

src

40

gnats

41

shadow

42

utmp

43

video
staff

44
50

for device nodes. Include users allowed to access these

in the appropriate groups.
for device nodes. Include users allowed to access sound
in this group
For daemons running under their own uid/gid. Why are
these static?
For daemons running under their own uid/gid. Why are
these static?
For daemons running under their own uid/gid. Why are
these static?
This has been discussed in the past, and the discussion
is not finally finished. Today, www data files belong to
this group and the web servers run with that group, thus
being able to write the files. This has been considered
a security hole, but was not yet changed.
For daemons running under their own uid/gid. Why are
these static?

For daemons running under their own uid/gid. Why are

these static?
This group is intended for users who need to access
source code, including files in /usr/src. Users in this
group can thus manage system source code. Also, this
group is the default group for access to the CSV repository in /var/lib/csv.
For daemons running under their own uid/gid. Why are
these static?
Programs that should be able to access the shadow passwords are sgid shadow.
Programs that should be able to access utmp are sgid
utmp.
This group is used to control access to /usr/local. Add
users to this if they should be able to write to /usr/
local and /var/local.

362
games
qmail
users

Groups: Managing Access Permissions

60

games that store user independent high score values in

/var/lib/games are sgid games
70 used for qmail
100 All users belong to this group. Place files that all users
should have access to in this group.

Chapter 43
HTML Editors
HTML editors include bluefish, screem and quanta. Bluefish is the standard
Gnome editor.

43.1

Bluefish

Editing HTML (and indeed any type of XML document) is supported through
bluefish, a purpose built editor based on the Gnome edit toolkit. Bluefish is
described as a programmers HTML editor because it is not a graphical editor (in that you work directly with the mark-up, i.e., the actual HTML tags,
rather than with how the final page might look, as with Netscape Compser).
Features include a multiple file editor, multiple toolbars, custom menus, image and thumbnail dialogs, open from the Web, CSS dialogs, PHP, SSI and
RXML support, HTML validation, and many wizards.
Figure 43.1 shows the basic interface editing a simple HTML document.
Syntax highlighting has been turned on under the ViewHighlight syntax
menu. You may also need to initialise a set of highlighting patterns with
OptionsListsReset syntax highlighting. You can refresh the highlighting
with ViewRefresh highlighting or else F5.
When you are ready to see what your marked up document will look like in
a browser simply select ViewPreview or use the F4 keyboard shortcut.

363

364

HTML Editors

Figure 43.1: Bluefish HTML Editor with syntax highlighting enabled.

Chapter 44
ImageMagick
ImageMagick is the tool for transforming images.
The command line mogrify is excellent for changing the size of an image.
mogrify -geometry does that, maintaining the images aspect ratio (the specified width and height are maximum values) append the geometry with an
exclamation point to force a change to aspect ratio.
Rotate an image with -rotate
Reduce the colors in an image: mogrify -colors 2 filename
To also dither the image: mogrify -colors 4 -dither filename
Monochrome image: mogrify -monochrome filename
Annotate image: mogrify -comment Hi there filename
Add borders to image (pixel width and height): mogrify -border 2x4 filename
Decorative border: mogrify -frame 20x20 filename

365

366

ImageMagick

Chapter 45
Initialisations on Booting
The Debian GNU/Linux kernel loads init very early on in the boot process,
using /etc/inittab as its configuration file. This file defines the default run
level and what should be done for each run level.
If you have a look at the processes running on your system (with the command line ps or with the graphical Gnome utility gtop) you will see that the
init process has process identifier of 1 (unless you are running a more secure
GNU/Linux where random numbers are assigned to the processes).
The initialisation table (/etc/inittab) is where system initialisations occur.
This table consists of records with four fields separated by a colon:
id:runlevels:action:process

The first field is an identifier. The second lists the runlevels for which this
record is relevant. The third is the action to be performed. The fourth is the
command to be run.
In this chapter we look at how the GNU/Linux system is initialised. See
Chapter 12 for an explanation of the boot process and how to control booting.

45.1

Run Levels

The runlevel is an identifier for each of the different states in which the
GNU/Linux operating system can be running, such as in single user mode,
367

368

Initialisations on Booting

multi-user mode, and halt and reboot modes. Generally a GNU/Linux system is running in multi-user mode.
The first script run by init, after booting into GNU/Linux, is /etc/init.
d/rcS. The initialisation files for the default run level (usually 2) are then
run. This is specified in /etc/inittab with the line:
l2:2:wait:/etc/init.d/rc 2

This runs /etc/init.d/rc with the parameter 2. The /etc/init.d/rc

script in turn runs the scripts in /etc/rc2.d/ (since the parameter 2 indicates rc2 as opposed to rc3, etc).
The default runlevel is runlevel 2, unless you change it in /etc/inittab:
# The default runlevel.
id:2:initdefault:

In general the runlevels 2, 3, 4, and 5 are all multi-user run levels and Debian
sets them up to be the same.
#
#
#
#

Runlevel 0 is
Runlevel 1 is
Runlevels 2-5
Runlevel 6 is

halt.
single-user.
are multi-user.
reboot.

l0:0:wait:/etc/init.d/rc
l1:1:wait:/etc/init.d/rc
l2:2:wait:/etc/init.d/rc
l3:3:wait:/etc/init.d/rc
l4:4:wait:/etc/init.d/rc
l5:5:wait:/etc/init.d/rc
l6:6:wait:/etc/init.d/rc

0
1
2
3
4
5
6

Thus, when the system enters a runlevel it executes the scripts in /etc/rc.n
where n is the runlevel in question. These scripts are in fact symbolic links
(symlinks) to scripts in /etc/init.d/. A script starting with S starts a
service. One starting with K stops a service. The number after the S or
K specifies the order in which the scripts are run. For example, S25xdm
will start before S35xdm.

45.2 Initialisation Scripts

369

To stop xdm, for example, from starting up by default on boot, simply remove
the symbolic link of the corresponding S script from /etc/rc?.d/S*xdm.
See the man page for init for an extensive discussion.
The init script is run with start on changing runlevel (S) and runlevels 0
(the halt runlevel) and 6 (the reboot runlevel).
To remove something (e.g., gdm) from the init scripts:
# update-rc.d -f gdm remove

45.2

Initialisation Scripts

A collection of initialisations are performed through running the script /etc/

init.d/rcS as specified in the initialisation table (/etc/inittab) with the
line:
si::sysinit:/etc/init.d/rcS

The particular initialisations are performed through scripts located in the

/etc/rcS.d/ folder. The names of these scripts are all of the form SNNmmmm
where NN is numeric and mmmm is the name of some Debian package or
application, such as setserial and hwclock. For example, you may find
/etc/rcS.d/S30setserial and /etc/rcS.d/S50hwclock.sh.
The script /etc/init.d/rcS will ensure all of these scripts are run, one
after another, in numeric and alphabetic order. Order is often important.
Any script ending with .sh is sourced as a shell script and the others are
run as commands. Irrespective of how the script is invoked it is passed
the parameter start indicating that the service that the initialisation script
represents is to be started in some sense. This is the meaning of the single
S in the scrip file names and in the name of the rcS script.
You can add your own scripts into /etc/init.d/ folder and then link them
appropriately to the particular run level directories. The update-rc.d command should be used to do this for you. Suppose you want to set up a firewall each time you boot the machine. You may create an executable script
file called /etc/init.d/myfirewall (see Section 60.8 for sample contents).
Then add this to the appropriate folders with:

370

Initialisations on Booting

# update-rc.d myfirewall start 40 S . stop 89 0 6 .

This creates the following symbolic links:

/etc/rc0.d/K89myfirewall -> ../init.d/myfirewall
/etc/rc6.d/K89myfirewall -> ../init.d/myfirewall
/etc/rcS.d/S40myfirewall -> ../init.d/myfirewall

45.3

CTRL-ALT-DEL: The Three Finger Salute

The infamous CTRL-ALT-DEL of the MS-Windows world (to reboot or shutdown your computer) is enabled by default under Debian. It is the following
line in the initialisation table that enables this:
# What to do when CTRL-ALT-DEL is pressed.
ca:12345:ctrlaltdel:/sbin/shutdown -t1 -a -r now

Thus, the ctrlaltdel action is enabled for runlevels 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5. If you

want to disable the CTRL-ALT-DEL salute then simply comment out this
line (by inserting a hash).

45.4

Terminals

There are six terminals enabled by default in Debian. This means that when
you boot the machine you will have one terminal where you see the boot
messages and eventually the login prompt (unless you are using a windowbased login such as gdm). This terminal is controlled as the device /dev/
tty1. By default there are five others: /dev/tty2. . . /dev/tty6. The entries
in the initialisation table responsible for running the appropriate application
to control each of these terminals are:
# Format:
# <id>:<runlevels>:<action>:<process>
1:2345:respawn:/sbin/getty 38400 tty1
2:23:respawn:/sbin/getty 38400 tty2
3:23:respawn:/sbin/getty 38400 tty3

45.4 Terminals

371

4:23:respawn:/sbin/getty 38400 tty4

5:23:respawn:/sbin/getty 38400 tty5
6:23:respawn:/sbin/getty 38400 tty6

We can see that only the terminal on tty1 is initiated for all user run levels
(2, 3, 4, and 5). The others are initiated only for run levels 2 and 3.
To get more than the default six terminals add additional getty entries and
inform the init daemon with:
# telinit q

A total of 256 terminals are available with a default kernel. There are 64
virtual consoles available. More terminals can be provided for in the kernel
by recompiling the kernel with different options.
Note that exporting a serial console is in the default init script. This is
particularly handy for Palms and similar handheld computers as a system
rescue option.
You can move to any of the consoles using left Alt-F1 to left Alt-F6 or left
Ctl-Alt-F1 to left Ctl-Alt F6. You can also move between the consoles with
Alt-Left and Alt-Right. If you have more that 12 virtual consoles (hence
you run out of function keys for Ctl-Alt) you can access them directly with
Alt-F1 (for console 13) etc.
If you are running one of the X Window System display managers (i.e., you
are presented with a graphical log on screen) such as gdm then this is usually
running on virtual terminal 7 which you can access with Alt-F7. Note that
X captures the Alt key so you will need to use Ctl-Alt-F1 to switch to virtual
console 1.

372

Initialisations on Booting

Chapter 46
Java
Debian can not distribute Suns Java because of Suns licenses which do not
meet the Debian Free Software Guidelines. This is a problem since Java is
such a widely used Internet language. However, you can manually install
the Sun Java software development kit yourself, as long as you are happy to
accept the Sun Java license. Alternatively, install one of the alternatives like
kaffe.

46.1

Install Sun Java

Obtain j2sdk-1\_4\_2\_03-linux-i586.bin (this is the J2SE kit) from

http://java.sun.com. It is a 34MB file so over a modem that could be
3 hours or so! Save the file into /usr/local/bin to save creating new paths.
Then
# sh j2sdk-1_4_2_03-linux-i586.bin

To accept the license type yes and the installation will begin. This will create
a new directory in /usr/local/bin with the name j2sdk1.4.2 03. Now create
the necessary links:
# ln -s /usr/local/bin/j2sdk1.4.2_03/bin/* /usr/local/bin

To confirm it is installed:
> java -version

373

374

Java

If theres a problem it might be protections:

# chmod -R go+rX j2sdk1.4.2_03

46.2

Java Alternatives

Version 1.3 might be at: ftp://ftp.tux.org/pub/java/debian/dists/.

Alternatives include:

deb ftp://ftp.informatik.hu-berlin.de/pub/Java/Linux/debian woody non-free

deb http://www.mirror.ac.uk/sites/ftp.blackdown.org/java-linux/debian woody non-f

The package is named j2sdk1.3

The Blackdown Java 2 Runtime Environment package (j2re1.3) is also available from:

deb ftp://metalab.unc.edu/pub/linux/devel/lang/java/blackdown.org/debian woody no

Java 2 Runtime Environment 1.4 (j2re1.4) is available from:

deb ftp://ntama.uni-mainz.de/pub/debian unofficial/

The Debian Java FAQ is available from http://www.debian.org/doc/manuals/

debian-java-faq/.

46.3

Mozilla Java Plugin

Currently it is not possible to use a free Java Virtual Machine as a Mozilla

plugin because most of the free JVMs do not yet support the Java AWT
(Java GUIs). So the non-free alternatives from Sun, IBM, or Blackdown are
required.
To get the Java plugin running with an installation of j2sdk1.4.2 03 (from Sun
and installed as described in Section 46.1) for Mozilla 1.5, link the appropriate
library to the mozilla plugin directory:

46.3 Mozilla Java Plugin

375

# cd /usr/lib/mozilla/plugins
# ln -s /usr/local/bin/j2sdk1.4.2_03/jre/plugin/i386/ns610-gcc32/libjavaplugin_oji.so

Then run Mozilla and visit about:plugins to ensure the plug in is found.
Old Recipes
An older recipe for installing a Java plugin for the then new version of Mozilla
(e.g., 2:1.3.1-3) which was compiled with gcc 3.3 was:
$
$
$
$
$
$
$
$

mkdir j2sdk-1.4.1-01-linux-i586-gcc3.2
cd j2sdk-1.4.1-01-linux-i586-gcc3.2
wget ftp://ftp.easynet.be/blackdown/JDK-1.4.1/i386/01/j2sdk-1.4.1-01-linux-i586-gcc3.2.b
wget http://twolife.free.fr/debian/j2se1.4-i586_1.4.1.0.1-4.diff
patch -p1 -i j2se1.4-i586_1.4.1.0.1-4.diff
debuild -uc -us
cd ../
wajig install j2re1.4_1.4.1.0.1-4_i386.deb

Then visit the URL about:plugins to ensure it is recognised.

Another approach was to leave it to Mozilla to download a Java Plug-in:
As root start up Mozilla.
Enable Java (Edit->Preferences->Advanced->Java)
Visit a java page (http://datamining.csiro.au/ssh)
Auto install the plug in.
As root: cd /usr/lib/mozilla/plugins
(make sure appropriate link exists)
chmod -R go+rX java2
As user browse to "about:plugins".

Another, essentially same, recipe is:

<download jre.xpi>
ftp://ftp.netscape.com/pub/netscape6/english/6.01/unix/linux22/xpi/jre.xpi
# unzip jre.xpi -d $MOZILLA_FIVE_HOME/plugins jre-image-i386/*
# cd $MOZILLA_FIVE_HOME/plugins
# ln -s jre-image-i386/plugin/i386/ns600/libjavaplugin_oji.so .

376

Java

Chapter 47
Jigdo: Build CD-ROM Images
Install jigdo-file
To build snapshot of sid distribution:

$ jigdo-lite ftp://ftp.fsn.hu/pub/CDROM-Images/debian-unofficial/sid/jigdo/sid-i386-1.is
<ENTER>
ftp://mirror.aarnet.edu.au/pub/debian/
ftp://mirror.aarnet.edu.au/pub/linux/debian-non-US/

377

378

Jigdo: Build CD-ROM Images

Chapter 48
KDE: Desktop Management
KDE is a popular alternative to Gnome. I dont use KDE so theres not a
lot I can say about it. Feel free to contribute.
Various KDE applications are described in this book, in limited detail. See
Chapter 54 for Magellan, the KDE personal information manager, and Chapter 51 for Konqueror for the KDE file manager.

379

380

KDE: Desktop Management

Chapter 49
Kernel: Rolling Your Own
Compiling your own Linux kernel may sound like a pretty scary task. Take
a deep breath and enjoy the experience. It is actually not such a big thing
to compile your own kernel. And Debian makes it even more straightforward
by supplying the kernel-package to leave you with a kernel-image package that
you simply install, just as you would any kernel-image package you might get
from Debian.
The advantages of compiling your own kernel include being able to tune the
kernel to your specific hardware, and ending up with a smaller kernel. You
may also need to compile your own kernel if the default kernel does not support some specific hardware you have. The distributed kernels though are
becoming modular and it is becoming rare that you would need to compile
your own kernel. If you do though, the recipe here should help and the introduction to compiling your own kernel at http://newbiedoc.sourceforge.
net/tutorials/kernel-pkg/index-kernel-pkg.html should prove a useful read.
The hardware we review in this book has occasionally required kernel compiles. For example, Bartok (Section 4.10.1) contains over 1GB of memory
but the supplied kernels limit to less than 1GB (NOHIGHMEM). Mint (Section 4.10.27) had a specific kernel compiled for it with sound support through
ALSA, IDE SCSI emulation support for CDRW, and with PPP and IPMASQ
support. Velox (Section 4.10.26) had a kernel compiled with sound support
through ALSA, IDE SCSI emulation support for CDRW, and support for
dual processors.
Some sample compiles of the kernel are included with specific installations
381

382

Kernel: Rolling Your Own

in Section 4.10. See Section 4.10.1 for an example of compiling kernel 2.4.16
with extra memory support (HIGHMEM) and multiple CPU support (SMP).
See Section 4.10.16 for an example of obtaining the linux kernel source (kernel
2.4.19) directly and compiling it the Debian way for Bach (Section 4.10.16).
See Section ?? for an example of obtaining the linux kernel source (kernel
2.4.19) and patching it with a pre-release (2.4.20-pre11) and compiling it the
Debian way for Vivaldi (Section 4.10.13).

49.1

Getting Started

The first step is to install the appropriate packages:

bin86
kernel-package
kernel-source-2.4.16
debconf-utils
alsa-source-0.5
pcmcia-source

(if you need ALSAs extra sound support)

For the particular release of Debian being used the version numbers will be
different. The kernel-package provides tools to generate, from the compiled
kernel image, a genuine Debian package that you simply install as a standard type package. The resulting package can be installed (and uninstalled)
cleanly and correctly with dpkg and wajig.
Note that you do not need the kernel-headers package as all the headers
required are in the kernel-source package. The headers were split out for
other reasons (compiling other packages without installing all of the kernel
sources).
Installing the kernel-source package simply places the archived kernel source
file (kernel-source-2.4.16.tar.bz2) into /usr/src. Similarly for any kernel modules you wish to also install (like alsa). Extract the actual source code
into /usr/src/kernel-source-2.4.16:
#
#
#
#

cd /usr/src
tar jxvf kernel-source-2.4.16.tar.bz2
tar zxvf alsa-driver-0.5.tar.gz
tar zxvf pcmcia-cs.tar.gz

49.2 Kernel Configuration

383

You can also obtain a more recent (or even just any different) version of the
kernel from the net yourself and still use the Debian kernel-package utilities.

49.2

Kernel Configuration

The next task is to configure the kernel to suit your setup. There are very
many configuration options and most can be ignored. Each also has a brief
but helpful piece of documentation in /usr/src/linux/Documentation/
Configure.help.
There are three methods available for selecting the configuration. The first
and most basic is config which presents each option, sequentially, for you
to decide what to do. This is a long process. The menu-based menuconfig
presents a menu in a terminal. Options are grouped hierarchically and you
can navigate to the specific options you wish to modify. The X Window
System configurator is xconfig. We might suggest xconfig as the more convenient of the methods, but menuconfig is a good alternative if there is no X
Window System running.
A good starting point for configuration is the basic configuration that is
the default provided by Debian. You then refine the configuration. For an
installed kernel-image you can find its configuration in /boot/config-2.4.
16, for example. A simple approach to configuration is to copy the installed
kernels configuration as the starting point and simply enable the options
missing from that configuration (e.g., SMP):
# cp /boot/config-2.4.16-686 kernel-source-2.4.16/.config

However, you may be better off starting with no .config. A default configuration will be installed and you can then add to this support for your specific
hardware.
Below is a record of my configurations for Mint (Section 4.10.27) and Velox
(Section 4.10.26) where configuration started with no /usr/src/kernel-source-2.
4.16/.config:
# cd kernel-source-2.4.16
# make xconfig (or menuconfig or config)
-> CONFIG_M686=y

384

Kernel: Rolling Your Own

Plug and Play support
-> CONFIG_PNP=y
Block devices
-> CONFIG_BLK_DEV_IDECD=m (previously y)
-> CONFIG_BLK_DEV_IDESCSI=m
-> CONFIG_BLK_DEV_LOOP=m
Networking options
-> CONFIG_FIREWALL=y
Mint
-> CONFIG_IP_FIREWALL=y
Mint
-> CONFIG_IP_MASQUERADE=y
Mint
-> CONFIG_IP_MASQUERADE_ICMP=y
Mint
SCSI support
-> CONFIG_BLK_DEV_SR=m (previously y)
-> CONFIG_BLK_DEV_SR_VENDOR=y
-> CONFIG_CHR_DEV_SG=m
SCSI support -> SCSI low-level drivers
-> CONFIG_SCSI_AIC7XXX=y
Velox
Network device support -> Ethernet (10 or 100Mbit)
-> CONFIG_NET_VENDOR_3COM=y
-> CONFIG_VORTEX=m
Network device support
-> CONFIG_PPP=y
Mint
Filesystems
-> CONFIG_ISO9660_FS=y
-> CONFIG_JOLIET=y
-> CONFIG_NTFS_FS=m
-> CONFIG_FAT_FS=m
-> CONFIG_MSDOS_FS=m
-> CONFIG_VFAT_FS=m
Sound
-> CONFIG_SOUND=m
(Will use ALSA modules)

For Altrop (Section 4.10.20) and Bartok (Section 4.10.1) the configuration
began with a copy of config-2.4.16-686-smp and /boot/config-2.4.16
respectively and the following were modified for the extra memory and SMP.

Processor Type and Features

CONFIG_MPENTIUMIII=y
CONFIG_HIGHMEM4G=y (originally off)
CONFIG_HIGHMEM=y (set automatically)
CONFIG_SMP=y (already set)

49.3 Kernel Modules

385

For the laptop Inco the initial configuration was that of /boot/config-2.4.
16-686 then modified as:
Processor Type and Features
CONFIG_MPENTIUMIII=y

This is not really needed though as I believe this simply adds some minor
tunings to the kernel.

49.3

Kernel Modules

The primary advantage of modules is that you compile to a smaller kernel

for multiple machines with different hardware and have the hardware drivers
loaded as needed. If you are compiling for a specific machine with specific
hardware then you might as well compile the various drivers into the kernel
rather than as modules.

49.4

Compiling the Kernel

# make-kpkg clean
# make-kpkg --append-to-version -p3 --revision kayon01 --initrd kernel_image
# make-kpkg --append-to-version -p3 --revision kayon01 --initrd modules_image

The use of --append-to-version will cause a new package to be created

called kernel-image-2.4.16-p3 with revision 1.0. This package can then be
installed without overwriting kernel-image-2.4.16 which may have been separately downloaded and installed.
You will be left with /usr/src/kernel-image-2.4.16-p3_kayon01_i386.
deb and /usr/src/alsa-modules-2.4.16-p3_0.5.10b-6+p0+kayon01_i386.
deb and /usr/src/pcmcia-modules-2.4.16-p3_3.1.8-10+2:kayon01_i386.
deb, depending on what you have. These are ready to install.

49.5

Installing the Kernel

Installing thee new kernel and module packages is no different to installing

similar packages you would obtain from the Debian archives.

386

Kernel: Rolling Your Own

If you are installing a new version of a kernel that is already installed you
should move the corresponding modules aside, or else you will be asked to
do so during the install:
# cd /lib/modules
# mv 2.4.16-p3 2.4.16-p3.prev

Now we are ready to install the kernel:

# cd /usr/src
# wajig install kernel-image-2.4.16-p3_kayon01_i386.deb

You will be asked whether you wish to run lilo. Usually you would. If this
wipes out a precious master boot record (MBR) you can recover it with lilo
-u.
Now install the modules (if any):
# wajig install alsa-modules-2.4.16-p3_0.5.10b-9+p0+kayon01_i386.deb
# wajig install pcmcia-modules-2.4.16-p3_3.1.8-10+2:kayon01_i386.deb

For Mint (Section 4.10.27) with support for CD-RW you now need to modify
/etc/modutils/cdrw (as suggested in CD Writing HOWTO):
options ide-cd ignore=hdd
alias scd0 sr_mode
pre-install sg
modprobe ide-scsi
pre-install sr_mod
modprobe ide-scsi
pre-install ide-scsi
modprobe ide-cd

To get this information into the right place the following should be done:
# update-modules

Again for Mint (Section 4.10.27) the following were added to /etc/modules
(otherwise the modules must be loaded manually for some reason which can
be avoid using char-major stuff but dont understand this yet):

49.6 Lilo Configuration

387

sr_mod
sg
ide-cd

For alsa edit /etc/alsa/alsa-base.conf to set startosslayer=true to

be sure snd-pcm-oss is loaded at boot, otherwise it needs to be added to
/etc/modules also.
# reboot

49.6

Lilo Configuration

image=/boot/vmlinuz-2.4.16-p3
label=2.4.16-p3
read-only
initrd=/boot/initrd.img-2.4.16-p3

49.7

Kernel Versions

Note how the versioning interacts with Debians package management. By

calling your own compiled kernel version 2:kayon.1 it will be a more recent version number than the standard Debian kernel-image package. That
is, kernel-image-2.2.14 2:kayon.1 i386 is regarded as being more recent than
kernel-image-2.2.14 2.2.14-1 i386. Thus, the packaging system will not try
to install a more recent 2.2.14 over your own kernel image. Debian kernel
packages always have the version number the same as the kernel version
number.

49.8

Latest Kernel

If you have a kernel-source installed you can update to latest available kernel
with:
# cd /usr/src/kernel-source-NNN
# uupdate -u ../linux.tar.gz

388

49.9

Kernel: Rolling Your Own

Why make-kpkg?

From Manoj Srivastava [email protected] on debian-user 6 Nov 2001.

Using make-kpkg is a very convenient way of compiling your kernels for
Debian GNU/Linux. The Package[]kernel-package takes all the required steps
for compiling a kernel so that the user need not remember the actual substeps involved. Installation of the resulting kernel is then trivial.
The Debian way allows you to keep multiple versions of kernel images on the
same machine with little effort. Even multiple flavours of the same kernel
version can easily be accommodated, You could have kernel-image-2.4.16686 and kernel-image-2.4.16-p3hmsmp available and choosable at boot time
through lilo.
Other kernel module packages are also hooked into the Debian way of dealing
with kernels so that you can simply compile them as part of the kernel compile
process. This includes pcmcia-source and alsa-source. Such modules generally
rely on the particular kernel version.
Debian also has the nice feature of keeping the configuration file for each
kernel image in /boot.
You can optionally apply patches to the kernel (supplied as .deb files) and
build a patched kernel automatically.
You can compile a kernel for another computer, for example using a fast
machine to compile the kernel for installation on a slower machine. This is
really nice since the modules are all included in the .deb; and one does not
have to deal with modules manually. The postinst looks at a configuration
file on the installation machine (as opposed to the machine that the image
was compiled on), and allows the local admin to decide on issues of symbolic
links, and whether the boot loader stuff must be run, and whether one wants
to create a boot floppy or not. The postinst and the postrm scripts allow the
local admin on the installation machine to add a script into runtime hooks;
this can allow, amongst other things, grub users to add and remove kernel
image stanzas from the grub menu (example scripts to do this are in the
package).

49.10 Loading Kernel Modules

49.10

389

Loading Kernel Modules

The configuration file /etc/modules.conf is automatically generated by the

update-modules command. It specifies module configurations that should
survive a kernel reboot.
The contents of /etc/modules.conf are updated using files found in /etc/
modutils/. Many Debian packages that have to manipulate modules when
they are installed will make additions to /etc/modutils/ and then run
update-modules.
You can make your own additions to /etc/modutils/ automatically have
them placed in the next generation of the /etc/modules.conf file.
A simpler alternative is to add needed modules into /etc/modules. This is
particularly useful for modules that need no options.

