Monday, February 20, 2012

HSQLDB Installation and Usage

HyperSQL is relational database software that can be downloaded and used for free. It works on top of Java.







HSQLDB Installation




I downloaded the HyperSQL package (hsqldb-2.2.8.zip) and extracted its contents into the "C:\Program Files\hsqldb" folder.





Starting an HSQLDB Server




The following example command starts the HyperSQL server with one database called "mydb" and the public name of "xdb". The public name hides the file names from users.


java -cp ../lib/hsqldb.jar org.hsqldb.server.Server --database.0 file:mydb --dbname.0 xdb

If the files named "mydb.*" do not already exist, they will be created. This way you can start the HSQLDB server and create a new database at the same time.





If the computer hosting the database server is restricted to the HTTP protocol by a firewall, use the HyperSQL HTTP Server.


java -cp ../lib/hsqldb.jar org.hsqldb.server.WebServer --database.0 file:mydb --dbname.0 xdb

When a HyperSQL server is running, client programs can connect to it using the HSQLDB JDBC Driver contained in hsqldb.jar.





Running Database Access Tools




HyperSQL includes the Database Manager JDBC frontend to connect to a HSQLDB server, query and modify tables.


java -cp ../lib/hsqldb.jar org.hsqldb.util.DatabaseManagerSwing

At the Connect dialog, enter the information necessary for connecting to the database.









SQL Commands


After I started the Database Manager using the command above, I entered the following SQL commands to create tables for MyBooks database.




CREATE CACHED TABLE Publishers (pnum INTEGER NOT NULL PRIMARY KEY, publisher VARCHAR(50) NOT NULL, parent VARCHAR(50));



CREATE CACHED TABLE Authors (anum BIGINT NOT NULL PRIMARY KEY, author
VARCHAR(50) NOT NULL, lastname VARCHAR(25), aka VARCHAR(50));



CREATE CACHED TABLE Books (index VARCHAR_IGNORECASE(20) NOT NULL PRIMARY KEY, title VARCHAR(50) NOT NULL, edition TINYINT, pubdate DATE NOT NULL, author VARCHAR(64) NOT NULL, anum BIGINT NOT NULL REFERENCES Authors, pnum INTEGER NOT NULL REFERENCES Publishers, pages SMALLINT, format VARCHAR_IGNORECASE(20), isbn13 CHAR(13), isbn10 CHAR(10));



CREATE CACHED TABLE Keywords (index VARCHAR_IGNORECASE(20) NOT NULL PRIMARY KEY REFERENCES Books, genre1 VARCHAR_IGNORECASE(25), genre2
VARCHAR_IGNORECASE(25), subject1 VARCHAR_IGNORECASE(36), subject2
VARCHAR_IGNORECASE(36), subject3 VARCHAR_IGNORECASE(36), keyword1
VARCHAR_IGNORECASE(25), keyword2 VARCHAR_IGNORECASE(25), keyword3
VARCHAR_IGNORECASE(25));

When you finish using the Database Manager, make sure that you properly shut down the database.



SHUTDOWN: To save changes and close the database.

SHUTDOWN COMPACT: To save the database in the minimal size and close it. Should be used periodically.





Using OpenOffice.org Base to Work with HSQLDB Server


You can use OpenOffice.org Base to work with a server-based HyperSQL database. First, you need to set up OpenOffice.org so that it can use the HyperSQL JDBC driver. Select Tools > Options > Java and click Class Path.





Click the Add Archive... button and enter the path to the hsqldb.jar file. Click OK to save the changes and restart OpenOffice.org Base. Make sure that you also close the OpenOffice.org Quickstart in the notification area of the taskbar. At the Database wizard, choose JDBC to connect to an existing database, and enter org.hsqldb.jdbc.JDBCDriver for the JDBC driver class.





Enter SA as username. Password is not required.

Thursday, January 5, 2012

Setting Up Filezilla FTP Server In Windows 7

The Windows operating system has built-in features that allow you to share documents, photos, music and video with other Windows users in the local network. However, users of Linux or another non-Windows OS may have a hard time trying to access shared resources on Windows computers. Setting up an FTP server on a Windows machine can solve such interoperability issues in sharing files between different types of computers.



FileZilla Server is a free, fast and powerful FTP server for Windows. By default, the FileZilla server starts automatically with Windows, and the admin port is 14147.





I don't like to see the admin interface started at every login.





You should define some ports for passive mode.





I like to enable TLS/SSL for added security in FTP transfers.





I created a group called users.





Then, I created a user for myself.





You should create a new rule for FileZilla in Windows Firewall.





In the new inbound rule wizard, select the following settings.



  • What type of rule would you like to create? Port
  • Does this rule apply to TCP or UDP? TCP
  • Does this rule apply to all local ports or specific local ports? 21, 990, 2100-2121
  • What action should be taken when a connection matches specific conditions? Allow the connection
  • Name: FTP connections

Sunday, January 1, 2012

Open-Source Database Servers

I've been thinking about installing an open-source database server for personal and commercial uses. My choices were limited as shown below.



Monday, December 26, 2011

Compiling MLDonkey for Windows

MLDonkey is a nifty program that helps you share files with other people. MLDonkey works on Linux, but the Windows version I downloaded didn't work on my computer running Windows XP. So I compiled MLDonkey using Cygwin's mingw64-i686-gcc-* compiler toolchain. Here I show how I did it. Part of the information below is taken from the MLDonkey Windows guide.


  1. Cygwin Setup

    First, install Cygwin using the Cygwin installer(setup.exe). I set the Root directory to C:\Cygwin and chose to install the following packages in addition to base packages.



    • bison

    • gettext-devel

    • libtool

    • make

    • mingw64-i686-binutils

    • mingw64-i686-gcc-core

    • mingw64-i686-gcc-fortran

    • mingw64-i686-gcc-g++

    • patch

    • pkg-config



  2. Open the file C:\Cygwin\etc\fstab in a text editor and append the following line.


    /usr/i686-w64-mingw32/sys-root/mingw /mingw none bind


    Set the HOME variable.



    Start the Cygwin terminal and type the following commands to set up Cygwin for Windows compilation.



    cp /usr/bin/i686-w64-mingw32-g++.exe /usr/i686-w64-mingw32/bin/g++.exe
    cp /usr/bin/i686-w64-mingw32-gcc.exe /usr/i686-w64-mingw32/bin/gcc.exe
    cp /usr/bin/i686-w64-mingw32-cpp.exe /usr/i686-w64-mingw32/bin/cpp.exe
    export PATH=/mingw/bin:/usr/i686-w64-mingw32/bin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/bin:/usr/lib/gcc/i686-w64-mingw32/4.5.3
    export CC=/usr/bin/i686-w64-mingw32-gcc.exe
    export PKG_CONFIG_PATH=/mingw/lib/pkgconfig

  3. Compile zlib and bzip2

    Download the zlib source (zlib-1.2.7.tar.gz) and unpack it.


    tar xzvf zlib-1.2.7.tar.gz
    cd zlib-1.2.7

    Compile and install zlib.


    make -f win32/Makefile.gcc
    cp -iv zlib1.dll /mingw/bin
    cp -iv zconf.h zlib.h /mingw/include
    cp -iv libz.a /mingw/lib
    cp -iv libz.dll.a /mingw/lib

    Now download bzip2 source from bzip2.org and unpack it.


    tar xzvf bzip2-1.0.6.tar.gz
    cd bzip2-1.0.6

    Change line 78 of bzlib.h to read:


    #if defined(_WIN32) && !defined(__MINGW32__)

    Compile and install bzip2.


    make
    cp bzlib.h /mingw/include/
    cp libbz2.a /mingw/lib



  4. libiconv

    Download and compile libiconv:


    tar xzvf libiconv-1.14.tar.gz
    cd libiconv-1.14
    ./configure --build=i686-w64-mingw32 --prefix=/mingw --enable-static
    make
    make install



  5. JPEG, PNG & Freetype

    Compile JPEG, libPNG and Freetype in the following way:


    ./configure --build=i686-w64-mingw32 --prefix=/mingw
    make
    make install


  6. GD Graphics Library

    Now get the libgd source, unpack and configure:


    ./configure --build=i686-w64-mingw32 --prefix=/mingw LIBS="-lbz2 -ljpeg -lws2_32 -liconv"

    Once Makefile is generated, change line 233 to read:


    DEFS = -DHAVE_CONFIG_H -DBGDWIN32

    Also fix gd.h near line 25:


    --- ./gd.h      Sat Oct 30 12:54:58 2004
    +++ ./gd.h Sun Jan 05 17:56:09 2006
    @@ -24,7 +24,7 @@
    #endif /* WIN32 */

    #ifdef NONDLL
    -#define BGD_DECLARE(rt) extern rt
    +#define BGD_DECLARE(rt) extern rt _stdcall
    #else
    #ifdef BGDWIN32
    #define BGD_DECLARE(rt) __declspec(dllexport) rt __stdcall

    Then, build and install gdlib:


    make install


    To create a DLL file called libgd-2.dll, run the following commands:



    mkdir /tmp/gdlib
    cd /tmp/gdlib
    ar x /mingw/lib/libgd.a
    gcc -shared -o /mingw/bin/libgd-2.dll -Wl,--out-implib,libgd.dll.a *.o -L/mingw/lib -lz -lbz2 -ljpeg -lpng -liconv -lfreetype




  7. wget

    Build wget as shown in this post. If you don't want to compile wget yourself, get the executable (wget.exe) somewhere, and put it in the same folder as mlnet.exe later.

