Welcome From The Chief Editor

Xfce Power User Tips, Tricks & Tweaks: File Utilities (Part One)

Game Zone: Sacred Citadel

PCLinuxOS Recipe Corner

Inkscape Tutorial: A Torn Paper Effect

ms_meme's nook: Sandbox Blues

Linux vs. Windows

dmidecode: See What Your BIOS Has To Say

LibreOffice Tips & Tricks: Part One

Backup Your Gmail Account With getmail

PCLinuxOS Puzzled Partitions

My Mobile Home Park's Wifi Setup

Running A Simple HTTPD Web Server

Screenshot Showcase

Welcome From The Chief Editor

WOW! It's hard to believe, but this issue marks a couple of milestones for The PCLinuxOS Magazine. First, it was four years ago this month that The PCLinuxOS Magazine was "reborn." Second, this month marks my four year "anniversary" as the chief editor of The PCLinuxOS Magazine. During that time, we have managed to produce and maintain a monthly publication schedule, and we have produced a number of "Special Editions" of the magazine. We accomplished this after my predecessor reduced the publication of the magazine to a quarterly publication schedule (he said there wasn't enough to write about ... huh?) and after he tried to "kill off" the magazine during a period of time when PCLinuxOS was going through some turmoil.

Also during that time, I've overseen The PCLinuxOS Magazine website's move to a new server, a complete redesign of that website, the closure of the magazine's separate forum, a redesign of the magazine's layout, and the addition of many new columns and regular features in the magazine. Some of those new and regular features in the magazine include a monthly Game Zone column, ms_meme's Nook, ms_meme's Forum Foibles, YouCanToo's PCLinuxOS Recipe Corner, and the PCLinuxOS Puzzled Partitions puzzle pages, to name a few. The journey hasn't always been a smooth one, but we persevered and overcame whatever "obstacles" came our way.

I am proud of what we have accomplished, and I believe that I'm dead-on target when I say that the staff of The PCLinuxOS Magazine is also equally proud of their achievements. We only hope that you've enjoyed the journey spanning the past four years as much as we've enjoyed bringing it to you.

OK ... now don't go reading anything into what I just said. Nope. I'm not planning on going anywhere for the foreseeable future. I don't think Meemaw is, either. Granted, a lot of work goes into the production of each and every issue of The PCLinuxOS Magazine. The end of month has become known as "crunch time" for those of us who put together the next month's issue of the magazine, each and every month. For us, it's our way of contributing something back to the best damn Linux distribution out there ... PCLinuxOS!

In "other news," June saw the return of the Gnome 2 desktop, in a way, with the addition of the Mate 1.6 desktop to the PCLinuxOS repository. Texstar was successful in compiling a fully functional Mate desktop that users can now install on top of a PCLinuxOS MiniMe or PCLinuxOS LXDE installation. Unless the end user removes the LXDE or KDE desktops and applications, the end user can switch back and forth between the different installed desktops, including the Mate desktop. After all, Linux is all about choice, and now PCLinuxOS users have yet another choice to add to all the other choices that are made available to them.

Also ... less than two months remain until the arrival of our new baby! After seven years of trying, to say that we (my wife and I) are excited is the largest understatement of all time. So, until next month, I wish you all peace, happiness, serenity and prosperity.

Xfce Power User Tips, Tricks & Tweaks: File Utilities (Part One)

by Paul Arnote (parnote)

In the previous Xfce Power User Tips, Tricks & Tweaks articles, we learned how to work with graphics files, archive files, multimedia files, and document files. Where these tips really shine, though, is in the file utility area -- so much so, that I'll need to break this up into two articles. This first part deals with the only deficiency/annoyance of Thunar that I can find -- the improper reporting of file sizes.

Show Correct File Sizes In Thunar

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us ... -- Charles Dickens, A Tale Of Two Cities.

I almost called this section "A Tale Of Two (Or More) File Managers." It's a perfect description of the only real "problem" I've encountered with Thunar. Indulge me while I bring you up to speed on how I discovered that Thunar isn't reporting the correct file sizes.

It's no secret that my favorite Linux desktop is Xfce. I love its simplicity, and find it to be a much more "mature" desktop than LXDE. Xfce has been around longer than LXDE, so it's understandable that it has had more time to "grow up." For me, it has "just enough" plugins available to allow me to tailor my desktop how I want, without getting weighed down with a bunch of unnecessary (and CPU cycle hogging) eye candy. My "love affair" for Xfce started when I discovered how nicely it ran on my older computers. As a result, I run Xfce on most of my computers -- even on my newest computer with a six core AMD FX-8100 processor. I do have ONE computer that uses the KDE desktop.

Every month, as you already know, I prepare each new issue of The PCLinuxOS Magazine and oversee the announcement of each new issue. For several months in a row, Old-Polack would write me back to tell me that I had listed the "wrong" file size in my monthly release notice. As an example, the file size for the June 2013 issue of The PCLinuxOS Magazine was reported as 10.7 MB by Thunar. However, checking the file size of the magazine PDF file in KDE's Dolphin file manager, the file size was reported as 10.2 MB -- a whole 0.5 MB difference! I also discovered that the PCManFM and Nautilus file managers also report the correct 10.2 MB file size.

As another example, in the image below, a video of one of our sonograms is highlighted. Thunar reports its file size as 105.9 MB, but every other file manager in existence reports is as 100.98 MB. Even if the file size is rounded up to 101.0 MB, that represents a whopping 4.9 MB discrepancy between what Thunar reports and the actual file size!

So I decided to file a "bug" report on the Xfce Bugzilla page. Read the entire entry for yourself, below.