390

Kernel: Rolling Your Own

Chapter 50
Keyboard
50.1

Mapping a Key

First find the keycode of the key you wish to map. Do this by running xev
and press the key you wish to map (e.g., the Windows key) and look for the
keycode:

KeyPress event, serial 22, synthetic NO, window 0x4000001,

root 0x26, subw 0x0, time 24756 22836, (129,34), root:(139,245),
state 0x58, keycode 115 (keysym 0xffed, Meta_L), same_screen YES,

Create /home/kayon/.Xmodmap and map the keycode to any unused keysym.

For example, assuming your keyboard has function keys F1F12 then generally F13 and beyond are not used, so lets use F15:

keycode 115 = F15

For a complete list of keysyms, see /usr/X11R6/include/X11/keysymdef.h.

(You omit the XK_ prefix when using them with xmodmap).
Run xmodmap ~/.Xmodmap. You can do this interactively instead with:

$ xmodmap -e "keycode 115 = F15"

391

392

Keyboard

Now you should be able to bind F15 to any action with, for example, sawfish.
Even better, sawfish supports custom modifier keys (i.e., modifiers apart
from Ctrl, Alt, and Shift- and knows about Hyper). You can map the left
windows key:
keycode 115 = Hyper_L
add Mod2 = Hyper_L

Then use Hyper_L for all bindings related to the window manager (thus freeing Ctrl and Alt-based bindings). This makes it a perfect window manager
key.
I end up with /home/kayon/.Xmodmap containing:
keycode 115 = Hyper_L
add mod3 = Hyper_L
keysym Alt_L = Meta_L Alt_L
add mod1 = Meta_L

Chapter 51
Konqueror: The KDE File
Manager
Konqueror is a file manager and web browser for the KDE desktop. It provides the usual file manager functionality including display of files and directories using an icon view or tree view, copying, moving and deleting by
direct drag and drop or by using copy, cut and paste, and file properties.

393

394

Konqueror: The KDE File Manager

Chapter 52
LaTeX
Debian Packages: tetex-bin tetex-extra
LATEX and TEX are sophisticated document typesetting systems. LATEX is a
mark-up language where you edit text documents (using any editor of choice)
and include mark-up to tell the formatter how to produce the final printed
page. Unlike proprietary word processing systems, like MS Word, LATEX is
available freely on most platforms and documents produced on one platform
will be identical to that produced on another platform.

52.1

LaTeX Documentation

There is an extensive collection of documentation for LATEX, in many different

formats. The command texdoc can be used to find documentation on any
LATEX package and employ the appropriate viewer for the format suitable for
the documentation found:
> texdoc geometry

52.2

Generating LaTeX

Many Debian packages can generate LaTeX. These include the Gnome office
suite applications Gnumeric (Chapter 39), AbiWord (Section 8.1) and Dia
(Chapter 23).
395

396

LaTeX

52.3

Creating LaTeX Documents

52.3.1

Using LyX

A great GUI for editing LaTeX documents is LyX. LyX provides much help
for the novice LaTeX user in getting started with producing very nice looking
documents.

52.3.2

Using Emacs

The AucTeX package provides a complete emacs environment for editing LaTeX documents.
C-c = runs the reftex command reftex-toc which will split the current
Emacs window to show two buffers, the top buffer showing the table of contents of the whole document, allowing quick navigation around the document.
The preview-latex package will provide a preview of graphics and mathematics
inside the emacs buffer where the LATEX file is being edited.

52.4

Processing a LaTeX Document

Use rubber to convert a source document into a PDF document:

> rubber --pdf report

Rubber has a problem with warnings produced by PDFLaTeX, interpreting

them as errors, and thus failing. A simple fix is to edit the file \_\_init\_\_.
py in /usr/share/rubber/rubber/, in the definition of the errors function,
insert the following:
...
for line in self.lines:
if line[0:23] == "! pdfTeX warning (dest)":
print "PDF WARN: " + line[25:],
return 0
if line[0] == "!":
...

52.5 LaTeX Tips and Tricks

52.5

LaTeX Tips and Tricks

52.5.1

Bibliography Starts on a New Page

397

The natbib package in LATEX checks to see whether the chapter command is
defined. If so it decides to use that for the bibliography headings. This will
generally place the bibliography on a new page, which is what you would
expect for a book. However, the llncs LATEX document class does define
the chapter command, but is used generally for writing articles! A simple solution is to tell natbib to use section rather than chapter for the
bibliography:
\usepackage{natbib}
\makeatletter
\renewcommand\bibsection%
{
\section*{\refname
\@mkboth{\MakeUppercase{\refname}}{\MakeUppercase{\refname}}}
}
\makeatother

52.6

TeX Capacity Exceeded

If you get an error while running TEX or LATEX like:

TeX capacity exceeded, sorry [pool size = 67555]

Then edit /etc/texmf/texmf.cnf to set:

pool_size = nnnnnn

where you add something to the current value of nnnnnn. This should take
effect next time you run LATEX.

398

LaTeX

Chapter 53
Login
53.1

All Capitals Login

If you enter your username on the login prompt all in capitals then the login
progam will be lead to believe that you have an upper-case only terminal
(pretty rare devices these days but once upon a time they ruled the desktop).
You will then enter into the system where uppercase letters rule. This is a
feature and not a bug!
Make sure your disable capslock before entering your userid.

53.2

Login Screen

Tricks with /etc/issue

Category: Software
All the software discussed in this small article can be downloaded here. This
includes shell scripts called createissue and listansi.
When you log in on the console of your Linux System, you are usually presented with a login screen with info about the system you are about to log
in on. In this short article I will show you how to change what you see on
your login screen, and also how to add a bit of colour.
When your Linux System boots it starts getty processes on a number of
399

400

Login

virtual terminals on your system. When getty starts, it prints the contents
of /etc/issue to the terminal. To customize the look of your console, all you
have to do is edit /etc/issue.
You can also add colour by using the colour capabilities of the Linux console.
The Linux console, like almost any other existing terminal, has escape sequences that can be used to change the appearance of text on screen. Piping
the following script into /etc/issue:
#!/bin/sh
spaces(){ COUNT=0; while [ $COUNT -lt
$1 ]; do echo -ne " ";
COUNT=$[$COUNT+1] done }
esc="\033[" echo -ne
"${esc}H${esc}J\n${esc}44;37;1m"
WELCOME="Welcome to "hostname"
running Linux "uname -r
CHARS=$[(80-echo $WELCOME | wc
--chars)/2] spaces $CHARS echo -ne
$WELCOME spaces $CHARS echo -ne
"${esc}0m\n\\l "

should produce this result:

Welcome to gatekeeper.localnet running Linux 2.2.16
tty1 gatekeeper login:
Note to newbies: Piping the output of a program into a file involves using the
operator. For example, to send the output of ls to a file called files.txt,
you would do this: ls files.txt
The line responsible for all the color is this one:
echo -ne "${esc}H${esc}J\n${esc}44;37;1m"

The 44;37 specifies White on Blue. To see how your terminal renders colours,
use this script:
#!/bin/bash

53.3 Midnight Commander

401

# Display ANSI colours.

#
esc="\033["
echo -n " _ _ _ _ _40 _ _ _ 41_ _ _ _42 _ _ _ 43"
echo "_ _ _ 44_ _ _ _45 _ _ _ 46_ _ _ _47 _"
for fore in 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37; do
line1="$fore "
line2="
"
for back in 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47; do
line1="${line1}${esc}${back};${fore}m Normal ${esc}0m"
line2="${line2}${esc}${back};${fore};1m Bold
${esc}0m"
done
echo -e "$line1\n$line2"
done

You can download both scripts here.

Please note that Redhat Linux overwrites /etc/issue with each bootup. To
keep your /etc/issue, edit /etc/rc.d/rc.local and remove the lines responsible
for overwriting /etc/issue. Even better, change rc.local to use createissue
instead.
Any comments will be appreciated. You can email me at [email protected]

53.3

Midnight Commander

You can browse through the contents of a Deb package (*.deb file) with gmc
as if it were a locally mounted fileystem, without having to unarchive and
untar all the constituent components. You can also browse tarballs, gzips,
bzips, gzipped tarballs, bzipped tarballs, and zips as well, providing that the
attendant gzip, bzip, tar, and zip programs are all installed. Double click the
archive in question and you can browse the archive as if it were a directory.

53.4

Gnome Memory Blocks

402

Login

Figure 53.1: Gnome Memory Blocks

Chapter 54
Magellan: KDE Personal
Information Manager
Magellan is a KDE-based alternative to Evolution. It is a personal information manager handling email, contacts, notes, tasks, to do lists, and journals.
For email it supports mail retrieval via POP3, IMAP4, and local mailboxes.
An interesting feature is that it supports mixed-mode POP3 and IMAP4 accounts where each account can be a completely different identity (e.g., if you
have multiple email accounts on different servers with different usernames).

403

404

Magellan: KDE Personal Information Manager

Chapter 55
Modems
55.1

Silence

If you want to turn the speaker of your modem off, then add ATM0 to /etc/
chatscripts/provider:

# ispnumber
OK-AT-OK ATM0
OK-AT-OK ATDT12345678

55.2

No Dial Tone

From some hotels (e.g., while travelling overseas) telephone switchboards

generates a tone that sounds like an engaged signal until a 0 is pressed.
With this one can not dial up as the ppp chat script always finds NO DIAL
TONE and fails. A fix might be:

Replace ATZ with ATH1. May need to extend the time waiting from the 100 (1 sec) standard setting to 250, so the modem
doesnt send the ATDT(phone no.) too soon.
405

406

55.3

Modems

Chat Script Giving up Too Early

By default pon does not wait around too long to establish a connection.
Sometimes it does not wait long enough. You can introduce a longer wait
(e.g., two minutes) as below.
Edit /etc/ppp/peers/provider (assuming your connection is the default,
called provider ) to replace:
connect "/usr/sbin/chat -v -f /etc/chatscripts/provider"

with
connect "/usr/sbin/chat -v -t120 -f /etc/chatscripts/provider"

If you connection is not the default provider but something else, then edit
the file with the same name in /etc/ppp/peers/.

Chapter 56
MSWindows
For running MSWindows applications under GNU/Linux see Wine (Section 56.1) and Citrix (Section 56.2). Wine provides an implementation of
many of the MSWindows libraries so that MSWindows applications can run
diretly under GNU/Linux. Citrix uses the Windows Terminal Server to access a Windows machine and display the desktop within a window on the
GNU/Linux desktop.
For applications that can work with MSWindows documents see OpenOffice 63 and AbiWord 8.
To simply view the contents of a MSWord document use wv.

56.1

Wine: Emultaing MS-Windows

Wine works well with MS-Windows/98 (e.g., winword and excel work just
fine) but not so good with MS-Windows/NT, MS-Windows/2000, and MSWindows/XP.

56.2

Citrix: MSWindows Under Linux

Citrix provides remote access to MSWindows within GNU/Linux, using the

Windows Terminal Server (WTS). This is commercial software, although
the clients (for a variety of platforms, including GNU/Linux and Java) are
407

408

MSWindows

available for download.

56.2.1

Screenshot

Figure 56.1: Citrix: MSWindows inside Linux.

56.2.2

Installation

Citrix provides both a standard client and a Java based client that can run
as an application or as an applet (although the Java application is only
available as version 6, with version 7 only providing an applet). The clients
can be downloaded from the Citrix web site, after agreeing to their licensing
conditions.

Client Installation
To install the client on GNU/Linux:

56.2 Citrix: MSWindows Under Linux

409

$ wget http://download2.citrix.com/files/en/products/client/ica/current/ICAClient-7.00-1
$ wajig rpminstall ICAClient-7.00-1.i386.rpm
$ /usr/lib/ICAClient/wfcmgr
Create new Entry
Network
Server [ACT] [citrix.ktware.com]
Window
Window Size [75%]
Login
[kayon,NEXUS,passwd]
Tools -> Settings
Drive Mapping
H: /home/kayon/
Enable Drive Mapping
$ /usr/lib/ICAClient/wfcmgr -desc ACT

Java Client Installation

The Java client can be installed as in:
$ wget http://download2.citrix.com/files/en/products/nfr/ica/setup.class
$ java setup
Install into /usr/local/share/citrix
$ CLASSPATH="/usr/local/share/citrix/JICAEngJ.jar:$CLASSPATH"\
java com.citrix.pn

Create a connection, such as ACT. Then start up the connection directly:

$ CLASSPATH="/usr/local/share/citrix/JICAEngJ.jar:$CLASSPATH"\
java com.citrix.JICA ACT

410

MSWindows

Chapter 57
Music
Most computers today have hardware for producing great audio. In this
chapter we explore how to get the most from your sound system.
FIRST DISCUSS CD PLAYERS
With the explosive growth of MP3 freely available on the web you will need
an MP3 player. There are several to choose from, but we concentrate on
xmms and qvmpeg.
You may want to record your own audio CDs so that you can listen to them
yourself or download them to your portable MP3 player. The grip package
encodes an audio CD as a collection of MP3 files.

411

412

Music

Chapter 58
MySQL
Debian Pacakges: mysql-client mysql-server mysql-navigator mytop
MySQL is a common database system used in GNU/Linux. It is extensively
used as the backend database server for the Apache web server. To quote
the Debian information about mysql-server:

The main goals of MySQL are speed, robustness and easy to

use. MySQL was originally developed because Tcx needed a
SQL server that could handle very big databases with magnitude higher speed than what any database vendor could offer.
They have now been using MySQL since 1996 in a environment
with more than 40 databases, 10,000 tables, of which more than
500 have more than 7 million rows. This is about 50G of mission
critical data.

Under Debian install the package mysql-client for connecting to a mysql

database server (possibly remote). To run a database server on your local machine you will need to install mysql-server. Install mysql-doc for the
full documentation for MySQL.
The package mysql-navigator provides a very effective (but non-Gnome) GUI
to MySQL. You can manage the MySQL database server using this. When
started, open a connection to the MySQL server on the local host with user
root. Most (but not all) admin operations can be performed through the
navigator.
413

414

MySQL

A Gnome-based interface, and somewhat easier to use interface, is provided

by the gmyclient. This is not yet packaged for Debian but using the alien
package creates a Debian package that installs just fine.
A beginners tutorial on using MySQL is available from http://www.devshed.
com/Server_Side/MySQL/Intro/. Also see the full user manual in /usr/
share/doc/mysql-doc/index.html.

58.0.3

MySQL Root Password

Once mysql-server is installed it is ready for immediate use. However, it is

best to at least set an admin password with:
$ /usr/bin/mysqladmin -u root password new-password

You will then also need to let cron jobs work on the database so create a
personal mysql config file for root in /root/.my.cnf containing:
[mysqladmin]
user
password

= root
= <secret>

Make sure the permissions are set appropriately:

# chmod 0600 /root/.my.cnf
# ls -l /root/.my.cnf
4.0k -rw------1 root root

58.0.4

64 Oct 12 10:52 /root/.my.cnf

Creating New Database

Create a new database called nhds (National Hospital Discharge Suvery).

The sample data we use comes from http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/.
$ mysql -u root -p mysql
Password:
mysql> CREATE DATABASE nhds;

415
The data to populate a new table we will create is stored in the file nhds99.
data as comma separated values. We can write a simple script to create the
table and import the data. The script is called nhds99.sql:
USE nhds;
CREATE TABLE nhds99 (
svy_year
int,
newborn
char(1),
age_unit
char(1),
age
int,
sex
char(1),
race
char(1),
m_status
char(1),
dis_month
int,
dis_status
char(1),
days_care
int,
los_flag
char(1),
geo_region
char(1),
no_beds
char(1),
hos_ownership
char(1),
ana_weight
int,
dc1
char(5),
dc2
char(5),
dc3
char(5),
dc4
char(5),
dc5
char(5),
dc6
char(5),
dc7
char(5),
pc1
char(4),
pc2
char(4),
pc3
char(4),
pc4
char(4),
p_src_payment
char(2),
s_src_payment
char(2),
drg
char(3));
LOAD DATA
LOCAL INFILE nhds99.data
INTO TABLE nhds99
FIELDS TERMINATED BY ,;

Then simply run it through mysql:

416

MySQL

$ mysql -u root -p nhds < nhds99.sql

You can remove the table from the database with:

$ mysql -u root -p nhds
mysql> FROP TABLE nhds99;

Using mysql-navigator you can not currently create new databases (except
by running an external script) but you can create tables. You can also run
SQL scripts. So create your database for nhds as above. Then start up the
navigator and open root@localhost. Then under the MySQL menu choose
Script. Identify the script and a log file then Fire. The new table should
then appear under the nhds database.
With the navigator you can even edit the script files with the Edit item in
the MySQL menu.

58.0.5

Create a New User

The mysql-navigator can be used to create a new user. Fire it up and open a
connection to the localhost server with user root and database mysql. Under
the MySQL menu select User. Choose the action to permform, prvoide the
relevant information then Fire. Then under the MySQL menu select Privilege
to grant database access. Note that you may still need mysqladmin -u root
-p reload?
Alternatively, you can do it as follows. The first insert adds this users
password to the users table. The second then gives this user access to a
particular database.
$ mysql -u root -pYYYYY mysql
mysql> insert into user (host,user,password,select_priv)
-> values (localhost, kayon, password(XXXXXX),Y);
Query OK, 1 row affected (0.00 sec)
mysql> insert into db (host,db,user,select_priv)
-> values (localhost, customers, kayon, Y);
Query OK, 1 row affected (0.00 sec)

417
mysql> exit
altrop$ mysqladmin -u root -pYYYYY reload

Then this user can access the specified data base to perform SELECT queries:
$ mysql -u kayon -pXXXXXX customers

58.0.6

Remote Host Access

Network access to a MySQL server under Debian is disabled by default for

security reasons. You can enable it by commenting out the skip-networking
option in /etc/mysql/my.cnf.
If you dont allow such access then your local MySQL client will report:
ERROR 2003: Cant connect to MySQL server on festival (111)

58.0.7

Remote User Permissions

On any host in domain ktware.com user kayon would like to connect to the
customers database with select privileges on the MySQL server running on
altrop.ktware.com.
You can arrange this as follows. The first insert adds this users password
to the users table. The second then gives this user access to a particular
database.
On altrop.ktware.com:
altrop$ mysql -u root -pYYYYYY mysql
mysql> insert into user (host,user,password)
-> values (%.ktware.com, kayon, password(XXXXXX));
Query OK, 1 row affected (0.00 sec)
mysql> insert into db (host,db,user,select_priv)
-> values (%.ktware.com, customers, kayon, Y);
Query OK, 1 row affected (0.00 sec)

418

MySQL

mysql> exit
altrop$ mysqladmin -u root -pYYYYYY reload

Then on inco.ktware.com, for example:

inco$ mysql -h altrop -u kayon -pXXXXXX customers -e show tables

58.0.8

Basic MySQL

Connect to the local database server as user nhds:

$ mysql -u nhds -p

Identify the current database:

mysql> select DATABASE();
+------------+
| DATABASE() |
+------------+
|
|
+------------+
1 row in set (0.00 sec)

List all available databases with:

mysql> show databases;
+----------+
| Database |
+----------+
| mysql
|
| nhds
|
| test
|
+----------+
3 rows in set (0.00 sec)

Select a particular database:

419
mysql> use nhds;
Database changed

List the available tables:

mysql> show tables;
+----------------+
| Tables_in_nhds |
+----------------+
| nhds96
|
| nhds97
|
| nhds98
|
| nhds99
|
+----------------+
4 rows in set (0.00 sec)

List details of the structure of a table:

mysql> describe nhds99;
+---------------+---------+------+-----+---------+-------+
| Field
| Type
| Null | Key | Default | Extra |
+---------------+---------+------+-----+---------+-------+
| svy_year
| int(11) | YES |
| NULL
|
|
| newborn
| char(1) | YES |
| NULL
|
|
| age_unit
| char(1) | YES |
| NULL
|
|
| age
| int(11) | YES |
| NULL
|
|
| sex
| char(1) | YES |
| NULL
|
|
| race
| char(1) | YES |
| NULL
|
|
| m_status
| char(1) | YES |
| NULL
|
|
| dis_month
| int(11) | YES |
| NULL
|
|
| dis_status
| char(1) | YES |
| NULL
|
|
| days_care
| int(11) | YES |
| NULL
|
|
| los_flag
| char(1) | YES |
| NULL
|
|
| geo_region
| char(1) | YES |
| NULL
|
|
| no_beds
| char(1) | YES |
| NULL
|
|
| hos_ownership | char(1) | YES |
| NULL
|
|
| ana_weight
| int(11) | YES |
| NULL
|
|
| dc1
| char(5) | YES |
| NULL
|
|
| dc2
| char(5) | YES |
| NULL
|
|
| dc3
| char(5) | YES |
| NULL
|
|
| dc4
| char(5) | YES |
| NULL
|
|

420
| dc5
| char(5) | YES |
| NULL
|
|
| dc6
| char(5) | YES |
| NULL
|
|
| dc7
| char(5) | YES |
| NULL
|
|
| pc1
| char(4) | YES |
| NULL
|
|
| pc2
| char(4) | YES |
| NULL
|
|
| pc3
| char(4) | YES |
| NULL
|
|
| pc4
| char(4) | YES |
| NULL
|
|
| p_src_payment | char(2) | YES |
| NULL
|
|
| s_src_payment | char(2) | YES |
| NULL
|
|
| drg
| char(3) | YES |
| NULL
|
|
+---------------+---------+------+-----+---------+-------+
29 rows in set (0.00 sec)

MySQL

Chapter 59
Nautilus: Navigating
FoldersNear and Far
The Apple Macintosh commercially pioneered the graphical user interface
(GUI) invented by Xerox Palo Alto Research Center (PARC). The Macintosh
Finder provided an ease of use that heretheto was lacking in computers.
Microsoft came along much later with their File Manager and then MSWindows Explorer. Learning well from both of these and more, Nautilus
was developed by Eazel, a startup company founded by some of the original
Apple Macintosh developers, including Mike Boich, Andy Hertzfeld, and Bud
Tribble.
Nautilus is a component-based Gnome-based file manager for the GNU/Linux
Operating System. Nautilus features a refreshingly new yet intuitive graphical user interface which is easily customised to suit individual tastes and
expertise.
Documents are, as we expect, represented by icons on a desktop. But the
contents of those documents are previewed within the icon!
Also users can share and manage files across a network.

59.1

Finding Your Way

Navigation will be familiar to any user, with the usual Back, Forward, Up,
Reload, Home, Search and Web Search buttons in the toolbar.
421

422

Nautilus: Navigating FoldersNear and Far

The main window has two panels with the left hand panel containing tabs
to access different components.
The right hand panel displays folders and documents in a rich variety of
ways. Users will be familiar with the View as List and View as Icons Folder
displays.
Folders containing MP3 music can be displayed using the View as Album
component, which provides a specialised view of your music collection as an
album, designed to allow easy music listening. Selecting an MP3 file starts
it playing automatically.

Figure 59.1: Nautilus View as Music.

It can also display the album artwork if you have that available. To link the
artwork in you need to.

59.2

Browsing HTML Documents

HTML documents (the type of documents that form the basis of the world
wide web), whether they live on your local disk or somewhere on the web,
are just another type of document, and Nautilus treats them as such. Open
one and you begin browsing the web within the Nautilus shell! By default
Nautilus uses the Embedded Mozilla to render these documents, but others
can be plugged in, depending on your desires.

59.3 Nautilus CD Creator

59.3

423

Nautilus CD Creator

Debian Pacakges: nautilus-cd-burner

Nautilus provides by far the simplest approach to burning data CDs. Simply copy documents into burn:/// (or select Go->CD Creator to get the
burn:/// folder) then click on the Write contents to CD button. An option is provided to blank a CD-RW before burning. To burn an existing ISO
image right-click on it to select the Write to CD... entry.
If, when you select to Write to CD the only option is to write the CD image
to file, then you probably have a permissions problem. XXXX How to fix
this? XXXX

59.4

Browsing Remote Sites

To use ssh to access a remote host, enter the appropriate Location:

ssh://festival/home/kayon/

Or ftp:
ftp://kayon:[email protected]

424

Nautilus: Navigating FoldersNear and Far

Chapter 60
Networks
60.1

Introduction

The network provides access to a wide collection of resources. Most computers today connect to the network either through an Ethernet network card
or else by modem. Once connected you have an IP address (and sometimes
more than one) assigned to your computer by which all communications is
effected. IP addresses are sequences of numbers.
Two things need to happen to get your network going: loading a driver for
your network card and specifying your network address and configuration.
An Ethernet based network is usually started up at boot time by the system
initialisation script /etc/init.d/networking. For pcmcia network cards the
/etc/pcmcia/ tree provides its own scrips, including /etc/pcmcia/network,
that is called whenever a network card is found in the PCMCIA socket.
Your IP address bitwise ANDed with the so called netmask yields your network address. The network address bitwise ORed with the negated netmask
yields your so called broadcast address. The IP address of the router through
which you connect to the Internet is referred to as the gateway.
A simple example is:
IP:
Mask:
Network:
Broadcast:

192.168.0.34
255.255.255.240
192.168.0.32
192.168.0.47

(0xc0a80022)
(0xfffffff0)
(0xc0a80020 = 0xc0a80022 & 0xfffffff0)
(0xc0a8002f = 0xc0a80020 | ~0x0f)

425

426

Networks

60.2

Network Configuration

60.2.1

Graphical Tools

Debian Pacakges: gnome-system-tools.

The gnome-system-tools package contains a graphical interface (networkadmin) to set up your network. The application is available from the standard Gnome menu as ApplicationsSystem ToolsNetworking. You will be
asked for the root password to effect changes to networking, as in Figure 60.1.

Figure 60.1: Dialogue requesting root password for network administration.

You will then see the interface that will allow you to set up your networking.
With a laptop, for example, with regularly changing network configurations
you can create a number of appropriate Network Profiles, with one called
home chosen in Figure 60.2. To establish a connection you can click on the
unselected button for the appropriate network device in the Status column
of the Connections tab (after choosing the appropriate Network Profile).

60.2.2

Manual Setup

To set up networking the key file is /etc/network/interfaces. Examples

of what to add to this file are included below, illustrating both DHCP for
automatically obtaining network information from a server, and a manual
setup.
When changes are made to the network manually, (e.g., by editing /etc/
network/interfaces), restart the network with:
# wajig restart networking

Note that to have networking started in this way you need to have auto eth0
in /etc/network/interfaces. Otherwise the start-up script /etc/init.d/

60.2 Network Configuration

427

Figure 60.2: Configuration of networks using the Gnome network administration tool.

networking will not start eth0. The start-up script calls ifup -a which
only starts those interfaces marked as auto. You can still manually start the
network with ifup eth0.

60.2.3

Neighborhood Table Overflow

If you get a neighborhood table overflow message make sure the loopback
device is running:
# ifup lo

The ifconfig lo command should show, among other lines:

UP LOOPBACK RUNNING

60.2.4

Example Configurations

We present here some example network configurations. The numbers will

only make sense for very specific locations and you will need to obtain
your specific addresses from your System Administrator. We illustrate these
through the contents of /etc/network/interfaces but it is advisable to

428

Networks

use ApplicationsSystem ToolsNetworking as discussed above to change

the contents of this configuration file.
The simplest configuration uses DHCP to automatically obtain network information from a server that allocates addresses:
auto eth0
iface eth0 inet dhcp

Velox (Section 4.10.26) was initially set up to allow DHCP allocation of the IP
address. The DHCP server delivered the appropriate information as demonstrated in /var/log/installer.log:
got dhcp offer
HOSTNAME: requesting velox
ip: 183.44.70.122
next server: 0.0.0.0
netmask: 255.255.255.0
gateway: 183.44.70.177
dnsServers[0]: 183.44.72.1
numDns: 1
domain: ktware.com
broadcast: 183.44.70.255
network: 183.44.70.0
configured interface eth0
The network has been successfully configured using DHCP/BOOTP.