  8. regex and libmagic

    Download regex-0.12.tar.gz and compile regex as required by libmagic.


    gcc -DSTDC_HEADERS -DHAVE_STRING_H=1 -I. -c regex.c
    ar ru libregex.a regex.o
    cp -iv libregex.a /mingw/lib
    cp -iv libregex.a /mingw/lib/libgnurx.a
    cp -iv regex.h /mingw/include

    Get the source tarball of open-source file command. Configure as follows:


    ./configure --build=i686-w64-mingw32 --prefix=/mingw

    Open config.h and add the following lines:


    #define WIN32 1
    #define MAGIC "magic"

    Then compile:


    make && make install


  9. OCaml

    You need flexdll (flexdll-0.27.zip) to build OCaml. Extract it to /mingw/bin. Then, download the latest OCaml source (3.12.1). Patch ocaml with this Unicode patch.


    tar xzvf ocaml-3.12.1.tar.gz
    cd ocaml-3.12.1
    patch -p1 -l < ../ocaml-3.12.1-unicode.patch


    In the config subfolder, copy Makefile.mingw to Makefile.



    cp config/m-nt.h config/m.h 
    cp config/s-nt.h config/s.h
    cp config/Makefile.mingw config/Makefile


    Begin compiling OCaml.


    make -f Makefile.nt world
    make -f Makefile.nt opt
    make -f Makefile.nt opt.opt
    make -f Makefile.nt install


    Set up OCaml environment variables:


    export CAMLLIB=/mingw/lib
    export OCAMLLIB=/mingw/lib
    export CAMLP4LIB=/mingw/lib/camlp4



  10. Build MLDonkey

    Get the MLDonkey source, then unpack and configure it.


    tar xjvf mldonkey-3.1.0.tar.bz2
    cd mldonkey-3.1.0
    ./configure --build=i686-w64-mingw32 --prefix=/mingw --disable-fasttrack


    To link with the static GD library, append -DNONDLL to the CPPFLAG line of config/Makefile.config



    CPPFLAGS=-I/mingw/include -DNONDLL


    Start compilation.


    export OCAML_SRC=~/ocaml-3.12.1
    cp -iv /mingw/lib/stublibs/dllunix.dll .
    make depend
    make mlnet.static
    strip mlnet.static
    mv mlnet.static mlnet.exe

    If the final linking stage fails, here is the command I used to produce mlnet.exe:


    g++ -g0 -O3 -o mlnet.exe -Wl,--subsystem,windows -L/lib/gcc/i686-w64-mingw32/4.5.3 -L/mingw/lib /tmp/camlstartup00193d.s build/flexdll_mingw.o /mingw/lib/std_exit.o src/daemon/common/commonMain.o build/driver.a build/core.a build/client.a build/common.a build/magic.a build/bitstring.a build/cdk.a build/extlib.a /mingw/lib/nums.a /mingw/lib/str.a /mingw/lib/unix.a /mingw/lib/bigarray.a /mingw/lib/stdlib.a src/utils/cdk/gdstubs.o src/networks/direct_connect/che3_c.o src/utils/lib/CryptoPP.o src/utils/lib/CryptoPP_stubs.o src/utils/net/upnp_stubs.o src/daemon/common/commonHasher_c.o src/utils/lib/magiclib_stub.o src/utils/bitstring/bitstring_c.o src/utils/cdk/zlibstubs.o src/utils/cdk/heap_c.o src/config/mingw/os_stubs_c.o src/utils/lib/fst_hash.o src/utils/lib/md4_comp.o src/utils/lib/md4_c.o src/utils/lib/charsetstubs.o src/utils/lib/md5_c.o src/utils/lib/sha1_c.o src/utils/lib/tiger.o src/utils/lib/stubs_c.o -lnums -lcamlstr -lunix -lbigarray -lgdi32 -luser32 -ladvapi32 -limm32 -lshell32 -lole32 resfile.o -lpthread -lmagic -lgd -ljpeg -lfreetype -lpng -lz -lbz2 -lws2_32 -lshlwapi /mingw/lib/libasmrun.a /mingw/lib/libcharset.dll.a /mingw/lib/libiconv.dll.a


    Optonally, compress the executable with upx.

    upx --best --strip-relocs=0 mlnet.exe




  11. Here's my mldonkey builds.




Tuesday, December 20, 2011

To build wget.exe with MinGW

wget is a useful command-line downloader. To build wget for the Windows platform, first install MinGW. Then, compile zlib, openssl and wget in that order. To compile zlib:



make -f win32/Makefile.gcc
cp -iv zlib1.dll /mingw/bin
cp -iv zconf.h zlib.h /mingw/include
cp -iv libz.a /mingw/lib
cp -iv libz.dll.a /mingw/lib


To compile openssl:



./Configure -DHAVE_STRUCT_TIMESPEC -DPTW32_STATIC_LIB -L/mingw/lib -lz -lpthreadGC2 -lws2_32 --prefix=/mingw threads zlib mingw
make
make test
make install


Now, build wget



./configure --prefix=/mingw --enable-threads=win32 --disable-nls --with-ssl=openssl
make
make install

Monday, October 17, 2011

Compiling Zip and Unzip with MinGW

The current version of zip supports higher compression with the bzip2 method. To build zip with bzip2 compression using MinGW, first prepare the bzip2 library:



tar xzvf bzip2-1.0.6.tar.gz
cd bzip2-1.0.6
make
cp bzlib.h /mingw/include/
cp libbz2.a /mingw/lib


Then, get the zip source. Use the LOCAL_ZIP environment variable to configure zip.



export LOCAL_ZIP='-DLARGE_FILE_SUPPORT -DZIP64_SUPPORT -DUNICODE_SUPPORT -DBZIP2_SUPPORT -DALLOW_REGEX


Edit the LIBS line in the file makefile.gcc in the win32 folder to link zip with bzip2 library



LIBS=-luser32 -ladvapi32 -lbz2


Compile zip.



make -f win32/makefile.gcc


You'll find zip.exe in the source folder.



Compiling Unzip with MinGW



Unzip is a command-line extraction tool for .zip archives. In order to be able to unpack bzipped .ZIP archive, I need to compile unzip with bzip2 support. After compiling bzip2 as above, I downloaded unzip60.tar.gz from Info-Zip project at Sourceforge and unpacked it.



tar xzvf unzip60.tar.gz
cd unzip60


I fixed the file win32/Makefile.gcc in the section following "# optional inclusion of bzip2 decompression"



INC_BZ2LIB = -I/mingw/include
LOCFLAGS = -I/mingw/include -DUSE_BZIP2
LD_BZ2LIB = -L/mingw/lib -lbz2
LIBBZIP2 = /mingw/lib/libbz2.a


Then, I compiled Unzip like this:


make -f win32/Makefile.gcc
ls -l *.exe

Three executables unzip.exe, unzipsfx.exe and funzip.exe are created. Copy them to a folder in your path or /bin.


cp -iv *.exe /C/Windows


Usage Examples


To back up a folder:


zip -Z bzip2 -b C:\Windows\Temp -SDurX backup.zip *

Thursday, August 18, 2011

Logging Into Linux Desktop with Xming, Xnest and Putty

I use Xming and Putty to remotely log into my Linux desktop over a secure connection. Since I use xdm for the X11 login screen, I had to set up xdm for remote login. I made sure /etc/X11/xdm/xdm-config had this setting:


DisplayManager.requestPort: 117

I changed /etc/X11/xdm/Xaccess to allow any connection:


echo "*" > /etc/X11/xdm/Xaccess

I installed xnest on the Linux machine.