Bug 9887 - Thunar displays incorrect file size information in Thunar status bar

Status:    RESOLVED WONTFIX

Product:    Thunar
Component:  general
Version:    1.4.0
Platform:   PC (x86) Linux
[snip]
Reported:   2013-03-03 18:09 CET by Paul Arnote
Modified:   2013-05-01 16:35 CEST (History)
CC List:    1 user (show)

Description Paul Arnote 2013-03-03 18:09:25 CET

Thunar is displaying the incorrect file size for a single selected file, or a group of multiple files selected. Thunar is reporting the MiB of the file as the number of KiB/1000, which is the method that hard drive manufacturers use to dupe us into believing we're getting a larger hard drive than we actually get.

The MiB file sizes should be based on the KiB/1024 measurement, which is how the OS sees a MiB. By using a simple hand calculator, I can take the total number of bytes listed in the file properties dialog and divide by 1024. The result is the same number of MiB that are reported by other file managers, such as Dolphin under KDE, and by Firefox when I download that same file. The larger the file, the larger the discrepancy between what is reported by Thunar as the file size and how every other application sees the file size.

Comment 1 Paul Arnote 2013-03-03 18:13:13 CET

BTW, I've found this same behavior on Thunar versions 1.4.0 and 1.6.0.

Comment 2 Nick Schermer 2013-05-01 16:35:50 CEST

Yes, and that is the correct thing to do:

https://developer.gnome.org/glib/2.36/glib-Miscellaneous-Utility-Functions.html#GFormatSizeFlags
explains why Thunar uses G_FORMAT_SIZE_DEFAULT.

Well, DRATS! OK ... I used somewhat different verbiage, but you get the idea. Seriously? For whatever reason, the Xfce developers are singularly interpreting that GFormatSizeFlags should be based on the 1,000 byte divisor, instead of the 1024 byte divisor -- as everyone else does. I find it funny that the Xfce developers are the only ones adhering to the stated GNOME standard. The last time I used Nautilus, the GNOME file manager, even it was reporting file sizes properly. Basically, using the 1,000 byte divisor describes more or less how much hard drive space a file is using (disregarding disk sector sizes), as opposed to how big the file actually is.

You could compile a custom version of Thunar, with the source code corrected to display the proper file size, but that is something that is far beyond the capabilities or knowledge of a typical user. In fact, I wouldn't recommend this "fix" for anyone but the most experienced user with a programming background. Fortunately, we can correct this error with a Thunar Custom Action. The custom action becomes the second best option, and for most users, the only acceptable option.

To start with, open a plain text editor and type in (or copy) the following bash script. Preferably, save it to a location somewhere in your path. I store mine in my ~/Scripts directory, and call it file-size.sh. Special thanks to Pete Kelly, a.k.a. critter, for his assistance with this script. Don't forget to make the file "executable."

#! /bin/bash

kb=$((2**10))
mb=$((2**20))

for file in $@; do
        if [ ! -e $file ]; then
                continue
        fi
     b1=`ls -l $file | cut -d" " -f5`
     let "b += b1"
done
     k=`echo -e "scale=2; $b/$kb" | bc`
     m=`echo -e "scale=2; $b/$mb" | bc`

zenity --info --title="Actual File Size" --width=300
--height=100 --text="$b bytes\n$k KB\n$m MB"

Provide a name and description for your new custom action. I entered "Actual File Size" on the first line for the name, and "Report the ACTUAL file size" on the second line for the description. On the third line, enter the following command:

$HOME/Scripts/file-size.sh %N

Select an icon for your new Thunar Custom Command. Under the "Appearance Conditions" tab, place a checkmark in front of every file type, and keep the "File pattern" set to the default * value. Now, whenever you select "Actual File Size" from Thunar's right click context menu, you will see a dialog box similar to the one shown below. You can select a single file or directory, or multiple files or directories. If you select multiple "items," the total file size will be calculated for all of the files, added together.

Enjoy the reporting of proper file sizes in Thunar. This custom action should be in the arsenal of every Xfce user, if you care at all about knowing the proper size of your files. In the next Xfce Power User Tips, Tricks & Tweaks article, I'll show you several more file utilities you can employ.

Game Zone: Sacred Citadel

by daiashi

About The Game

Three warriors unite against an evil that threatens to enslave the once peaceful world of Ancaria. Lord Zane's Ashen Empire has created an army of Grimmocs, modified Orc henchmen at war with the Seraphim. Only when these heroes unite and use their skills to support each other they will stand a chance.

There are four playable character classes, the Seraphim Mage, Safiri Warrior, Ancarian Ranger and the Khukuri Shaman, each with a different skill set that can be further individualized through RPG features and collectible items. Each character will also have the ability to dual-wield two exchangeable weapons and use combo attacks, all of which combines into a fluid and unique arcade game experience with sophisticated graphics and spectacular effects. The player will also be able to ride mounts, use war machines and spend his hard earned cash in towns all over the world of Sacred Citadel.

Sacred Citadel will also offer an engrossing multiplayer mode. Up to three players can join forces against their enemies in coop mode.

Sharpen your axe, string your bow, brew your potions! Ancaria needs heroes like you. Grab your friends to join the resistance!

The once peaceful land of Ancaria is in grave danger. The evil Ashen empire has enslaved its population and is using the orc-like Grimmoc to wipe out the Seraphim, who swore to protect it. In order to defeat the empire you will have to prove yourself as a warrior by riding terrifying mounts, acquiring earth shattering skills and looting powerful weapons and valuable treasures. Grab your friends and join the resistance!

Key Features:

Battle it out with up to 3 player co-op

Take charge of 1 of 4 unique playable character classes with their own set of skills

Explore the vast world of Ancaria

Ride thumping mounts and use devastating war-machines

Tons of loot!

Define your own fighting style with different weapon combinations

Software:

Playonlinux, Wine and Steam.

System requirements:

Minimum:

OS: Vista/Win7

Processor: 2GHz Dual Core

Memory: 2 GB RAM

Graphics: Nvidia GeForce 8600 or better, ATI Radeon HD 2600 or better

DirectX: 9.0c

Additional: GPU Memory: 256MB

About The Company

Founded in 1998, Southend Interactive lays claim to providing the video gaming community with the absolute best in digital entertainment for over a decade. They specialize in high-end console, PC, and mobile games development. Over the years, the have fortified their expertise in numerous gaming platforms across multiple genres.