A manual configuration requires the information to be specified:

auto eth0
iface eth0 inet static
address 105.229.8.151
netmask 255.255.255.192
broadcast 105.229.8.191
gateway 105.229.8.190

A computer with a 3Com 3c905 ethernet card:

eth0: 3Com 3c905 Boomerang 100baseTx at 0xfc80, 00:c0:4f:f7:02:bf, IRQ 10
8K word-wide RAM 3:5 Rx:Tx split, autoselect/MII interface.
MII transceiver found at address 24, status 7849.
Enabling bus-master transmits and whole-frame receives.

60.3 Wireless Network

429

You can check that the eth0 interface is functioning:

# ifconfig eth0
eth0
Link encap:Ethernet HWaddr 00:C0:4F:F7:02:BF
inet addr:192.168.1.1 Bcast:192.168.1.255 Mask:255.255.255.0
UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST MTU:1500 Metric:1
RX packets:0 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
TX packets:21 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:21
collisions:0 txqueuelen:100
Interrupt:10 Base address:0xfc80

A computer with a SMC91C92 Ethernet network card. I had to configure the

appropriate kernel module to have this card recognised. I used the modconf
command to do this, select the Net modules and select the smc9194 module.
Configuring this succeeded, returning the following message:
SMC9194: SMC91C90/91C92(r:3) at 0x300 IRQ:10 INTF:TP MEM:4608b ADDR: 00:c0:4f:df:25:55

60.3

Wireless Network

Using a Cisco Air PCM350 series (PCM352) wireless PCMCIA card in a

laptop. Card is recognised when inserted and the airo module is loaded and
eth1 is identified. Card is also seen as wifi0! Install the CISCO Utilities
(Version 2.0 from www.cisco.com as Linux-ACU-Driver-v2.0.tar.gz). Install
as follows:
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#

mkdir /tmp/cisco
cd /tmp/csico
wget http://www.cisco.com/pcgi-bin/Software/Tablebuild/download.cgi/Linux-ACU-Driver-v
tar zxvf Linux-ACU-Driver-v2.0.tar.gz
mkdir -p /opt/cisco/bin
mv utilities/* /opt/cisco/bin
mv helpml.tar.gz /opt/cisco
cd /opt/csico
tar zxvf helpml.tar.gz
tm helpml.tar.gz
cd
/opt/cisco/bin/acu

430

Networks

For LEAP authentication you can login with a username and password. This
can be set up with:
# leapscript <username> <password>

Then start up a network connection on wifi0:

# ifup wifi0

Trying a ifup eth1 freezes the machine (Kernel 2.4.23).

DHCP fails at present. The wireless card is associatied. Have tried:
acpi=off for booting - no luck
removing the NIC module (3c59x) and reinserting wireless so that it
becomes eth0 - no luck.
Perhaps you may need to first set your IP address to 0.0.0.0 subnet mask 255.255.255.0 before initializing the DHCP client process (a
known problem when the DHCP server is Windows). How to do this?
Fixed IP also fails to work.
WARNING: On the laptop, suspend to disk fails to resume when the card
is plugged in!!!! TODO Fix this.

60.4

Domain Name Searching

If you would like to search for hosts in other domains by simply listing the
host name (e.g., inco, rather than inco.ktware.com) you can add those other
domains to /etc/resolv.conf. Note that PPP will add its own ISP related resolv.conf file on dial up. Thus, with ISP identified as provider add
the following line to /etc/ppp/resolv/provider:

search ktware.com

60.5 Hostname Changes

60.5

431

Hostname Changes

Changing your hostname is not so trivial because it sometimes permeates to

various files in /etc/. But the starting point to change your hostname from
porsche to zafira is:
# hostname zafira

This alone will not suffice as the change in hostname will not survive a reboot.
You need to edit /etc/hostname which is where the name is obtained at boot
time.
Then search through /etc, for example, for occurances of the old name, just
in case:
# grep -r inco /etc

Typically you will find the hostname hardwired in /etc/hosts, /etc/mailname,

/etc/motd, and various apache, ppp, ssh, and exim files, depending on your
setup. These can probably be edited by hand to replace the host name.
Users have reported making such changes without problem. Some people
have reported problems rebooting after making some of these changes so be
careful!

60.6

Ports and Services

You can turn services on and off by the update-inetd command. For example, to turn telnet off:
# update-inetd --disable telnet

You can also manually turn services off by directly editing /etc/inetd.conf.
For example, if you have telnetd installed (not recommended) and wish to
turn it off (rather than uninstalling it) then comment out the line in /etc/
inetd.conf that starts with telnet and restart inetd:
# /etc/init.d/inetd restart

432

Networks

7
9

echo
discard

13

daytime

17
20
21
22
23
25
37

quotd
ftp-data
ftp
ssh
telnet
smtp
time
prints the current time as seconds sine the epoch in
machine readable form. This can be useful if network
clients expect the service for crude time synchronisation
(some windows clients can use this service). Otherwise
it is not generally needed.
domain
gopher
finger
http
pop3
sunrpc
auth
The IDENT protocol. It is not useful but most IRC
servers require this port to be open and returning information. Apparently some FTP servers and postgresql
require this service as well.
nntp
is the Network News Transport Service if you are running a news server (e.g., inn or cnews). Otherwise it is
not needed.

53
70
79
80
110
111
113

119

This is like /dev/null but for networks. This port is

generally not needed, especially if you are worried about
attacks.
Prints the current date as a string (e.g.,
Mon May 23 07:14:21 2001).
Not generally not
needed. Can be turned off to avoid possible denial of
service attacks where an attacker may link it to the
echo port using spoofing. Also, the returned format
could be used to guess the operating system type.

60.7 Getting the Cabling Right

123
143
161
194
194
220
389
443
873
2049
2049

ntp
imap2
udp snmp
tcp irc
udp irc
imap3
tcp ldap
tcp https
tcp rsync
tcp nfs
udp nfs

3306
6000
6667
8080
32860

tcp

433

Simple Net Management Protocol

Internet Relay Chat

Lightweight Directory Access Protocol

Secure HTTP
Efficient protocol for copying and syncing files.
This port will advertise the export list for NFS.
Older versions of nfsd have bugs so make sure your nfs
is up to date.

mysql
X Window System
udp ircd
Internet Relay Chat
tcp webcache
WWW caching service
udp nlockmgr
Not known to be a security problem but could be turned
off.

60.7

Getting the Cabling Right

60.8

IP Forwarding: Home Networks

Debian Pacakges: iptables.

Consider a home network of GNU/Linux and MSWindows machines, connected via ethernet. A GNU/Linux machine can connect to the Internet via
PPP. We want to provide network access from all machines. We use iptables
(for kernel version 2.4).
Suppose Modern (Section 4.10.7) is the host which will connect to the Internet
using PPP. After installing iptables do the following on this host which will
serve as the Internet gateway:
#
#
#
#
#

iptables
iptables
iptables
iptables
iptables

--flush
--table nat --flush
--delete-chain
--table nat --delete-chain
--table nat --append POSTROUTING --out-interface ppp0 -j MASQUERADE

434

Networks

# iptables --append FORWARD --in-interface eth0 -j ACCEPT

This clears the rules for filtering and then adds a rule to provide the IP
forwarding. Now we need to turn it on for the kernel:
# echo 1 > /proc/sys/net/ipv4/ip_forward

And thats it! This host, Modern (Section 4.10.7) will now act as a gateway
to the Internet for your local machines.
There is some setup needed to have this survive a reboot. One approach is
to do this through init.d, as explained in Section 45.2. The first step is to
create a script file called /etc/init.d/myfirewall containing:
#! /bin/sh
#
# Set up a firewall for IP Masquerading
#
PATH=/bin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/usr/sbin
case "$1" in
start)
echo -n "Starting IP Masquerading: myfirewall"
iptables --flush
iptables --table nat --flush
iptables --delete-chain
iptables --table nat --delete-chain
iptables --table nat --append POSTROUTING --out-interface ppp0 -j MASQUERADE
iptables --append FORWARD --in-interface eth0 -j ACCEPT
echo 1 > /proc/sys/net/ipv4/ip_forward
echo "."
;;
stop)
echo -n "Stopping IP Masquerading: myfirewall"
echo 0 > /proc/sys/net/ipv4/ip_forward
echo "."
;;
reload)
echo "Not implemented."
;;
force-reload|restart)

60.8 IP Forwarding: Home Networks

435

sh $0 stop
sh $0 start
;;
*)
echo "Usage: /etc/init.d/myfirewall {start|stop|restart|force-reload|reload}"
exit 1
;;
esac
exit 0

Then the firewall can be turned on and off with:

$ wajig start myfirewall
$ wajig stop myfirewall

To have it started at boot and stopped at shutdown:

# update-rc.d myfirewall start 40 S . stop 89 0 6 .

This creates the following links:

/etc/rc0.d/K89myfirewall -> ../init.d/myfirewall
/etc/rc6.d/K89myfirewall -> ../init.d/myfirewall
/etc/rcS.d/S40myfirewall -> ../init.d/myfirewall

Another approach is to only turn it on and off as a PPP connection is established. See the scripts in /usr/share/doc/iptables/examples for details.
Now Rose (Section 4.10.29) and Inco (Section 4.10.24), machines on the local
home network, can have their network interface set up:
iface eth0 inet
address
network
netmask
gateway

static
192.168.1.2
192.168.1.0
255.255.255.0
192.168.1.5

(modern)

436

60.9

Networks

Multiple Ethernet Cards

On the Dell laptop Inco (Section 4.10.24) we have two Ethernet cards when
the Laptop is docked and one when not docked. The card in the Laptop itself
is identified as eth0 when not docked but as eth1 when docked, in which
case the docking station Ethernet card is identified as eth0.
The laptops internal Ethernet card is only used when the laptop is not
docked. Thus we can get away with configuring eth0 for both situations and
eth1 as a removable card so that it is not automatically configured when the
machine is booted!

Chapter 61
NFS: Network File System
Debian Pacakges: nfs-kernel-server nfs-client
For managing a collection of networked Debian boxes the use of NFS to
mount home directories is a good idea.

61.1

Setting Up NFS

Suppose Altrop (Section 4.10.20) is the host of the home directories that are
exported to Cultus (Section 4.10.19). On Altrop install nfs-kernel-server:
altrop$ wajig install nfs-kernel-server

Then edit /etc/exports to add the following line:

/home cultus(rw)

Then restart the daemon:

altrop$ wajig restart nfs-kernel-server

On Velox (Section 4.10.26), an earlier install, I used nfs-user-server rather

than the usual nfs-kernel-server because the latter gave the following error
when starting the daemons:
437

438

NFS: Network File System

nfssvc: Function not implemented

I use nfs-kernel-server on Punto (Section ??) and Prefect (Section 4.10.17)

which are running kernel 2.4.9 and Altrop (Section 4.10.20), running 2.4.16.
Errors will also be reported if you have not loaded the nfsd module into the
kernel. Be sure to add the following to /etc/modules if you get errors:
nfs
nfsd

Now on Cultus (Section 4.10.19) add the following line to /etc/fstab:

altrop:/home /home nfs defaults 0 0

Then on Cultus (Section 4.10.19) you can:

cultus$ mount /home

You should also maintain common passwd, shadow, group and gshadow files
between the various hosts. See Section 66.1 below for details.

61.2

Export Lists

Suppose you have a network that is a subnet of a C class network, as with the
hosts on ktnet. They have addresses starting from 155.229.8.150 with a
netmask of 255.255.255.192. To NFS export to all hosts in this subnetwork
you can use the following:
/home
/usr/local
/edmnet/altrop
/var/lib/cvs
/var/spool/mail

155.229.8.150/255.255.255.192(rw)
155.229.8.150/255.255.255.192(rw)
155.229.8.150/255.255.255.192(rw)
155.229.8.150/255.255.255.192(rw)
155.229.8.150/255.255.255.192(rw,no_root_squash)

61.3 Root Access On NFS

61.3

439

Root Access On NFS

By default root on a client is mapped to user nobody on an NFS server.

This is a security measure. However, this may mean that evolution, for
example, will not be able to read NFS mounted mail directories (i.e., where
on machine Cultus (Section 4.10.19) you mount /var/spool/mail from, for
example, Altrop (Section 4.10.20)). evolution (or something used by evolution)
seems to be root when accessing the email. The solution is to allow root
mapping to root for this export from Altrop (Section 4.10.20). Thus, on
Altrop (Section 4.10.20) ensure the following exists in /etc/exports:
/var/spool/mail

cultus(rw,no_root_squash)

440

NFS: Network File System

Chapter 62
NT File System
Kernel 2.2.12 and beyond support read only access to NTFS, the file system
of MS-Windows/NT. The kernel needs to be configured to use it:
CONFIG_NTFS_FS=m

I have two NTFS partitions on the MS-Windows/NT side of the machine.

So I edit /etc/fstab to include these two lines:
/dev/hda1
/dev/hda2

/nt/c
/nt/d

ntfs
ntfs

defaults,user,ro,umask=002,gid=100 0 0
defaults,user,ro,umask=002,gid=100 0 0

The various options mean: ro mounts the file system as read-only; user
lets any user mount the file-system; nohide shows hidden and associated
files; noexec avoids regular files showing up as non-executable.
Then create directories for the mount points:
# mkdir /nt/c
# mkdir /nt/d

As any user can then mount the drives:

# mount /nt/c
# mount /nt/d

441

442

NT File System

These will be mounted each time you reboot, unless you add the noauto
option to the appropriate lines in [NTFS]/etc/fstab.
Users are granted access to [NTFS]/nt/c and [NTFS]/nt/d through the
use of the umask=002,gid=100 in the fstab, and then add trusted users
to this group. You can allow access for only a specific user by adding
uid=1000,gid=1000 to the options. Or you can remove all security and
give complete access to everyone with umask=000 (this is dangerous as any
login will be able to peruse your possibly private and password containing
files on the NTFS partition).
Note that permissions on the mountpoint itself ([NTFS]/nt/c are irrelevant:
when you mount a filesystem the permissions of the mounted filesystems
root directory replace the permissions of the mountpoint, even when the
filesystem in question does not support permissions.
If you need to transfer files from your linux partition to your NTFS partition
then Explore2fs is an option. Have a look at http://uranus.it.swin.edu.
au/~jn/linux/explore2fs.htm

Chapter 63
OpenOffice
OpenOffice began life as StarOffice from the German company StarDivision.
Sun Microsystems purchased it and made it open source and also sells it as
StarOffice.
To start up OpenOffice:
$ openoffice

63.1

OpenOffice Writer

OpenOffice Writer can be used for a variety of tasks including business letters,
documentation and desktop publishing. Flexible layout and design options
make support multicolumn newsletters and brochures. Indexing can be used
for bibliographical and index entries and keywords as well as the generation of
indexes and reference tables (such as a table of contents). Groupware features
support easy collaboration with others on the same document, while keeping
track of changes. Export to HTML means you can create your own web site
with hyperlinks, frames, and image maps.

63.2

Dictionaries

The UK dictionary should be installed as the package myspell-en-gb. Previously to install the English (UK) dictionary one had to:
443

444

OpenOffice

Figure 63.1: Sample Writer from StarOffice

$ wget http://dict.progbits.com/en_GB.zip
$ cd /usr/lib/openoffice/share/dict/ooo
$ sudo unzip ~/en_GB.zip
$ chmod u=rw,go=r *en_GB*
$ sudo zile dictionary.lst
DICT en GB en_GB
$

Then in openoffice enable the GB dictionary and disable the US dictionary.

Go to ToolsOptions. Language SettingsWriting AidsEdit. Turn off US
spelling (keep US hyphenation) and then English UK and turn on spelling
(and US hyphenation). Then in Language SettingsLanguages choose English UK.
The thesaurus with the GB dictionary does not exist. There is a US thesaurus
though. To make it available under GB add the following line to the end of
/usr/share/myspell/dicts/dictionary.lst:

63.3 OpenOffice Impress

445

THES en GB th_en_US

63.3

OpenOffice Impress

Impress is the PowerPoint equivalent in OpenOffice. Generally, you can load

and present PowerPoint presentations with little difficulty in Impress.
Fonts are often the main cause of problems though, with some MSWindows fonts not available under other operating systems. This manifests itself
most often with bullets which use the wingding font in PowerPoint. To
have these automatically converted to dingbats in OpenOffice, go to ToolsOptions-Fonts. Specify Font as Wingdings and Replace With Dingbats and
click the tick. Should fix it, although the bullets are replaced with stars!
Quotes are still a problem in the translation.

446

OpenOffice

Chapter 64
Oracle: Commercial Database
Installing Oracle on Debian involves obtaining the Oracle tar file, setting up
an Oracle user and some Oracle groups, and running the Oracle installation
software.
See http://openacs.org/doc/openacs-4/oracle.html for details.

64.1

Obtaining the Distribution

Oracle can be downloaded from http://otn.oracle.com/software/content.

html. Obtain the appropriate tar file e.g. linux817.tar. Extract the
archive:
# cd /ktnet/oracle
# tar xvf linux817.tar

64.2

Oracle User and Groups

Create a user for Oracle to run as:

# adduser oracle

Then create various groups which normal users might belong to in order to
administer Oracle.
447

448

Oracle: Commercial Database

# addgroup dba
# addgroup oinstall

And add user oracle to these groups:

# adduser oracle dba
# adduser oracle oinstall

For this new oracle user edit /home/oracle/.bash\_profile to add the

following lines:
export
export
export
export
export
export
export

ORACLE_BASE=/ktnet/oracle
ORACLE_HOME=$ORACLE_BASE/product/8.1.7
PATH=$PATH:$ORACLE_HOME/bin
LD_LIBRARY_PATH=$LD_LIBRARY_PATH:$ORACLE_HOME/lib
ORACLE_SID=ora8
ORACLE_TERM=vt100
ORA_NLS33=$ORACLE_HOME/ocommon/nls/admin/data

umask 022

Now make sure the appropriate installation directory is set up:

# cd /ktware
# mkdir oracle
# chown -R oracle.dba oracle

64.3

Oracle Installation

Log in as the oracle user and run the install utility:

# su - oracle
$ cd /ktware/oracle
$ ./runInstaller

You now proceed through a collection of setup screens.

File Locations The source should be a path to stage/products.jar and
the destination should be /ktware/oracle/product/8.1.7.

Chapter 65
Partitions

Partitioning of your hard drive(s) can be as trivial as creating just two partitions, one for swap and the rest for the installation and everything elsethis
is the Debian default and recommendation for new users. Or it can be as
complex as creating many partitions for different parts of the system to use.
An argument for creating multiple partitions is that filling up one partition
wont impact on other partitions (which could be a problem if the system is
unable to function properly because the disk is full). Also, corrupting one
partition (although rare) wont affect another, thus it is good to keep the
system partition separate from the user partitions. The decision is yours.

65.1

Sample Usage

It is useful to see where the disk is being used for an installed system. Below
we identify the usage on several systems at some specific time.
449

450
Host
Disk
/bin
/boot
/dev
/etc
/home
/lib
/sbin
/tmp
/usr
/var

Partitions
Altrop Festival
66G
69G
3M
3M
21M
37M
32M
21G
153M
4M
2G
5G
21G

37M
2G
124M
4M
0G
4G
16G

Cultus
36G
3M
17M

Mint
8G
3M
10M
60M
27M 38M
2G
3G
89M 80M
3M
3M
2M
6M
3G
3G
2G 284M

Notes: The 16G in /var on Festival (Section 4.10.11) is taken up with

database files for mysql. Similarly, on Altrop (Section 4.10.20) 19G of the
21G is in /var/lib/mysql.

65.2

Suggested Partitioning

A very useful guide written by Karsten Self is available from http://kmself.

home.netcom.com/Linux/FAQs/partition.html.
The simplest of partitioning scheme is to have three partitions, one for /
(4GB-10GB perhaps), one for swap (2 times available RAM) and the rest as
/home. This may well suffice and avoids users filling up the root partition
and the system thus having problems.
A significantly (and perhaps unnecessarily) more complex scheme, and one
that is often recommended based on the Debian distribution and the Filesystem Hierarchy Standard is:

65.2 Suggested Partitioning

Path
swap
/

/tmp
/boot
/usr

/var

/etc

/usr/local

/home

Size
2xRAM

451

Rationale
An old rule of thumb. Generally theres
plenty of disk space to handle this.
50MB100MB This is where the base system lives and contains just enough to boot a system, and will
allow you to boot into single user mode in
case of catastrophe elsewhere on the disk.
By being small it is less prone to corruption
as a result of a system crash. On a typical server (maximum of PLYMZ and Velox
(Section 4.10.26)) it contains bin (2MB),
lib (40MB), root (15MB), and sbin (2MB).
The directory is usually static and unshareable.
50MB100MB It is empty after reboot.
16MB
It is 6MB on PLYMZ, 2MB on Velox (Section 4.10.26).
500MB-2GB
This directory is usually static and shareable.
It is 1GB on PLYMZ, 2GB on Velox (Section 4.10.26). This includes /usr/local.
200MB500MB This directory is variable with some parts
shareable and others not. Often used for
email and news feeds. It is 1GB on PLYMZ,
2GB on Velox (Section 4.10.26), and both are
being used as web servers.
This directory is usually static and unshareable. It is 5MB on PLYMZ, 10MB on Velox
(Section 4.10.26).
200MB-2GB
This directory is usually shareable. Typically for local networks this is mounted
from a server. It is 500MB on Velox (Section 4.10.26) acting as a server.
200MB
This directory is usually shareable. Typically for local networks this is mounted from
a server. It is 4GB on Velox (Section 4.10.26)
acting as a server.

452

/ktnet

65.3

Partitions

(remainder)

This is used for a networked environment

where disk space on each machine is shared.
Create a subdirectory on /ktnet with the
name of this host with the intention of NFS
mounting this on other hosts in the network.
Mount other hosts /ktnet areas here.

Repartitioning MS-Windows

Your computer perhaps came with MS-Windows installed and perhaps two
partitions on the hard drive, one called the C: drive and the other called
the D: drive. These are simply areas on the disk that have been allocated
to each of these drives. The partition essentially marks where on the disk
the boundaries are between the different drives. The raw bits associated
with each drive are then organised in some way to create a filesystem. The
C: drive and the D: drive probably have the FAT or the FAT32 filesystem.
(Under GNU/Linux these drives are usually identified as /dev/hda1 and
/dev/hda2.)
These two partitions (or however many your computer came withperhaps
just one) will probably have been arranged to fill the whole of the hard drive,
leaving no room for any other operating system. So, if you wish to keep a
dual boot system you need to move these partitions to make room for other
partitions (with different organisations of the bitsthat is, different types of
file systems).
Changing the size of an existing partition can damage the data on that
partition although by carefully following certain steps this should not happen.
Nonetheless be sure to make a backup of the current partitions if you can.
This is important if you have data on the system you do not want to lose.
The first step is to decide how much space you need for each of your partitions. For a 6GB hard drive you might give 3GB to Win32 and 3GB to
GNU/Linux. But this depends on how much space you are currently using.
Next, the aim is to move all of the data on the current partitions to the
beginning of the partition, then change the location of the end of the partition. The Win32 tool fips is commonly used to perform this rearrangement
of partitions.

65.3 Repartitioning MS-Windows

453

The fips toolkit consists of three files: two executables (RESTORRB.EXE

and FIPS.EXE) and a text file (ERRORS.TXT). These should be copied to
a bootable floppy (created under Win32 with the DOS command sys a:).
Now under Win32 run your disk de-fragmenter (the DOS command defrag).
When finished reboot your computer, booting from the fips floppy disk.
Then simply type a:\fips and fips will let you know what to do next.

454

Partitions

Chapter 66
Passwords
If you forget your password for root, then you will be in a spot of bother. One
way to fix this is to reboot the machine using the Debian installation floppy
or CD. When you get the first question (about the having a colour monitor)
press CTRL-ALT-F1 to get a shell. Mount your root partition (lets say it is
/dev/hda1):
# mount /dev/hda1 /mnt

then edit the password file to erase the encrypted password for root:
# editor /mnt/etc/passwd

Save the file then reboot (CTRL-ATL-DEL).

66.1

Password File Sharing

NIS, which manages password file sharing among several hosts, provides the
simplest mechanism for doing this, but there are alternatives that can work
for small networks (2 or 3 machines). You can maintain the passwd, shadow,
group, and gshadow files on a server Altrop (Section 4.10.20) and copy them
across to the other machines as needed, as described below, using rdist! The
downside is that all new users should be added on the server and passwords
should be changed on the server only with the appropriate password files
then pumped out to the other hosts.
455

456

66.1.1

Passwords

Using rdist

The rdist package can be used to update files on a collection of hosts from
a central host. This is what I do from Altrop (Section 4.10.20) where the
password and group files are maintained.
On Altrop (Section 4.10.20) in /root/distfile I have the following:
KTNET = ( inco punto cultus festival atom brick prefect )
FILES

= ( /etc/passwd /etc/shadow /etc/group /etc/gshadow

/etc/apt/sources.list /etc/printcap /etc/resolv.conf )

${FILES} -> ${KTNET}

install -oyounger,chknfs,savetargets;

Thus I have seveb hosts that are updated with seven files from altrop. The
options for install include: younger so that if the remote host has update the
files they wont be updated from altrop, and instead I need to have a look
at them to see what has changed; chknfs so that NFS mounted files are not
updated; and savetargets so that old copies are placed in .OLD files so I can
then compare what has changed!
The command to do the update is:
# rdist -F -P /usr/bin/ssh

This will use ssh to communicate and will do it serially (-F) so that the
passwords that are asked for dont interfere with each other!

66.1.2

Simple tar

When a new user is added (using adduser) the files need to be copied to
each of the other hosts. A simple way is to tar up the files, copy them to a
NFS mounted are (e.g., a trusted users home directory), log in as root on
the other host, cp the tar file to /tmp so that root can access it (root access
to the NFS mounted home directories is not permitted) and then untar it in
/etc.
This is okay for a small network! It also relies on /home being mounted by
NFS from the master (altrop). Still, I need a better solution.

66.1 Password File Sharing

66.1.3

457

Using NIS

NIS is used to share password files among a collection of machines. This

ensures all users have access to all machines and have the same user id and
group ids. The group of machines is referred to with a domain name (nothing
to do with a network domain name though). One machine in the group must
be a master server and the rest are nis clients of that server. You can also
have slave servers but well ignore that one for now.
Setting Up The Master Server
To set up the master NIS server on Caravan (Section 4.10.6):
caravan$ wajig install nis

You will be asked to name the nis domain. You can call it anything and later
edit it in /etc/defaultdomain. Lets call it ktnet.ktware.com (it has no
formal relationship to the network domain name).
In the file /etc/default/nis set NISSERVER=master to identify caravelle
as the master server.
To restrict who can access you NIS server add your local network number to
the file /etc/ypserv.securenets
Now restart the NIS server:
$ wajig restart nis

Now set up the server:

# touch /etc/networks
# /usr/lib/yp/ypinit -m

(because it does not exist)

You will be asked to list all of your servers (just caravelle for now).
This essentially builds the maps from the current password file on caravelle.
Note that you cant use the nis maps on caravelle itself - dont remove the
users from caravelles password file!