On Windows, install xming and X11 fonts. Start the Xming server.


Xming.exe :16 -clipboard -multiwindow -nolisten inet6

Then, start putty, enable X11 port forwarding and connect to the Linux box. Once you are logged into the remote terminal, start Xnest:


Xnest :16 -ac -geometry 960x720 -once -query 127.0.0.1

A window will pop up showing your lovely Linux destkop. Now, enjoy your Linux applications on Windows.

Sunday, April 3, 2011

Cloud Storages for Linux

Today the trend is to put your valuable data somewhere on the Internet and access it anywhere. This is a dramatic departure from the past as our trust grows towards Internet companies. More companies are offering cloud storage services, for example, Box.net and Zumodrive. Here I show how to set up Linux to access cloud storages.


Box.net offers 5GB of free online storage for personal use, but each upload must be smaller than 25MB. Zumodrive offers 2GB free space initially, but unlike box.net you can upload any size of files using the ZumoDrive desktop application.




Adding a Box.net folder in KDE Dolphin



  1. Select Network from the Places panel. Then, double-click on Add Network Folder.



  2. Choose the WebFolder (webdav) and click Next.



  3. Enter information for Box.net as follows.




Setting up Zumodrive on Mint KDE edition



  1. Download the Zumodrive package for Ubuntu 8 or later (zumodrive-ubuntu8-i386-0.989.deb).
  2. The Zumodrive package depends on openjdk-6-jre, but Sun's JRE is installed in Mint, so you don't have to install openjdk-6-jre.

    However, you need install libinotifytools0, libgnet2.0-0 and libnautilus-extention1. I used Synaptics to install the missing packages.
  3. Unpack the zumodrive package into the system.

    cd /
    dpkg --extract zumodrive-ubuntu8-i386-0.989.deb .

  4. Copy /usr/share/applications/zumodrive.desktop to your Desktop folder, so you can start Zumodrive by double-clicking the icon on desktop. Optionally, right-click on the icon, choose Properties and make it executable.


  5. Now double-click on the Zumodrive icon. Once you type in your email and password, you can access Zumodrive through the ~/Zumodrive folder.

Wednesday, March 23, 2011

Hacker's Guide To Installing Windows 7

Many people want to try the new Windows 7, but they're not too sure if Windows 7 is worth it. After all, it doesn't make sense to buy a new computer to try Windows 7 and then find out it's another lame bloatware. This guide will help an average joe to download, install and activate Windows 7 with freely available tools.



Hardware Requirements of Windows 7


First, you need to decide if your computer is capable of running Windows 7. According to Microsoft, Windows 7 has the following hardware requirements:



  • 1 GHz or faster 32-bit or 64-bit processor
  • 1 GB RAM (32-bit) or 2 GB RAM (64-bit)
  • 16 GB available hard disk space (32-bit) or 20 GB (64-bit)
  • DVD-ROM drive or DVD burner
  • DirectX 9 graphics card with WDDM 1.0 or better driver


That means Windows 7 can run on most computers available. You may have to buy additional memory or a new video card to be able to run Windows 7. See the Windows 7 Compatibility site.



Next, decide which edition of Windows 7 you want to install on your computer. There are many editions of Windows 7, for example, Home Premium, Professional, Enterprise and Ultimate. For most people, Windows 7 Home Premium is good enough.



Windows 7 Direct Downloads and Bittorrents



It is recommended that you use aria2, Halogenware Retriever or Free Download Manager to download Windows 7 so you can resume a download in the event of connection problems. On the Web, you can download DVD images of Windows 7 from the following locations:



  • Windows 7 Home Premium SP1 (x86 English) X17-24208.iso

    MD5: c5bb99b2f1a9e7a5b4fbc6e3eff70882

    SHA1: 22df3e5a80f8dbf014c2776a01b1cd9f24d83233

    CRC32: 9c5dc931
  • Windows 7 Home Premium SP1 (x64 English) X17-24209.iso

    MD5: 971843a457b6e0db0af61258cbe7256a

    SHA1: b4821f46a171708f5f8f8a0ef48fc16529437961

    CRC32: d236fd70
  • Windows 7 Professional SP1 (x86 English) X17-24280.iso

    MD5: befd4f1e00ec8da2effbd789f4e66fbf

    SHA1: 917a542b0541054bb9c2a06a11a46aed6943856b

    CRC32: 20078d8d
  • Windows 7 Professional SP1 (x64 English) X17-24281.iso

    MD5: 338f3245d68527db47b8a44e55317d0a

    SHA1: 5ed2584110e03f498db4458ba9fafd5a7ef602ed

    CRC32: 74f3cb73
  • Windows 7 Ultimate SP1 (x86 English) X17-24394.iso

    CRC32: C2966895

    MD5: 24F3A45D43D7C532AA3126CC094C61BD

    SHA1 : 92c1ada4ff09c76ec2f1974940624cab7f822f62

    SHA2: BBB5E0BAF3659F6DEC96B50381CBB05C09F066675EE639324B728215D5D47C43
  • Windows 7 Ultimate SP1 (x64 English) X17-24395.iso

    CRC32: 8589EE18

    MD5: 56A26636EC667799F5A7F42F142C772D

    SHA1: 1693b6cb50b90d96fc3c04e4329604feba88cd51

    SHA2: 9A2F3972FBBBB4974255CCCC26CDA9B1A75D9D0179867D6111162AC33F0CB693
  • Windows 7 Home Premium (x86 English) X15-65732.iso

    SHA1: CC9D8220B2179E784D85BF1EA98D2EE2190D534F

    ISO/CRC: 5DF6DBA0
  • Windows 7 Home Premium (x64 English) X15-65733.iso

    SHA1: 336779EA6B65F63E11A609B4D021439C47AB315B

    ISO/CRC: 56D954E4
  • Windows 7 Professional (x86 English) X15-65804.iso

    SHA1: 697FA06554502FB21D30275273B25747299C020D

    ISO/CRC: 578725D1
  • Windows 7 Professional (x64 English) X15-65805.iso

    SHA1: 50127304441A793EE51B3F501289F6599A559E9F

    ISO/CRC: 502C42C1
  • Windows-7-SP1-EN-MSDN-TechNet.torrent


I like using aria2 for download. Get my aria2 win32 build from here. To use aria2c to download Windows 7 Home Premium, open the Command Prompt and type the following command.



aria2c --file-allocation=prealloc http://msft-dnl.digitalrivercontent.net/msvista/pub/X15-65732/X15-65732.iso


To stop the download, press Ctrl+C twice. Later, you can resume download with the command:



aria2c -c http://msft-dnl.digitalrivercontent.net/msvista/pub/X15-65732/X15-65732.iso


After the download has finished, verify the checksums of the download with md5deep or HashCheck shell extension.

This is optional. If you want to create a single All-in-One DVD that can be used to install Home Basic, Home Premium, Professional and Ultimate edition, download and run eicfg_remover. This tool removes ei.cfg from the ISO file.

Then, burn the image to a blank DVD. You need to have a DVD burner and a blank DVD, of course. For free DVD-burning software, you can get ImgBurn, InfraRecorder or CDBurnerXP.



Wednesday, March 2, 2011

Compiling Linux Kernel 2.6.38

Let's compile a Linux kernel. To build a kernel, I installed the following packages:




  • binutils
  • gcc-4.4
  • libglade2-dev for "make gconfig"
  • libqt3-mt-dev or libqt4-dev for "make xconfig"
  • make
  • module-init-tools
  • patch


libglade2-dev is needed to configure the kernel by running “make gconfig”. In addition, I am going to include the following features.




  • unionfs is a union filesystem that allows me to merge several filesystems into a single logical one. It has several uses, such as Live CD's and modifiable read-only filesystem.
  • ndiswrapper allows me to use many network devices by installing native Windows drivers.

I downloaded the kernel source and unpacked it.


tar xjvf linux-2.6.38.tar.bz2
cd linux-2.6.38

Then, I applied the unionfs patch.


gzip -dc ../unionfs-2.5.3_for_2.6.18.8.diff.gz | patch -p1 -l

Then, I configured the kernel with a GTK configuration tool.


cp /boot/config-2.6.31.5 .config
make gconfig


Open Makefile with an editor and define EXTRAVERSION if necessary.