They believe that the main component to their success is their passion for video games, combined with their advanced, proprietary technology. They take pride in their award winning games, ensuring the public that their products are that of the highest standards.

At Southend, they develop first class video games for multiple platforms, including console, mobile and PC. For them, there are three magical ingredients for doing fun games: freedom for everyone to be creative, kickbutt technology and love for games.

Some Gameplay Screenshots

Getting It To Run

This game was installed using Playonlinux, which is available through Synaptic. After you have Playonlinux installed, click on the game tab to find Steam. It should install Wine version 1.5.25.

After Wine is finished and Steam is updated, search for the game in the store and download the demo. It ran very well on my computer, with a 2.6 dual core AMD processor and nVidia 9600 with 4 gigs of RAM. You may have to set the game window to "on top," since my taskbar was visible until I did this.

PCLinuxOS Recipe Corner

Slow Cooker Beef Stroganoff

Ingredients:

2 pounds beef stew meat.
1 cup chopped onion.
1 can (10 3/4 ounces) condensed cream of golden mushroom soup.
1 can (10 3/4 ounces) condensed cream of onion soup.
1 jar (6 ounces) sliced mushrooms, drained or use fresh sliced.
1/4 teaspoon pepper.
1 package (8 ounces) cream cheese, cubed.
1 container (8 ounces) sour cream.
6 cups hot cooked noodles or rice.

Cooking Instructions:

1. In 3 1/2- to 4 1/2-quart slow cooker, mix beef, onion, soups, mushrooms and pepper.
2. Cover and cook on low heat setting 8 to 10 hours or until beef is very tender.
3. Stir cream cheese into beef mixture until melted. Stir sour cream into beef mixture. Serve over noodles.

Inkscape Tutorial: A Torn Paper Effect

by Meemaw

If you are like me, you want all your projects to look crisp and perfect, even around the edges. However, sometimes you may want a "weathered" effect on something you are creating. I scrapbook a bit - gotta chronicle the growth of my grandchildren, and make sure past memories are recorded for the future. Sometimes your design calls for a more antique effect. This tutorial is to give the effect of torn paper on the edge of a printed photo.

Scan and save your photo. Open Inkscape and import your photo. As it has been repeated many times, always work on a copy so you don't lose your original, but once it is imported into Inkscape, you are working on a copy, so your original will remain unchanged.

Before you do anything, create a rectangle the same size as your photo. Remember, when your photo is chosen, the dimensions are in the bar above your project. Just create a rectangle and change the dimensions to the same height and width as your photo. Make the Fill Black and Stroke none. Put it to the side to use later.

Using the pencil tool, draw a box around your photo, cutting across the corners or sides where you want the edges to look torn. Draw a second one, and overlap the line on the first box, so they are kind of wavy back & forth. On my photo, the top right and bottom left corners are going to be frayed the most. Notice my lines cross in a few places.

The next step will be done to both lines. We want to make our curves more jagged, so it will look like a rougher tear. Choose both lines, then click Extensions > Modify Path > Add Nodes. You will be asked whether you want to add by segment length or segment number. Choose segment length and change that to 5 px. Click Apply, then Close. Then, with the same line chosen, click on Extensions > Modify Path > Jitter Nodes. You will be asked about displacement. I put 2 px in each space and left the rest alone. Click Apply, then Close. In the example below I have only done one of them so you can see the difference.

We are going to use one of these lines to "cut off" part of our photo. Choose one of the lines and duplicate it, setting the duplicate aside. (We'll do enough duplicates here that you can probably use the keystroke <CTRL> + D faster than you can click on Edit > Duplicate.) Choose the same line that you just duplicated, and then the photo (hold the Shift key to choose the photo), click on Object > Clip > Set. Any corners outside the line should now be gone.

Using the same line you just used, change the fill to black and the stroke to none. Set the blur on it to 0.5, and send it down behind the original. Duplicate it, and on the duplicate, change the fill to something similar to your photo's border, and change the stroke to none. Align those two with the lighter one on top, and slide them under your photo with the lines matched up. That is going to give a little shadow to the torn border of the photo. These three objects can be grouped so you don't have to line them up over and over.

Just as a reminder, the Selection toolbar, just above your project, is activated when your Selection tool, or cursor is chosen. It has the Levels buttons, so you can stack things in a certain order. From left to right, you can Lower to Bottom, Lower One Level, Raise One Level, or Raise to Top. We'll use these many times while we're working on this project.

Many photos have two layers of paper, and when they tear, the layers tear in different spots. Using the second line you created will give this effect. Duplicate your photo, and the line, and slide the line off to the side. Using this line and photo duplicate, click Object > Clip > Set again to cut off the corners in different spots. Slide it back over the photo you did earlier. Then, click on the line duplicate you just made, set the fill to something just a bit lighter than the photo border, and the stroke to none. Duplicate it again, and on the duplicate, set the fill to black, stroke to none, and set the blur to 0.5. Line these two up with the black underneath and group them, then send them to the bottom. Then slide them behind the photo where you want them. You can group these as well.

Now you need to position these photos directly over each other. I should be fairly easy with some of the corners cut off, but you probably need to zoom in on your edges and use your arrow keys to move a pixel at a time.

Position the black rectangle you created earlier over the photo and make sure everything is lined up. Using your cursor only, click and drag around the edges of your project to select everything, then click on Object > Clip > Set again. Your photo should now have straight sides again except for the torn parts and the torn parts should look like they have a little shadow around the edges..

Some of this may have been a bit difficult, and I hope your photo came out the way you wanted it. As with anything, practice helps.

