pete harris

Amazon helpfully provide non-windows applications for downloading mp3s you’ve bought (what’s wrong with normal HTTP, I don’t know) but the ubuntu one is for a previous release so the exactly specified dependencies aren’t there in more up to date systems.
This can be got round by just installing the particular packages from the 9.10 release. This can be done by going to “software sources” under the system menu, going to the “Other sources” tab and adding this line:
deb http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ karmic main restricted universe
(or alternatively, manually add this line to /etc/apt/sources.list)

You should then be able to update the package list and install the amazon package using dpkg -i amazonmp3.deb or using the gdebi GUI program.

Just downloaded the new Chemical Brothers album for £3 - good old Amazon (even if they do evade VAT by being based in Luxemburg)

Tried to find servers that’d do this, like ustream which sort of works
then found this java project
http://sourceforge.net/projects/x360mediaserve/

No problem, just run the server, tell it where your music is. It’ll index it all then provide album/artist searches via your xbox music interface.

job’s a good ‘un!

Just bought an xbox and wanted to set it up in my room so as not to block the TV in the lounge.

My existing wifi dongle doesn’t work with the box, and official ones cost about 40 quid so thought I’d try a bit of linux iptables to get the xbox live connection working

(internet)   ---phone line-->  bthomehub  --wifi-->   laptop   ---wired--->   xbox

This told me how to get the ports forwarded on my laptop:

http://www.portalstorm.net/guides/xboxlive.php

iptables -A FORWARD -i wlan0 -o eth0 -s 192.168.2.0/24 -m conntrack --ctstate NEW -j ACCEPT
iptables -A FORWARD -m conntrack --ctstate ESTABLISHED,RELATED -j ACCEPT
iptables -A POSTROUTING -t nat -j MASQUERADE

iptables -t nat -A PREROUTING -p udp --dport 88 -i wlan0 -j DNAT --to 192.168.2.x
iptables -t nat -A PREROUTING -p tcp --dport 3074 -i wlan0 -j DNAT --to 192.168.2.x
iptables -t nat -A PREROUTING -p udp --dport 3074 -i wlan0 -j DNAT --to 192.168.2.x
iptables -t nat -A POSTROUTING -p udp -s 192.168.2.x --sport 88 -j MASQUERADE --to-ports 88
iptables -t nat -A POSTROUTING -p tcp -s 192.168.2.x --sport 3074 -j MASQUERADE --to-ports 3074
iptables -t nat -A POSTROUTING -p udp -s 192.168.2.x --sport 3074 -j MASQUERADE --to-ports 3074

then I need to set my bt home hub up for forwarding the ports from the internet onto my laptop

I don’t have the password for my router (my housemate has the account) so I’ve had to use uPnP to get it working.

installed http://packages.debian.org/gupnp-tools

then I can “invoke” uPnP methods on the router to tell it to open new ports for me.

ports 88 and 3074 UDP, and port 3074 TCP

Need to be able to script the upnp step, or find out the password for the router, to make this a more complete solution.

Alternatively, if I could just bridge the wired and wireless connections using linux then my xbox would pick up a DHCP address from the router and do uPnP directly.

using mysqldump is a quick an easy way to backup databases, but restoring a single table (possibly to retrieve a single row) is a pain in the arse.

This article has a useful perl script which does just that

The bit that does the actual work is quite simple:

<snip>

125     ## go through the file one line at a time
126     while (my $line = <STDIN>) {

<snip>

140             ## set a flag when we encounter the table we want
141             if ($line =~ /^-- Table structure for table `$conf{'tableName'}`/) {
142                 $flag = 1;
143                 printmsg("Turning flag on", 1);
144             }
145             ## turn flag off as soon as we encounter next table definition
146             elsif ($line =~ /^-- Table structure for table/) {
147                 $flag = 0;
148                 printmsg("Turning flag off", 1);
149             }
150
151             ## if flag is set, then print to STDOUT, otherwise just move on
152             if ($flag) {
153                 print $line;
154             }

<snip>

156     }

I keep my “documents” and “photos” folders synced to an external hard disk

rsync --modify-window=2 -avz Documents/ /media/LACIE/Documents/

The –modify-window is because the fat32 filesystem on my USB disk has lower precision when it comes to time so rsync thinks all the files have been modified.  This flag sets a window of 2 seconds.

Interesting article about the design of the BBC website

http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/bbcinternet/2010/02/a_new_global_visual_language_f.html

Still, it’s probably cost the licence fee payer a lot of money.

I’ve just bought myself an Asus EEE 1008 HA netbook.

Made an ubuntu netbook remix USB stick, then installed it quite easily.

1) got the BIOS to boot from USB (had to disable “boot booster” in the bios)

2) deleted a partition (for some reason, windows had two 70 gig partitions - one with windows on, and the other empty)

3) standard install

All hardware seems to be working fine including sound, wireless, bluetooth and touchpad

Next step is to get some sort of sync working between netbook and desktop (maybe my server too?)

Also might consider trying to get my netbook tethered to my “Unlimimted” web access on my phone