"Linux Gazette...making Linux just a little more fun!"

Answers to these questions should be sent directly to the e-mail address of the inquirer with or without a copy to [email protected]. Answers that are copied to LG will be printed in the Tips column of the next issue.

Date: Mon, 01 Mar 1999 13:08:48 -0800
From: Abdul Rauf,
Subject: Intel NIC

I have a problem while I am trying to implement firewall on a Linux box. Problem is that I have installed two Intel NIC's in the system and gave them two IPs with the same subnet, when I ping them from the other machines both of them reply but when I ping to each other they don't. What could be the reason? Thanks

--
Abdul Rauf

Date: Mon, 01 Mar 1999 15:44:28 -0800
From: Sudhakar Chandrasekharan,
Subject: DSL Access

My telephone carrier slashed the prices on DSL access http://public.pacbell.net/dedicated/dsl/dsl_basic.html. I am currently on the waiting list to get connected via DSL. The PacBell page lists the following under the "Hardware Requirements" section -

* Alcatel 1000 DSL Modem
* POTS Spliter
* Kingston KNE 40T Network Interface Card

I have a dual-boot (Debian GNU/)Linux - Win '95 machine at home. How is the support for the above hardware under Linux?

--
Sudhakar

Date: Sat, 06 Mar 1999 23:06:49 +0000
From: "graham.drake",
Subject: video card

The Linux desktops running under X do not fit my monitor, I suppose I have not got the resolution correct. I have a Compaq Presario 2110 but have not got any video card details. If anybody out there has set up on the same computer please would you send me details. Thanks,

--
Graham

Date: Fri, 05 Mar 1999 20:15:23 +0000
From: Huub van Niekerk,
Subject: E-mail

I'm looking for an email program that equals Windows' Eudora. Who can do a suggestion? Thanks.

--
Huub

Date: Sat, 06 Mar 1999 02:57:15 +0000
From: DanBarnes,
Subject: Joystick Article

I've been puttering around off and on with getting a joystick working with Linux and I realize that I can't recall coming across an article anywhere on this, this might be a good article idea for Linux Gazette.

--
Dan

Date: Wed, 03 Mar 1999 16:39:55 -0600
From: Mark Forstneger,
Subject: new kernel

I am looking for information on what differentiates kernel 2.2.x from 2.0.x. Perhaps you could do an article on it? There were many articles on the Windows98 release and how it different from Windows95, whether one should upgrade, etc. Jump on the bandwagon. Thank you very much.

-- Mark

(Check out the article by Joseph Pranevich, "The Wonderful World of Linux 2.2." in our February issue. --Editor)

Date: Wed, 3 Mar 1999 14:31:00 -0800
From: "Michel A. Lim",
Subject: Does Linux like WINS?

Hello all. Now that my network card is working, I am trying to connect my Linux box (Red Hat 5.2, kernel 2.0.36-0.7) to my Windows network. After some struggling, the Linux machine now appears and is accessible in the Network Neighborhoods of all my Win 9x/NT4 workstations. Furthermore, I can ping and telnet from each workstation to the Linux server by its host name (WHL31) and by its static IP address (192.168.34.6).

However, I can only ping from the Linux box to the workstations by their respective IP address. Since the workstations receive IP addresses dynamically from the DHCP service on my NT3.51 server, I cannot simply add the host names for all workstations to /etc/hosts. Therefore, my NT3.51 server (192.168.34.1) also acts as the WINS server for my network. I have configured Samba (1.9.18p10) with the following entries in /etc/smb.conf:

wins server = 192.168.34.1
name resolve order = wins hosts lmhosts bcast

What am I missing here? Is there another way to direct Linux to the WINS database? I was hoping to try things this way first, before trying to set up the Linux server as the WINS and/or DNS-caching server for my network.

Thank you for your attention in this matter. Any suggestions and ideas would be most welcome. However, please bear in mind that I am not very network savvy. For that matter, I'm also do not have any formal IS training.