Now let's compile the kernel.


make bzImage
make install
make modules
make modules_install
depmod -e -F /boot/System.map-2.6.38 -m 2.6.38


Set the default root device and ramdisk size for the new kernel.



cd /boot
rdev vmlinuz-2.6.38 1,0
ramsize vmlinuz-2.6.38 4096


Finally, compile ndiswrapper (Patches available here).



tar xzf ndiswrapper-1.55.tar.gz
cd ndiswrapper-1.55
KVERS=2.6.31.6 make uninstall
KVERS=2.6.31.6 make
KVERS=2.6.31.6 make install


Generate modules.* files.


depmod -e -m -F /boot/System.map-2.6.31.6 2.6.31.6

Sunday, January 2, 2011

Building mplayer on Debian Linux

MPlayer is one of my favorite media players. It is used with such frontend as smplayer, gnome-mplayer or MPlayerGUI to provide a good alternative to Windows Media Player and VLC. First, I installed the necessary compiler toolchain.



  • autoconf
  • automake
  • binutils
  • bison
  • cpp
  • g77 or fort77
  • gcc
  • gettext
  • g++
  • libtool
  • make


Next, I installed the necessary development libraries:



  • libasound2-dev
  • libbz2-dev
  • libesd0-dev
  • libfontconfig1-dev
  • libfribidi-dev
  • libjpeg62-dev
  • libncurses5-dev
  • libpng12-dev
  • libxv-dev


Some useful libraries are not included in the Debian distribution, so I had to compile them on my own. They are faac, lame, libdca, live, x264 and xvidcore. First, I built liblzo.



tar xzvf /usr/src/lzo-2.04.tar.gz
cd lzo-2.04/
./configure --prefix /usr
make
make install


Then, I built the giflib.



tar xjvf /usr/src/giflib-4.1.6.tar.bz2
cd giflib-4.1.6/
ls
./configure --build=i586-pc-linux-gnu --prefix=/usr --disable-shared
make
make install


I built cdparanoia.



tar xzvf /usr/src/cdparanoia-III-10.2.src.tgz
cd cdparanoia-III-10.2/
./configure --build=i586-pc-linux-gnu --prefix=/usr --disable-shared
make
make install


I compiled libdca in the following way:



tar xjvf libdca-0.0.5.tar.bz2
cd libdca-0.0.5/
./configure --build=i586-pc-linux-gnu --prefix=/usr --disable-shared
make
make install


I built ogg, vorbis, theora and speex.



./configure --build=i586-pc-linux-gnu --prefix=/usr --disable-shared
make
make install


To compile lame, run:



tar xzvf /usr/src/lame-3.98.4.tar.gz

cd lame-3.98.4/

./configure --build=i586-pc-linux-gnu --prefix=/usr --disable-shared --mandir=/usr/share/man --enable-expopt=full --enable-nasm

make

make install


Unpack live555 source in /usr/lib and compile live555 as follows:



cd /usr/lib/live

./genMakefiles linux

make


To compile x264, do:



tar xjvf /usr/src/x264-snapshot-20110102-2245.tar.bz2

cd x264-snapshot-20110102-2245/

sh configure --host=i586-pc-linux-gnu --prefix=/usr --enable-pic --disable-asm

make

make install


Compile the xvid library as follows:


cd xvidcore/build/generic

./configure --build=i586-pc-linux-gnu --prefix=/usr

make

make install


Finally, you're ready to compile MPlayer. Get the latest snapshot tarball and extract it:



wget ftp://ftp.mplayerhq.hu/MPlayer/releases/mplayer-export-snapshot.tar.bz2

tar xjvf mplayer-export-snapshot.tar.bz2

cd mplayer-export-2009-05-29

CPPFLAGS='-DLIBTWOLAME_STATIC' ./configure --prefix=/usr --enable-runtime-cpudetection --yasm=/usr/bin/yasm --language=all --confdir=/etc/mplayer

make

make install

chmod 4755 /usr/bin/mplayer

Wednesday, December 29, 2010

ssh + netcat + tar + xz = Secure Network Transfer Link

I found a way to use simple command-line tools to transfer files between computers far apart. Using this method, I was able to duplicate the contents of an entire filesystem securely over a SSH tunnel between two computers. In this method, no NFS server or scp command is needed. However, netcat plays an important role in this method. Let's first make sure we have everything ready.



  • OpenSSH
  • netcat
  • tar or cpio
  • xz, lzma, lzo, bzip2 or gzip


I'll be really brief.




  1. At the computer where you will receive files (say, 192.168.1.2), type the following commands to start netcat in listening mode and use tar + xz to unpack the incoming stream of data.



    cd /my/downdoad/folder
    nc -l 7749 | xz -dc | tar xvf -


  2. At the computer where you will send files (say, 192.168.1.1), create a ssh tunnel to the computer receiving files (192.168.1.2).



    ssh -l username -L 5525:192.168.1.2:7749 192.168.1.2


  3. Open another terminal window and type the following command to start sending files.



    tar cvf - . | xz -c | nc 127.0.0.1 5525


Partition Imaging with Netcat



Backing up hard drive partitions over the network can be accomplished with just a few simple tools like netcat. This is another handy usage of netcat. At the receiving computer where you'll store the backup, type the command to receive the partition image:



nc -l 7749 | lzma -dc | dd of=/dev/sda8 bs=640K


At the sending computer from which you'll transmit the partition, establish an SSH link first:



ssh -l username -L 5525:192.168.1.2:7749 192.168.1.2


Then compress the partition data and transmit over the secure SSH channel:



dd if=/dev/sda11 bs=640K | lzma -9c | nc 127.0.0.1 5525


Note that the transfer may take many hours for a large partition.

Sunday, November 14, 2010

Transmission-Daemon for Windows

Here are my Windows builds of transmission-daemon. I built it with Cygwin's GCC compiler. 7-zip or a newest version of unzip should be used to unpack them.


The package contains the following files:


  • Cygwin1.dll

    Cygwin Unix layer

  • transmission-cli.exe

    Command-line Bittorrent Client

  • transmission-create.exe

    Create .torrent files

  • transmission-daemon.exe

    Transmission server

  • transmission-edit.exe

    Edit .torrent files

  • transmission-remote.exe

    Control the transmission daemon

  • transmission-show.exe

    Show .torrent contents


Unpack the package into a folder, for example, C:\Program Files\Transmission. Then, create a shortcut with the following command:

transmission-daemon -b -o -m -ep -a 127.0.0.1,192.168.*.* --utp


Double-clicking the shortcut will not open any window. However, transmission-daemon is silently running in the background. You can control the daemon with any Web browser by opening this local Web address:


http://127.0.0.1:9091/

Although you can control transmission-daemon with a Web browser, it's not a pretty thing to do so. I recommend using transmission-remote-dotnet or transmission-remote-gui. The following is a screenshot for Transmission Remote .NET which is written in C#.



And, below you can see Transmission Remote GUI that's written in Pascal.




The settings for the daemon are stored in the ~/.config/transmission-daemon folder. Make sure the HOME environment variable points correctly to your folder.



Also, TRANSMISSION_WEB_HOME environment variable should be correctly set up to use the web browser interface.



To learn how to build transmission-daemon for Windows, read this post.

Saturday, August 21, 2010

Debian Linux: Simple steps to recover files from /lost+found

The following steps illustrate how one can use simple shell commands to recover files from the /lost+found directory in Linux. This assumes that you actually have some files in /lost+found.




  1. First, concatenate all the *.md5sums files in /var/lib/dpkg/info into a single file:


    cd /var/lib/dpkg/info
    cat *.md5sums | sort -k 2 > /tmp/all.md5


  2. Go to the /lost+found directory. fsck may have placed some files here after fixing the Linux partition. If you don't find any file here, you can relax and skip the following steps. Run md5sum on files in /lost+found.


    cd /lost+found
    md5sum * | sort > /tmp/lost.md5


  3. Put only the md5sum values into a temporary file, called 0.txt.


    awk '{print $1}' /tmp/lost.md5 > /tmp/0.txt


  4. Search all.md5 for the md5sum values in 0.txt and save the results in 1.txt.


    for f in $(cat /tmp/0.txt); do grep $f all.md5 >> /tmp/1.txt; done


  5. Put the names of files in /lost+found into a temporary fie 2.txt.


    awk '{print $2}' /tmp/lost.md5 > /tmp/2.txt


  6. Move the lost+found files to their original locations.


    cd /
    for $f in $(cat /tmp/2.txt); do MD5=$(grep $f /dev/shm/lost.md5 | awk '{print $1}'); ORIGIN=$(grep $MD5 /tmp/1.txt | awk '{print $2}'); mv /lost+found/$f /$ORIGIN; done

Monday, August 9, 2010

Tweaking Lenovo IdeaPad S12

I bought Lenovo IdeaPad S12 for $400. This little laptop has 12.1" display, VIA Nano processor, 1GB memory and 160GB hard drive. It's shipped with Windows XP, but I want to install Windows 7 alongside XP, so as to have a dual-boot system.