This torn paper effect can be used other places too. Your only limit is your imagination!

ms_meme's nook: Sandbox Blues

                                        MP3             OGG

Linux vs. Windows

by Shamus Young
Reprinted with permission
from his blog, Twenty Sided

Recently, I installed both Windows and Linux in some kind of dual-boot situation. So now I've had a chance to use the two systems side-by-side so I can make a proper apples-to-Macintosh type comparison. I've installed both and I've used both, and I'm ready to offer Linux some constructive criticism. It's a good attempt at an operating system, but they need to make some changes if they want to beat Windows.

Linux Doesn't Reboot Enough

I'm not sure how they managed to mess up something as simple as rebooting. I mean, it's just restarting the computer. It's like a blue screen of death that skips the blue screen.

When I installed Windows the process worked properly: The installer looked at my computer for a long time, then copied some files and rebooted. Then it had another long ponder before rebooting again. Then it booted into Windows, announced there were critical updates, and asked to boot again. Then once I installed my graphics drivers it wanted another boot. I guess my only complaint is that it stopped to ask about that fourth reboot. That was kind of odd. I mean, why would I say no?

On the other hand, the Linux installer feels like it's missing parts or something. I ran the installer and it rebooted just once, right into Linux. After that I installed some updates, but the machine still didn't ask to reboot itself. It just sat there like it was ready for me to start using it. I waited ten minutes just to be sure, but it never did ask to restart.

Eventually I had to bring in the laptop and reboot that, just so I could feel like the job was done properly.

Linux Doesn't Remind Me About Things

Look, I can't be expected to keep track of all the complicated stuff the computer needs me to do. That's what notification popups are for. I'll be sitting there, writing a document or surfing the web, oblivious to the sea of problems going on behind the scenes. Then a little popup appears to save me from my unbridled productivity and let me know that there's an update wizard waiting to be run, or that I need to set up the update wizard so that it can remind me to run it later. Or perhaps I need to download and install the update wizard so that it can remind me to set it up to remind me to run it. That's a lot of stuff to keep track of, and without notifications I'd never be able to keep up.

Linux doesn't do any of this for you. Oh sure, there's a little shield on the Panel (that's what Linux people call the taskbar) that shows a green check mark if everything is okay and something else if it isn't, but you have to remember to look down there yourself. Plus, that shield thing is only good for critical stuff like software upgrades. It doesn't ever help you out with advice on desktop icon placement, or how you manage your toolbar, and I guess I'm supposed to keep track of virus scanners by myself and remember to do my own backups? How can anyone work like this?

Linux Doesn't Boot or Shutdown Properly

Everyone knows that properly booting a computer takes several minutes, and shutting one down takes a couple more. We don't know why, and we don't know what sort of mysterious things are happening when that red disk access light is flickering. All we do know is that these things are terribly important. Everyone knows this.

Everyone except the people running Linux apparently, because they decided to cut some corners when it comes to starting up and shutting down. I'd say they got rid of half the stuff the computer does at startup. And shutdown? They just skip the whole thing. You tell the machine to shut down and it just does it right then and there, without sitting at a logo screen for a couple of minutes. It's like they thought we wouldn't notice little details like this.

Linux Software is Like, Weird and Stuff

I hope you're not going to try to get anything done on Linux, because it doesn't have any software. You want Internet Explorer? Nope. Notepad? Nope. Minesweeper? Missing. New Hardware Detection Setup and Driver Install Wizard? MIA.

Oh sure, Linux users will tell you about “alternatives.” Instead of Internet Explorer they have goofy off-brand programs like Firefox and Chrome. And their Notepad knockoff is strange because it has all these strange things like formatting, fonts, and spell checking.

There's this huge library of software out there that you can download through their own proprietary downloader. They don't even charge you money for it, which means it's all pirated.

Linux Doesn't Have the Genuine Advantage

For years I've been typing these huge codes into Windows when I install it. Yes, they're long and hard to type and it's kind of annoying, but that's the cost of getting a Genuine Advantage. Linux doesn't have anything like this. They couldn't even be bothered to add in a little one. Clearly Linux has no advantage at all.

So that's Linux. Frankly, with software this bad I can't imagine how Linux manages to stay in business.

About the author

I'm Shamus Young, a 40 year old writer and software engineer and an enthusiastically married father of 3. In my free time I tend to play videogames and write software of dubious value. I also tend to write about these things here.

If you're looking to suggest or request an article on a particular subject, look here. If you want to buy my books, look here.

If you'd like to contact me my email is: shamus -at- shamusyoung dot com.

If you're nosy and want some personal info: I'm a Christian, but an nontraditional one who is happy to live harmoniously with other people without forcing my values on them. I keep my politics to myself, because I'd rather have friends than "win" arguments. I don't have a degree. If you need more, you can read more than you ever wanted to know about me in my autoblography.

Also, you can buy my books or buy my books.

dmidecode: See What Your BIOS Has To Say

by Paul Arnote (parnote)

Linux, Unix and BSD users have it good. Real good. Especially when it comes to polling their computer about its current BIOS settings.

BIOS stands for "Basic Input Output System," and the computer's BIOS acts like a traffic cop or translator, making it possible for all of the different components and parts of your computer hardware to talk with one another and interoperate in harmony. Sometimes, your computer BIOS is also sometimes known as DMI, which is an abbreviation for Desktop Management Interface.

Source: Wikipedia

How many times have you wondered about whether a certain setting was available or enacted in your computer's BIOS? Or, how many times did you wonder about your computer's hardware configuration? Well, with the dmidecode command, you can find all of that sort of information your mind can ingest.

dmidecode is already installed on your PCLinuxOS installation. Open a terminal session, switch to the root user, and type dmidecode at the command line prompt. You should be shown hundreds of lines of output that provides details about most every aspect of your computer hardware. Below is a snippet of information dmidecode is able to provide. This dmidecode output is from my IBM Thinkpad T42 laptop.