458

Passwords

Setting Up The Client

To set up the NIS client on Festival (Section 4.10.11):
festival$ wajig install netbase portmap nis

You will be asked the name of the nis domain. You must use the name
you supplied to the master server (ktnet.ktware.com). It is stored in
/etc/defaultdomain.
Specify the NIS server address in /etc/yp.conf:
ypserver 105.229.8.170

Restart the client:

$ wajig restart nis

Now edit the passwd, shadow, group and gshadow files. In passwd remove
all the users (anyone with a user id in the 1000s) and add:
+::::::

And in shadow:
+::::::::

Then in groups and gshadow files, similarly remove the users and add:
+:::

NIS should now be working. Certainly ypcat passwd should show the users
in NIS.

Chapter 67
PPP: Networking Over
Modems
For Debian use pppconfig to configure your network connections. This tool
will request the appropriate information and knows about chat scripts and
PAP connections. It will ask you to name the connection you want to configure, with a default name of provider. It will then generate the appropriate
configuration scripts in [ppp]/etc/chatscripts/provider and [ppp]/etc/ppp/peers/provider
(the provider in these paths is replaced with the name you supply pppconfig).
The plog command will show you the ppp log which is in [plog]/var/log/ppp.log.
To watch the plog file issue the command plog -f as root or else as a user
in the group adm.
The pppconfig command allows you to configure your modem connections.
Essentially it is a front end to the various scripts in /etc/ppp. My PCMCIA
modem is loaded at /dev/ttyS1. Newer versions of ppconfig check the serial
ports for modems for you. Usually, /dev/ttyS0 corresponds to COM1 under
MS-Windows and /dev/ttyS1 corresponds to COM2.
To allow users other than root to connect through the modem (using the pon
and poff pair of commands) add the users to the Unix group dip:
# adduser kayon dip

Then, next time user kayon logs on he will be in group dip in addition to
the other groups he was already in. He will then be able to initiate and
459

460

PPP: Networking Over Modems

terminate a dial up session. However, user kayon does not have access to the
log file through the plog commandonly root does, presumably for security
reasons, since unless you inhibit it, passwords can be displayed there.
Further information on PPP is available from

67.1

modemlights applet

This is the Gnome applet I use for modem access. After adding a user to
the dip Unix group they can use this applet to dial the modem, display
transfers, and to hangup. Under properties I had to change the connect
and disconnect commands to be pon and poff rather than pppon and pppoff
(which dont exist perhaps this is a problem). The newer Potato version
of the applet had the defaults correct.

Chapter 68
Presentations
68.1

Beamer

This is an excellent package for LATEX to generate PDF based presentations.

It is a newer alternative to prosper (see Section 68.2).

68.2

Prosper

Prosper is a LATEX package for generating presentations with colour, animations and flair! A newer alternative that works better with PDF is beamer
(see Section 68.1).

68.3

OpenOffice Impress

OpenOffice (and StarOffice) Impress is a MSPowerPoint replacement that

facilitates the quick creation of impressive presentations. Special effects and
vector graphics tools support animations and sound effects, and include flow
chart-style shapes. An AutoPilot tools steps the user through the process
of creating Web-based slide shows. Predefined presentation layouts are also
provided.
461

462

Presentations

Figure 68.1: Sample Impress from StarOffice

68.4

KPresenter

Chapter 69
Printing
69.1

CUPS - Common Unix Printing System

Debian Pacakges: cupsys, cupsys-client, cupsys-bsd, cupsys-driver-gimpprint

cupsomatic-ppd, a2ps, hp-ppd, foomatic-db, gsfonts-other.
CUPS is a newer printing system and may become the preferred printing system for Unix and GNU/Linux. It uses PPD (PostScript Printer Description)
files to identify the features of a printer. This allows printer configurations to
be maintained and provides access to the printer options through the command line. It also has client side filters to convert, for example, PDF to
PostScript to avoid the dreaded raw output of PDF.

69.1.1

Add Printing to New Host

If you have CUPS set up already on a server, and you generally have the
same environment on your desktop machines, when setting up a new host,
simply install the packages listed above. Then copy over the appropriate
configuration files:

#
#
#
#

cd /etc/cups
scp ktw:/etc/cups/printers.conf .
scp ktw:/etc/cups/ppd/* ppd
chmod o+r ppd/*.ppd

463

464

Printing

Always keep your configuration up to date on the server, perhaps using the
web interface via []http://ktw:631/. (If you use instead the command line
interface with the command lpadmin then you also need to copy lpoptions
across.) A convenient way to keep the configurations consistent is with rdist
(see Section 66.1.1 for an example).

69.1.2

Using the Web Interface

After installing cupsys visit http://localhost:631/ to add a printer to

your host Bartok (Section 4.10.1). The example here adds a network printer
(that we identify as hplj in /etc/hosts where it is associated with address
192.168.0.6) using a HP JetDirect device to connect a HP LaserJet 1200.
Name: lp0
Location: Richards Desk
Description: HP LaserJet 1200
Device: AppSocket/HP JetDirect
URI: socket://hplj:9100/
Make: HP
Model: HP LaserJet 1200 Series PS (en)

If you are using the web interface and now go to the printer and get a
permission denied error, chances are it is because your browser is going to
bartok.act.ktware.com rather than localhost. You can edit /etc/cups/
cupsd.conf to give permission for all local hosts (since in my setup I have
printers configured on the server then use rdist to distribute the configuration
to all clients):
<Location />
...
Allow From 192.168.0.*
</Location>
...
<Location /admin>
...
Allow From 192.168.0.*
</Location>

You could use .act.ktware.com instead to allow access from any host in
your domain. Then restart the cupsys daemon:

69.1 CUPS - Common Unix Printing System

465

$ wajig restart cupsys

Print a test page to make sure it works. Also, go into Configure Printer to
set Page Size to A4, and any other default settings, like duplex printing.

69.1.3

Installing a HP PSC 2210

# cd /usr/share/cups/model
# foomatic-datafile -t cups -d hpijs -p HP-PSC_2210 > HP-PSC_2210-hpijs.ppd
# wajig restart cupsys

Then the printer is listed as Make Hewlett-Packard (not HP) in the web
interface to CUPS. Simply choose it.

69.1.4

Enabling a Printer

# /usr/bin/enable lp1

69.1.5

CUPS Command Line Interfaces

You can also simply use the command line to administer the printers. You
can add a network printer enable the printer with:
# lpadmin -p hplj -v socket://192.168.0.6:9100/ -E

Another example for a LPD print server:

# lpadmin -p lp1nd -v lpd://printhost/lp1nd -E

To add information about the Location and a Description of the printer:

# lpadmin -p lp0 -L "Level 2 South" -D "HP LaserJet 4"

To specify a PPD for the printer:

466

Printing

# lpadmin -p lp7 -P /usr/share/postscript/ppd/HP_LaserJet_4050_Series.ppd

# lpadmin -p lp11 -P LEXC750.PPD

The PPD file is copied into /etc/cups/ppd/lp11.ppd, for example.

You can look at the printer options (assuming it has a PPD) with:

# lpoptions -p lp7 -l

And you can set options with:

# lpoptions -p lp7 -o PageSize=A4

# lpoptions -p lp1 -o PageSize=A4

And so on. These options are placed in /etc/cups/lpoptions. The same

options can be set using the web interface. The web interface is indeed
somewhat easier to use, and it modifies the PPD file directly (e.g., /etc/
cups/ppd/lp1.ppd) rather than using the /etc/cups/lpoptions file!
You can access printer options directly from the command line when printing,
if the printers PPD supports the option. For example, the HP LaserJet 4050
driver Im using (from hp-ppd) supports n-up printing and watermarks:

$ lp -o HPNup=TwoUpL sample.pdf
$ lp -o HPwmText=Draft odbcmine.pdf

69.2

Using lprng to Print on Remote Hosts

$ wajig install lprng

$ sudo emacs -nw /etc/printcap
.common:
:sd=/var/spool/lpd/%P
:sh:mx=0:mc=0
lp1:tc=.common:lp=lp1@atria
$ wajig start lprng

69.3 Using rlpr to Print on Remote Hosts

69.3

467

Using rlpr to Print on Remote Hosts

A collection of Debian machines can be serviced by a remote printer server

running a printer daemon lpd. A simple approach to printing is then to install
rlpr. This provides the commands rlpr, rlpq, and rlprm. They can be used
as replacements for the usual lpr, lpq, and lprm commands. You can make
these aliases permanent by linking them into /usr/local/bin as in:
#
#
#
#

cd
ln
ln
ln

/usr/local/bin
-s /usr/bin/rlpr lpr
-s /usr/bin/rlpq lpq
-s /usr/bin/rlprm lprm

To specify the pinter on which to print you need to include in the printer
name the print server host, as in [email protected]. This can be
improved on by creating a /etc/rlprrc file with something like:
artz.ktware.com: lp1 lp1nd lp5 lp5t lp7 lp9

Make sure the protections on the file allow everyone to read the file. Then
when specifying a printer, simply mention its name, as in -Plp1 or set the
PRINTER environment variable to "lp1".

468

Printing

Chapter 70
Python
Debian Pacakges: python-base python-dev python-doc python-examples pythongdbm python-mpz python-regrtest python-tk python-xmlbase
Python is a programming language that is similar to Java in some respects,
but has fewer of the overheads of Java, and generally at a higher level
than Java. It is an excellent choice as a glue language. Being interpreted,
it is also excellent for rapid prototyping, with common experience being
that applications can be developed 5 times more quickly in Python than in
Java. See http://www.ferg.org/projects/python_java_side-by-side.
html for more details of such a comparison.
A number of products use Python as a scripting and extension language,
including OpenOffice.

70.1

Python Documentation

All python packages are self documenting, and the documentation can be
obtained using the pydoc command:

$ pydoc csv

469

470

Python

70.2

Python and R: Python Interfaces to R

R is a powerful and freely available statistical language. In Debian it is

installed as r-base.
The Debian packages are also available from the comprehensive R archive
network (or CRAN) by adding the following line to your /etc/apt/sources.
list:
deb http://cran.r-project.org/bin/linux/debian woody main
# wajig install r-base

We can now install either RSPython or RPy. Both provide a Python interface to R, and RSPython also provides an R interface to Python while
RPy is generally easier to use than RSPython! RSPython is not packaged
for Debian yet, but RPy is.

70.2.1

Installing RSPython

$ wget http://www.omegahat.org/RSPython/RSPython_0.5-1.tar.gz

Then install RSPython in R:

# R CMD INSTALL --clean RSPython_0.5-1.tar.gz

This command, executed as the root user has then installed the required files
into /usr/lib/R/library/RSPython. To communicate where the files are
installed to Python we need to set up three environment variables (a Debian
package would probably set this up so that these extra environment variables
are not required), and then run Python and try out some RSPython calls:
$
$
$
$
$

export
export
export
export
python

R_HOME=/usr/lib/R
PYTHONPATH=${R_HOME}/library/RSPython/Python
PYTHONPATH=${PYTHONPATH}:${R_HOME}/library/RSPython/libs
LD_LIBRARY_PATH=${R_HOME}/bin

70.2 Python and R: Python Interfaces to R

471

Python 2.2.1 (#2, Sep 13 2002, 23:25:07)

[GCC 2.95.4 20011002 (Debian prerelease)] on linux2
Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.
>>> import RS
Initialized R-Python interface package.
>>> RS.call("rnorm", 10)
[-0.65567988872831473, 0.67905969371540564, -1.1444361954473865,
0.81452303045337249, 0.72703311800839554, 0.86401079894005484,
-2.0267500136837922, 1.3879521193129922, -0.59819064121768595,
1.1045450495203162]
>>> RS.call("plot", [1,2,3,4])
>>> RS.call("plot", RS.call("rnorm",10))
>>> ^D

If you get:
$ python
>>> import RS
Traceback (most recent call last):
File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
File "/usr/lib/R/library/RSPython/Python/RS.py", line 1, in ?
import RSInternal
ImportError: /usr/lib/atlas/libblas.so.2: undefined symbol: e_wsfe
>>>

Then be sure that you dont have atlas2-base installed:

$ wajig remove atlas2-base

70.2.2

Installing RPy

For sophisticated plotting using the R package see Chapter 71.

Install python-rpy.
Older approaches did:
$ wajig install rpy_0.3.1-1_i386.deb
$ (cd /usr/lib; sudo ln -s R/bin/libR.so)

472

Python

Then test it with:

$ python
Python 2.3.1 (#2, Sep 24 2003, 11:39:14)
[GCC 3.3.2 20030908 (Debian prerelease)] on linux2
Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.
>>> from rpy import *
>>> l = [r.dchisq(x, 4) for x in r.seq(0, 10, by=0.1)]
>>> r.par(ask=1, ann=0)
{ask: 0, ann: 1}
>>> r.plot(l, type=lines)
Hit <Return> to see next plot:
>>> r.dev_off()
{null device: 1}
>>> ^D

To install it by hand until rpy debian package is released:

$ cd /tmp
$ wget http://easynews.dl.sourceforge.net/sourceforge/rpy/rpy-0.2.tar.gz
$ tar zxvf rpy-0.2.tar.gz
$ cd rpy-0.2
$ sudo python setup.py install
$ sudo emacs -nw /etc/ld.so.conf
Add the line:
/usr/lib/R/bin
$ sudo ldconfig
$ python
Python 2.2.1 (#2, Sep 7 2002, 15:35:22)
[GCC 2.95.4 20011002 (Debian prerelease)] on linux2
Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.
>>> from rpy import *
>>> l = [r.dchisq(x, 4) for x in r.seq(0, 10, by=0.1)]
>>> r.par(ask=1, ann=0)
>>> r.plot(l, type=lines)
>>> ^D
$ cd ..
$ sudo rm -rf rpy-0.2*

For earlier versions of rpy I used to get:

70.2 Python and R: Python Interfaces to R

473

$ python
>>> from rpy imprt *
Traceback (most recent call last):
File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
File "rpy.py", line 24, in ?
import _rpy
ImportError: /usr/lib/atlas/libblas.so.2: undefined symbol: e_wsfe
>>>

then you needed to remove atlas2-base.

$ wajig remove atlas2-base

However, more recently this packages is actually required to run R and rpy!
With version 0.3.1 of rpy I get the following (11 Aug 03):
> python2.2
Python 2.2.3+ (#1, Aug 10 2003, 10:11:23)
[GCC 3.3.1 (Debian)] on linux2
Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.
>>> import rpy
Traceback (most recent call last):
File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
File "/usr/lib/python2.2/site-packages/rpy.py", line 24, in ?
import _rpy
ImportError: /usr/lib/python2.2/site-packages/_rpymodule.so:
undefined symbol: jump_now
>>>

Also happens for python2.3 (11 Aug 2003).

474

Python

Chapter 71
R: Statistical Software
Debian Pacakges: r-base
There is an excellent selection of very high quality statistical software available for Debian GNU/Linux. A favourite is R, an open source version of
S/SPlus, widely used in the academic statistical community.
While R has its own interpreter and interactive shell, the examples provided
here use the RPy interface (Section 70.2.2) so that we can use R inside of
Python programs. This is simply a convenience of staying within the one
environment.

71.1

Graphs

R is excellent for generating graphs in many formats, including PostScript,

PDF, PNG, and JPG. A highly recommended approach is to generate graphs
in xfig format. These can then be loaded into the xfig application, for example, for further editing, if absolutely needed (perhaps you want to make
minor changes but have lost the original R code used to generate the graph).
And for LATEX processing the rubber package will automatically convert them
to the appropriate EPS or PDF format. Of course, xfig can also generate
PNG and JPG and many other formats.

475

476

R: Statistical Software

Generate a simple line and point graph:

Heres an interactive example to demonstrate the generation of a simple line
graph.

Services

> python
>>> from rpy import *
>>> l = [1,2,3,4,5,4,5,3,6,2,3,4,8,2,1]
>>> r.postscript("rplot01.eps")
>>> r.plot(l, type=b, xlab="Days", ylab="Services")
>>> r.dev_off()

10

12

14

Days

Two lines with a legend:

The following Python script generates a PNG graphic with two lines drawn.
from rpy import *
import os
dates = (Jul-98, Aug-98,
Jan-99, Feb-99,
death30 = (2.02, 1.53, 2.73,
3.87, 6.11, 3.23,
death6m = (1.52, 2.55, 3.28,
4.42, 5.68, 8.29,

Sep-98, Oct-98, Nov-98, Dec-98,

Mar-99, Apr-99, May-99, Jun-99)
3.09, 2.37, 2.60,
4.52, 4.27, 1.40)
1.55, 0.95, 3.65,
15.08, 32.70, 75.52)

r.png("rplot02.png")
r.par(cex=1.5)
r.plot(death6m, type="b", xlab="Month", ylab="Percentage",
lty=1, pch=0, axes=False)
r.lines(death30, type="b", lty=2, pch=1)
r.box()

71.1 Graphs

477

r.axis(1, at=range(1,len(dates)+1), labels=dates)

r.axis(2, at=range(0,100,10))
r.legend(1, 60,
(Deaths before 30 days, Deaths before 6 months),
lty = (2, 1), pch=(1, 0))
r.dev_off()
os.system("gv rplot02.png")

Generate a bar plot:

Heres a more complete Python program to generate a barplot
#!/usr/bin/env python
from rpy import *
import Numeric
import os,sys
ext = fig
if len(sys.argv) > 1: ext = sys.argv[1]
dev = {eps : (r.postscript, gv), pdf : (r.pdf, xpdf),
png : (r.png, display), fig : (r.xfig, xfig)}
fn="rplot03." + ext
dev[ext][0](fn)
ages = (0-19, 19-60, 61-100)
labels = (Asthma, Diabetes, Cancer, Mental, Surgery)
bars = Numeric.array([[25,15,26,25,18],[45,32,28,12,45],[27,35,56,34,28]])
r.barplot(bars, beside = True, legend = ages, ylim = (-7, 60),
col = ("lightblue", "mistyrose", "lightcyan"))

478

R: Statistical Software

r.text((2,6,10,14,18), (-2,-2,-2,-2,-2), labels = labels, pos = 4)

r.title(main = "Sample Bar Plot", font_main = 4)
r.dev_off()
os.system(dev[ext][1] + " " + fn)

71.1 Graphs
Generate a pie chart:
from rpy import *
import os
dates = (A, B, C, D, E, F)
percs = (25, 12, 35, 8, 10, 10)
labs = ()
for i in xrange(len(dates)):
labs += ("%s (%d%%)" % (dates[i], percs[i]),)
r.postscript("rplot04.eps")
r.pie(percs, labels=labs)
r.dev_off()
os.system("gv rplot04.eps")

479

480

R: Statistical Software

Chapter 72
Rsync: Remote Files
72.1

Rsync Server

To set up an rsync server simply install the rsync package then copy /usr/
share/doc/rsync/sample-rsyncd.conf.gz to /etc/rsyncd.conf. Edit it
to perhaps turn logging on:

log file=/var/log/rsyncd
...
transfer logging = yes

Make sure that port 873 is allowed through your firewall. Add the following
line to /etc/inetd.conf:
rsync stream tcp nowait root /usr/bin/rsync rsyncd --daemon

Then restart inetd by sending it a HUP.

The rsync server works with modules. Modules are defined in the configuration file. A list of modules is returned from an rsync server when the server
is queried:

$ rsync datamining.csiro.au::
debianbook
Grahams Debian GNU/Linux Survival Guide

481

482

Rsync: Remote Files

For each module (debianbook in the above) you identify a its configuration,
including a path to where it lives, for example:
[debianbook]
comment = Grahams Debian GNU/Linux Survival Guide
path = /var/www/debian/book
read only = yes
list = yes
uid = nobody
gid = nogroup
transfer logging = yes
...

To get a directory listing from an rsync server:

$ rsync datamining.csiro.au::debianbook/

To have your local server start up at boot time add the following to /etc/
inetd.conf:
rsync stream tcp nowait root /usr/bin/rsync rsyncd --daemon

After editing the /etc/rsyncd.conf file be sure to send the process a HUP
signal.

Chapter 73
Samba
Debian Pacakges: samba swat
The swat package is a nice web based administration tool. Highly recommended.
If using encrypted passwords (default) then need to add users using the
password manager in swat or with the command line smbpasswd. You may
also need to set the encrypted password option in /etc/samba/smb.cnf:
encrypt passwords = true

Note that the default installation provides access to user homes straight out
of the box.

483

484

Samba

Chapter 74
Scanning
The usual GNU/Linux scanner interface is called sane (Scanner Access Now
Easy).

74.1

Setup HP PSC 2210

Debian Pacakges: hpoj

# ptal-init setup
Probe parallel (n)
Probe USB (y)
Setting up as "mlc:usb:PSC_2200_Series"
# wajig restart cupsys
Reconfigure cupsys printer at http://localhost:631
For the URI choose ptal:/mlc:usb:PSC_2200_Series

Note that the hpoj daemon is the one to start/stop when changing hpoj
options.
Test it works as a user:
> ptal-devid
MFG:Hewlett-Packard;MDL:PSC 2200 Series;
CMD:MLC,PCL,PML,DW-PCL,DYN;CLS:PRINTER;
1284.4DL:4d,4e,1;SN:MY32AF320G0G;
S:0380008084021000002c148005cc250005c;AiO:0;

485

486

Scanning

If permission problems (printing works just fine but cant access the device
for scanning etc.), then try:
# chmod o+rx /dev/ptal-printd

74.2

Scanning Setup

Debian Pacakges: xsane sane-utils

Plug in the scanner (perhaps to the USB port). Then run xsane which will
try to find it. If there are problems finding the scanner, then make sure the
scanner kernel module is loaded:
# insmod scanner

If you still have problems, try disconnecting the USB scanner and plug it
back in.

Chapter 75
Science
75.1

Chemistry

75.1.1

Periodic Tables

The gnome periodic table is a simple periodic table.

Figure 75.1: The Gnome Periodic Table

487

488

Science

Chapter 76
Security
76.1

Booting Linux

You can protect against just anyone booting your system into Linux by disabling booting from floppy disk and CD-ROM in the BIOS, and by password
protecting LILO.

76.2

Checking Security with Nessus

The nessus package is an excellent package for checking known security

problems. Install on one machine both nessus (the client) and nessusd
(the server).
For nessusd you need to create a user account using nessusd-adduser.
One suggestion is to simply create a user with the same name as your user
account (e.g., kayon). Then start the daemon (server) with:
# nessusd -D

Note that this daemon is not automatically run within the /etc/init.d
framework.
As a user start up the nessus client and login with your user name. Go to
the Target selection tab and type in a list of hosts you wish to check, comma
489

490

Security

separated. If you want to test all machine on your network, try something
like 192.167.0.1/24.
After you click Start the scan the checking is initiated. Eventually a report
will be presented. You can save the report in various formats, including
LATEX.
The testing is extensive and the report provides suggestions for eliminating
security holes.

76.3

Check Security with Chkrootkit

The chkrootkit package provides the chkrootkit command to check for signs
of rootkits on the local system. Run the command as root and scan the
output for warnings.

# chkrootkit
ROOTDIR is /
Checking amd... not found
Checking basename... not infected
Checking biff... not found
Checking chfn... not infected
Checking chsh... not infected
Checking cron... not infected
Checking date... not infected
Checking du... not infected
Checking dirname... not infected
Checking echo... not infected
Checking egrep... not infected
Checking env... not infected
Checking find... not infected
Checking fingerd... not found
Checking gpm... not found
Checking grep... not infected
Checking hdparm... not infected
Checking su... not infected
Checking ifconfig... not infected
Checking inetd... not infected
Checking inetdconf... not infected
Checking identd... not found

76.3 Check Security with Chkrootkit

491

Checking init... not infected

Checking killall... not infected
Checking ldsopreload... not infected
Checking login... not infected
Checking ls... not infected
Checking lsof... not found
Checking mail... not infected
Checking mingetty... not found
Checking netstat... not infected
Checking named... not found
Checking passwd... not infected
Checking pidof... not infected
Checking pop2... not found
Checking pop3... not found
Checking ps... not infected
Checking pstree... not infected
Checking rpcinfo... not infected
Checking rlogind... not found
Checking rshd... not found
Checking slogin... not infected
Checking sendmail... not infected
Checking sshd... not infected
Checking syslogd... not infected
Checking tar... not infected
Checking tcpd... not infected
Checking tcpdump... not infected
Checking top... not infected
Checking telnetd... not found
Checking timed... not found
Checking traceroute... not found
Checking vdir... not infected
Checking w... not infected
Checking write... not infected
Checking aliens... no suspect files
Searching for sniffers logs, it may take a while... nothing found
Searching for HiDrootkits default dir... nothing found
Searching for t0rns default files and dirs... nothing found
Searching for t0rns v8 defaults... nothing found
Searching for Lion Worm default files and dirs... nothing found
Searching for RSHAs default files and dir... nothing found
Searching for RH-Sharpes default files... nothing found
Searching for Ambients rootkit (ark) default files and dirs... nothing found
Searching for suspicious files and dirs, it may take a while... nothing found

492

Security

Searching for LPD Worm files and dirs... nothing found

Searching for Ramen Worm files and dirs... nothing found
Searching for Maniac files and dirs... nothing found
Searching for RK17 files and dirs... nothing found
Searching for Ducoci rootkit... nothing found
Searching for Adore Worm... nothing found
Searching for ShitC Worm... nothing found
Searching for Omega Worm... nothing found
Searching for Sadmind/IIS Worm... nothing found
Searching for MonKit... nothing found
Searching for Showtee... nothing found
Searching for OpticKit... nothing found
Searching for T.R.K... nothing found
Searching for Mithra... nothing found
Searching for OBSD rk v1... nothing found
Searching for LOC rootkit ... nothing found
Searching for Romanian rootkit ... nothing found
Searching for Suckit rootkit ... nothing found
Searching for Volc rootkit ... nothing found
Searching for Gold2 rootkit ... nothing found
Searching for TC2 Worm default files and dirs... nothing found
Searching for Anonoying rootkit default files and dirs... nothing found
Searching for ZK rootkit default files and dirs... nothing found
Searching for ShKit rootkit default files and dirs... nothing found
Searching for anomalies in shell history files... nothing found
Checking asp... not infected
Checking bindshell... not infected
Checking lkm... You have
5 process hidden for ps command
Warning: Possible LKM Trojan installed
Checking rexedcs... not found
Checking sniffer... eth0 is not promisc
Checking w55808... not infected
Checking wted... nothing deleted
Checking scalper... not infected
Checking slapper... not infected
Checking z2... nothing deleted

Note that with current versions of ps and chkrootkit (as of 3 December 2003),
ps reports the PID of some kernel processes as 0 which chkrootkit does not
match to the process. Output from ps is:
USER

PID %CPU %MEM

VSZ

RSS TTY

STAT START

TIME COMMAND

76.3 Check Security with Chkrootkit

root
root
root
root
root
root
root
root

1
2
0
0
0
0
0
22

0.0
0.0
0.0
0.0
0.0
0.0
0.0
0.0

0.0
0.0
0.0
0.0
0.0
0.0
0.0
0.0

1484
0
0
0
0
0
0
0

493
488
0
0
0
0
0
0
0

?
?
?
?
?
?
?
?