Shrinking the Recovery Partition


I booted IdeaPad S12 with my own Linux Live CD. In Xterm, I typed the following command:



fdisk -l -u /dev/sda


I got the following output.



Disk /dev/sda: 160.0 GB, 160041885696 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 19457 cylinders, total 312581808 sectors
Units = sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Disk identifier: 0xee8a96be

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sda1 * 2048 217909247 108953600 7 HPFS/NTFS
/dev/sda2 217909248 281638911 31864832 f W95 Ext'd (LBA)
/dev/sda3 281638912 312581807 15471448 12 Compaq diagnostics
/dev/sda5 217911296 281638911 31863808 7 HPFS/NTFS


The last primary partition /dev/sda3 seems to be Lenovo's recovery partition. I was able to boot the recovery partition with the following GRUB commands:



root (hd0,2)
chainloader +1
boot


Once I boot into Lenovo's OneKey Recovery System, I can use OneKey AntiVirus to scan the laptop for virus or use OneKey Recovery to restore the laptop to the factory state. I rebooted the laptop with my Linux Live CD. Then, I used GParted to shrink /dev/sda3 and changed its partition number to /dev/sda4:


  1. Shrink /dev/sda3 to 6 GB.
  2. Duplicate /dev/sda3 to a new primary partition /dev/sda4.
  3. Remove the partition /dev/sda3.
  4. Change the type of the new partition /dev/sda4 to 12.


After that, my partition layout looks like this:



Disk /dev/sda: 160.0 GB, 160041885696 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 19457 cylinders, total 312581808 sectors
Units = sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Disk identifier: 0xee8a96be

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sda1 * 2048 217909247 108953600 7 HPFS/NTFS
/dev/sda2 217909248 281638911 31864832 f W95 Ext'd (LBA)
/dev/sda4 299997810 312576704 6289447+ 12 Compaq diagnostics
/dev/sda5 217911296 281638911 31863808 7 HPFS/NTFS


I restarted my laptop. I was able to boot Lenovo's OneKey Recovery System using the following GRUB commands.



root (hd0,3)
chainloader +1
boot


Moving Lenovo's pre-installed Windows XP to a logical partition


To reserve primary partitions for other crucial operating systems, I moved the Windows XP partition to the extended partition. This technique is explained in this post. Roughly speaking:



  1. Shrink the Windows XP partition (/dev/sda1) by half using GParted. Space is created between /dev/sda1 (Windows XP, type 7) and /dev/sda2 (extended, type f).
  2. Enlarge the extended partition (/dev/sda2) to the left. A space is created at the beginning of the extended partition.
  3. Make a copy of Windows XP partition in the space of the extended partition. The new partition will become /dev/sda6.
  4. Fix the partition numbers with fdisk (switching partition numbers of /dev/sda6 and /dev/sda5). Previously, /dev/sda6 came before /dev/sda5.
  5. Fix BOOT.INI of the new XP partition (/dev/sda5).
  6. Boot the new XP partition (/dev/sda5) in safe mode using GRUB or SYSLINUX. Change drive letters in the registry.
  7. Reboot Windows XP (/dev/sda5) normally and remove the old partition (/dev/sda1).


Starting Windows XP with SYSLINUX


Recently, I switched to SYSLINUX. I created a 100MB primary partition (/dev/sda1) formatted with FAT16. Then, in Linux, I installed SYSLINUX.


syslinux /dev/sda1

A new MBR had to be installed, too.


install-mbr /dev/sda -v --drive 0x80 --enable +14

I copied chain.c32 from the SYSLINUX package to the SYSLINUX partition (/dev/sda1). Then, I copied NTLDR, NTDETECT.COM and BOOT.INI to the SYSLINUX partition (/dev/sda1), too.


I created a text file named SYSLINUX.CFG with the following instruction.


TIMEOUT 30
DEFAULT chain.c32 ntldr=NTLDR

This will let you boot Windows XP in a logical partition.



Installing Programs on Windows XP


I removed the following programs from factory-installed Windows XP of Lenovo S12:


  • Symantec Norton Internet Security
  • Diskeeper
  • Veriface

Then, I installed the following software:


  • Avast Anti-virus
  • MyDefrag


Installing Windows 7 Home Premium


I created a new NTFS partition (/dev/sda2) using GParted. I set its bootable flag and hid all other FAT and NTFS partitions. Then, I installed Windows 7 Home Premium.


After that, I moved the Windows 7 partition into the extended partition as /dev/sda6. Then, I removed the original partition (/dev/sda2). I rebooted with Windows 7 installation DVD, clicked the Repair option and opened the Command Prompt. I typed the following commands to make the new Windows 7 partition bootable.


C:
bcdedit /store C:\Boot\BCD /enum
bcdedit /store C:\Boot\BCD /set {bootmgr} device partition=C:
bcdedit /store C:\Boot\BCD /set {default} device partition=C:
bcdedit /store C:\Boot\BCD /set {default} osdevice partition=C:

Then, I added the following entry to SYSLINUX.CFG.


LABEL win7
KERNEL chain.c32
APPEND hd0 6

To make sure that SYSLINUX can boot Windows 7, I typed the following command at the boot: prompt.


chain.c32 hd0 6

Now I am able to boot Windows 7 from a logical partition.



Booting Windows 7 with Software SLIC emulation


There are many ways to emulate SLIC so that Windows 7 can be activated. In my case, I've set up a boot sequence like this.


MBR -> SYSLINUX -> GRUB -> Windows 7

GRUB was patched for the loadslic command which is crucial for Windows activation. The SYSLINUX command to invoke GRUB is like this.


chain.c32 grub=stage2 grubcfg=(hd0,0)/win7.cfg

Then, I created a file WIN7.CFG with the following contents.


hiddenmenu
timeout 0
default 0

title Windows 7 Home Premium
loadslic (hd0,0)/lenovocb-01.bin
chainloader (hd0,5)+1

Wednesday, July 28, 2010

Checking Integrity of A Debian/Ubuntu System

Sometimes, a Linux filesystem becomes corrupted, system files are damaged, or some crucial files get lost. This often happens, regardless of which filesystem (ext2, ext3, ext4, jfs, reiserfs, reiser4, or xfs) is used. There are many possible reasons, such as:



  • Unstable hardware, for example, memory or hard drive problem
  • Overheat, power surge, quake or another environmental disaster
  • Buggy software, such as a bug in the kernel or the filesystem driver
  • Compromised security, for example, network intrusion or attack
  • Worm or virus infection


Files in Linux systems can be categorized into the following three:




  1. Verifiable System Files

    In Linux systems that are managed by packages (such as Debian and Ubuntu), these files are installed by packages and make up the bulk of the filesystem. These files reside in such directories as /bin, /lib, /sbin and /usr. They are usually static, which means they don't normally change except when the system is updated, or locally compiled binaries are installed.
  2. Changeable System Files

    These files are auxiliary system files for system configuration, initialization or customization, and system data (such as logs and cache). They reside in /boot, /etc, /opt, /srv and /var.
  3. User Data

    These files are created and used by superuser (a.k.a root) and normal users, or software-generated during casual user activities. Typically, they are in /home, /media, /mnt and /root.


