Some Issues and Challenges

The excessive amount of work has kept me away from my blog, that's true.  However, the fact that my Linux distros have been performing beyond my expectations has also, in a way, stopped me from writing here.  

I mean... There's very little to write about when nothing breaks.

But then I noticed several problems:

1.  Insync and OpenMandriva Lx:

The upgrade to OpenMandriva Lx 4.2 removed my Insync client on my laptop.  I do not know what the problem was (a Python issue, maybe?).  I have not been able to make it come back.

2.  Insync and PCLinuxOS:

The update I applied yesterday produced the same problem with Insync that I had in OpenMandriva.  So, my laptop cannot sync files with Insync in PCLinuxOS, either. 

3.  Mesa updates and sound problems in Mageia 8:

This is something I have seen before in my desktops.  Four Mesa-related packages ask me to uninstall Steam, which I do not want to do, so I've been postponing such updates for a long time.

Then I noticed that VLC stopped working and that my repo database in MCC was acting weird, refusing to install certain tainted packages.  This led to mute audio in videos played with SMplayer, Mplayer, and Kplayer.

I decided to experiment with these because I need the audio in the desktop to work, so I installed the four Mesa-related files and, sure enough, Mageia got rid of Steam.

My year with Fedora helped me there.  Instead of using MCC, I opened Konsole and used DNF following these instructions from the Mageia Wiki:

 

• If nonfree or tainted repositories are desired, they can be activated using dnf config-manager as shown with this example for 64 bit system (replace x86_64 with i586 for 32 bit):
  

dnf config-manager --set-enabled mageia-x86_64-nonfree updates-x86_64-nonfree
dnf config-manager --set-enabled mageia-x86_64-tainted updates-x86_64-tainted

• 32-bit repositories are turned off by default on 64-bit x86. If you need them:
  

dnf config-manager --set-enabled mageia-i586 updates-i586

With that, after running dnf-update, I could get steam, vlc, ffmpeg, and other packages back.  This repaired the problem with video sound, but VLC is still not operational.

I'll try to fix this.  When I get some time.

 

 

Temporary fix for Insync problem not running on OpenMandriva LX 3.1

After the Christmas update, Insync has refused to run properly on my OpenMandriva Lx 3.1 install.

When one first installs the package, it runs, syncs, and seems to be OK.  However, after closing the session, Insync is gone from the panel and nothing can summon it back.

To circumvent this issue, I uninstalled the package and, using the terminal, installed it again as root using the urmpi command.

After it synchronized and everything, I closed the session and it was gone again.  However, this time, one can bring it back from Konsole as root.  It is not the most elegant fix, but it is easy enough.

I guess this solves that problem for the time being...

Progress Report

This table shows my progress working with several problems on my four main Linux distros.

After a lot of effort, I made significant progress with the Epson XP 231 in PCLinuxOS.  Today, I managed to get it to work as it should.  Some people are reporting my same problem with Steam on that OS, though...

OpenMandriva Lx 3.1 pretty much does everything, except that Insync, which I believed was running, must be reinstalled every time to get it to work. You close the session and it's gone.  Bad.

Mageia 5.1's problem is the scanner.  XSane reports that the usb port where it is found fails to open the device.  I originally thought it was the file epwoka.conf at /etc/sane.d, but it does not seem to be the problem.

And then Fedora 25 weirdly refuses to print, but I suspect it is because I installed Fedora two days ago and noob is too short a word to describe me.

But I will keep trying.  At least, I could solve the printing/scanning problem in PCLinuxOS by using what I learned in Fedora about the installation of packages via shell.

UPDATE: I finally solved the problems with the printer on Fedora 25 and installed Steam.  Hence, Fedora is so far the first system in which I managed to get everything running.

Those Meaningful Gifts... Thanks, OpenMandriva!!

Yesterday, I read an email coming from the mail list of OpenMandriva.  It was an announcement about an unexpected release: The community had been working on a surprise and released OpenMandriva Lx 3.01 as a Christmas gift.

News of the kind always stirs some excitement in me. How can I forget that it was Mandriva the distro that made me fully commit to Linux in 2009?

This time was a bit different, however.  Do not get me wrong; my interest in OpenMandriva has not waned over the years despite the fact that I also use Mageia 5 and PCLinuxOS daily for my computing needs.  What happened is that, exactly one week ago, my EPSON Stylus TX 200 all-in-one printer died and I had been on the market trying to find a good replacement.

I eventually bought an EPSON XP-231 because it is advertised to have full Linux support but, so far, I have not managed to get it to work properly in Mageia (scanner problems) and PCLinuxOS (both printer and scanner problems) because of the drivers.  Therefore, my investment on the new hardware was beginning to look like a relatively expensive mistake.

Then OpenMandriva Lx 3.01 came and saved the day.

The XP-231 was not easy to get to work, to be honest, but I eventually got it to print and scan appropriately in OpenMandriva Lx 3.01.

Oh, and I must add that this release also corrected a bug that prevented me to run Insync, a program that I became fond of.

All I can say is that I am thankful for the hard work of the folks at OpenMandriva, who gave me this wrappingless Christmas gift...

And wrappingless gifts, I have learned, tend to be the most meaningful ones! 

My experiment with Insync

Some months ago, I decided to give the cloud a chance.  I have been very critical of cloud services because I know that major cloud service providers give you some free space in exchange of a bit of your soul.

Well, I may be exaggerating there, but they do capitalize on your information somehow and that, along with security concerns, kept me out of the cloud.

However, I decided that since I already own an Android phone, which connects me to Google drive, I could use the service to see how it worked.

Now, the idea of having cloud storage is to be able to synchronize my files and to be able to access them from my desktop, laptop, and phone. Connecting the desktop in my office would be great, too.

On Linux, one can use the console to do something like that.  However, since Google does not release a GUI client of Google Drive, I wanted to check a GUI version and the best one I found was Insync.

This is not a free service.  They offer you a 15 day trial and then, if you like what they do, you pay a plan and you can install the program in as many machines as you want.

So I tried out their service.

In my humble opinion, their program worked as a charm: the interface was intuitive, the synchronization of the single folder I selected was flawless, and the access from both Mageia and OpenMandriva was perfect from different machines. I was very impressed, but I was not considering to pay despite I found the pricing reasonable.  My problem was my own cloud aversion.

My initial thought was to uninstall the program once the trial period was over and move on with my life, once again forgetting about the cloud. However, something unexpected happened: after a week of using the program, I received an email from an Insync representative who identified herself as Janine. It was a short follow up message reminding me that, if I needed help, they were ready to support me.  One week later, she wrote another one reminding me of the end of the trial.

I must say that those emails were different from emails one regularly gets from a company.  They were professionally written but, besides being the most courteous messages I have received from a company in my life, they had this human flavor to them...

Even so, I did not upgrade.  I expected that to be the last I was going to hear from Insync, but I received one more email.  This one blew my mind.  It was Janine again offering more trial time or support if I did not upgrade on account of a problem or if the service failed meet my expectations.  If the problem was pricing, she also had an offer to cover for that.

With that email, this company made me feel like a valued customer.  I replied thanking for their awesome service and paid my Insync plus for consumers plan ($25).

Now I run the program from Mageia and OpenMandriva, both from desktop/laptops, and my "cloudophobia" is diminishing.  In fact, I have found the service very useful.