S
SW
SWN
SWN
SW
SW
SW
SW

Dec02
Dec02
Dec02
Dec02
Dec02
Dec02
Dec02
Dec02

0:00
0:00
0:00
0:00
0:00
0:00
0:00
0:00

For LKM warnings you can get the process ID with:

# chkrootkit -x lkm
ROOTDIR is /
###
### Output of: ./chkproc -v -v
###
PID
3: not in ps output
CWD
3: /
EXE
3: /
PID
4: not in ps output
CWD
4: /
EXE
4: /
PID
5: not in ps output
CWD
5: /
EXE
5: /
PID
6: not in ps output
CWD
6: /
EXE
6: /
PID
7: not in ps output
CWD
7: /
EXE
7: /
You have
5 process hidden for ps command

The process information can be checked in /proc/<process id>/status:

> cat /proc/3/status
Name:
ksoftirqd_CPU0
State: S (sleeping)
Tgid:
0
Pid:
3
PPid:
1

init
keventd
ksoftirqd_CPU0
ksoftirqd_CPU1
kswapd
bdflush
kupdated
aacraid

494

Security

TracerPid:
0
Uid:
0
0
0
Gid:
0
0
0
FDSize: 32
Groups:
SigPnd: 0000000000000000
SigBlk: ffffffffffffffff
SigIgn: 0000000000000000
SigCgt: 0000000000000000
CapInh: 0000000000000000
CapPrm: 00000000ffffffff
CapEff: 00000000fffffeff

0
0

You can also look at the processes involved in the pstree:

> pstree -p |grep ([34567])
|-bdflush(6)
|-ksoftirqd_CPU0(3)
|-ksoftirqd_CPU1(4)
|-kswapd(5)
|-kupdated(7)

76.4

Identify Portscanners

There are some tools to check who is portscanning your machine and when.
A good tool seems to be ippl, the IP Protocols Logger, but others include
snort and portsentry.
In kernel 2.4 iptables has a mechanism for portscans where you can set it up
so that most portscans will take hours to return nothing.

76.5

Packages to Avoid

For security reasons the following should be avoided:

fingerd
ftp-server

76.5 Packages to Avoid

495

ftp: Users will try to ftp to remote hosts and log in using clear text
passwords. Run dsniff on the local machine as root to see that you can
easily capture their passwords!
ftpd
netkit-rpc
nfs-common
nfs-kernel-server
nfs-user-server
portmap
rsh-client: Users will try to rsh to remote hosts and log in using clear
text passwords. Run dsniff on the local machine as root to see that
you can easily capture their passwords! The ssh package will install a
replacement rsh.
rsh-server
rstart
rstartd
rusersd
rwalld
sendmail
talkd
telnet: Users will try to telnet to remote hosts and log in using clear
text passwords. Run dsniff on the local machine as root to see that you
can easily capture their passwords!
telnetd

496

76.6

Security

OpenPGP and Keys

Install the GNU Privacy Guard package in Debian as gnupg. This is the
GNU implementation of the OpenPGP.
To automatically check signatures from a keyserver add the name of a keyserver to /home/kayon/.gnupg/options file. For example:
keyserver wwwkeys.au.pgp.net

This replaces the command line option --keyserver wwwkeys.au.pgp.net.

To create a gpg key:
> gpg --gen-key
gpg (GnuPG) 1.2.3; Copyright (C) 2003 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
This program comes with ABSOLUTELY NO WARRANTY.
This is free software, and you are welcome to redistribute it
under certain conditions. See the file COPYING for details.
Please select what kind of key you want:
(1) DSA and ElGamal (default)
(2) DSA (sign only)
(5) RSA (sign only)
Your selection? 1
DSA keypair will have 1024 bits.
About to generate a new ELG-E keypair.
minimum keysize is 768 bits
default keysize is 1024 bits
highest suggested keysize is 2048 bits
What keysize do you want? (1024)
Requested keysize is 1024 bits
Please specify how long the key should be valid.
0 = key does not expire
<n> = key expires in n days
<n>w = key expires in n weeks
<n>m = key expires in n months
<n>y = key expires in n years

76.6 OpenPGP and Keys

497

Key is valid for? (0)

Key does not expire at all
Is this correct (y/n)? y
You need a User-ID to identify your key; the software constructs the user id
from Real Name, Comment and Email Address in this form:
"Heinrich Heine (Der Dichter) <[email protected]>"
Real name: Kayon Toga
Email address: [email protected]
Comment:
You selected this USER-ID:
"Kayon Toga <[email protected]>"
Change (N)ame, (C)omment, (E)mail or (O)kay/(Q)uit? o
You need a Passphrase to protect your secret key.
Enter passphrase: ***********
Repeat passphrase: **********
We need to generate a lot of random bytes. It is a good idea to perform
some other action (type on the keyboard, move the mouse, utilize the
disks) during the prime generation; this gives the random number
generator a better chance to gain enough entropy.
....++++++++++.+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++.+++++.++++++++++
..+++++++++++++++++++++++++.+++++++++++++++++++++++++.
++++++++++++++++++++>+++++.+++++..>+++++.....+++++
We need to generate a lot of random bytes. It is a good idea to perform
some other action (type on the keyboard, move the mouse, utilize the
disks) during the prime generation; this gives the random number
generator a better chance to gain enough entropy.
..++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++.+++++++++++++++++++++++++.+++++
.++++++++++..+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
public and secret key created and signed.
key marked as ultimately trusted.
pub

1024D/5A829E4A 2003-04-03 Kayon Toga <[email protected]>

Key fingerprint = B0C5 F86D 98A4 40A4 B900 B1FA D0C6 2DA0 34F4 9ADB

498
sub

Security
1024g/D7DE757D 2003-04-03

To get the hex ID of your public key:

> gpg --list-keys [email protected]
pub 1024D/5A829E4A 2003-04-03 Kayon Toga <[email protected]>
sub 1024g/D7DE757D 2003-04-03

The hex ID here is 5A829E4A. This is required to create key-cert objects.

To extract your public key block in ascii format to a file key.asc
> gpg --export -a -o key.asc [email protected]

This generates:
-----BEGIN PGP PUBLIC KEY BLOCK----Version: GnuPG v1.2.3 (GNU/Linux)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=nrTb
-----END PGP PUBLIC KEY BLOCK-----

76.7 Securing Your Network

499

To put your public key on to one of the public key servers (so others can
access it) you can do:
> gpg --send-key --keyserver pgp.earth.li 5A829E4A
gpg: success sending to pgp.earth.li (status=200)

You can check the key was received with:

> gpg --recv-key --keyserver pgp.earth.li 5A829E4A
gpg: key 5A829E4A: "Kayon Toga <[email protected]>" not changed
gpg: Total number processed: 1
gpg:
unchanged: 1

The key is also now at other servers without any extra effort:
> gpg --recv-key --keyserver wwwkeys.pgp.net 5A829E4A
gpg: key 5A829E4A: "Kayon Toga <[email protected]>" not changed
gpg: Total number processed: 1
gpg:
unchanged: 1

76.7

Securing Your Network

There is a lot to understand about networking in order to secure your network. Fortunately Debian GNU/Linux is generally by default quite secure.
That is, the default configuration of packages tend to be secure. You have
to take action to make them insecure. Nontheless, it is possible!
Here are some random jottings:
To start with, if someone has physical access to your hub-based network they
can plug in a machine and do many things.
With a passive ethernet frame sniffer an attacker can listen for ARP requests
on a network and guess at IP addresses that may not be in use within the
range of available adresses for the network and use this as its own address.
Even if your network has hosts using the whole range of addresses that are
available theres always the likelihood that one PC or Laptop is turned off
so that its IP address is free.

500

Security

If you use a switch-network and put MAC address filters on the switch an
attacker can simply unplug an existing PC or Laptop and take over its MAC
address.
Normally the MAC address is in the ethernet card. A typical situation is
to plug a Laptop into a network and perhaps bring up the interface using
DHCP to get an IP but may not be able to do much more.
In some situations the MAC address can be set in software. DECnet, for
example, depends on being able to do this. Older suns had the MAC in
battery-backedup ram and used the same address for all ethernet cards in the
system. When you change the 48 bit MAC address you are actually turning
it into a customised MAC address which will be 96 bits long consisting of
the original 48 bit MAC followed by the new 48 bits you set. To the outside
it appears as another MAC address.
You can change the MAC address with:
# ifconfig eth0 hw ether 00:50:56:01:00:00

Turning off DHCP will help protect against users that plug in a Laptop but
not the hackers youre trying to guard against.
FROM http://www.linuxlock.org/features/somjuly00.html
LinuxSecurity.Com wins Source of the Month for July, 2000
This months LinuxLock.Org Security Source of the Month goes to a group
of individuals dedicated to bringing security to the fore-front of the linux
community; this is the staff of LinuxSecurity.Com. Since we started following
the site in January 2000, it has evolved into one of the internets premiere
sources of Linux Security Information.
LinuxSecurity.Com contains a large newsfeed, of linux security news, articles,
and press releases, to keep us on top of the industry.
This month pushed them over the top, when they released The Linux Security Quick Reference Guide. This guide is a printable PDF document with
numerous security checks and tips, some of the sections include Linux Kernel
Security, File Permissions, Intrusions Detection, Linux Security Resources,
and more.
LinuxSecurity.Com has provided original features every month, covering things
such as, how to use certain security tools, and interviews with Security

76.8 Identifying Your System?

501

Gurus. This month LinuxSecurity Interviews Carr Biggerstaff, Senior Vice

President of Marketing, and Thomas Haigh, Vice President and Chief Technologist for Secure Computing, Inc. about their work with Linux and security.
LinuxSecurity.Com recieved a Slashdot post this month for an Interview they
conducted with Jay Beale, the Lead Developer of the Bastille Project. This
post on Slashdot is the kind of press Linux needs to be more aware of the
security issues surrounding us, and the solutions that exsist.
LinuxSecurity.Com also contains a rather complete and growing Resources
Section, a listing of local linux security providers, a newsletter, a mailing list,
and a weekly security digest.
They also feature a LinuxSecurity.Com Security Tip of the Day, that can be
found on other sites such as the highly travelled LinuxToday.Com
We all at LinuxLock.Org applaud the efforts of LinuxSecurity.Com and encourage you all to go and visit their site, and use the various features they
have to offer... Keep up the good work.

76.8

Identifying Your System?

Note that, for example, a HTTP server on port 80 identifying itself as:
> httptype ktware.com
Apache/1.3.29 (Debian GNU/Linux) PHP/4.3.3

or a SSH server on port 22 identifying itself as:

> telnet ktware.com 22
Trying 150.229.8.170...
Connected to ktware.com.
Escape character is ^].
SSH-1.99-OpenSSH_3.6.1p2 Debian 1:3.6.1p2-10

is not really a security risk. Serious attacks will attempt all know vulnerabilities of the port, irrespective of what is running behind the port. Thus
this is not regarded as sensitive information. On the other-hand, hiding the
banner loses a lot for inter-operation.

502

Security

Indeed, software should advertise its version number to aid debugging in all
kinds of circumstances. If theres a security flaw then the flaw should be
fixed instead of trying to hide it.

Chapter 77
Sketch
Sketch is an interactive vector drawing program. It is comparable to the
commercial CorelDraw. Sketch supports drawing primitives like rectangles,
ellipses, bezier curves, bitmap and Encapsulated PostScript images, and text.
Objects can be rotated, scaled, and sheared. Primitives can have fill and line
properties. A number of special effects like blend groups, text to bezier and
text along a path are provided. Sketch supports an unlimited undo history.
Import of xfig, ai, wmf, cmx and svg files. Exports to pdf, eps, ai and
svg. Sketch is written in Python with a Tkinter GUI. User scripts can be
written in Python.

503

504

Sketch

Figure 77.1: Sketch provides considerable functionality as an alternative to

dia. It does not use the GTK+ toolkit and so does not conform to the Gnome
look and feel.

Chapter 78
Sound Recording
Debian Pacakges: gnome-media sound-recorder gramofile audacity aumix aumixgtk rawrec
Recording from the sound card of your computer opens up the possibility of
recording from external sources including your old Long Playing turntable
turn that old collection of vinyl into a collection of audio CDs.
Recording to WAV format takes up quite a bit of spaceapproximately
10MB for each 1 minute of recording. Thats about 600MB for a very long
LP, which is about what you can fit onto a CD. Often though old LPs contain
just 30 to 40 minutes and so can be doubled up on to 74 or 80 minute CD-Rs.

78.1

Required Software

The Gnome sound recorder comes from the gnome-media package. A command line application sound-recorder provides an alternative method of recording sounds.
The rawrec package provides a useful command line recorder and might be
used to record to a 320kbps mp3 as in:

$ time rawrec -t 3600 | \

sox -t sw -r 44100 -c 2 - -t wav - | \
lame --alt-preset insane - recording.mp3

505

506

Sound Recording

The gramofile application is more useful for recording from vinyl LPs, for
example. It also supports track splitting and filtering to remove thr traditional vinyl pop. For editing the sound signal use the graphical audacity
application.

78.2

Hardware Connections

Connect the amplifiers line out to the line-in of the computer.

78.3

Mixer Settings

Sound recording applications rely on proper settings within the audio mixer.
With the mixer you can select the source for the recording (line-in or microphone) and the level of Gain for the recording. The mixer is also used to set
output volume levels.
There are multiple possible sources for recording, including Line-In and Microphone. If the source is an external multitrack mixer or HiFi then plug it
into the Line In and set Line as the Rec source. Note that both the line level
and IGain need to be set appropriately, perhaps after some experimentation.
Setting the gain too high results in clipping and setting it too low means
that noise in the source can overwhelm the signal.
There are various tools to set the levels of various channels. Gnome Audio
Mixer is available under ProgramsMultimedia, providing a graphical interface to mute/unmute channels and to select the channels for recording.
A command line alternative is the aumix command from the aumix package.
You can query the current setting of the line-in and input-gain with:
$ aumix -lq -iq
line 100, 100, R
igain 30, 30

Here the line-in is selected for recording with 100% level. The gain is set at
30%. These work for my sound card.
Alternatively you can get all the current settings with:

78.4 Using Gramofile

507

$ aumix -q
vol 62, 62, P
pcm 63, 63
speaker 79, 79
line 100, 100, R
mic 62, 62, P
cd 100, 100, P
igain 30, 30
line1 0, 0, P
line2 0, 0, P
phin 0, 0, P
phout 0, 0
video 3, 3, P

To set the line-in and gain to the above values and for recording from line-in:

$ aumix -l100 -i30 -lR

With aumix-gtk installed aumix will start up a graphical display that allows
setting the values interactively.

78.4

Using Gramofile

This is, currently, by far the simplest tool to record from gramophones, with
a usable but unsophisticated interface.
Consider a sample record: Kraftwerks Computer World, side 1. Line-in
is set to 100 and igain is 30. From gramofiles recording meters this setting
rarely (0.3%) exceeds 50% maximum volume level, which is perhaps too low?
Nonetheless the result sounds okay.
The automatic track finder only found 3 (instead of 4) tracks (but only when
the minimum gap is set to 5). Listening to the Track 3/4 changeover it is
clear whythere is no gap. However, the .tracks file that is written can
be edited by hand and then the audio processing can be deployed to split
the file into tracks. The filtering includes Conditional Median Filtering to
filter out ticks. Mostly works just fine and is the default, so use it. Loading
the resulting 4 tracks into xmms works just fine (the original WAV file has a

508

Sound Recording

header that says it is 100 minutes long but this can be fixed within gramofile
by choosing to process the audio signal and using the Copy Only filter).
To record the resulting files to an audio CD see Chapter 14.

78.5

Recommended Recording Process

1. Gramofile to record from the sound card through line in from the source
(e.g., LP record)
2. Gramofile to identify track beginnings and endings. These are saved to
a .tracks file automatically.
3. Audacity to confirm and fine tune the track splits stored in the .tracks
file.
4. Gramofile to perform the split into tracks and to filter out pops using
the Conditional Median Filter II. The tracks are saved into separate
files numbered 01, 02, etc.
5. Xmms to check the beginning and ending of each track to confirm the
splits were fine.
6. Audacity to edit out any remaining spikes in each track, being sure to
export back to WAV if any changes are made.
7. The tracks are now ready to burn to CD. Create a disk.toc:
CD_DA
TRACK AUDIO
FILE "side1001.wav" 0
TRACK AUDIO
FILE "side1002.wav" 0
...
TRACK AUDIO
FILE "side2005.wav" 0

Then
$ cdrdao write disk.toc

78.6 Recordings Using the Gnome Sound Recorder

509

A handy table of minutes to seconds:

1/60
6/360
11/660
16/960
21/1260
26/1560

78.6

2/120
7/420
12/720
17/1020
22/1320
27/1620

3/180
8/480
13/780
18/1080
23/1380
28/1680

4/240
9/540
14/840
19/1140
24/1440
29/1740

5/300
10/600
15/900
20/1200
25/1500
30/1800

Recordings Using the Gnome Sound Recorder

When recording using the Gnome Sound Recorder the first 10 seconds of the
recording are chopped off? Might be better to use sound-recorder.

78.7

Using Command Line Sound-Recorder

When recording from the command line the command is:

$ sound-recorder -c 2 -b 16 -P -S 5:00 recording.wav

The options set stereo recording (-c 2), 16 bit sampling (-b 16), priority threading (-P) to ensure high priority in CPU usage, and limiting the
recording to 5 minutes. The output is written to the file recording.wav.
Many of these options are the default so you can simply:
$ sound-recorder -P recording.wav

Use Ctrl-C to stop the recording.

78.8

Using Command Line Sox

$ sox -t ossdsp -w -s -r 44100 -c 2 /dev/dsp recording.wav

510

Sound Recording

Chapter 79
Spell
For the older standard ispell, to change the default dictionary use the updateispell-dictionary. You will be offered a choice if the appropriate packages
are installed. This is being replaced by aspell.
For the newer aspell you can choose your default dictionary by specifying it
in /etc/aspell.conf:
master british

511

512

Spell

Chapter 80
SPlus: Statistical Software
SPlus is commercial software, popular with statisticians and commercial data
analysts. Install on Debian:
# adduser splus
# su - splus
$ cd
$ umask 022
$ tar zxvf splus.tz
$ ./HOSTINFO
Email the code and your SPlus serial number and server name to SPlus
By return mail you will get a license key
$ ./CONFIGURE
Select 4:
Destinations and Name of Splus Script
Select 2:
Name of Splus shell script
"Splus"
Change to "splus" to make life easier for everyone
The script to start Splus will be installed in /usr/local
$ ./INSTALL
Enter the key when prompted
Then fails with:
cp: cannot create regular file /usr/local/bin/splus:
Permission denied
So:
$ su
# ./INSTALL
y to CONFIGURE
# chmod go+rx /usr/local/bin/splus
Should now be installed!

513

514

SPlus: Statistical Software

Chapter 81
Spruce: Email
This is not Gnome, but it is GTK+ and supports multiple POP accounts.

Figure 81.1: The basic interface offered by Spruce

515

516

Spruce: Email

Chapter 82
SSH: Secure Communications
The Secure Shell (provided by the ssh package) provides a secure mechanism
for communicating with remote hosts on a network. Unlike traditional tools
such as rsh, rcp, rlogin, telnet, and ftp, ssh encrypts all communications,
including passwords, reducing the opportunity for inappropriate interception.
It can also be used to encrypt your pop (email) communications and protect
you from DNS and IP spoofing where remote machines pretend to be genuine
machines that you are wanting to connect to. Implementations of ssh exist
for most of the major operating systems.

82.1

Versions of SSH

A Finnish company developed the original ssh but copyright and patent issues
lead to the development of the free OpenSSH.
There are two major (and slightly incompatible) versions of ssh: 1.X and 2.X.
From a 2.X client you will not be able to connect to a 1.X server. Connecting
to an OpenSSH 2.X server from any version of the client is supported though.

82.2

Installation

Debian provides the OpenBSD version of ssh by default. Because of the

US export laws which prohibit the export of cryptography software, being
classified as munitions, the ssh package cannot be part of the main Debian
517

518

SSH: Secure Communications

distribution. You will need to have a non-US distribution in your /etc/apt/

sources.list file, such as one of the following:
deb http://non-us.debian.org/ unstable/non-US main contrib non-free
deb http://ftp.au.debian.org/debian-non-US unstable/non-US main contrib non-free

Having made this addition you can update the information about available
packages and then retrieve, unpack, and configure the package with:
# wajig update
# wajig install ssh

(apt-get update)
(apt-get install ssh)

During the install you may be asked about installing ssh as setuid root. The
suggestion from the configuration script is that you do not install as setuid
root and if you have problems, then run dpk-reconfigure ssh to reconfigure
the package.

82.3

Remote Host Authentication

When you use ssh to connect to a remote host for the first time you will be
confronted with a message like:
The authenticity of host rosz (192.168.1.2) cant be established.
RSA key fingerprint is 99:1f:eb:c2:8f:cb7:33:23:1f:4c:e5:51:20:e9:85:5a.
Are you sure you want to continue connecting (yes/no)?

SSH does not know this host. Type yes to add the fingerprint of this host
to ~/.ssh/known_hosts. Next time you connect to this remote host you
should not get this message.

82.4

Simple Usage

Ssh is a client-server program where your client (on your local host) connects
to a remote ssh server (running on the remote host), requiring that ssh be
installed on both hosts. (Many systems now run ssh.) You need to know the

82.5 Public and Private Keys

519

password of the account you wish to connect to on the remote host. Once
connected all communications between the two hosts is securely encrypted.
Connect to a remote host simply by issuing the appropriate ssh command.
To connect as user kayon to a remote host altrop.ktware.com or to copy files
from your local host to kayons account at the remote host you can simply:
$ ssh [email protected]
$ scp file.name [email protected]:remote.file.name

82.5

Public and Private Keys

Through devious means a Trojan remote host might be pretending to be

the remote host you are attempting to connect to (using IP spoofing, DNS
spoofing or routing spoofing) and thus might intercept your communications
and obtain your password. A more secure approach using ssh employs a
public-key mechanism. Here, you create your own key (essentially just a
sequence of bits) that consists of a public part and a private part. You copy
the public key on to your account on the remote host and the private part
never leaves your local host. The remote host can use the public key to
encrypt a message such that only with your private key can you decrypt the
message.
You can generate a private/public key pair with the ssh-keygen command,
storing the private key in /home/kayon/.ssh/identity and the public key
in /home/kayon/.ssh/identity. A passphrase will be asked for to encrypt
your private key within your file system (otherwise the root user, for example,
could obtain your private key). Your passphrase will be used to unlock
your private key whenever you need to use it. The public key needs to be
communicated to your remote host. The steps are simple:
>
>
>
>

ssh-keygen -t dsa
cd .ssh
scp id_dsa.pub [email protected]:.ssh/id_dsa.pub.modern
ssh altrop

> cd .ssh
> cat id_dsa.pub.modern >> authorized_keys
> exit

520

SSH: Secure Communications

The remote host may already have an authorised keys file in /home/kayon/
.ssh/authorized_keys. Dont copy over it, but append the contents of your
local /home/kayon/.ssh/identity.pub to it. Multiple keys can appear in
the one file.
Now, when you connect to the remote host using ssh your public key on
that host will be used to send an encrypted message (a random number in
fact) back to your local host. The local host decrypts the message using the
private key stored only on the local host and decrypted using the passphrase.
The decrypted message is returned to the remote host for verification.
This method, using public keys, does not send passwords (or passphrases)
over the network. A passphrase is used on the local host only to unlock the
local private key.

82.6

SSH Agents

Entering the passphrase every time you want to do a remote copy or make
a remote connection can be tiring. There is a simple mechanism provided to
avoid this. All you need do is to start up a shell or other similar command
that already knows what your passphrase is (by you telling it just once).
This is done with ssh-agent to start the shell and ssh-add to store the
passphrase for this shell:

> ssh-agent bash

> ssh-add
(or ssh-add .ssh/id_dsa)
Need passphrase for .ssh/id_dsa
Enter passphrase for .ssh/id_dsa
Identity added: .ssh/id_dsa (.ssh/id_dsa)
> ssh altrop

The ssh-add will prompt you for your passphrase but from then on all further
interaction with the remote host will not require the passphrase again.
The -l option of ssh-add lists the key(s) currently kept in memory for this
ssh-agent. The -d option removes an identity from memory.

82.7 DSA Key Generation

82.7

521

DSA Key Generation

Version 2 of ssh provides alternative encryption methods with DSA encryption instead of the RSA keys for Version 1. There is debate as to which
is more secure. Version 2 encrypts more of the data but always uses the
same Diffie-Hellman group (perhaps being more likely then that it has been
cracked).
inx$ ssh-keygen -t dsa
Generating public/private dsa key pair.
Enter file in which to save the key (/home/kayon/.ssh/id_dsa):
Enter passphrase (empty for no passphrase):
Enter same passphrase again:
Your identification has been saved in /home/kayon/.ssh/id_dsa.
Your public key has been saved in /home/kayon/.ssh/id_dsa.pub.
The key fingerprint is:
cc:50:d4:85:86:56:b8:8a:77:57:61:51:63:89:46:09 kayon@inx
$ scp .ssh/id_dsa.pub altrop:.ssh/authorized_keys2.inx
$
$
$
$

ssh altrop
cd .ssh
cat authorized_keys2.inx >> authorized_keys2
exit

Be sure the protections on the files do not permit others to access them. In
particular, ssh wont work if the /home/kayon/.ssh/authorized_keys is
writable by anyone other than the user.

82.8

Changing Your Passphrase

The passphrase to unlock your private key can be changed at any time with:
$ ssh-keygen -t dsa -p

This does not change your private or public key at all so no further action is
required in terms of distributing your public key.

522

82.9

SSH: Secure Communications

SSH and Rsync

Rsync is used to efficiently copy files across the network. It can use ssh to
perform its tasks by setting the appropriate environment variable:
export RSYNC_RSH=ssh

82.10

SSH and the X Window System

The default Xsession on Debian is run with ssh-agent so that ssh connections
can be initiated more easily (after you have performed an ssh-add). This is
controlled by the file /etc/X11/Xsession.options:
use-ssh-agent

You can have your ssh passphrase asked for each time you log on. Using
gdm and the Debian Session (rather than the Gnome Session) will load the
/home/kayon/.xsession file which can contain:
#!/bin/sh
ssh-add .ssh/id_dsa < /dev/null
exec gnome-session

If you have ssh-askpass and ssh-askpass-gnome installed you will be

prompted for your passphrase. All connections to hosts which have the public
key will now be direct (no password or passphrase required).
By default the ForwardX11 option for ssh is turned off. Thus, when you
connect to remote hosts you wont be able to display X Window System
applications on your screen. You can turn it on per connection with:
$ ssh -X plymz

Or else you can turn it on for all connections to a particular host by adding
the following line to /home/kayon/.ssh/config:

82.11 SSH Tunnelling

523

Host plymz
ForwardX11 yes

Or even more generally allow X Window System forwarding through all connections:
Host *
ForwardX11 yes

82.11

SSH Tunnelling

Tunnelling allows connections to be made to remote services through an

encrypted connection. This is useful if there is a firewall preventing your
access to a server from one machine, but you do have access to the server
from another machine to which you can use ssh to connect.
Ssh uses port forwarding to establish a connection between a local port and
the port which runs the service to be tunnelled on the remote machine (which
might be POP or FTP or HTTPS, for example). Once port forwarding is
set up you connect to the local port which then forwards the connection
through ssh to the remote port. That is, all requests sent to the local port
are forwarded to the remote port and thus encrypted, and from the remote
port it appears you are actually on that remote host.
Tunnelling requires the remote host to be running an ssh server, which can
be checked using telnet to connect to port 22:
$ telnet lynx.ktware.com 22

You will either receive a message stating the version of the remote ssh server
or an error message similar to:
telnet: Unable to connect to remote host: Connection refused

The ssh syntax for port forwarding is:

$ ssh -f [kayon@altrop]
-L [local port]:[altrop]:[remote port] [command]

524

SSH: Secure Communications

A useful example is tunnelling of POP as described in Section 27.2.1. We

list a number of actual examples here:
Suppose you want to access your secure https server from outside the secure
network. The https server uses port 443. suppose you have ssh access to
host lynx. Establish the tunnel with:
$ ssh -2 -n -N -f -a -C -L 5443:admin.hq.ktware.com:443 lynx sleep 1000d

Then you can access this firewall protected HTTPS server locally through
https://localhost:5443/.
Heres an example using POP:
$ ssh -2 -n -N -f -a -L 5143:mail-bt:143 lynx sleep 1000d

Then you can access the POP server on your local machine.