This post focuses on verifiable system files (installed by packages). When the filesystem becomes corrupted (but not completely unreadable), it is possible to verify and restore the system integrity by using package checksums. Before you continue, make sure to fsck the filesystem.



e2fsck -r -v /dev/sda7


In this example, /dev/sda7 points to an ext2 partition we're going to check. Be aware that you cannot fsck a mounted filesystem. Therefore, boot with a Debian Live CD (or a Ubuntu CD) and run fsck. After you've performed fsck, there may be some files created in the /lost+found directory. We'll deal with them later. First, mount the filesystem.



mount -t ext2 /dev/sda7 /mnt


Go to /var/lib/dpkg/info. Then, concatenate all the md5sums files. Most, if not all, Debian and Ubuntu packages come with a md5sum file that we can use to check the integrity of the package and the files installed by the package.



cd /var/lib/dpkg/info
cat *.md5sums | sort > /dev/shm/all.md5


all.md5 has md5 checksums of all the files installed on the system. Now, check the files on the Debian/Ubuntu system against the concatenated md5sums file.



cd /
md5sum -c /dev/shm/all.md5 > /dev/shm/check.txt 2>&1


/dev/shm/check.txt now contains the results of the integrity check. It looks like this:



bin/bash: OK
bin/bunzip2: OK
bin/bzcat: FAILED


In this example, /bin/bzcat is damaged. To find all the missing or damaged files, use a command like this one:



grep -v ': OK$' /dev/shm/check.txt


Let's reinstall this file. First, find out which package this file belongs to.



dpkg -S /bin/bzcat


We'll see the following result.



bzip2: /bin/bzcat


Now we know that we need to reinstall bzip2. Let's download the package.



dpkg -p bzip2 | grep 'Filename: '


This command will let us know the name of the package to download. Use wget to download it.



wget ftp://ftp.us.debian.org/debian/pool/main/b/bzip2/bzip2_1.0.5-4_i386.deb


You can just reinstall the package.



dpkg -i bzip2_1.0.5-4_i386.deb


Or, you can just extract one file:



dpkg --fsys-tarfile bzip2_1.0.5-4_i386.deb | tar xf - ./bin/bzcat


Alternatively,



dpkg --fsys-tarfile bzip2_1.0.5-4_i386.deb | tar xOf - ./bin/bzcat > /mnt/bin/bzcat


To restore a file from the /lost+found directory, you can also use the MD5SUMS file. First, run md5sum on files in /lost+found.



cd /lost+found
md5sum *


You may get an output like this.



9aaa2176d20c1b1203e3abbac55a2513  #124531


To find out what #124531 file is originally, find its md5 checksum from the all.md5 file above.



grep 9aaa /dev/shm/all.md5


You'll get a result like this.



9aaa2176d20c1b1203e3abbac55a2513  bin/bzip2


Now you can just move it to its place.



mv \#124531 /mnt/bin/bzip2


After you restore all damaged files and restore files from /lost+found, you can find missing files in the system. Go to /var/lib/dpkg/info again and concatenate all the list files.



cd /var/lib/dpkg/info
cat *.list | sort | uniq > /dev/shm/all.txt


The .list files in the /var/lib/dpkg/info directore show the list of files installed by packages. Let's find what's missing from the system.



cd /
for f in $(cat /dev/shm/all.txt ); do test -e "$f" || echo "$f" >> /dev/shm/nonexist.txt ; done


The file /dev/shm/nonexist.txt will show which files are missing from the system. You can then replace the missing files as done previously.

Monday, July 26, 2010

Linux: Using dd To Back Up Hard Drive Partitions

I am going to use the omnipresent and omnipotent tool called dd to back up a hard drive partition. I am working with the drive /dev/sdb. First, I save a text file that has information on the partition table layout.



fdisk -l /dev/sdb > hdpt.txt
fdisk -l -u /dev/sdb >> hdpt.txt


Then, I choose the compression format to use for the backup archive.


  • gzip
  • bzip2
  • lzma
  • xz


My choice for the compression format is lzma which provides superior compression and faster decompression. The following command backs up a partition at /dev/sdb1 with dd and lzma.



dd if=/dev/sdb1 | lzma -9c > backup01.bin.lzma


To restore this backup later, use the following command:



lzcat backup01.bin.lzma | dd of=/dev/sdb1

Thursday, July 22, 2010

Linux Commands To Partition and Format a Drive

Partitioning



In addition to the wonderful gparted, we can also use fdisk to partition a disk:



fdisk /dev/sdb


The device names for hard disks and USB drives are typically /dev/sd?, for example, /dev/sda, /dev/sdb, /dev/sdc, etc. For Linux kernels 2.6.18 or older, IDE hard drives may be called /dev/hda, /dev/hdb, etc.



Formatting



To format a FAT16 partition:



mkdosfs -F 16 -n LABEL -r 512 -v /dev/sdb1


To format EXT2 partition:



mke2fs -L SID -v /dev/sdb2


To format a JFS partition:



jfs_mkfs -c -L Debian_Sid /dev/sdb2


Installing MBR


MBR is a boot code necessary for booting from the hard drive or USB flash.



install-mbr /dev/sdb -v --drive 0x80 --enable +12


Installing bootloaders


For SYSLINUX:


syslinux /dev/sdb1


Checking Filesystem Integrity


For FAT16/FAT32:


dosfsck -r -v -V /dev/sdb1

Saturday, July 10, 2010

List of Useful Software for Windows



I just finished setting up my laptop. It's got Windows 7 Home Premium installed. The following is a list of software I installed onto my laptop:





Related Posts


Wednesday, June 30, 2010

Install Windows XP on a USB flash/hard drive

I am building a new PC from old spare parts. The new PC will be used mainly for the Internet, so a hard drive won't be necessary unless there's a need to download music and movies. I'm going to put together a computer with no internal storage, but use a USB stick as the main storage. Windows XP Professional will be installed on the USB stick, and the computer will boot up from the USB stick. Here I show how to install XP onto a USB stick and boot the PC from it. You should have the following ready.





Let's begin.




  1. Get your Windows XP installation CD and copy its contents to an empty folder on the hard drive. If you don't have the CD, use utorrent or emule to download the ISO file.



    Then, use 7-zip to extract the contents of the ISO file into an empty folder.



  2. Start the Command Prompt, go to the I386 subfolder and type the following commands to uncompress the USB driver files:


    CD I386
    EXPAND -I USB.IN_
    EXPAND -I USBPORT.IN_
    EXPAND -I USBSTOR.IN_

    We'll get 3 new files: USB.INF, USBPORT.INF and USBSTOR.INF. Remove the original .IN_ files.


    ERASE USB.IN_ USBPORT.IN_ USBSTOR.IN_


  3. Edit TXTSETUP.SIF to include USB storage support at the initial stage of Windows XP installation. The highlighted entries were copied from the [InputDevicesSupport.Load] section to the [BootBusExtenders.Load] section:

    [BootBusExtenders.Load]
    pci = pci.sys
    acpi = acpi.sys
    isapnp = isapnp.sys
    acpiec = acpiec.sys
    ohci1394 = ohci1394.sys
    usbehci = usbehci.sys
    usbohci = usbohci.sys
    usbuhci = usbuhci.sys
    usbhub = usbhub.sys
    usbstor = usbstor.sys


    Likewise for [BootBusExtenders] and [InputDevicesSupport]:



    [BootBusExtenders]
    pci = "PCI Bus Driver",files.pci,pci
    acpi = "ACPI Plug & Play Bus Driver",files.acpi,acpi
    isapnp = "ISA Plug & Play Bus Driver",files.isapnp,isapnp
    acpiec = "ACPI Embedded Controller Driver",files.none,acpiec
    ohci1394 = "IEEE 1394 Bus OHCI Compliant Port Driver",files.ohci1394,ohci1394
    usbehci = "Enhanced Host Controller",files.usbehci,usbehci
    usbohci = "Open Host Controller",files.usbohci,usbohci
    usbuhci = "Universal Host Controller",files.usbuhci,usbuhci
    usbhub = "Generic USB Hub Driver",files.usbhub,usbhub
    usbstor = "USB Storage Class Driver",files.usbstor,usbstor


    Insert the following in the [HiveInfs.Fresh] section:


    [HiveInfs.Fresh]
    AddReg = hivedef.inf,AddReg
    AddReg = hivesys.inf,AddReg
    AddReg = hivesft.inf,AddReg
    AddReg = hivecls.inf,AddReg
    AddReg = hiveusd.inf,AddReg
    AddReg = dmreg.inf,DM.AddReg
    AddReg = usbboot.inf,usbservices


    Then, in the [SourceDisksFiles] section:



    [SourceDisksFiles]
    usbboot.inf = 1,,,,,,_x,3,,3
    bootvid.dll = 1,,,,,,3_,2,0,0,,1,2
    kdcom.dll = 1,,,,,,3_,2,0,0,,1,2


    Save and close TXTSETUP.SIF.