Regards, --
Michel A. Lim

Date: Sun, 7 Mar 1999 16:14:27 -0300
From: "AcidBrain",
Subject: Linux to Netware Problem

Hi, I liked your zine very much. I'm mailing you, because it appears that no one knows how to solve my problem ( at least here, in Brazil). The problem appears when I try to connect ( dialing ) to my ISP, that is a Novell Netware. Look at the logs.

First, I tried to connect with minicom :

CONNECT 33600/ARQ/V34/LAPM/V42BIS

Connected to NetWare CONNECT 2.0.30 Service Selector on port AIO_111913000.

Sorry, there are no services available at this time.

Would you know the solution ? If so, please help-me. Thanks,

--
AcidBrain

(The best guide I know of for connecting to the Internet using PPP is an article by Terry Dawson "The 10-Minute Guide for Using PPP to Connect Linux to the Internet" found at http://www.linuxjournal.com/issue36/ppp.html. --Editor)

Date: Mon, 8 Mar 1999 17:45:41 -0000
From: Robert Karlsson,
Subject: Problem with the proxy

I am running Slackware 3.4 with the kernel 2.0.36. I am trying to get my Linux to work with our schools proxy. I need some kind of proxy client that can handle SOCKS5. We tried some clients for SOCKS4 (homemade) but they don't work so it got to SOCKS5. What should I do?? I have no idea how to make it work. I don't know so much about SOCKS5 so I cant program my own program. Is there some program for SOCKS5? Please answer. (I want to throw W95 in the wall) /SiD_V

--
Robert

Date: Wed, 10 Mar 1999 20:50:03 +0000
From: Michael Wilson,
Subject: Dodgy Hard Drive

Before I start, excellent resource, keep up the good work... to my problem now. I have 3 HD's two on the master and slave on the primary controller and the last on the primary of the secondary controller.

The dodgy drive is a Segate Medallist ST34321A. I have included a part of the boot.msg so as you can so what I mean...

<4>PIIX4: IDE controller on PCI bus 00 dev 11
<4>PIIX4: not 100% native mode: will probe irqs later
<4>    ide0: BM-DMA at 0xf000-0xf007, BIOS settings: hda:pio, hdb:pio
<4>    ide1: BM-DMA at 0xf008-0xf00f, BIOS settings: hdc:pio, hdd:pio
<4>hda: SAMSUNG SV0644A, ATA DISK drive
<4>hdb: FUJITSU MPC3064AT, ATA DISK drive
<4>hdc: ST34321A, ATA DISK drive
<4>hdd: CR-2801TE, ATAPI CDROM drive
<4>ide0 at 0x1f0-0x1f7,0x3f6 on irq 14
<4>ide1 at 0x170-0x177,0x376 on irq 15
<6>hda: SAMSUNG SV0644A, 6105MB w/490kB Cache, CHS=778/255/63, UDMA
<6>hdb: FUJITSU MPC3064AT, 6187MB w/0kB Cache, CHS=838/240/63, UDMA
<6>hdc: ST34321A, 4103MB w/128kB Cache, CHS=8894/15/63, UDMA
<4>hdd: ATAPI 8X CDROM CD-R drive, 512kB Cache
<6>Uniform CDROM driver Revision: 2.51
<4>Partition check:
<4> hda: hda1 < hda5 hda6 hda7 hda8 > hda2
<4> hdb: hdb1 < hdb5 >
<4> hdc:hdc: set_multmode: status=0x51 { DriveReady SeekComplete Error }
<4>hdc: set_multmode: error=0x04 { DriveStatusError }
<4> [PTBL] [523/255/63] hdc1 < hdc5 >

Any ideas, or the scrap heap for it ??

--
Michael

Date: Wed, 10 Mar 1999 04:47:23 +0000
From: "Rod King",
Subject: Uninstalling Software

Have you had any articles on uninstalling application software in Linux. I am having some trouble finding information on this subject. Thanks

--
Rod King

Date: Thu, 11 Mar 1999 15:35:34 +0000
From: Ben,
Subject: retrieving Win9x / NT user names with Linux.