82.12

SSH Access Denied

If you are having problems look in /var/log/auth.log for details.

82.13

SSH Terminal in a Browser

MindTerm is invoked with something like https://altrop.ktware.com/ssh.After

wajig install mindterm be sure to
# cd /var/www
# ln -s /usr/share/mindterm/ ssh

which makes it immediately available (assuming you are running a http server
such as apache).
This supports both the external ssh pop up window and the internal (to
the browser) ssh window. No problems with terminal types here. Although
the default internal terminal is a bit too narrow for my liking. I extend it

82.14 SSH Version 1

525

to 80 chars by editting /usr/share/doc/mindterm/index.html, and setting

width=850 in the applet element. Note that you can also change the font if
you wish:
<applet archive="mindterm.jar"
code=mindbright.application.MindTerm.class
width=850 height=400>
<param name=fn value="blah">
</applet>

82.14

SSH Version 1

To turn version 1 support on in Debian, edit /etc/ssh/sshd config to change

Protocol 2 to Protocol 2,1 and add the line:
HostKey /etc/ssh/ssh_host_key

Then generate the host key with:

# ssh-keygen -f /etc/ssh/ssh_host_key --N t rsa1

526

SSH: Secure Communications

Chapter 83
SUDO: Root Access
The sudo package allows a normal user to execute commands as root in a
controlled manner.
Debians sudo package has the password timeout set to 15 minutes. This
means that when you first enter your password, as long as you dont wait
more than 15 minutes between sudo commands, you wont have to enter it
again. The password timeout can be immediately expired with sudo -k.
Debians sudo is compiled with
--with-exempt=sudo
--with-secure-path="/usr/local/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/sbin:...

As a consequence, the PATH of the user is ignored except if the user is in

group sudo.
Adding users to the group sudo allows those users to execute sudo without
a password but this is strongly discouraged.
Sudo allows a fairly fine grain of control. Note that inclusions (lists of specific
commands/paths allowed, rather than rejected) is preferable. But be careful
granting root access to commands with shell escapes.

527

528

SUDO: Root Access

Chapter 84
Swap
If running out of swap you can add 257MB more. First have a look at what
you have available:
# free
total
Mem:
256216
-/+ buffers/cache:
Swap:
224900

used
252208
148268
51268

free
4008
107948
173632

shared
118100

buffers
56996

Next create a file without holes and a multiple of 4K in size:

# dd if=/dev/zero of=/extra-swap bs=1024 count=262144
262144+0 records in
262144+0 records out

Now mark it as a swap file by writing a signature to its beginning which

contains some administrative information and is used by the kernel:
# mkswap /extra-swap
Setting up swapspace version 1, size = 268431360 bytes

Now tell the kernel about the new swap file:

# swapon /extra-swap

529

cached
46944

530

Swap

Now check it is there!

# free
total
Mem:
256216
-/+ buffers/cache:
Swap:
487036

used
252448
148508
51268

free
3768
107708
435768

shared
118100

buffers
56996

To remove the swap file from usage:

# swapoff /extra-swap

You can add to /etc/fstab:

/extra-swap

none

swap

sw

Then on boot when swapon -a is run the new swap will be added to swap
space.

cached
46944

Chapter 85
Themes
These have become quite popular in GNU/Linux resulting in the http://
themes.freshmeat.net web site as a central repository.

85.1

Enlightenment

Head over to e.themes.org, and find the themes you like. Download them,
and put them in ~/.enlightenment/themes. Then, restart Enlightenment
(use the left-click menu). Now, you can choose your new themes from the
middle-click menu. Its really pretty simple... I wouldnt worry about aptgetting that sort of thing (if you even can). There is supposed to be a tool
that will automatically update your themes, but last time I checked, it was
in the alpha stages. Cant recall what it was called, sorry...

531

532

Themes

Chapter 86
USB
Debian Pacakges: hotplug, usbview, usbutils.
The USB port is well supported in Debian. USB allows plug-n-play functionality of many devices. Installing hotplug (or the older usbmgr) will install
a daemon that monitors the USB ports and install the appropriate modules when devices are plugged in, while also noting when they are removed.
The usbview command will display the tree of USB devices connected in a
window, while the lsusb command lists in a terminal the usb devices. The
usbmodules command will list the drivers that might be able to manage
interfaces on currently plugged in USB devices.
For USB devices simply connect them to the USB socket and hotplug will
notice the new device and load the appropriate modules. (The alternative
usbmgr daemon will beep twice as it notices new devices.) The lsusb command will show that the device is recognised. What happens next depends
on the type of the device.
Further information about USB under GNU/Linux is available from http:
//www.linux-usb.org/. In particular, see http://www.linux-usb.org/
USB-guide/book1.html.
Generally, newer kernels are required. For example, with kernel-image-2.4.16686 a USB 20GB Hard Disk and USB DVD Burner worked but a USB Printer
did not. With kernel-image-2.4.20-686 they all worked.
533

534

86.1

USB

Mass Storage Devices

The standard Mass Storage Device protocol is used for USB devices such
as hard disk drives, flash memory drives, memory card readers, and digital
cameras. Such devices have a standard VFAT (MSWindows) file system.
The USB mass storage device is treated as a SCSI device so simply mount
the SCSI device:
# mount -t auto /dev/sda1 /mnt

You should now be able to see and use the device as any other disk. If you
already have a SCSI device then the USB device might be /dev/sdb1!
The kernel module usb-storage drives USB mass storage devices and should
be automatically loaded by hotplug. The kernel module vfat is also required,
and if it does not autoload then you will need to:
# modprobe vfat

You can run dmesg to check that the USB device has been found.
A sample setup of four USB devices includes a USB mouse, HP Printer/Scanner/Copier
with a card reader, a digital camera, and a flash memory drive (3System USB
flash disk). The /etc/fstab includes:
/dev/sda1
/dev/sdb1
/dev/sdc1

/hpcard auto
/camera auto
/flash auto

rw,user,noauto 0 0
rw,user,noauto 0 0
defaults,user,noauto 0 0

Then any user can mount, for example, /hpcard, when a memory card has
been inserted into the card reader. A problem is that unless the camera is
connected before the flash drive after a reboot, the mappings end up being
reversed!
The devices look like any other hard drive device so you can run fdisk on it
and reorganise partitions:
# fdisk /dev/sda

86.2 Mass Storage Devices (DVD Writer)

535

You can also format the partition(s) on the device, usually with a DOS/FAT
filesystem:
> mkfs -t vfat /dev/sda1

86.1.1

HP Photosmart 320

This camera has a USB connector and can be configured to be recognised

as a mass storage device, as an alternative to using the Picture Transfer
Protocol standard). Using it as a mass storage device is simple and after
setting up the USB packages it all worked flawlessly. Create a mount point
for the camera:
# mkdir /camera

The camera acts just like a mass storage device! Photos can be copied or cut
from the appropriate folder and saved to your hard disk.

86.2

Mass Storage Devices (DVD Writer)

Connect a Sony DRX-500ULX, DVD+/-RW+/-R to Debin GNU/Linux using USB. Plugging it in results in a coule of beeps as usbmgr recognises it.
You can also run usbview or lsusb to check that it is properly recognised.
The device will be treated as a SCSI CD so you should be able to mount it
as:
# mount -t iso9660 /dev/scd1 /mnt

Create a specific mount point for it, such as /dvdrw:

# mkdir /dvdrw

Add an appropriate line to your /etc/fstab:

/dev/scd1

/dvdrw

auto

defaults,user,noauto 0 0

536

USB

With cdrdao and cdrecord the CD write functionality works just fine:
# cdrdao disk-info --device 4,0,0 --driver generic-mmc

For a DVD first create an image to burn on to the DVD.

# mkisofs -R -o cdimage.raw dvd/

Now install dvdrecord to write to a DVD-RW with:

# dvdrecord -v speed=2 dev=4,0,0 cdimage.raw

Note that dvdrecord does not appear to be actively maintained. Also, this
dvdrecord command will fail for a DVD+RW (it only works for DVDRW presently), so use the dvd+rw-tools instead. This package is actively
maintained and also supports DVD-R(W). Format the DVD+RW with:
# dvd+rw-format /dev/scd1

Now growisofs is meant to work but failed with this particular drive with a
message indicating that the drive does not support TAO (Track At Once)
mode.
# growisofs /dev/scd1 -R -J dvd/

So instead use the pre-mastered CD image to burn the DVD+RW:

# growisofs -Z /dev/scd1=cdimage.raw

So, to recap, to burn a DVD+RW:

# mkisofs -R -o cdimage.raw dvd/
# dvd+rw-format /dev/scd1
# growisofs -Z /dev/scd1=cdimage.raw

86.3 USB Printer: HP LaserJet 1200

86.3

537

USB Printer: HP LaserJet 1200

The Hewlett-Packard LaserJet 1200 is a PostScript laser printer installed on

Bartok (Section 4.10.1). Plug into USB. Create appropriate devices (if they
dont already exist - also be sure to be using perhaps kernel 2.4.20 or later)
and try printing:
# cd /dev
# MAKEDEV usb
# enscript -o - ~/.profile > /dev/usb/lp0

Worked just fine. Now set up printing as in another chapter.

86.4

USB Printer: HP PSC2210

The HP PSC2210 is a printer, scanner, copier, and fax installed on Mint

(Section 4.10.27). Connect with USB. Create the appropriate USB devices
if they do not already exist:
# cd /dev
# MAKEDEV usb

Install the packages for the printer: hpoj hpijs hp-ppd sane xsane mtools
hpoj-xojpanel. Install packages for printer queueing: cupsys cupsys-bsd
cupsys-client. Perhaps also foomatic-bin. Make sure the module printer
is loaded:
# lsmod | grep printer
# modprobe printer

If the printer module does not get loaded at boot time then add it to
/etc/modules.

538

USB

Chapter 87
Video
This chapter reviews software for viewing and modifying Video, and the set
up of software for particular video chip sets.

87.1

Viewing Video

Debian Pacakges: lumiere w32codecs.

All forms of video viewing is supported by Linux. You can view AVI, DVD,
SVCD, and many more codecs (video encodings). Install lumiere and you can
view the videos within nautilus. The w32codecs allow viewing of many MS
Windows video codecs.
Some packages expect the DVD device to be called /dev/dvd. If it does not
exist, and your DVD device is /dev/hdc, for example, then simply:
# ln -s /dev/hdc /dev/dvd

87.2

DVD Videos

There at least five video players available for Debian: totem, xine-ui, mplayer,
ogle, and vlc.
There are considerable uncertainties in the legal situation with respect to the
position of the US movie studios. Certainly illegal copying of DVDs is to be
539

540

Video

avoided, but unfortunately the CSS copy protection scheme (used on DVDs)
has become a view restriction scheme, thereby, according to many, restricting
freedom of speech. Thus the required library to read many commercial DVDs
needs to be obtained separately.
# sh /usr/share/doc/libdvdread2/examples/install-css.sh

Also, to allow users access be sure they are in group cdrom.

87.2.1

Xine

Debian Packages: xine-ui, xine-dvdnav, libdvdread2.

A highly recommended multi-media viewer is xine-ui, an MPEG2/MPEG1
audio/video player with a skinned graphical user interface.
Keyboard shortcuts for various functions include:
gui
aspect
chapt
volume

87.2.2

g
a
PgUp PgDn
v V

pause
p
subtitles . ,
chapt %
0-9
enlarge <> M-1,2,3

full screen
audio channel
audio sync
1:1 aspect

f
+ <- -> Home
s

Ogle

Debian Packages: ogle.

The ogle DVD player supports DVD menus and navigation. Install ogle-gui
for a useful graphical user interface.

87.2.3

DVD Sound Track

You can extract sound from a DVD, one track at a time or a chapter at a
time. Some simple command line examples should suffice to demonstrate
how this is done.
First off place the DVD into the DVD drive! This should probably be identified as /dev/dvd. Have a look at its table of contents with the lsdvd
command:

87.2 DVD Videos

> lsdvd
libdvdread: Using libdvdcss
Title: 01, Length: 02:32:44
Title: 02, Length: 00:17:36
Title: 03, Length: 00:00:11
Longest track: 1

541

version 1.2.5
Chapters: 26,
Chapters: 02,
Chapters: 02,

for DVD access

Cells: 27, Audio streams: 02, Subpictures: 01
Cells: 02, Audio streams: 01, Subpictures: 00
Cells: 02, Audio streams: 01, Subpictures: 00

This DVD has three titles, the first one (Title 01) probably contains the main
material, as it is identified as being the longest track. It also has two audio
streams.
To capture the audio from the tenth chapter of the first title, saving it as
OGG format, the command line is simply:
transcode -i /dev/dvd -x dvd -T 1,10,1 -a 0 -y ogg -m track10.ogg

The arguments identify the input as /dev/dvd (-i), the type of input as
DVD (-x), the title, chapter, and angle to encode, in this case being title
1, chapter 10, and camera angle 1 (-T), the audio track is track 0 (-a), the
output format is OGG (-y, and the output filename is track10.ogg (-m).
To extract multiple chapters from a title you can do the following composite
command:
for i in 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9; do
echo transcode -i /dev/dvd -x dvd -T 1,$i,1 -a 0 -y ogg -m track0$i.ogg;
done

Another example generates MP3 output of chapter 20 from title 1:

transcode -i /dev/dvd -x dvd -T 1,20,1 -a 0 -y raw -m track20.mp3

To extract the whole audio track of a title (all chapters) as OGG audio:
transcode -i /dev/dvd -x dvd -T 1,-1 -a 0 -y ogg -m audiotrack.ogg

If you prefer WAV files, the following will do it:

> transcode -i /dev/dvd -x dvd -T 1,20 -a 0 -y wav -m track20.wav

542

87.3

Video

Video Backups

Debian Packages: video-dvdrip transcode cvdimager mplayer-686 subtitleripper

mencoder-686
You will need the following Debian archive available:

deb http://marillat.free.fr/ unstable main

87.3.1

Using The dvdrip GUI

The video-dvdrip packages provides tools for working with DVD videos. With
this tool you can make backup copies (in numerous compressed video formats) for personal use of videos that you own. Or you could copy the video
onto your hard disk for archiving and watching directly. Youll need lots of
disk space (a movie DVD contains up to 9GB and converting needs further
disk space).
In fact dvdrip is only a GUI to numerous command line tools including
transcode which does the bulk of the work.
The dvdrip command provides an intuitive interface and reminder of all the
vast array of options available. Generally, load your DVD, go to the RIP
Title table and obtain the table of contents. The largest one is usually the
movie! If you are space restricted (less than 10GB say) you may like to do
one or more chapters at a time. You can then begin the rip to produce a
.vob file.
You have many choices for the format you would like to convert to.
Here is an example of taking a single chapter (happens to be chapter 19 of
title 1 of one of my DVDs) and encoding in several formats (where there is
a choice, they are 2620 kbit/s, but VCD is only 1152):

87.3 Video Backups

Type
VOB
SVCD
VCD
divx4
divx5
xvid
xvidcvs
ffmpeg
fame
af6

543

Ext Time
.vob
2m
.mpg
23m
.mpg
16m

Size Comments
239MB Audio somewhat poor.
99MB Very blocky.
51MB No choice of kbit/s.

.avi
.avi
.avi

94MB
103MB
103MB

10m
10m
10m

But to determine the best procedure, format and parameters for grabbing a
DVD into a compressed form suitable for hard disk storage is not a trivial
exercise. For example, deinterlacing may be required, but it is (almost) only
needed for material which was shot using a video camera, or transmitted for
TV.

87.3.2

Command Line Tools

Debian Pacakges: mpegtools cpdvd cpvts.

Obtain some information about the contents of title 1 of a DVD:
> tcprobe -i /dev/dvd -T 1

Heres a recipe for generating an SVCD backup copy of your own DVD DVDs are expensive and a backup can save the heartache of a bad scratch.
The first step is to copy the video data from the DVD. You can use either
cpdvd:
> mkdir xyz
> cd xyz
> cpdvd .

or dvdbackup:
> dvdbackup -F -i/dev/dvd -o.

544

Video

Then generate the SVCD:

>
>
>
>
>
>
>

ripmake ../xyz svcd

make -f xyz-svcd.mak
xine xyz-svcd-SAMPLE.mpg
make -f xyz-svcd.mak rip
cdrdao write --speed 16 xyz-svcd-CD1.cue
cdrdao write --speed 16 xyz-svcd-CD2.cue
...

(-s 650 to set CD-R size)

(generates a sample)
(view the sample)
(generates disks)
(burn a CD-R)

Set the target for ripmake to be avi (generally thought to be a better format
and okay if you only view on computer, but there arent many, if any, DVD
players that can play an AVI file, although for backup you could regenerate
the DVD and thus if you lose or damage your original at least there is some
hope):
>
>
>
>
>
>

mkdir xyz
cd xyz
cpdvd .
ripmake [-s 650] ../xyz avi
make -f xyz-avi.mak
make -f xyz-avi.mak rip

(-s to set CD-R size)

(generates a sample)
(generates avi collection)

To convert an AVI to an SVCD:

>
>
>
>

ripmake xyz.avi svcd

make -f xyz-svcd.mak
xine xyz-svcd-SAMPLE.mpg
make -f xyz-svcd.mak rip

To merge multiple AVI files into one big AVI file:

> avimerge -i a1.avi a2.avi a3.avi -o a.avi

To split an AVI file up into smaller chunks (a-0000, a-0001, etc):

> avisplit -i a.avi -s 700

To extract a particular section of the AVI file:

87.4 DVD-AUDIO

545

> avisplit -i a.avi -t 0:7:20.0-0:8:20.0

To adjust the synchronisation of the adio, where the video appears to lag
behind the audio:

> avisync -i a.avi -o a-sync.avi -n -5

Note that the size of a CD is usually quoted as the size of a CD in data

mode (whitch uses 2048 bytes/sector). When mastering a VCD/SVCD we
are usually talking in terms of raw mode (2324 bytes/sector). Note that
ripmake uses the common data mode size and internally converts to raw
mode so that 700MB is usually the correct size for a 800MB VCD/SVCD (in
raw mode).

87.4

DVD-AUDIO

87.5

Video from Photos

Use mencoder-686. Convert all images to the same size first. (Whats the
best size? Should I crop or rescale?)

> for i in *.jpg; do convert -resize 800x600! $i $i; done

> mencoder \*.jpg -mf on:fps=0.25 -o output.avi -ovc lavc
> mplayer output.avi

Then transcode to SVCD and burn to CD. So far I do the following. But
this gives 1 frame per second. Cant seem to slow it down?

>
>
>
>
>
>

transcode -a 0 -i output.avi -f 1 -y mpeg2enc,mp2enc -o output

mplayer output.m1v
mplex -f 4 -V -o output.mpg output.m1v
mplayer output.mpg
vcdimager --type=svcd output.mpg
cdrdao write videocd.cue

546

Video

87.6

nVidia Video Driver

nVidia does not supply Open Source drivers for GNU/Linux. Thus some
extra work is required to get nVidia graphics chips working. Bartok (Section 4.10.1) has an nVidia Riva Ultra 64 graphics chip. The appropriate
driver was installed and configured.
> wajig install nvidia-kernel-2.4.25-1-686-smp nvidia-glx

Then edit Path[]/etc/X11/XF86Config-4 to remove the two lines:

Load
Load

"GLcore"
"dri"

and to replace:
Driver

"nv"

Driver

"nvidia"

with

The nVidia splash screen should then be displayed when X is started.

87.6.1

Compiling the Driver

If the package for your kernel is not available yo ucan compile your own.
The process of installing the video drivers for GEForce 256 (Velox (Section 4.10.26)) and TNT2 (Mint (Section 4.10.27)) is straightforward. Note
that this is no longer required for standard Debian kernels which supply the
nvidia-kernel-2.4.25-1-686-smp and nvidia-glx packages. See section 87.6 for
details.
Install the appropriate Debian packages (with the kernel-headers package
that matches your installed kernel):
$ wajig install nvidia-kernel-src nvidia-glx-src
$ wajig install kernel-headers-2.4.20-686

87.6 nVidia Video Driver

547

Then, assuming youve installed a standard Debian kernel (e.g., kernel-image2.4.20-686) go to the kernel source directory and unpack the downloaded
archives:
# cd /usr/src
# tar zxvf nvidia-kernel-src.tar.gz

Debian packages are now generated from these sources with the following
steps. First build the nvidia kernel package. As part of this step the file
NVIDIA kernel-1.0-4349.tar.gz (about 700K) will be downloaded from the
nVidia archive:
#
#
#
#
#
#

export KSRC=/usr/src/kernel-headers-2.4.20-686
export KVERS=2.4.20-686
cd modules/nvidia-kernel-1.0.4349
CC=gcc-2.95 debian/rules binary_modules
cd ../..
wajig install nvidia-kernel-2.4.20-686_1.0.4349-1+_i386.deb

Next build and install the nVidia GLX package. Again, during this step the
file NVIDIA GLX-1.0-4349.tar.gz (about 4.2M) will be retrieved from the
nNidia archive:
#
#
#
#

cd nvidia-glx-1.0.4349
dpkg-buildpackage -us -uc
cd ..
wajig install nvidia-glx_1.0.4349-1_i386.deb

If not already modified, edit /etc/X11/XF86Config-4 to replace

Driver

"nv"

with
Driver

"nvidia"

Remove from the Modules section the:

548
Load
Load

Video
"GLcore"
"dri"

Make sure to load the new nVidia module:

modprobe NVdriver

To have this loaded at boot time add the following line to /etc/modules:
NVdriver

You can check that it all works by loading some of the GL graphics from
xscreensaver. Or run them directly, e.g., gears or evas-demo.
On Mint (Section 4.10.27) with version 0.9.769 of the nVidia driver there were
problems with system freezes. It generally happened in the xscreensaver
preferences when trying some of the GL savers (in full screen mode). In
window mode outside of xscreensaver they work just fine. Also freezes were
occurring when switching between multiple X Window Sessions (C-A-F7 and
C-A-F8, for example). The screen would go black. The problem appears to
have gone away with version 1.0.2314 of the nVidia driver.
On Velox (Section 4.10.26) with version 0.9.769 of the nVidia driver running
the evas test demo command crashed the xserver on exit from evas-demo!

Chapter 88
Web: Serving, Accessing, and
Mirroring
88.1

Browsing the Web

The Gnome web browser is epiphany. Galeon is an alternative with more

features. Both are based on mozilla to render the web pages.

88.1.1

Epiphany

88.1.2

Galeon

Galeon is the Gnome web browser using Mozilla as the rendering engine.
For information on adding plugins for Galeon see Section 88.1.4.

88.1.3

Mozilla

Mozilla is the new version of Netscape! It is essentially a rewrite of Netscape

as an open source project. The latest version is not available directly from
Debian (only an older M18 release is currently available under unstable15
May 2001) but is supplied by a Debian developer. Add the following to your
/etc/apt/sources.list:
549

550

Web: Serving, Accessing, and Mirroring

Figure 88.1: Galeon.

deb http://pandora.debian.org/~kitame/mozilla ./

Mozilla is becoming pretty stable and works as the rendering engine for
galeon and epiphany.

88.1.4

Plugins

For Java plugins see Section 46.3.

For a viewer of various video formats install mplayerplug-in and mplayer-686.
The mozplugger package provides a variety of other plugins.

88.2

Web Server

Installing a web server under Debian is as simple as installing apache:

88.2 Web Server

551

Figure 88.2: Galeon.

# wajig install apache

You will now have a default web page at http://localhost/. The actual
page being displayed there comes from /var/www/index.html. You can
begin creating your own web site from there.
For a secure web server, using SSL to encrypt all communications from a
browser to the server (recognised with the https: prefix), there are at least two
options in Debian. One is to use apache with the libapache-mod-ssl module
and the other is to install the apache-ssl which installs a separate apache
server to listen to port 443 (instead of 80). There are advantages either
way but using apache-ssl is straightforward and cleanly keeps the two servers
separate (configuration files are in /etc/apache and /etc/apache-ssl and
log files in /var/log/apache and /var/log/apache-ssl respectively).

552

88.2.1

Web: Serving, Accessing, and Mirroring

User Web Pages

The directory /home/kayon/public_html is usually made accessible by default by apache. It can be accessed as:
http://www.ktware.com/~kayon/

Files in this directory need to be world readable in order to be accessible

through the server.
If it is not working then read on.
Make sure you have (uncommented) the following line in /etc/apache/
httpd.conf:
LoadModule userdir_module /usr/lib/apache/1.3/mod_userdir.so

That will allow Apache to look at a directory under the users home directory
named public_html.

88.2.2

Bad Behaviour on Missing /

If a ServerName is not defined then when someone visits a page like

http://www.ktware.com/debian/book

they will get an error since this is actually a directory being referenced.
With a ServerName defined to be www.ktware.com in httpd.conf a / will
be automatically appended.

88.2.3

Password Protect Web Files

You can do this either on a per directory basis in /etc/apache/httpd.conf

or through the use of a .htaccess file in the directory containing the files
to protect. The following is either added to a <Directory> directive in
/etc/apache/httpd.conf or into .htaccess in the relevant directory.

88.2 Web Server

553

AuthUserFile /home/kayon/public_html/.htpasswd
AuthGroupFile /dev/null
AuthName ByPassword
AuthType Basic
Require user kayon

Then create the password file:

$ cd public_html
$ htpasswd -c .htpasswd kayon

You will be prompted for a password. This stores the encrypted password in
the file .htpasswd (the -c option says to create the file). You can manually
edit this file, keeping the same format, and perhaps even cutting the user
passwords from /etc/shadow to maintain the same passwords.
Note that you should take precautions to protect the actual encrypted passwords if you copy them from the shadow file (otherwise they may be subject
to attempts to crack them). For example:
# chown www-data.www-data .htpasswd
# chmod o= .htpasswd

I would like to figure out a way to use the system passwords file without
making /etc/shadow accessible to everyone (which is precisely the point of
the shadow file) and without having to copy the encrypted passwords into
.htpasswd. Then I would define the particular user group (AuthGroupFile)
as the users who can actually access the relevent web pages.
Protecting a cgi-bin directory through the use of the .htaccess file make
sure you have in /etc/apache-ssl/httpd.conf:
AllowOverride AuthConfig

Normally this is set to None. That is, in /etc/apache-ssl/httpd.conf you

should have something like:
<Directory "/home/kayon/projects/wwp/cgi-bin">
Options None

554

Web: Serving, Accessing, and Mirroring

AllowOverride AuthConfig
Order deny,allow
Deny from all
Allow from ktware.com
</Directory>

88.2.4

Renew SSL Certificate

I am using a self-signed certificate. To renew the certificate for 365 days once
it expires (from http://www.euhq.org/debian-apache-ssl-howto.html:
#
#
#
#

#
#
#
#
#

cd /etc/apache-ssl
openssl genrsa -out ktware.com.key 1024
chmod 600 ktware.com.key
openssl req -new -key ktware.com.key -out ktware.com.csr
AU
ACT
Canberra
Togaware
Data Mining
Togaware
[email protected]
(no challenge)
openssl x509 -req -days 365 -in ktware.com.csr \
-signkey ktware.com.key -out ktware.com.crt
mv apache.pem apache.pem.old
cp ktware.com.key apache.pem
cat ktware.com.crt >> apache.pem
chmod 600 apache.pem

Then restart the server:

# /etc/init.d/apache-ssl restart

88.2.5

Compressed HTML

Gzip you html documents and apache will still serve them up as if they were
not compressed! All automatically.