  4. Edit DOSNET.INF so that the second [Files] section looks like this:

    [Files]
    d1,usbboot.inf
    d1,_default.pif
    d1,12520437.cpx
    d1,12520850.cpx


  5. Edit USB.INF as follows:


    [StandardHub.AddService]
    DisplayName = %StandardHub.SvcDesc%
    ServiceType = 1 ; SERVICE_KERNEL_DRIVER
    StartType = 0 ; SERVICE_DEMAND_START
    ErrorControl = 1 ; SERVICE_ERROR_NORMAL
    ServiceBinary = %12%\usbhub.sys
    LoadOrderGroup = Boot Bus Extender

    [CommonClassParent.AddService]
    DisplayName = %GenericParent.SvcDesc%
    ServiceType = 1 ; SERVICE_KERNEL_DRIVER
    StartType = 0 ; SERVICE_DEMAND_START
    ErrorControl = 1 ; SERVICE_ERROR_NORMAL
    ServiceBinary = %12%\usbccgp.sys
    LoadOrderGroup = Boot Bus Extender



  6. Modify USBPORT.INF like this.


    [EHCI.AddService]
    DisplayName = %EHCIMP.SvcDesc%
    ServiceType = 1 ; SERVICE_KERNEL_DRIVER
    StartType = 0 ; SERVICE_DEMAND_START
    ErrorControl = 1 ; SERVICE_ERROR_NORMAL
    ServiceBinary = %12%\usbehci.sys
    LoadOrderGroup = Boot Bus Extender


    [OHCI.AddService]
    DisplayName = %OHCIMP.SvcDesc%
    ServiceType = 1 ; SERVICE_KERNEL_DRIVER
    StartType = 0 ; SERVICE_DEMAND_START
    ErrorControl = 1 ; SERVICE_ERROR_NORMAL
    ServiceBinary = %12%\usbohci.sys
    LoadOrderGroup = Boot Bus Extender


    [UHCI.AddService]
    DisplayName = %UHCIMP.SvcDesc%
    ServiceType = 1 ; SERVICE_KERNEL_DRIVER
    StartType = 0 ; SERVICE_DEMAND_START
    ErrorControl = 1 ; SERVICE_ERROR_NORMAL
    ServiceBinary = %12%\usbuhci.sys
    LoadOrderGroup = Boot Bus Extender


    [ROOTHUB.AddService]
    DisplayName = %ROOTHUB.SvcDesc%
    ServiceType = 1 ; SERVICE_KERNEL_DRIVER
    StartType = 0 ; SERVICE_DEMAND_START
    ErrorControl = 1 ; SERVICE_ERROR_NORMAL
    ServiceBinary = %12%\usbhub.sys
    LoadOrderGroup = Boot Bus Extender


  7. Edit USBSTOR.INF:


    [USBSTOR.AddService]
    DisplayName = %USBSTOR.SvcDesc%
    ServiceType = 1
    StartType = 0
    Tag = 3

    ErrorControl = 1
    ServiceBinary = %12%\USBSTOR.SYS
    LoadOrderGroup = Boot Bus Extender


  8. Create a new file USBBOOT.INF with the following contents:


    [usbservices]

    HKLM,"SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\USBSTOR","DisplayName",0x00000000,"USB Mass Storage Driver"
    HKLM,"SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\USBSTOR","ErrorControl",0x00010001,1
    HKLM,"SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\USBSTOR","Group",0x00000000,"System Reserved"
    HKLM,"SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\USBSTOR","ImagePath",0x00020000,"system32\DRIVERS\USBSTOR.SYS"
    HKLM,"SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\USBSTOR","Start",0x00010001,0
    HKLM,"SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\USBSTOR","Type",0x00010001,1

    HKLM,"SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\usbehci","DisplayName",0x00000000,"USB 2.0 Enhanced Host Controller Miniport Driver"
    HKLM,"SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\usbehci","ErrorControl",0x00010001,1
    HKLM,"SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\usbehci","Group",0x00000000,"System Reserved"
    HKLM,"SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\usbehci","ImagePath",0x00020000,"system32\DRIVERS\usbehci.sys"
    HKLM,"SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\usbehci","Start",0x00010001,0
    HKLM,"SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\usbehci","Type",0x00010001,1

    HKLM,"SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\usbhub","DisplayName",0x00000000,"USB2 Enabled Hub"
    HKLM,"SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\usbhub","ErrorControl",0x00010001,1
    HKLM,"SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\usbhub","Group",0x00000000,"System Reserved"
    HKLM,"SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\usbhub","ImagePath",0x00020000,"system32\DRIVERS\usbhub.sys"
    HKLM,"SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\usbhub","Start",0x00010001,0
    HKLM,"SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\usbhub","Type",0x00010001,1

    HKLM,"SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\usbuhci","DisplayName",0x00000000,"Microsoft USB Universal Host Controller Miniport Driver"
    HKLM,"SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\usbuhci","ErrorControl",0x00010001,1
    HKLM,"SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\usbuhci","Group",0x00000000,"System Reserved"
    HKLM,"SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\usbuhci","ImagePath",0x00020000,"system32\DRIVERS\usbuhci.sys"
    HKLM,"SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\usbuhci","Start",0x00010001,0
    HKLM,"SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\usbuhci","Type",0x00010001,1

    HKLM,"SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\usbohci","DisplayName",0x00000000,"Microsoft USB Open Host Controller Miniport Driver"
    HKLM,"SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\usbohci","ErrorControl",0x00010001,1
    HKLM,"SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\usbohci","Group",0x00000000,"System Reserved"
    HKLM,"SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\usbohci","ImagePath",0x00020000,"system32\DRIVERS\usbohci.sys"
    HKLM,"SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\usbohci","Start",0x00010001,0
    HKLM,"SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\usbohci","Type",0x00010001,1


  9. If you haven't erased the original .IN_ files, do so now.


    erase USB.IN_
    erase USBPORT.IN_
    erase USBSTOR.IN_

    Compress the modified files with cabarc.


    cabarc n USB.IN_ usb.inf
    cabarc n USBPORT.IN_ usbport.inf
    cabarc n USBSTOR.IN_ usbstor.inf

    You'll get 3 compressed files with IN_ extension.



  10. Put these files back into the I386 subfolder of the Windows XP installation folder.

    • DOSNET.INF
    • TXTSETUP.SIF
    • USB.IN_
    • USBBOOT.INF
    • USBPORT.IN_
    • USBSTOR.IN_


  11. You'll need this boot sector (w2ksect.bin) to make your new CD bootable. Put w2ksect.bin inside the main folder containing XP files.



  12. Now, let's burn a new CD containing Windows XP files. Start ImgBurn and select Write files/folders to disc. Click the Browser for a folder... icon and select the folder containing Windows XP files. Then, set up options as follows.










    Insert a blank CD into your optical drive and burn it.



  13. Plug in your USB flash drive or USB hard drive to your computer and run the HP USB Disk Storage Format Tool. On Windows Vista or Windows 7, run it as administrator.




  14. From the I386 folder of XP installation CD, copy the following files to the USB drive:



    • ntldr
    • ntdetect.com

    Then, create a new file boot.ini with the following contents. Put it on the USB drive.


    [boot loader]
    timeout=30
    default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS

    [operating systems]
    multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /fastdetect


  15. Run the Partition Table Editor (PTEDIT32.EXE) as administrator. Select your USB drive from Hard Disk pulldown menu.




    Change the type of primary partition on the USB drive from 00 to 80. Click the Save Changes button.



    Partition Information should read FAT16X, Bootable



  16. Remove your hard drive from the computer. Then, connect your USB flash drive directly to your computer.



  17. Change the boot order in the BIOS so that your computer can boot from a USB drive. Typical BIOS options are as follows:


    • USB HDD
    • USB Hard Drive


  18. Insert your new Windows XP CD your burned above and boot your computer with it. During installation, don't format the USB drive. Just leave it as is.



  19. After successfully installing Windows XP on your USB drive, install the EWF or FBWF filter.



Tuesday, June 29, 2010

Dumping the Contents of a Data CD into an ISO file

ISO files are used to burn Data CD's. If you want to share software CD's with someone far away, you can dump the contents of the CD into an ISO file and then transfer the ISO file to him.


For this job, readom from the cdrkit package can do. If you use Windows, download cygwin1.dll and readom.exe, then put them in C:\Windows and start the Command Prompt. Put the Windows XP CD in your CD-ROM (Assume CD-ROM's drive letter is D:) and run the following commands:

readom dev='D:' f='/home/Public/Downloads/dumped.iso' speed=2 retries=8 -noerror -nocorr

Assuming we're using Windows Vista or Windows 7, we'll find the dumped ISO file at C:\Users\Public\Downloads\dumped.iso.


Alternatively, we can use WinImage to dump the CD contents. From the Disk menu of WinImage, make sure “use CD-ROM D:” is checked. Then, select “Create CD-ROM ISO image...” from the Disk menu. If you get an access error, close any Windows Explorer, Media Player or file manager.