# dmidecode 2.12
SMBIOS version fixup (2.33 -> 2.3).
SMBIOS 2.3 present.
61 structures occupying 2126 bytes.
Table at 0x000E0010.

Handle 0x0000, DMI type 0, 20 bytes
BIOS Information
    Vendor: IBM
    Version: 1RETDNWW (3.19 )
    Release Date: 10/13/2005
    Address: 0xDC000
    Runtime Size: 144 kB
    ROM Size: 1024 kB
    Characteristics:
        PCI is supported
        PC Card (PCMCIA) is supported
        PNP is supported
        APM is supported
        BIOS is upgradeable
        BIOS shadowing is allowed
        ESCD support is available
        Boot from CD is supported
        Selectable boot is supported
        EDD is supported
        3.5"/720 kB floppy services are supported (int 13h)
        Print screen service is supported (int 5h)
        8042 keyboard services are supported (int 9h)
        Serial services are supported (int 14h)
        Printer services are supported (int 17h)
        CGA/mono video services are supported (int 10h)
        ACPI is supported
        USB legacy is supported
        AGP is supported
        BIOS boot specification is supported

Handle 0x0001, DMI type 1, 25 bytes
System Information
    Manufacturer: IBM
    Product Name: 23738TU
    Version: ThinkPad T42
    Serial Number: L32321Z
    UUID: 56A11681-48B1-11CB-8DF4-B7968D3A47CB
    Wake-up Type: Power Switch

Handle 0x0002, DMI type 2, 8 bytes
Base Board Information
    Manufacturer: IBM
    Product Name: 23738TU
    Version: Not Available
    Serial Number: VJ0BV5CG145

Handle 0x0003, DMI type 3, 17 bytes
Chassis Information
    Manufacturer: IBM
    Type: Notebook
    Lock: Not Present
    Version: Not Available
    Serial Number: Not Available
    Asset Tag: No Asset Information
    Boot-up State: Unknown
    Power Supply State: Unknown
    Thermal State: Unknown
    Security Status: Unknown
    OEM Information: 0x00000000

Handle 0x0004, DMI type 126, 17 bytes
Inactive

Handle 0x0005, DMI type 126, 17 bytes
Inactive

Handle 0x0006, DMI type 4, 35 bytes
Processor Information
    Socket Designation: None
    Type: Central Processor
    Family: Pentium M
    Manufacturer: GenuineIntel
    ID: D6 06 00 00 BF F9 E9 AF
    Signature: Type 0, Family 6, Model 13, Stepping 6
    Flags:
        FPU (Floating-point unit on-chip)
        VME (Virtual mode extension)
        DE (Debugging extension)
        PSE (Page size extension)
        TSC (Time stamp counter)
        MSR (Model specific registers)
        MCE (Machine check exception)
        CX8 (CMPXCHG8 instruction supported)
        SEP (Fast system call)
        MTRR (Memory type range registers)
        PGE (Page global enable)
        MCA (Machine check architecture)
        CMOV (Conditional move instruction supported)
        PAT (Page attribute table)
        CLFSH (CLFLUSH instruction supported)
        DS (Debug store)
        ACPI (ACPI supported)
        MMX (MMX technology supported)
        FXSR (FXSAVE and FXSTOR instructions supported)
        SSE (Streaming SIMD extensions)
        SSE2 (Streaming SIMD extensions 2)
        SS (Self-snoop)
        TM (Thermal monitor supported)
        PBE (Pending break enabled)
    Version: Intel(R) Pentium(R) M processor
    Voltage: 1.3 V
    External Clock: 400 MHz
    Max Speed: 1700 MHz
    Current Speed: 1700 MHz
    Status: Populated, Enabled
    Upgrade: None
    L1 Cache Handle: 0x000A
    L2 Cache Handle: 0x000B
    L3 Cache Handle: Not Provided
    Serial Number: Not Specified
    Asset Tag: Not Specified
    Part Number: Not Specified

Handle 0x0007, DMI type 5, 20 bytes
Memory Controller Information
    Error Detecting Method: None
    Error Correcting Capabilities:
        None
    Supported Interleave: One-way Interleave
    Current Interleave: One-way Interleave
    Maximum Memory Module Size: 1024 MB
    Maximum Total Memory Size: 2048 MB
    Supported Speeds:
        Other
    Supported Memory Types:
        DIMM
        SDRAM
    Memory Module Voltage: 2.9 V
    Associated Memory Slots: 2
        0x0008
        0x0009
    Enabled Error Correcting Capabilities:
        None

Handle 0x0008, DMI type 6, 12 bytes
Memory Module Information
    Socket Designation: DIMM Slot 1
    Bank Connections: 0 1
    Current Speed: Unknown
    Type: DIMM SDRAM
    Installed Size: 1024 MB (Double-bank Connection)
    Enabled Size: 1024 MB (Double-bank Connection)
    Error Status: OK

Handle 0x0009, DMI type 6, 12 bytes
Memory Module Information
    Socket Designation: DIMM Slot 2
    Bank Connections: 2 3
    Current Speed: Unknown
    Type: DIMM SDRAM
    Installed Size: 1024 MB (Double-bank Connection)
    Enabled Size: 1024 MB (Double-bank Connection)
    Error Status: OK

Yes, that's a lot of information ... and that's just a fraction of the total amount of information supplied. To be certain, that's a lot of information to wade through if you are looking for specific information about specific parts of your system. Fortunately, there's a way to limit the dmidecode output.

Looking through the dmidecode output listed above, notice how each "section" of the output is labeled with a specific "DMI type." By knowing what DMI type relates to which section of hardware information, you can tailor dmidecode to show you only the specific data you are seeking.