88.2 Web Server

88.2.6

555

Web Log Summaries

A very nice web log analyser and summary generator is awstats. Install the
package:
# wajig install awstats

This will give you a statistics summary page at http://localhost/cgi-bin/awstats.pl.

You will need to enable icons by adding the following line to your apache configuration file /etc/apache/httpd.conf:
Alias /awstats-icon/ /usr/share/awstats/icon/

Also you may like to include browser and host OS information in the summary
by using the apache combined log format:
LogFormat=1

Be sure the apache generates this information (the default is not to). Your
/etc/apache/httpd.conf should contain:
CustomLog /var/log/apache/access.log combined

To allow the analyser to run through the apache log files (/var/log/apache/
access) it needs permission to be able to read them. The simplest approach
is to:
# chmod o+r /var/log/apache/access*

The summary log file can now be generated with:

# /usr/lib/cgi-bin/awstats.pl -config=awstats -update

(This is what cron also runs every 10 minutes, by default.)

556

88.2.7

Web: Serving, Accessing, and Mirroring

Server Side Includes

Add the following to allow server side includes in .html files:

AddHandler server-parsed .html

And make sure the includes module is included by running:

> wajig reconfigure apache

88.2.8

Identifying the Web Server

To identify the web server running on a particular site you can use the httptype command available from http://httptype.sourceforge.net/. Example usage:
> httptype ktware.com
Apache/1.3.26 (Unix) Debian GNU/Linux PHP/4.1.2

88.3

Mirror Websites

Wget is a command line tool to download multiple files from http and ftp
addresses on the Internet. Suppose you wish to download all of the available
xmms skins from http://www.spacefem.com/skins/. The skins are in files
with the .tar.gz extension:
> wget -r -l 1 -A tar.gz -nd http://www.spacefem.com/skins/

Here the -r flag indicates that we want to recurse through the link, while -l
1 indicates that we recurse only a single level. The -A .tar.gz resticts the
download to just those files the have a .tar.gz extension. The extenstions
can be a comma separated list. The -nd request wget to not create any
directoriesthe files are downloaded to the current directory.

Chapter 89
Word: Processing and Printing
The premier Gnome word processor is AbiWord (Chapter 8) and KWord
does the same for KDE, although OpenOffice (Chapter 63) provides a word
processor that is very competitive with MSWord. Professional editors may
be more interested in the LATEX (Chapter 52) publishing systems.

557

558

Word: Processing and Printing

Chapter 90
X: The Window System
The X Window System is the GNU/Linux windowing environment, serving a similar function to MS-Windows in providing a graphical windowing
interactive mouse point-and-click (WIMP) interface.
The first task in setting up the X Window System is to determine the type
of your video controller chip. There are very many video controller chips
available and when you purchase a PC with MS-Windows preinstalled someone has already done the hard work of making MS-Windows work with the
particular video chip. Under Linux you will need to tune the configuration
to get the X Window System functionally fully.
The X Window System, unlike MS-Windows, is a client-server architecture.
You run an X Window System server somewhere (usually on your local host)
to display onto your local host. You then run clients (such as word processors,
Netscape, etc.) somewhere (usually your local host, but no necessarily) and
have them display on through the server onto the display on your local host!
The freely available XFree86 is the default X Window System for most
GNU/Linux systems. Version 4.1.0 is becoming an easily tuned system.
You will then need to run either xf86config (for a console-based interface) or
XF86Setup (for a X Window System based interface) to create an appropriate /etc/X11/XF86Config file. If you are in luck, this will be straightforward.
Below are sample configurations:
559

560

90.1

X: The Window System

Hand Crafting your XF86Config

Sometimes it is easiest to hand craft a basic /etc/X11/XF86Config file. Here

is one for the NeoMagic chipset NM2160 found in many laptop computers.
This one works for 16 bpp at 1024x768:
Section "Files"
RgbPath
"/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/rgb"
FontPath
"/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/misc/"
FontPath
"/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/75dpi/:unscaled"
FontPath
"/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/100dpi/:unscaled"
FontPath
"/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/Type1/"
FontPath
"/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/Speedo/"
FontPath
"/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/misc/"
FontPath
"/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/75dpi/"
FontPath
"/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/100dpi/"
FontPath
"/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/freefont/"
FontPath
"/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/sharefont/"
EndSection
Section "ServerFlags"
EndSection
Section "Keyboard"
Protocol
AutoRepeat
LeftAlt
RightAlt
RightCtl
ScrollLock
XkbKeymap
EndSection
Section "Pointer"
Protocol
Device
Emulate3Buttons
Emulate3Timeout
EndSection

"Standard"
500 5
Meta
ModeShift
Compose
ModeLock
"xfree86(us)"

"PS/2"
"/dev/psaux"
50

Section "Monitor"
Identifier "Dell SyncMaster 17GLi"

90.1 Hand Crafting your XF86Config

VendorName
ModelName
HorizSync
VertRefresh
Modeline
EndSection

561

"Dell"
"SyncMaster 17GLi"
31.5 - 48.5
55-65
"1024x768" 65 1024 1032 1176 1344 768 771 777 806 -hsync -vsync

Section "Device"
Identifier "NeoMagic"
#
Option
"intern_disp"
Option
"extern_disp"
EndSection
Section "Screen"
Driver
"svga"
Device
"NeoMagic"
Monitor
"Dell SyncMaster 17GLi"
DefaultColorDepth 16
Subsection "Display"
Depth
16
Modes
"1024x768" "800x600" "640x480"
ViewPort
0 0
EndSubsection
EndSection

This setup is used when the notebook is docked with display being to an
external monitor. Both internal and external displays dont work together
and so you need to manually edit the XF86Config file each time you change
between the external and internal display (could be done with a script, but
essentially you swap the # around, which is used to identify a comment
line). It is reported that having both enabled can destroy the internal display.
It certainly makes it go pretty ugly momentarily. According to the Linux
on the Dell Latitude CPi A366XT page http://www.radcyberzine.com/
linux/linux-dell.html page, you cant just switch between internal and
external displays without updating your XF86Config and restarting X, or
YOU CAN DAMAGE YOUR DISPLAYS!
The value for the Vertical Refresh rate of 55-65 was suggested by Charlie
Hedlin since LCDs dont need 80Hz and the like.
XF86Config for the clgd7543/b/font

562

X: The Window System

I hand crafted a simple XF86Config for the clgd7543 that worked to get 8
bpp at 800x600:

90.2

The Basic X Window System Architecture

The most basic mode of operation of Debian is through the console with a
command line interface. This is, after all, how Unix users have interfaced
with Unix for more than thirty years. In a modern environment though
we expect to be able to use the point-and-click interface with the desktop
metaphor invented by Xerox in 197XXXX and popularised by the release of
the Apple Macintosh in 1984, the X11 Window System in 1986, and finally
with MS-Windows in 1995.
It is the X Window System that provides the platform for todays graphical
user interfaces in Debian and many other platforms. The X Window System
is really nothing more than another application sitting on top of the Linux
kernel. However, it is special in that it uses a client-server architecture so
important to a multi-user, multi-hardware, networked environment. The
significance of this is that you can run your X Window System application
on one machine (whether it is a Debian, Redhat, Solaris, Macintosh, or
Microsft machine) and have remote hosts of any type display directly to it.
As presented in Chapter 90 to run the X Window System we issue the command startx. With no further embelishments we have a basic graphical user
interface running and can usually start up oher applications like Netscape.
But this is just the start!
When you start up an application under the X Window System that application will display a window on your screen. The raw window is under the
control of the application while the X Window System simply handles the
rendering of the window onto your screen. For a very simply installation
this might look like the screen in Figure 90.1. You can get this with the
command:
$ startx xterm

Or to have this happen automatically each time you start the X Window
System simply create an ~/.xsession file and with the single line:

90.2 The Basic X Window System Architecture

563

xterm

Then issue the command:

$ startx

Either way this will start up the X Window System and then a terminal
emulator (xterm) but absolutely nothing else. If you get an error like the following then you probably already have an X Window System session running
on the default virtual terminal (vt07).
Fatal server error:
Server is already active for display 0
If this server is no longer running, remove /tmp/.X0-lock
and start again.

When reporting a problem related to a server crash, please send

the full server output, not just the last messages
Xlib: connection to ":0.0" refused by server
Xlib: Invalid MIT-MAGIC-COOKIE-1 key
giving up.
xinit:

unable to connect to X server

xinit:

No such process (errno 3):

Server error.

The solution is simply to run the new X Window System server on a different
virtual terminal (lets use vt09, but it could be vt08 or vt10) and we will call
the display by the name :1 rather than the default :0 which seems to already
be in use:
$ startx xterm -- :1 vt09

or else

564

X: The Window System

$ startx -- :1 vt09

When an application is specified as an argument to startx that application

is run and the ~/.xsession file is not used.

Figure 90.1: A basic X Window System graphical interface with a single

xterm and no glitz. Note the rather bland background pattern, the default
X Window System background, often referred to as the herring bone screen.
This display will show moire patterns if your monitor is slightly out of tune,
which can be corrected!
Note that there is no decoration on this single window. That is the job of a
window manager but we arent running any at the moment. Theres plenty
to choose from but lets stay with sawfish. Sawfish is a window manager that
focusses on just managing windowsit leaves out a lot of the other features
not specifically related to managing Windows that are supported by many
other window mangers like Enlightenment. A window manager is no more
than another X Window System application. So in the xterm window we
can simply type the command sawfish to run this window manager (and

90.2 The Basic X Window System Architecture

565

we run it as a separate job in the background so that we wont tie up this

xtermthis is the meaning of the ampersand):
$ sawfish &

The result is the decorated window we see in Figure 90.2.

Figure 90.2: A basic X Window System graphical interface with a single

xterm and running a window manger (sawfish).
If instead you run the command gnome-session you will see the desktop in
Figure 90.3.
To have this as the default behaviour it is suggested you replace the xterm
in the ~/.xsession file with:
exec gnome-session

Then next time your startx Gnome will automatically begin. Details of
working with Gnome are in Chapter 37.

566

X: The Window System

Figure 90.3: The Gnome desktop is now in control. These are the windows
that come up by default on a new installation.

90.3 Multiple X Window System Users, One Console

90.3

567

Multiple X Window System Users, One

Console

You want two or more users to be able to run on seperate X Window System
sessions on the same system. Obviously not interacting with the system at
the same time if both sessions are running on console, but not havin to bail
out of a session to allow the other user access.
Do a console login as the desired userid. Launch an X Window System session
to an unused local display. Assuming your first session runs to :0, try:
startx -- :1 1>.startx.log 2>&1 &

For gdm, add the following lines to the file ....

90.4

Getting Started with Gnome

We will assume that you have installed Gnome and the related packages.
This includes the Gnome Display Manager (gdm) which, once installed, will
automatically start up when you boot into Debian.
The essence to running Gnome is to include the following in the file ~/
.xsession:
exec gnome-session

Alternatively if you are using the Gnome Display Manager (gdm) then select
Gnome or Debian from the Session menu.

90.5

GDM Startup

The Gnome Display Manager gdm, when installed, will start up automatically on boot. This presents an X Window System interface to log on. If you
are used to starting the X Window System from the command line you will
be used to using either .xsession or .xinitrc to tune some of your X Window System settings. The System menu in the gdm dialogue lets you start

568

X: The Window System

up Debian, Gnome, or XSession. To tune your X Window System settings in

this environment with your .xsession file be sure to run with the Debian
session. If you use the default Gnome session in gdm place your tuning in the
file .gnomerc in your home directory, but be sure not to include any window
managers, etc., as these are started by the gnome-session command that
the Gnome session starts. Some startup tunning I perform incudes:
#
# Left ALT should be META so that it is the way I like it in Emacs.
#
xmodmap -e keysym Alt_L = Meta_L
xmodmap -e add mod1 = Meta_L
#
# Start up by asking for the SSH Pass Phrase
#
ssh-add </dev/null

90.6

References

A good guide to setting up X Window System under GNU/Linux is:

The Concise Guide to XFree 86 for Linux by Aron Hsiao. 464 pages,
published November 1999 by QUE, ISBN 0789721821.

90.7

Wheel Mouse

To set up the Microsoft IntelliMouse PS2 WheelMouse, in /etc/X11/XF86Config4:

Section "InputDevice"
Identifier
Driver
Option
Option
Option
Option
Option
EndSection

"Generic Mouse"
"mouse"
"CorePointer"
"Device"
"Protocol"
"Emulate3Buttons"
"ZAxisMapping"

"/dev/psaux"
"ImPS/2"
"true"
"4 5"

90.8 Window Managers

90.8

569

Window Managers

There is an enormous variety of window managers for the X Window System.

A good index of window managers and desktop enviroments under the X
Window System can be found at http://www.plig.org/xwinman/. We have
talked already about Gnome above in Section ?? which is a session manager
but uses sawfish as its default window manager.

90.9

XFree

The LBX (Low Bandwidth X) X Window System server extension is useful

for increasing the responsiveness of remote X applications. Remote Emacs
windows are delivered to a desktop over a 33 K connection at about 3 times
the non-accelerated rate!

570

X: The Window System

Chapter 91
XML
91.1

XSLT Processors

Debian has a decent collection of XSLT processors:

lib-xt-java: Works well. Style sheet parameter is handled effortlessly.
$ java com.jclark.xsl.sax.Driver <XML file> <XSL file> [id=wgi001]

sablotron: Works well but my sample genealogy style sheet with a parameter cause sablotron to find an error! (Perhaps its stricter with XSL or else
it does not implement some featurenot yet explored.)
$ sabcmd <XSL file> <XML file> [\$id=wgi001]

transformiix: Produces slightly different output to all the rest. Does not
seem to allow assignment to parameters.
$ transfrmx -s <XSL file> -i <XML file>

xalan: Works well but could not get it to take the parameter?
$ xalan -xsl <XSL file> -in <XML file> [-param id wgi001]

xsltproc:
$ xsltproc [--param id wgi001] <XSL file> <XML file>

571

572

XML

Thanks
Many people have contributed directly and indirectly to this book, with
snippets from email messages and discussion group postings and directly to
me. I list here some of the people who have contributed, knowingly and
unknowingly.
Rohinton Kazak fixed many typos. Vincent McIntyre provided information
on the installation of the machine Ive called Vince (Section 4.10.10). Damien
McAullay, Christian Kaske, Yoshiro Mihira, Jason Burrell, Bob Bownes, Peter Lamb, Dirk Eddelbuettel, Dean Jackson, Karsten Self, Shaul Karl, Ethan
Benson, John Flinchbaugh, Nathan Norman, Noah L. Meyerhans, Manoj Srivastava, and many others.

573

Index
.config, 86, 89, 93, 101
.fetchmailrc, 270
.htaccess, 552, 553
.procmailrc, 272
.tar.gz, 556
.vob, 542
.xinitrc, 567
.xsession, 567
/, 52, 53, 60, 63, 66, 69, 70, 72, 73,
450
/bin/sh, 31
/boot, 181
/boot/config-2.4.16, 383, 384
/boot/config-2.4.16-686, 385
/boot/grub/menu.lst, 65, 181
/boot/vmlinux, 180
/boot/vmlinux.old, 180
/cdrom, 192
/dev/cdrom, 191
/dev/dvd, 539541
/dev/fd0, 289
/dev/hda, 100, 263
/dev/hda1, 107, 185, 452
/dev/hda2, 53, 107, 452
/dev/hda3, 53, 62, 65
/dev/hdc, 195, 539
/dev/hdd, 193
/dev/hde, 93, 101, 191, 192
/dev/hdg, 93, 101
/dev/hdh, 93
/dev/hdj, 93
/dev/scd0, 193, 195
/dev/sda1, 74, 109, 185

/dev/sda2, 109
/dev/sdb1, 74
/dev/sdc1, 75
/dev/sg0, 206
/dev/tty1, 370
/dev/tty2, 370
/dev/tty6, 370
/dev/ttyS0, 459
/dev/ttyS1, 459
/dev/zero, 196
/dmrnet, 69
/dvdrw, 535
/etc, 33
/etc/, 431
/etc/X11/XF86Config, 295, 559, 560
/etc/X11/XF86Config-4, 127, 293,
547
/etc/X11/Xsession.options, 522
/etc/adduser.conf, 135
/etc/adjtime, 219
/etc/adjtimex.conf, 218, 219
/etc/alsa/alsa-base.conf, 387
/etc/apache, 551
/etc/apache-ssl, 551
/etc/apache-ssl/httpd.conf, 553
/etc/apache/httpd.conf, 552, 555
/etc/apt-move.conf, 151
/etc/apt/apt.conf, 148
/etc/apt/preferences, 148
/etc/apt/sources.list, 2629, 38, 44,
47, 84, 138, 142, 146, 148,
149, 151, 152, 159, 470, 549
/etc/aspell.conf, 511
575

576
/etc/backup.include, 172
/etc/chatscripts/provider, 405
/etc/cron.daily/, 225
/etc/cron.monthly/, 225
/etc/cron.weekly/, 225
/etc/crontab, 225, 226
/etc/cups/cupsd.conf, 464
/etc/cups/lpoptions, 466
/etc/cups/ppd/lp1.ppd, 466
/etc/cups/ppd/lp11.ppd, 466
/etc/debian version, 223
/etc/default/cdrdao, 198
/etc/default/nis, 457
/etc/default/rcS, 215
/etc/defaultdomain, 457
/etc/email-addresses, 270
/etc/exim.conf, 269
/etc/exim4/update-exim4.conf.conf,
270
/etc/exports, 223, 437, 439
/etc/fstab, 51, 55, 100, 192, 223,
263, 290, 438, 530, 534, 535
/etc/gdm/gdm.conf, 51
/etc/hostname, 269, 431
/etc/hosts, 269, 431, 464
/etc/hosts.allow, 223
/etc/hosts.deny, 223
/etc/inetd.conf, 223, 224, 431, 481,
482
/etc/init.d/, 368, 369
/etc/init.d/hwtools, 101
/etc/init.d/myfirewall, 369, 434
/etc/init.d/networker, 174
/etc/init.d/networking, 425, 426
/etc/init.d/rc, 368
/etc/init.d/rcS, 368, 369
/etc/inittab, 224, 367369
/etc/kernel-img.conf, 50, 62, 65, 74,
182
/etc/lilo.conf, 50, 56, 132, 180, 185
/etc/lilo/conf, 167

INDEX
/etc/mailname, 431
/etc/modules, 45, 72, 84, 107, 110,
167, 194, 195, 386, 387, 389,
438, 537
/etc/modules.conf, 107, 109, 118,
389
/etc/modutils/, 389
/etc/modutils/cdrw, 193, 386
/etc/modutils/sndconfig, 107, 109,
118, 163
/etc/motd, 224, 431
/etc/mysql/my.cnf, 417
/etc/network/interfaces, 45, 285, 426,
427
/etc/orbitrc, 342
/etc/passwd, 224
/etc/pcmcia/, 425
/etc/pcmcia/network, 425
/etc/ppp/ip-up.d, 217
/etc/ppp/peers/, 406
/etc/ppp/peers/provider, 406
/etc/ppp/resolv/provider, 430
/etc/profile, 177, 224
/etc/rc2.d/, 368
/etc/rcS.d/, 369
/etc/rcS.d/S30setserial, 369
/etc/rcS.d/S50hwclock.sh, 369
/etc/resolv.conf, 45, 430
/etc/rsyncd.conf, 481, 482
/etc/samba/smb.cnf, 483
/etc/securetty, 224
/etc/services, 224
/etc/shadow, 224, 553
/etc/shells, 224
/etc/texmf/texmf.cnf, 397
/etc/yp.conf, 458
/etc/ypserv.securenets, 457
/flash, 75
/home, 52, 53, 66, 70, 72, 73, 450
/home/kayon/.Xmodmap, 391, 392
/home/kayon/.bashrc, 232

INDEX

577

/usr/share/rubber/rubber/, 396
/home/kayon/.cdrdao, 198
/usr/src, 382
/home/kayon/.cvsignore, 232
/usr/src/kernel-source-2.4.16, 382
/home/kayon/.gnupg/options, 496
/usr/src/kernel-source-2.4.16/.config,
/home/kayon/.ssh/authorized keys,
383
521
/usr/src/linux/Documentation/sound/,
/home/kayon/.xsession, 522
107, 109, 118
/home/kayon/bin/spam-filter.sh, 277
/usr/src/linux/arch/i386/boot/video.S,
/home/kayon/public html, 552
132
/home/oracle/.bash profile, 448
/usr/src/linux/drivers/sound/i810 audio.c,
/hpcard, 534
163
/ktware/oracle/product/8.1.7, 448
/var, 262, 450
/mirrors/debian, 152
/var/cache/apt/archive/, 144
/mnt/floppy, 290
/var/cache/apt/archives, 152
/proc/cpuinfo, 52, 58, 60, 63, 66,
/var/lib/csv, 361
69, 72, 116
/var/lib/cvs/, 231
/raid, 55
/var/lib/cvs/CVSROOT/cvsignore,
/root/.my.cnf, 414
232
/root/distfile, 456
/usr/X11R6/include/X11/keysymdef.h, /var/lib/mysql, 450
/var/log, 360
391
/var/log/apache, 551
/usr/lib/R/library/RSPython, 470
/var/log/apache-ssl, 551
/usr/local, 261
/var/log/apache/access, 555
/usr/local/, 146
/var/log/auth.log, 524
/usr/local/bin/bash, 31
/var/log/installer.log, 428
/usr/local/bin/mkcdrtoc, 201
/var/log/syslog, 287
/usr/share, 52
/usr/share/dia/sheets/, 250
/var/spool/mail, 439
/usr/share/doc/apt-howto/en/index.html,/var/www/index.html, 551
138
[, 442, 459
/usr/share/doc/apt/offline.html/index.html,
init .py, 396
138
/.bash login, 177
/usr/share/doc/base-passwd/users/.bash logout, 177
and-groups.html, 359
/.bash profile, 177
/usr/share/doc/iptables/examples,
/.cddb, 203
435
/.dia/diarc, 238
/usr/share/doc/mysql-doc/index.html, /.dia/shapes, 255
414
/.dia/shapes/Sample/minimal.shape,
/usr/share/doc/rsync/sample-rsyncd.conf.gz,
255
481
/.dia/sheets/Sample.sheet, 256
/usr/share/myspell/dicts/dictionary.lst, /.enlightenment/themes, 531
444
/.profile, 177

578
/.xsession, 562, 567
a2ps, 463
abiword, 165
latex export, 165
adjtimex, 215, 218
Adobe, 299
alien, 145, 414
alsa, 382
alsa-source, 388
Altrop, 47, 84, 193, 195, 201, 208,
384, 437439, 450, 455, 456
Amirix, 21
apache, 62, 65, 68, 550, 551, 555
installing, 550
apache-ssl, 551
apm, 168
apmd, 168
Applications
System Tools
Floppy Formatter, 289
Networking, 426, 428
Users and Groups, 289, 359
apt, 67, 70, 144
apt-get, 24, 28, 29, 33
apt-get install wajig, 59, 61, 64
apt-get update, 59, 61, 64
apt-howto, 138
apt-listchanges, 145
apt-move, 151, 152
apt-setup, 27
aptitude, 29
aspell, 511
ati rage 128 pro tf, 106
atlas2-base, 471, 473
auctex, 396
audacity, 505, 506, 508
audio, 164
audio mixer, 506
audio recording, 505
connecting, 506

INDEX
mixer, 506
plugs, 506
recording settings, 507
required software, 505
steps, 508
aumix, 505507
aumix-gtk, 505, 507
autoconf, 314
autogen.sh, 313, 318
automake, 313, 314
awstats, 555
Bach, 263, 382
Background
colour, 248
Backup, 171175
Legato NetWorker, 173175
Bartok, 51, 381, 384, 464, 537, 546
base-config, 38, 61, 64
bash, 31
bastille, 285
beamer, 461
BIOS, 179
bladeenc, 203
bluefish, 363
boot
sparc station, 42
boot managers
lilo, 180
Build, 313
build (wajig command), 146
callbacks.c, 314, 317
callbacks.h, 314
capt, 29
Caravan, 457
Cargo, 58, 91
cat, 9
cd-rw
ide-probe-mod, 195
ide-scsi, 195

INDEX
cdda2wav, 203
cdlabelgen, 210
cdmaster, 197
cdparanoia, 203, 204
cdrdao, 194, 197201, 209
cdrecord, 146, 148, 194, 196, 197,
201, 202, 207, 208
Cepheus, 42
chemical modelling
ghemical, 297
chemistry
ghemical, 297
chkrootkit, 490
chrony, 217
cinepaint, 62, 65, 68, 71
clamav, 277
clamav-freshclam, 277
clipboard, 321
clock, 215
hardware clock, 215
system clock, 215
timezone
change, 215
timezones, 215
CMD Technology Inc PCI0680, 91
CMD680, 91
commands
adjtimex, 215
apm, 168
apt-get, 24, 28
apt-get install wajig, 59, 61, 64
apt-get update, 59, 61, 64
apt-move, 152
apt-setup, 27
aumix, 506, 507
base-config, 38, 61, 64
cat, 9
cdrdao, 194, 197
chkrootkit, 490
cpdvd, 543
cpvts, 543

579
cron, 216
date, 215
depmod, 55
dmesg, 193, 534
dpkg, 24, 28
dselect, 28
dvdrecord, 536
dvdrip, 542
fdisk, 534
fetchmail, 271, 272
fips, 452
ftp, 517
gdm, 567
gnome-session, 565, 568
gramofile, 508
hdparm, 100
head, 9
httptype, 556
hwclock, 215
i8kctl, 118
initrd, 56
insmod, 193
install-mbr, 180
lilo, 180
lpadmin, 464
ls, 9
lsdvd, 540
lshw, 52, 58, 60, 63, 66, 69, 72,
77, 79, 116, 123
lsmod, 193
lspci, 52, 58, 60, 63, 66, 69, 72,
85, 88, 92, 95, 97, 99, 103,
106, 108, 112, 114, 116, 119,
121, 125, 163
lsusb, 533, 535
make-kpkg, 388
make-pseudo-image, 31
mkdir, 9
mkdosfs, 290
modconf, 193, 429
modprobe, 107, 109