We can also use CDBurnerXP, InfraRecorder or ImgBurn to dump the CD contents to an ISO file.

Wednesday, June 2, 2010

Compiling GTK+ Theme Engines

The GTK+ widget library supports diverse customization of look and feel for GTK+ applications. This is achieved by installing a shared library (*.so or *.dll) that provides a particular GTK+ theme style. The default GTK+ theme engine (Raleigh) is too generic and old-fashioned to suit my style. The pixmap engine is too much of a resource hog, and the Wimp engine doesn't seem to work for GTK+ 2.18 and later releases.


My favorite GTK+ theme engines are thus:



  • Aurora engine
  • Candido engine
  • CleanIce engine
  • Clearlooks engine
  • Lighthouseblue engine
  • MagicChicken engine
  • Murrine engine
  • Nodoka engine
  • Rezlooks engine
  • Smooth engine
  • Wonderland engine


Compiling GTK+ Theme Engines 2.20.1


After building GTK+ 2 library, I can compile GTK+ theme engines, including Clearlooks and Lighthouseblue. I couldn't find the upstream release of gtk2-engines, so I downloaded the source from Debian Sid's page.


gtk2-engines requires intltool, so I compiled intltool first.


tar xzvf intltool-0.41.1.tar.gz
cd intltool-0.41.1
./configure --prefix=/mingw
make
make install

configure script will complain if xgettext, msgmerge and msgfmt are not found. I got these programs from my static gettext package I compiled previously.



Then, I compiled gtk-engines as follows:


tar xzvf gtk2-engines_2.20.1.orig.tar.gz
cd gtk-engines-2.20.1/
./configure --prefix=/mingw --disable-deprecated --enable-animation
make

I only wanted clearlooks, so I copied libclearlooks.dll.


find -iname \*dll
cp ./engines/clearlooks/.libs/libclearlooks.dll /mingw/lib/gtk-2.0/2.10.0/engines


Compiling Aurora Theme Engine


I downloaded the Aurora source from here and unpack it. I compiled Aurora like this:


./configure --prefix=/mingw --enable-animation
make
make install


Cygwin: Compiling Smooth Theme Engine


The source code of smooth theme engine can be downloaded from here. Compiling is easy:


./configure --prefix=/usr
make
make install

Monday, May 31, 2010

Compiling GTK+ for Windows with MinGW

GTK+ is a set of open-source widget libraries that are mature, functional and portable. GTK+ library is mainly used by many Linux programs. I am building a complete stack of GTK+ 2.x library before beginning my programming projects. This tutorial makes use of the free MinGW compiler to build GTK+.



If you haven't installed MinGW yet, read this tutorial on installing MinGW in Windows. Alternatively, you can also install MinGW Portable on your USB flash drive so you can enjoy compiling anywhere. GTK+ depends on many basic libraries that provide image, localization, font and other functions. These prerequisite libraries have be compiled first. Once you've installed MinGW and MSYS, launch MSYS. The following steps require you to type commands into MSYS console.




  1. Zlib 1.2.7


    Zlib is an essential compression library required by png, tiff and cairo. Get the zlib source and unpack it:

    tar xzvf zlib-1.2.7.tar.gz
    cd zlib-1.2.7/

    Compile zlib like this:


    make -f win32/Makefile.gcc

    Then, manually copy the files as follows:


    cp -iv zlib1.dll /mingw/bin
    cp -iv zconf.h zlib.h /mingw/include
    cp -iv libz.a /mingw/lib
    cp -iv libz.dll.a /mingw/lib


  2. libiconv 1.14


    libiconv is a character-set conversion library, and is needed by gettext. Download the libiconv source and compile libiconv:


    ./configure --prefix=/mingw
    make
    make install


  3. gettext 0.18.1.1


    GNU gettext is a tool for localizing and translating programs. Build gettext like this:


    ./configure --prefix=/mingw --enable-threads=win32 --enable-relocatable
    cd gettext-runtime/
    make
    make install


  4. glib 2.32.4


    glib's configure script requires pkg-config.exe and msgfmt.exe in the PATH. Download the executables and save them in /mingw/bin. Remember to set the system-wide environment variable PKG_CONFIG_PATH:


    export PKG_CONFIG_PATH=/mingw/lib/pkgconfig

    glib 2.30 and later depends on libffi. Compile libffi like this:


    ./configure --prefix=/mingw && make && make install

    Then, get the glib source from ftp.gnome.org and compile glib as follows:


    ./configure --prefix=/mingw --with-threads=win32 --with-pcre=internal --disable-debug
    make
    make install


  5. ATK 2.4.0


    Download ATK from here. Compile it like this:


    ./configure --prefix=/mingw
    make
    make install


  6. libpng 1.5.12


    PNG can be compiled like this:


    ./configure --prefix=/mingw
    make
    make install


  7. Optional libraries


    The following libraries are optional, but many GTK+ packages include them. It's up to you to decide whether to compile them or not.



    As usual, compile any of them like this:


    ./configure --prefix=/mingw && make && make install


  8. Pixman 0.26.2 and Cairo 1.12.2


    Get Pixman and Cairo from cairographics.org. Compile Pixman as follows:


    ./configure --prefix=/mingw

    make

    make install

    Then, compile cairo:


    ./configure --prefix=/mingw --enable-pthread
    make
    make install


  9. Pango Library 1.30.1


    Compile Pango like this:


    ./configure --prefix=/mingw --with-included-modules=yes

    make

    make install


  10. gdk-pixbuf 2.26.2


    Download and compile gdk-pixbuf:


    ./configure --prefix=/mingw --without-libjasper --with-included-loaders=yes --disable-modules --disable-debug
    make
    make install


  11. GTK+ 2.24.11 and GTK+ 3.4.2


    At last, we are ready to compile GTK+ for Windows. I compiled GTK+ like this:


    ./configure --prefix=/mingw --with-included-immodules=ime --disable-modules --disable-debug

    make

    make install


    To test your newly compiled GTK+ library, run gtk-demo.exe or testgtk.exe.



Wednesday, May 19, 2010

My Windows Vista/7 Power Settings

Here are my power settings on Windows Vista or Windows 7. I find the default setting annoying or inadequate, especially the Start menu power button triggering sleep.




  • Lid Close Action
    • On Battery: Sleep
    • Plugged in: Do nothing


  • Power Button Action
    • On Battery: Hibernate
    • Plugged in: Hibernate


  • Sleep Button
    • On Battery: Sleep
    • Plugged in: Hibernate


  • Start menu power button
    • On Battery: Shut down
    • Plugged in: Shut down

Sunday, May 16, 2010

Using Mencoder To Merge AVI Files

Merging 2 AVI files can be easily accomplished with mencoder. But the two AVI files must be encoded with the same video and audio codec. Assuming that you have part1.avi and part2.avi, seamlessly consecutive, the mencoder command to concatenate them is:


mencoder -ovc copy -oac copy -o whole.avi part1.avi part2.avi

Wednesday, May 5, 2010

Using VLC to Dump a DVD title

VLC is a free, powerful media player for Windows, Mac and Linux. I've used VLC mainly for playing Movies. Sometimes, I use VLC to listen to Internet radio. I seldom use VLC to rip DVD's but VLC can come in handy when dealing with tricky DVD titles. For DVD titles with mixed VOB ID's, VLC can be used to dump such DVD titles. Follow the steps below:




  1. From the Media menu of VLC, select Convert/Save...

    VLC Media Convert
  2. Choose the Disc tab. In the Disc Selection area, choose DVD and check No DVD menus. Type in the drive letter (for example, F:\) for your DVD drive. The main title number is typically 1, but may vary. Audio track is usually 0 for the primary language (English) and 1 for secondary lanuage (French or Spanish). Click Convert/Save button.



  3. In the next Convert window, click the Create a new profile button.



  4. Name the new profile as Copy Without Conversion. In the Video codec tab, check both options Video and Keep original video track.


    In the Audio codec tab, check both options Audio and Keep original audio track.



    Leave anything else as is. Click Save.



  5. Back to the Convert window, type in the name for Destination file (E:\output.ts). For the profile, select the newly created profile (Copy Without Conversion) from the dropdown list. Click Start.



  6. VLC starts saving the DVD title to a disk file.




Although VLC has many built-in functions for ripping DVD's and converting movies, I don't have much experience with them. I think VLC's transcoding function is premature.


After VLC finishes conversion, you'll get an output file (output.ts) whose size may be up to several gigabytes. Now, use mencoder to transcode it.



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