Here's a list of the different DMI types you can specify:

BIOS

System

Base Board

Chassis 4 Processor

Memory Controller

Memory Module

Cache

Port Connector

System Slots

On Board Devices

OEM Strings

System Configuration Options

BIOS Language

Group Associations

System Event Log

Physical Memory Array

Memory Device

32-bit Memory Error

Memory Array Mapped Address

Memory Device Mapped Address

Built-in Pointing Device

Portable Battery

System Reset

Hardware Security

System Power Controls

Voltage Probe

Cooling Device

Temperature Probe

Electrical Current Probe

Out-of-band Remote Access

Boot Integrity Services

System Boot

64-bit Memory Error

Management Device

Management Device Component

Management Device Threshold Data

Memory Channel

IPMI Device

Power Supply

To utilize the different DMI types, issue the command dmidecode -t x, where x is the number of the DMI type you want to display. Thus, dmidecode -t 21 will display the following information that provides details about the built-in pointing devices on my Thinkpad T42:

dmidecode -t 21
# dmidecode 2.12
SMBIOS version fixup (2.33 -> 2.3).
SMBIOS 2.3 present.

Handle 0x0033, DMI type 21, 7 bytes
Built-in Pointing Device
    Type: Track Point
    Interface: PS/2
    Buttons: 3

Handle 0x0034, DMI type 21, 7 bytes
Built-in Pointing Device
    Type: Touch Pad
    Interface: PS/2
    Buttons: 0

Thus, to display information about the memory device, you would enter dmidecode -t 17. To display information about the specific memory modules installed in your computer, you could enter dmidecode -t 6. You could continue with any of the defined DMI types in the list above. If you come across a DMI type that isn't supported by your particular BIOS, you will see the following:

# dmidecode 2.12
SMBIOS version fixup (2.33 -> 2.3).
SMBIOS 2.3 present.

There is an alternate way to display DMI types, and that is by using dmidecode keywords. Let's say you want to inspect all the information about the memory installed in your computer. Instead of specifying DMI types 5, 6, 16 and 17 separately, you could simply type dmidecode -t memory. When you do, all the information from the relevant sections will be displayed all at once.

Here are the dmidecode keywords you can use, followed by the sections that they relate to:

bios 0, 13
system 1, 12, 15, 23, 32
baseboard 2, 10
chassis 3
processor 4
memory 5, 6, 16, 17
cache 7
connector 8
slot 9

Is dmidecode perfect? Nope. In fact, dmidecode has sometimes provided unreliable information. It has nothing to do with any "flaws" in dmidecode. Rather, it's the nature of the beast. DMI data has been proven to be too unreliable to be just trusted blindly. dmidecode doesn't poll the hardware itself. Instead, it simply reports what the BIOS tells it.

Still, dmidecode is a very useful tool in any Linux user's arsenal. So, the next time you need to gather information about your computer configuration, dmidecode is one tool that can quickly provide that necessary information.

LibreOffice Tips & Tricks: Part One

by Meemaw

In 2010, this magazine did a series on OpenOffice. Since then, the default office suite for PCLinuxOS has become LibreOffice. However, the two programs are almost identical in function, so it was very easy for me to switch all my computers - even the ones at work - to LibreOffice. This will be a series of Tips and Tricks to help you use your office suite more effectively. This time we will be using LibreOffice instead of OpenOffice. I have updated LibreOffice on my computers to Version 4.0.3. The first two articles will focus on LO Writer.

Configuring Options

One of the first things you can do when you open LO is to configure your options. We're going to review them just to see if there is anything new. Clicking on Tools > Options will bring up the options window.

Personalization? That's new. What is it? When you click this section you will find that you can add a Firefox persona to your LO window. The configuration window lets you open up the Firefox extensions window and find a persona you like, then add the link for it in the LO options window. This is good if you have a continuous Internet connection, but if you only connect occasionally with dial-up or your connection is unreliable, you may want to skip this. I found a nice persona called Groovy Blue. You also want to be careful because adding a persona does not change your menu bar, so if the persona is too dark or detailed, you may not be able to see your menu bar or toolbars.

Just as a reminder, you can set the default file extensions on your documents. If you have to share a lot of documents with your MSOffice friends, you can set LO to save in Office format. Go to Load/Save > General in the Options window, and configure each document type from that window. You will see a drop-down containing each document type - text, spreadsheet, presentation - and choose your desired file format from the drop-down to the right.

Looking for Calc or Impress options? Open a blank Calc or Impress document, and then go back to options. We'll look at a few of them in later articles.

Inserting Objects

One of the things you may do in a word processing document is to insert a picture to bring some color to your documents. While everyone may already know how to do it, let's review it anyway. Click on Insert > Picture > From File, and in the pop up window, navigate to the folder where your image is located, choose it and click OK.

Your image will be inserted wherever your cursor is located. If it is a large image, it will take over the whole page, but you can resize it by grabbing one of the handles on the corner and dragging it to the desired size. When the image is selected, your text formatting toolbar changes to a graphics toolbar containing many of the same items. You can center or left-align your picture, turn wrap on and off, put a border around it and even change the border's design.

If your image illustrates something in one of the paragraphs, you should right-click and choose Anchor > To Paragraph from the pop-up menu. That way, your image will stay with the correct paragraph as you edit your document. You can also anchor to page (it should stay where you put it even while you edit the document) or anchor as character (puts it into your text as another character, and moves with that part of the text as you edit).

Making Letterhead or a Reusable Document

Wow! Stationery costs a lot these days! If you can design your own letterhead satisfactorily, and can get the paper you need, you can save some of the money you would pay an outside company to print that stationery. It's an easy process. Open a blank document and set your page formatting. For a one-page letter, go into Format > Page, go to the Header tab and check the box that says "Header On". You can set the height of your header here, too. Click Insert > Picture > From File and insert the image. Then, enter the information you want on your letterhead, and format it as you desire. Save it as Letterhead.odt.

Any time you want to write a letter, open your letterhead, re-save it with an appropriate filename, and compose your letter. When you print it, the letterhead will be on your letter.