580

INDEX
mv, 9
network-admin, 426
nsrexecd, 174, 175
ntpd, 216
ntpdate, 216, 217
nwrecover, 175
orpheus, 164
plog, 459
pop, 517
ppconfig, 459
pppconfig, 459
pydoc, 469
rcp, 517
ripmake, 545
rlogin, 517
rm, 9
rsh, 517
rsync, 32, 152, 522
sawfish, 564
smbpasswd, 483
sort, 9
spamassassin, 277
ssh, 518, 519, 521523
ssh-add, 520, 522
ssh-agent, 520
ssh-keygen, 519
startx, 562
su, 46
swapon -a, 530
tasksel, 39, 62, 65, 68
telnet, 517, 523
texdoc, 395
transcode, 542
tzconfig, 215
update-grub, 74, 182
update-modules, 107, 109, 118,
389
update-rc.d, 369
uptime, 8
usbview, 533, 535
users-admin, 359

uudecode, 276
uuencode, 276
visudo, 38, 62, 65, 67, 70
vorbiscomment, 164
wc, 9
wget, 556
xf86config, 559
XF86Setup, 559
concurrent versioning system, 227
config-2.4.16-686-smp, 384
configure.in, 318
Connection Points, 243, 257
cpdvd, 543
cpvts, 543
Create Text, 242
cron, 216
Cultus, 437439
cupsomatic-ppd, 463
cupsys, 463
cupsys-bsd, 463
cupsys-client, 463
cupsys-driver-gimpprint, 463
cvdimager, 542
cvs, 227
cvs-doc, 227
daemons
ntpd, 216
usbmgr, 533, 535
database
mysql, 413
date, 215
Debian GNU/Linux, xxix
defoma, 293
dell
latitude c600, 63
optiplex gx110, 123
optiplex gx150, 76
optiplex gx240, 79, 106
optiplex gx260, 81, 84, 88
optiplex gx270, 72

INDEX
optiplex gxi 523m, 103
precision 420, 105, 121
precision 620, 95, 97
precision 650, 69
presatio 5740AP, 66
depmod, 55
dhelp, 267
dia, 237, 238, 240, 241, 243, 245,
247, 250, 255258
discover, 43
disk.toc, 202
dist-upgrade (wajig command), 107,
109
distributions, 19
debian, 20
code name, 25
release name, 25
version, 25
mandrake, 33
red hat, 20, 33
slackware, 20, 33
suse, 33
dmesg, 193, 534
doc-base, 267
doc-central, 267
document typesetting
latex, 395
dpkg, 24, 28
dselect, 28
dual boot, 183
MS-Windows/NT, 181
DVD
Audio, 545
Sound track
Extraction, 540
dvd+rw-tools, 536
dvdbackup, 543
dvdrecord, 536
dvdrip, 542
dwww, 267

581
Edit, 247, 319
Clear, 321
Copy, 247, 321
Cut, 247, 321
Delete, 247
Paste, 247, 321
emacs, 274, 396
auctex, 396
latex, 396
emacs21, 38, 61, 64, 67, 70
Embedded Debian, 21
eog, 279
epiphany, 550
epiphany-browser, 549
etc/modules, 548
etherconf, 44
evas-demo, 548
Evolution, 281
evolution, 274, 277, 439
exim, 46, 269, 270
exim4, 270
Export, 246
eye of gnome, 279
fdisk, 534
Festival, 88, 91, 201, 208, 450, 458
feta, 137
fetchmail, 47, 269272
File, 244, 319
Build Source Code, 320
Close, 247
Exit, 247, 319
New Diagram, 238, 244
New Project, 319
Open, 244, 319
Page Setup, 238, 247
Preferences, 238, 245, 248
Grid Lines, 245
User Interface, 245
View Defaults, 245
Project Options, 306, 320

582

INDEX

callbacks.h, 314
configure.in, 318
files
interface.c, 314
.fetchmailrc, 270
interface.h, 314
.procmailrc, 272
j2sdk-1 4 2 03-linux-i586.bin, 373
.vob, 542
main.c, 314
/etc/X11/XF86Config, 295
Makefile, 313, 314
/etc/X11/XF86Config-4, 293
sources.list, 59, 61, 64
/etc/default/nis, 457
src/gword, 314
/etc/email-addresses, 270
src/Makefile.am, 318
/etc/exim.conf, 269
src/Makefile.in, 318
/etc/exim4/update-exim4.conf.conf,
support.c, 314, 317
270
support.h, 314
/etc/fstab, 263, 290, 534
fingerprint, 518
/etc/hostname, 269
fips, 452
/etc/hosts, 269
firewall, 285
/etc/inetd.conf, 481
floppy, 289
/etc/init.d/myfirewall, 369, 434
foomatic-db, 463
/etc/init.d/rc, 368
frozen, 25
/etc/init.d/rcS, 368, 369
fstab
/etc/inittab, 367369
noauto, 192
/etc/network/interfaces, 285
nohide, 192
/etc/orbitrc, 342
ro, 192
/etc/rcS.d/S30setserial, 369
user, 192
/etc/rcS.d/S50hwclock.sh, 369
users, 192
/etc/yp.conf, 458
ftp, 517
/etc/ypserv.securenets, 457
functions
/home/kayon/bin/spam-filter.sh,
glade xml get widget(), 318
277
gtk.mainquit, 316
/usr/share/doc/base-passwd/usersgtk object get data(), 317
and-groups.html, 359
gtk object set data(), 317
/usr/share/myspell/dicts/dictionary.lst, lookup widget(), 317, 318
444
on exit1 activate, 316
/var/log/syslog, 287
galeon, 549, 550
init .py, 396
gcdmaster, 198
/.dia/diarc, 238
/.dia/shapes/Sample/minimal.shape,gdm, 39, 51, 62, 65, 68, 71, 84, 370,
567
255
gdm-themes, 39, 62, 65, 68, 71
/.dia/sheets/Sample.sheet, 256
gfloppy, 289
autogen.sh, 313, 318
callbacks.c, 314, 317
ggobi, 356
Save, 244, 319
Save As, 244

INDEX
ghemical, 297
glade, 303306, 310, 313, 314, 316
325, 327, 328
glade xml get widget(), 318
gmyclient, 414
gnome, xxxi, 5, 6, 8, 1013, 18, 20,
28, 39, 62, 65, 68, 71, 150,
164, 165, 192, 198, 235, 240,
245, 247, 258, 262, 281, 290,
291, 303307, 309, 319, 322
324, 326329, 332336, 341,
342, 345, 346, 356, 363, 367,
379, 395, 460, 487, 505, 506,
515, 549, 557, 567569
gnome office
abiword, 165
gnome-apt, 29
gnome-media, 505
gnome-session, 565, 568
gnome-system-tools, 426
gnome-tasksel, 44, 48
gnome-terminal, 313
gnuplot, 354, 355
gnus, 274
gogo, 203
gphoto2, 189
gramofile, 505508
Grid
spacing, 248
visibility, 248
grip, 203
groups
audio, 164
floppy, 289
grub, 43, 50, 62, 65, 67, 84, 88, 92,
105, 118, 179, 181184
gsfonts-other, 463
gthumb, 357
GTK+ toolkit, 235
gtk.mainquit, 316
gtk object get data(), 317

583
gtk object set data(), 317
gv, 210
gword, 315
Handles, 242
hardware clock, 215
hdparm, 100, 263
head, 9
Help, 319, 322
About, 323
FAQ, 322
Manual, 322
Quick-Start Guide, 322
help (wajig command), 139
hosts
Altrop, 47, 84, 108, 193, 195,
201, 208, 384, 437439, 450,
455, 456
Atom, 97
Bach, 99, 263, 382
Bartok, 51, 381, 384, 464, 537,
546
Bigdaddy, 79
Brick, 95
Caravan, 69, 457
Cargo, 58, 91
Cepheus, 42, 111
Cleveland, 105
Cultus, 437439
Fairmond, 76
Festival, 84, 88, 91, 201, 208,
450, 458
Friends, 66
imaphost, 271
Inci, 63
Inco, 116, 118, 152, 435, 436
Incx, 195
lynx, 271
Mint, 123, 194, 195, 199, 201,
208, 381, 383, 386, 537, 546,
548

584
Modern, 72, 433, 434
Prefect, 43, 103, 438
Punto, 438
Rose, 131, 435
Uramys1, 88
Velox, 121, 180, 185, 194, 195,
216, 218, 381, 383, 428, 437,
451, 546, 548
Vince, 81, 573
Vivaldi, 91, 382
Wayfare, 60
hotplug, 72, 74, 533, 534
hp-ppd, 463, 466
hpoj, 485
httptype, 556
hwclock, 215
hwtools, 101, 264
i8kctl, 118
i8kutils, 117
ID3, 205
image viewer
eog, 279
eye of gnome, 279
imagemagick, 357
imaphost, 271
Inco, 118, 152, 435, 436
Incx, 195
infotex, 267
initrd, 56, 106, 109
insmod, 193
install
debian 2.2r2, 106, 123
debian 3.0, 76, 79, 81, 84, 88,
91, 95, 97
debian-installer, 51, 58, 60, 63,
66
debian-installer beta 1, 69, 72
progeny 3.0, 99, 103, 105
install-mbr, 180
installation, 35

INDEX
books, 133
Debian Installation Guide, 35
from CD-ROM, 35
interface.c, 314
interface.h, 314
iptables, 433
j2re1.4, 374
j2sdk-1 4 2 03-linux-i586.bin, 373
jigdo-file, 377
kaffe, 373
kayon, 270, 271
kde, 341
kernel, 5
2.4.14-686-smp, 108
himem, 108
kernel modules
ide-probe-mod, 195
kernel-headers, 382
kernel-image, 381
kernel-image-2.2.18pre21, 51, 112
kernel-image-2.2.19, 52
kernel-image-2.4.16, 112, 385
kernel-image-2.4.16-686, 533
kernel-image-2.4.16-686-smp, 52
kernel-image-2.4.16-p3, 385
kernel-image-2.4.18-686-smp, 105
kernel-image-2.4.20, 84
kernel-image-2.4.20-1-686-smp, 55
kernel-image-2.4.20-686, 533
kernel-image-2.4.20-686-smp, 52
kernel-image-2.4.21-1-686, 91
kernel-image-2.4.22-1-686, 70, 72
kernel-image-2.4.23-1-686, 72
kernel-image-2.4.24-1-686, 65, 67
kernel-image-2.4.25-1-686, 62
kernel-image-2.4.25-1-686-smp, 52
kernel-package, 381, 382
kernel-source, 382
kernel-source-2.4.16, 52

INDEX
kernel-source-2.4.16.tar.bz2, 382
l3enc, 203
Ladder, 253
lame, 203, 204
latex, 395
abiword export, 165
emacs, 396
Legato Networker, see Backup
less, 38, 61, 64, 67, 70
libapache-mod-ssl, 551
libdvdread2, 540
libglade, 303, 304, 315, 317, 318,
324, 326, 327
lilo, 50, 84, 88, 106, 118, 179181,
386
initrd, 107, 109
Lines, 243
lookup widget(), 317, 318
lpadmin, 464
ls, 9
lsdvd, 540
lshw, 52, 58, 60, 63, 66, 69, 72, 77,
79, 116, 123, 136
lsmod, 193
lspci, 52, 58, 60, 63, 66, 69, 72, 85,
88, 92, 95, 97, 99, 103, 106,
108, 112, 114, 116, 119, 121,
125, 163
lsusb, 533, 535
lumiere, 539
lynx, 271
mailman, 276
main.c, 314
make-kpkg, 388
make-pseudo-image, 31
Makefile, 313, 314
man page, 267
mencoder-686, 542, 545
menu

585
Create Text, 242
Edit, 247, 319
Clear, 321
Copy, 247, 321
Cut, 247, 321
Delete, 247
Paste, 247, 321
Export, 246
File, 244, 319
Build Source Code, 320
Close, 247
Exit, 247, 319
New Diagram, 238, 244
New Project, 319
Open, 244, 319
Page Setup, 238, 247
Preferences, 238, 245, 248
Project Options, 306, 320
Save, 244, 319
Save As, 244
Help, 319, 322
About, 323
FAQ, 322
Manual, 322
Quick-Start Guide, 322
Ladder, 253
Objects, 249
Bring to Front, 249
Send to Back, 249
Programs
Development, 305
Select, 248
Connected, 248
Transitive, 248
Settings, 319
Tools, 250
Filter, 277
Filters, 277
UML, 238
View, 245, 248, 319
Diagram Properties, 248

586
New View, 248
Show All, 248
Show Clipboard, 305, 321
Show Widget Tree, 305, 309
Zoom, 248
Zoom In, 248
Zoom Out, 248
Mint, 194, 195, 199, 201, 208, 381,
383, 386, 537, 546, 548
mkdir, 9
mkdosfs, 290
mkisofs, 197
modconf, 193, 429
Modern, 433, 434
modprobe, 107, 109
modules
usb-storage, 534
vfat, 534
More Options, 359
most, 38, 61, 64, 67, 70
Mouse Button
left, 249
right, 244
mozilla, 549
mozplugger, 550
mp3encode, 203
mpegtools, 543
mplayer, 539
mplayer-686, 542, 550
mplayerplug-in, 550
mtools, 290
multiboot, 181
mutt, 274
mv, 9
myspell-en-gb, 443
mysql, 413, 450
mysql-client, 413
mysql-doc, 413
mysql-navigator, 413, 416
mysql-server, 413, 414
mytop, 413

INDEX
nautilus, 206, 357, 539
nautilus-cd-burner, 423
ncftp, 30
network
firewall, 285
ifconfig, 45
ip masquerading, 285
nat, 285
netstat, 45
network address translation, 285
setup, 45
network-admin, 426
nfs, 437
export list specification, 438
root access from client, 439
set up, 437
nfs-client, 437
nfs-kernel-server, 437, 438
nfs-user-server, 437
nsrexecd, 174, 175
NTFS, 441
ntp, 39, 216, 217
ntp-simple, 70, 216
ntpd, 216
ntpdate, 39, 62, 65, 68, 70, 216, 217
nvidia video chip, 546
nvidia-glx, 546
nvidia-kernel-2.4.25-1-686-smp, 546
nwrecover, 175
OReilly, 21
Object Defaults, 242
Object Properties, 239
Objects, 249
Bring to Front, 249
Send to Back, 249
office suite
abiword, 165
ogle, 539, 540
ogle-gui, 540
on exit1 activate, 316

INDEX
openoffice.org, 62, 65, 68
openssh, 517
optima, 91
super vision II 3600, 51
workpro, 99
orpheus, 164
Outlook, 281
packages
a2ps, 463
abiword, 165
adjtimex, 218
alien, 145, 414
alsa, 382
alsa-source, 388
apache, 62, 65, 68, 550, 551,
555
apache-ssl, 551
apmd, 168
apt, 67, 70, 144
apt-get, 29, 33
apt-howto, 138
apt-listchanges, 145
apt-move, 151
aptitude, 29
aspell, 511
atlas2-base, 471, 473
auctex, 396
audacity, 505, 506, 508
aumix, 505, 506
aumix-gtk, 505, 507
autoconf, 314
automake, 313, 314
awstats, 555
bash, 31
bastille, 285
beamer, 461
bladeenc, 203
bluefish, 363
capt, 29
cdda2wav, 203

587
cdlabelgen, 210
cdmaster, 197
cdparanoia, 203, 204
cdrdao, 197201, 209
cdrecord, 146, 148, 194, 196,
197, 201, 202, 207, 208
chkrootkit, 490
chrony, 217
cinepaint, 62, 65, 68, 71
clamav, 277
clamav-freshclam, 277
cupsomatic-ppd, 463
cupsys, 463
cupsys-bsd, 463
cupsys-client, 463
cupsys-driver-gimpprint, 463
cvdimager, 542
cvs, 227
cvs-doc, 227
defoma, 293
dhelp, 267
dia, 237, 238, 240, 241, 243,
245, 247, 250, 255258
discover, 43
doc-base, 267
doc-central, 267
dvd+rw-tools, 536
dvdbackup, 543
dvdrecord, 536
dwww, 267
emacs, 274
emacs21, 38, 61, 64, 67, 70
epiphany, 550
epiphany-browser, 549
etherconf, 44
evas-demo, 548
Evolution, 281
evolution, 274, 277, 439
exim, 46, 269, 270
exim4, 270
feta, 137

588

INDEX
fetchmail, 47, 269, 270
foomatic-db, 463
galeon, 549, 550
gcdmaster, 198
gdm, 39, 51, 62, 65, 68, 71, 84,
370, 567
gdm-themes, 39, 62, 65, 68, 71
gfloppy, 289
ggobi, 356
glade, 303306, 310, 313, 314,
316325, 327, 328
gmyclient, 414
gnome, xxxi, 5, 6, 8, 1013, 18,
20, 28, 39, 62, 65, 68, 71,
150, 164, 165, 192, 198, 235,
240, 245, 247, 258, 262, 281,
290, 291, 303307, 309, 319,
322324, 326329, 332336,
341, 342, 345, 346, 356, 363,
367, 379, 395, 460, 487, 505,
506, 515, 549, 557, 567569
gnome-apt, 29
gnome-media, 505
gnome-system-tools, 426
gnome-tasksel, 44, 48
gnome-terminal, 313
gnuplot, 354, 355
gnus, 274
gogo, 203
gphoto2, 189
gramofile, 505508
grip, 203
grub, 43, 50, 62, 65, 67, 84, 88,
92, 105, 118, 179, 181184
gsfonts-other, 463
gthumb, 357
gv, 210
hdparm, 100, 263
hotplug, 72, 74, 533, 534
hp-ppd, 463, 466
hpoj, 485

hwtools, 101, 264

i8kutils, 117
imagemagick, 357
initrd, 109
iptables, 433
j2re1.4, 374
jigdo-file, 377
kaffe, 373
kde, 341
kernel-headers, 382
kernel-image, 381
kernel-image-2.2.18pre21, 51, 112
kernel-image-2.2.19, 52
kernel-image-2.4.16, 112, 385
kernel-image-2.4.16-686, 533
kernel-image-2.4.16-686-smp, 52
kernel-image-2.4.16-p3, 385
kernel-image-2.4.18-686-smp, 105
kernel-image-2.4.20, 84
kernel-image-2.4.20-1-686-smp,
55
kernel-image-2.4.20-686, 533
kernel-image-2.4.20-686-smp, 52
kernel-image-2.4.21-1-686, 91
kernel-image-2.4.22-1-686, 70, 72
kernel-image-2.4.23-1-686, 72
kernel-image-2.4.24-1-686, 65, 67
kernel-image-2.4.25-1-686, 62
kernel-image-2.4.25-1-686-smp,
52
kernel-package, 381, 382
kernel-source, 382
kernel-source-2.4.16, 52
l3enc, 203
lame, 203, 204
less, 38, 61, 64, 67, 70
libapache-mod-ssl, 551
libdvdread2, 540
libglade, 303, 304, 315, 317, 318,
324, 326, 327

INDEX
lilo, 50, 84, 88, 118, 179181,
386
initrd, 107, 109
lshw, 136
lumiere, 539
mailman, 276
mencoder-686, 542, 545
mkisofs, 197
most, 38, 61, 64, 67, 70
mozilla, 549
mozplugger, 550
mp3encode, 203
mpegtools, 543
mplayer, 539
mplayer-686, 542, 550
mplayerplug-in, 550
mtools, 290
mutt, 274
myspell-en-gb, 443
mysql, 450
mysql-client, 413
mysql-doc, 413
mysql-navigator, 413, 416
mysql-server, 413, 414
mytop, 413
nautilus, 206, 357, 539
nautilus-cd-burner, 423
ncftp, 30
nfs-client, 437
nfs-kernel-server, 437, 438
nfs-user-server, 437
ntp, 39, 217
ntp-simple, 70, 216
ntpdate, 39, 62, 65, 68, 70, 216,
217
nvidia-glx, 546
nvidia-kernel-2.4.25-1-686-smp,
546
ogle, 539, 540
ogle-gui, 540
openoffice.org, 62, 65, 68

589
openssh, 517
pcmcia, 425
pcmcia-source, 388
postfix, 269
preview-latex, 396
procmail, 269
prosper, 461
pstoedit, 354, 357
python, 316, 327
python-base, 469
python-dev, 469
python-doc, 469
python-examples, 469
python-gdbm, 469
python-glade2, 64
python-gnome, 316
python-gnome2, 64
python-mpz, 469
python-regrtest, 469
python-rpy, 471
python-tk, 469
python-xmlbase, 469
qmail, 269
quanta, 363
rawrec, 505
rdist, 456, 464
readvcd, 208
reportbug, 150
rsync, 481, 482
rubber, 396, 475
samba, 483
sane-utils, 486
screem, 363
sendmail, 269
silo, 179
Sketch, 503
sndconfig, 163
sodipodi, 353
sound-recorder, 505, 509
spamassassin, 276, 277
ssh, 38, 59, 61, 64, 67, 70, 84,

590

INDEX
171, 270, 456, 517, 518, 520,
521, 523
subtitleripper, 542
sudo, 139, 197, 527
swat, 483
synaptic, 44, 48
task, 27
task-imap, 273
task-tex, 28
tasksel, 48
tetex-bin, 395
tetex-extra, 395
totem, 539
transcode, 542
usbmgr, 74, 533
usbutils, 533
usbview, 533
vcdgear, 208
vcdimager, 208
video-dvdrip, 197, 542
viewcvs, 227
vlc, 539
vm, 274
vrms, 39, 62, 65, 68
w32codecs, 539
wajig, 38, 62, 65, 67, 70, 84,
137139, 150
webmagick, 357
wget, 30, 556
wv, 407
x-ttcidfont-conf, 293
x-window-system, 39, 62, 65, 68,
71
xcdroast, 199
xfce, 235
xfig, 353, 354, 475
xgobi, 356
xgraph, 354
xine-dvdnav, 540
xine-ui, 62, 65, 68, 71, 539, 540
xingmp3enc, 203

xmms, 39, 62, 65, 68, 508, 556

xosl, 179
xsane, 486
xserver-xfree86, 127, 293
xterm, 563
zile, 38, 61, 64, 67
pcmcia, 425
pcmcia-source, 388
Pen, 243
Photoshop, 299
plog, 459
pop, 517
postfix, 269
ppconfig, 459
pppconfig, 459
Prefect, 43, 438
preview-latex, 396
procmail, 269
Programs
Development, 305
prosper, 461
pseudo-image, 32
pstoedit, 354, 357
public html, 552
Punto, 438
purpose built, 58, 60
pydoc, 469
python, 316, 327
python-base, 469
python-dev, 469
python-doc, 469
python-examples, 469
python-gdbm, 469
python-glade2, 64
python-gnome, 316
python-gnome2, 64
python-mpz, 469
python-regrtest, 469
python-rpy, 471
python-tk, 469
python-xmlbase, 469

INDEX
qmail, 269
QT+ toolkit, 341
quanta, 363
rawrec, 505
rcp, 517
rdist, 456, 464
readvcd, 208
Red Hat, 33
RedHat, xxix
reftex, 396
releases
frozen, 25
sid, 25
stable, 25, 26, 141
testing, 25, 26, 148
unstable, 25, 26, 107, 109, 116,
147, 148
woody, 25
reload (wajig command), 150
reportbug, 150
restart (wajig command), 150
Reverse Dragging, 245
ripmake, 545
rlogin, 517
rm, 9
root, 197
Rose, 435
rsh, 517
rsync, 32, 152, 481, 482, 522
rubber, 396, 475
samba, 483
sane-utils, 486
Save, 313
sawfish, 564
screem, 363
Select, 248
Connected, 248
Transitive, 248
sendmail, 269

591
Settings, 319
SGI, 21
Sheets, 237, 243, 250
Shortcuts
Ctl+C (copy), 247
Ctl+D (delete), 248
Ctl+F2, 305
Ctl+Q, 319
Ctl+Q (quit), 247
Ctl+S, 319
Ctl+S (save), 245
Ctl+V (paste), 247
Ctl+W (close), 247
Ctl+X (cut), 247
F3, 319
F3 (open), 244, 319
sid, 25
silo, 179
Sketch, 503
Slackware, 33
smbpasswd, 483
sndconfig, 163
sodipodi, 353
sort, 9
sound recording, 505
connecting, 506
mixer, 506
plugs, 506
recording settings, 507
required software, 505
steps, 508
sound-recorder, 505, 509
sources.list, 59, 61, 64
spamassassin, 276, 277
src, 314, 315
src/gword, 314
src/Makefile.am, 318
src/Makefile.in, 318
ssh, 38, 59, 61, 64, 67, 70, 84, 171,
270, 456, 517523
ssh-add, 520, 522

592
ssh-agent, 520
ssh-keygen, 519
stable, 25, 26, 141
stage/products.jar, 448
start (wajig command), 150
startx, 562
stop (wajig command), 150
su, 46
subtitleripper, 542
sudo, 139, 197, 527
support.c, 314, 317
support.h, 314
SVG, 255
swap, 107
swapon -a, 530
swat, 483
synaptic, 44, 48
system clock, 215
task, 27
task-imap, 273
task-tex, 28
tasksel, 39, 48, 62, 65, 68
telnet, 517, 523
testing, 25, 26, 148
tetex-bin, 395
tetex-extra, 395
tex
capacity exceeded, 397
texdoc, 395
TimeSys, 21
Tools, 250
Filter, 277
Filters, 277
totem, 539
transcode, 542
tzconfig, 215
UML, 238
Undo, 248
Universal Modelling Language, see
UML

INDEX
unstable, 25, 26, 107, 109, 116, 147,
148
update-grub, 74, 182
update-modules, 107, 109, 118, 389
update-rc.d, 369
upgrade (wajig command), 146
uptime, 8
USB, 52
USB Printer, 52
usb-storage, 534
usbmgr, 74, 533, 535
usbutils, 533
usbview, 533, 535
users
kayon, 270, 271
root, 197
users-admin, 359
uudecode, 276
uuencode, 276
VA Linux Systems, 21
vcdgear, 208
vcdimager, 208
Velox, 121, 180, 185, 194, 195, 216,
218, 381, 383, 428, 437, 451,
546, 548
vfat, 534
video chips
ati rage 128 pro tf, 106
nvidia, 546
video-dvdrip, 197, 542
View, 245, 248, 319
Diagram Properties, 248
New View, 248
Show All, 248
Show Clipboard, 305, 321
Show Widget Tree, 305, 309
Zoom, 248
Zoom In, 248
Zoom Out, 248
viewcvs, 227

INDEX
Vince, 573
Virtual Mail Folders, 281
Visio, 237
visudo, 38, 62, 65, 67, 70
Vivaldi, 382
vlc, 539
vm, 274
vorbiscomment, 164
vrms, 39, 62, 65, 68
w32codecs, 539
wajig, 38, 62, 65, 67, 70, 84, 137
139, 150
Wajig Commands
build, 146
dist-upgrade, 107, 109
help, 139
reload, 150
restart, 150
start, 150
stop, 150
upgrade, 146
wc, 9
web browser
galeon, 549
web server
apache, 550
webmagick, 357
wget, 30, 556
window manager, 564
woody, 25
word processor
abiword, 165
word processor
latex, 395
wv, 407
x-ttcidfont-conf, 293
x-window-system, 39, 62, 65, 68, 71
xcdroast, 199
xf86config, 559

593
XF86Setup, 559
xfce, 235
xfig, 353, 354, 475
xfree86
4.2, 106
xgobi, 356
xgraph, 354
xine-dvdnav, 540
xine-ui, 62, 65, 68, 71, 539, 540
xingmp3enc, 203
xmms, 39, 62, 65, 68, 508, 556
xosl, 179
xsane, 486
xserver-xfree86, 127, 293
xterm, 563
zile, 38, 61, 64, 67