Most companies have several form letters they send to their customers. This could be a mailing about a discount they offer once a year, or a specific letter about an unpaid bill they send out when appropriate. At my office we sponsor some activities every year, so instead of rewriting a letter every year, we draft one, and then re-use it the next year, making the necessary changes. The easiest way to do that, and keep a record of past letters is to rename each one for the current year. Opening a letter called "EarthDayInvitation2012", I can change the information I need to change, then choose File > Save As.... and save it as "EarthDayInvitation2013". I keep a separate folder for every year, which gives me a history that I can use to keep track of anything done differently from previous years and notes reminding me what worked and what didn't.

Export Labels to PDF

Labels are so fun to do! Well, maybe not, but I have found that printing them can be easier if they have been exported as a pdf. If you are doing a bigger mailing, a pdf file may be easier to work with if any of your pages print incorrectly. I did a 1200-label mailing a few months ago where one of the label sheets got pulled through before it was needed. I had a page where the addresses printed over the edges of the labels. A pdf file is more easily searched to find the page(s) that should be reprinted. When you finish making your labels, and you have saved the document in LO, export it to a pdf file before you close LO. Open the pdf and print from it.

I know - you are thinking that I'm making extra work by saving two files, but sometimes in LO (AND in Word) I have saved the labels and when I opened them again, they were wrong or some were missing. That has never happened with a pdf. It may have been only my error, but I've done tons of labels in the last few years, and printing them has been so much easier since I started exporting them to a pdf file. I have also had the bad luck to have a printer quit and had to transfer the label file and print them on another printer, and transporting the pdf file is much easier than a writer document.

Thesaurus

How many times have you read something and the writer seems to use the same descriptive word several times? (Yes, I'm guilty of that too.) LO has a nice thesaurus included. Just in case you aren't sure what a thesaurus is, it is a sort of specialized dictionary: one that finds synonyms, or words meaning the same thing as the word you are using. To use the thesaurus, simply highlight your word and click Tools > Language > Thesaurus or press <CTRL> + F7.

Keyboard Shortcuts

Many of these are standard keyboard shortcuts, and are available in other programs as well:

<CTRL> + X     Cut
<CTRL> + C     Copy
<CTRL> + V     Paste
<CTRL> + N     New (in LO it is a new text document)
<CTRL> + O     Open (existing document)
<CTRL> + S     Save (you can use <CTRL> + <SHIFT> + S for Save As....)
<CTRL> + Z     Undo
<CTRL> + Y     Redo
<CTRL> + P     Print
<CTRL> + Q     Quit (close the program)
<CTRL> + Scroll Wheel     Zoom

I have (finally) discovered that the shortcut <CTRL> + Scroll Wheel works in loads of programs! I have used it in Chrome, Firefox, Thunderbird, Inkscape, GIMP, Google Docs, most pdf readers and, of course, LibreOffice. Pushing the scroll wheel forward (away from you) will zoom in and pushing it backward will zoom back out.

Many other useful shortcuts use the function keys and can be used in LO:

<CTRL> + H     Find and Replace
<CTRL> + F3     Auto text
<CTRL> + F4     Close present document
<CTRL> + F5     Navigator
<CTRL> + F7     Thesaurus (if you don't have a word highlighted, you can type one in)
<CTRL> + F10     Set non-printing characters as visible
<CTRL> + F11     Styles and Formatting tool
<CTRL> + F12     Insert table

You also need to remember that some of these keys have a different function in Calc, Impress or Draw

Some of these are used without the <CTRL> button.
F1 LO Help
F7 Spelling & Grammar Check

I hope you have found a tip or two that helps you! Next month we'll look at a few more tips and tricks for LibreOffice Writer.

Backup Your Gmail Account With getmail

by agmg (Antonis Komis)

Backing up your data is always important. Even when it comes to web-based emails. If you are a Gmail user, you can use a simple command-line program called getmail to backup up all your emails to a single .mbox file. This file can then be imported into most email clients (i.e. Thunderbird) and let you have all your Gmail messages in a local folder.

getmail is not installed by default in PCLinuxOS, but you can get it very easily using Synaptic Package Manager. Just search for "getmail" and select it for installation.

Before using getmail, you need to create a configuration directory, a directory to store the .mbox file, and the .mbox file itself. Open your favorite terminal emulator (i.e. Konsole) and type the following command:

mkdir $HOME/.getmail

and then the following command to set permissions for the folder:

chmod -R 0700 $HOME/.getmail

(only owner can read, write and execute on that folder).

The next step is to create a folder for the downloaded messages to be stored in. I have named it "gmail-backup" but you can use any name you like:

mkdir $HOME/gmail-backup

Don't forget to set its permissions, like before:

chmod -R 0700 $HOME/gmail-backup

NOTE: Both "$HOME" and "~" refer to your home directory at /home/

Now, you must create the .mbox file to contain the downloaded messages because getmail does not do this automatically. Type the following command at the prompt to create the .mbox file inside the gmail-backup directory:

touch ~/gmail-backup/gmail-backup.mbox

Again, you can use any name you like for your .mbox file.

Finally, you must create a configuration file for getmail to use and read your Gmail account information. Additionally, this configuration file will tell getmail where to save your downloaded messages.

Open your favorite text editor (i.e. KWrite) and copy-paste the following text in a file:

[retriever]
type = SimplePOP3SSLRetriever
server = pop.gmail.com
username = yourname@gmail.com
password = yourpassword
[destination]
type = Mboxrd
path = ~/gmail-backup/gmail-backup.mbox
[options]
verbose = 2
message_log = ~/.getmail/gmail.log

Change the username and password to the ones for your Gmail account. If you used a different directory and filename for the .mbox file, change the "path" in the "destination" section to reflect your actual path and filename.

NOTE 1: you have to enable POP3 support for your Gmail account in order for getmail to be able to successfully retrieve your messages.
More info: https://support.google.com/mail/troubleshooter/1668960?hl=en

NOTE 2: if you are using two-step verification for your Gmail account, you need to authorize getmail by generating an application-specific password and use that instead of your main account password.
More info: https://support.google.com/accounts/topic/28786?hl=en&ref_topic=2373945

Once you have filled all the required data, save your file as:

~/.getmail/getmailrc

Close your text editor and return to the terminal.

Type getmail

You'll see a long string of messages display in the terminal window as getmail starts downloading the contents of your Gmail account. You can stop it at any time by typing Ctrl+C inside the terminal window.

NOTE: If the script stops, don't panic. Google has some limits on how many messages can be downloaded from an account at one time. To continue downloading your messages, just run the getmail command again and getmail will pick up where it left off. See getmail's FAQs for more information about this issue.

Once getmail finishes downloading all your emails, you will see an informative message and you will be returned to the prompt. You can safely close the terminal window.

You can automate the process of backing up your Gmail account by creating a shell script and setting it to run on a schedule using a cron job that runs once a day, once a week, or however often you feel is necessary.

Official website: http://pyropus.ca/software/getmail/

PCLinuxOS Puzzled Partitions

Download puzzle solutions here

Download puzzle solutions here

PCLinuxOS Crossword Puzzle: June 2013
Graphic Terms

Download puzzle solutions here

Crossword Puzzle Hints
1. to conver an image and save it as another filetype.
2. a tool used to apply a specific effect to an object.
3. the intensity of color in a picture.
4. the difference in the color and brightness of an object and other objects within the samefield of view.
5. to replace information for one part of a picture with information from another part.
6. a type of memory organization or images file format used to store digital images.
7. graphical image made to be displayed as a background on a computer screen.
8. used in digital image editing to seperate different elements of an image.
9. painting too used to fill an object with color.
10. to cut out part of a picture to keep or emphasize andother part.
11. the lightness of a color.
12. the rapid display of a sequence of images to create and illusion of movement.
13. the components of a layer separated into red, green and blue colors.
14. one of the main properties of a color.
15. the adjustment of the intensity of colors.

PCLinuxOS Graphics Word Search

(Click on image to enlarge)
Download puzzle solutions here

My Mobile Home Park's Wifi Setup

by Grandpa

Now, why would you be interested in my mobile home park's WiFi setup? Maybe you and your neighbors would like to share a fast Internet connection and share the cost. I am sure you can think of many reasons why this could be helpful. So, having never tried to write anything like this before, I will try to explain how we did it.

First a little background. I live in the Southern California desert. Most of our residents are "Snowbirds." Snowbirds are people who live in the Northern USA and Canada. In the winter months, they come South where it is warmer. We all know how a good fast, secure Internet connection is needed in our lives today. Most connections like that can be expensive. They also require a 12-month contract. So we share 4 DSL connections with 100/120 people. We charge $25.00 a year. Yes, that is $25.00 for 12 months of fast secure Internet.

How did we do this? The park already had 4 phone lines coming into the Park. One line went to the gate entry call box.

One went to the TV shack. We also have our own cable TV system.

Another line goes to the 911 phone in the Spa area, and the fax machine in the office. The office line had DSL already on it. We had DSL put on the other three. I guess here I should tell you that the park owns the phone lines in the park. Verizon brings the lines into a corner of the park, and from there, we run them to every site.

So, from that box in the corner, we ran three new lines to the office. We connected the three new and the existing office DSL to these four Verizon routers.

After connecting an ethernet cable to each of them we routed them up into the attic. One went to a Linksys WRT54g router, which had the stock firmware replaced with DD-WRT firmware. It was connected to an antenna on the front of the clubhouse.

The other three went through the attic, out the back, under the street, to this pole, with three antennas attached to it.

There is one omni and two directional antennas. You can also see a box under them. In that box, there are the circuit boards from three Linksys WRT54g routers with DD-WRT firmware installed on them. All routers have very strong passwords. The users must be given a password in order to use the router we want them to use.

We use DD-WRT firmware because it is much more programmable. It is open source software based on Linux. I could go into detail how to install the software. However, it is available on their website, along with instructions to install and program. Their information is very well written and easy to follow.

Running A Simple HTTPD Web Server

by YouCanToo

There are times that you want to test out a web script or page, but you don't want to install a resource hungry web server, or don't need to run a mySQL database or a server side script. IE: PHP, CGI, etc.

Here comes Python to the rescue. Python has a module to run a mini web server on your system. It takes no time to configure and eats up very little system resources! With the help of this little HTTP server you can turn any directory in your system into your web server directory. The only thing you need to have installed is Python, which is installed by default in PCLinuxOS.

Starting your Simple Server from the command line

Open up a terminal and go to the directory you would like to start the web server:

cd /home/somedirectory

In my example I called mine "SimpleServer"

[dwmoar@laptop ~]$ cd SimpleServer
[dwmoar@laptop SimpleServer]$

Now to start your Simple Server we enter

python -m SimpleHTTPServer

That's it! Now your http server will start using the default port 8000. You will see the following message in the terminal window

[dwmoar@laptop SimpleServer]$ python -m SimpleHTTPServer
Serving HTTP on 0.0.0.0 port 8000

If you want to run your Simple Server on another port you need to start it using the following format.

python -m SimpleHTTPServer port number

Example:

If I used python -m SimpleHTTPServer 8080
I would see the following.

[dwmoar@laptop SimpleServer]$ python -m SimpleHTTPServer 8080 Serving HTTP on 0.0.0.0 port 8080

Now open your favorite web browser and type the following address

http://localhost:8000 or http://127.0.0.1:8000 or using given port number that you chose to use.

If the directory has a file named "index.html," that file will be served as the initial file.

If there is no "index.html," then the files in the directory will be listed.

It even works using a public IP address:

To quit the Simple Server, in the console window use CTRL+C. This should also work on a Windows machine running Python. And there you go. Happy web serving!

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