I've searched high and low for info on how to do this - something like an nbtstat on a win32 box from a UNIX server. I just need a way to allow a Linux server to retrieve the user name that a win9x / NT user is logged in to a hot-desking machine with.

So if I log in to a Win95 box as fubaruser / password, then try and open a local intranet page on the Linux server, it will allow me to log in with my own personal profile for the intranet site - and this profile will follow me from Win9x machine to Win9x machine. Because of the unclean nature of these machines, and the multiplicity of browsers in use, cookies are impractical.

help me pleeeeease?

--
Ben

Date: Wed, 24 Mar 1999 23:03:52 -0800
From: David Gardner
Subject: Advice on Linux Internet gateway box...

I'm using an old i486-66 box (16 MB RAM, 250 MB HD) running Linux 2.0.32 kernel with Diald, pppd, routed and other assorted daemons. I also use masquerading to allow all workstations on my home network to get onto and use the Internet. It works okay but the syslogd tends to get stuck and blocks any additional dial-out sessions. Once I kill the syslogd process, everything goes fine again but ... nothing is logged. Can you make recommendations on how to solve this problem?

I'm also considering ADSL to replace my POTS connection. Do you have any specific recommendations for converting the Internet gateway system?

--
David

Date: Mon, 22 Mar 1999 11:20:04 -0000
From: Brian Lycett,
Subject: PC CHIPS Problem

I recently bought a brand spanking new PC-CHIPS motherboard, model 598, with a SiS530 onboard AGP 3D graphics card. I was quite eager to run Linux on this, but imagine my disappointment when I started X and got a corrupted, garbled screen. When I came out of X, the fonts were also all messed up.

I tried the latest XFree86 release, which is supposed to support the PC-Chips mainboard, but it still didn't work. Does anyone know of any fixes for this? The VGA uses shared system memory - could this be a problem?

This is the first problem in Linux I've come across that I can't find help for anywhere.

So if anyone out there could help me get X Windows up and running on my new box, I'd be very, very happy. Thank you.

--
Brian

Date: Sun, 21 Mar 1999 14:44:06 -0600
From: Mark Zolton,
Subject: Linux, PalmIII, and Email

I just purchased a PalmIII and I am interested in using it to compose and send email. The Pilot utilities for Linux contain a pilot-mail program which is capable of retrieving email from a POP client and sending it to the PlamIII. It sends email from the PalmIII via sendmail. I have no trouble getting email from the POP client, however, I have not played around with sendmail enough to know how to set it up to send email to my service providers SMTP host. What I would really like to find is an application which would allow me to use the PalmIII's serial connection to send email to an SMTP host so I don't have to mess with sendmail. If that isn't possible, can anyone recommend a good tutorial on setting up sendmail for personal use?

--
Mark

Date: Sun, 21 Mar 1999 04:49:26 PST
From: "Ar San",
Subject: TACACS is year 2000 compliance

I would like to know that TACACS/TACACS PLUS is/are year 2000 compliance?? (NetWare Server) Thanks!! --
San

Date: Thu, 18 Mar 1999 21:40:52 +0100
From: "Wojtek Pêkala",
Subject: Scanner Mustek Cp 600

The CP 600 scanners are really cheap, and that's the reason why my employer has equipped me with one. Right now the scanner is the only reason why I still have a Windows partition on my disk, as the lpt scanners lack generally support under Linux. I tried to use the Win3.1 software for the scanner under Wine but to no avail. The failure surprised me since Wine generally handles the old small W3.1 progs quite well. Here is what I got:

Unexpected Windows program segfault - opcode = 8b
Page fault in 32-bit code (0x0809ddfc).
Fault address is 0x03780345
Loading symbols: wine /usr/X11R6/lib/libSM.so.6
/usr/X11R6/lib/libICE.so.6
    /usr/lib/libMesaGL.so.3 /usr/X11R6/lib/libXpm.so.4
    /usr/X11R6/lib/libXext.so.6 /usr/X11R6/lib/libX11.so.6
    /usr/lib/libncurses.so.4 /lib/libdl.so.2 /lib/libm.so.6
/lib/libc.so.6
    /lib/ld-linux.so.2 /lib/libnss_files.so.1
    TOOLHELP SHELL COMMDLG KEYBOARD WIN87EM LEAD52 PANEL USER GDI KERNEL
    WINEPS WPROCS DISPLAY SYSTEM USER32 GDI32 KERNEL32
In 32 bit mode.
Register dump:
 CS:0023 SS:002b DS:002b ES:002b FS:03b7 GS:002b
 EIP:0809ddfc ESP:40a6f5b8 EBP:40a6f61c EFLAGS:00010246(  R- 00  I  Z-
-P1 )
 EAX:03780345 EBX:000003ff ECX:0000037c EDX:03780345
 ESI:03780345 EDI:000008d4
Stack dump:
0x40a6f5b8 (USER32..code+0x33e090):  00000000 40307818 000008d4 01c004b1
08abd96              0 00000001 00000413 00000081
0x40a6f5d8 (USER32..code+0x33e0b0):  00000413 402e2598 00000000 00000413
0000000              1 00000000 00000001 00000000
0x40a6f5f8 (USER32..code+0x33e0d0):  00000000 00000001 00000000 4031754c
40a6f62              8 080c33f8 402e2598 00000081
0x40a6f618 (USER32..code+0x33e0f0): 

Backtrace:
=>0 0x0809ddfc (MENU_SetItemData+0x15c [menu.c])
  1 0x0809e6e8 (MENU_ExecFocusedItem+0x5c [menu.c])
  2 0x081c7862 (TOOLBAR_SetMaxTextRows+0x22 [toolbar.c])
  3 0x081c7d53 (TOOLBAR_LButtonDown+0x47 [toolbar.c])
  4 0x081b419a (TSXFree+0x2e)
  5 0x081b4a81 (TSXMapWindow+0x65)
  6 0x0807d3a0 (CallFrom16_p_long_tp+0x8 [callfrom16.s])
  7 0x08067e87 (BUILTIN_Init+0x6b)
...

Date: Thu, 18 Mar 1999 06:23:44 -0800 (PST)
From: Jonathan Markevich,
Subject: Mac client over LocalTalk

Does anyone know if it is possible to do file sharing over a simple LocalTalk (serial) connection? I had a modem cable so I could plug into a RS232 modem, and a null modem cable. Sounds good so far...

Getting netatalk to use the serial connection instead of the Ethernet one was another issue... SuSE 5.2-6.0 doesn't include slattach and the HOWTOs claim that's what I need.

This machine is a Mac Plus and it really really needs some storage space. It would be an awesome client otherwise; I should be able to run MacTCP, Eudora and Mosaic! Except... I can't LOAD them on the machine without some sort of networking. Incompatible floppies, you know.

Any ideas? I've also read the netatalk HOWTO and it says "First you need TCP/IP running" and doesn't seem to include the thought of a SERIAL connection.

Thanks for your help! --
Jonathan

Date: Wed, 17 Mar 1999 12:31:13 +0100
From: tuezney,
Subject: opengl accelerated?

Are there already free accelerated opengl1.1 compliant drivers for e.g. riva TNT based cards for Linux? Is there anybody working on this? Xi-graphics do make them but than they are commercial!

--
tuezney

Date: Thu, 11 Mar 1999 07:46:02 -0700
From: "K.A. Steensma",
Subject: What is a *.ajr file?

I had kind of forgotten that your message about issue #38 had come in via email. So last night (on my desktop computer), I went over to you home page and found the "Linux Gazette Downloading Information" section, pointed at the "here" in "Linux Gazette can be downloaded by clicking here" and went to download issue #38. As my pointer went over the "here", my status line (in Netscape) indicated that I would be downloading "ftp://ftp.ssc.com/pub/lg/lg-issue38.tar.gz". But when I clicked on the "here" and the dialog box game up for me to decide where I wanted to put the file, the file name was "lg-issue38_tar.arj". (I should have said earlier that I use Win98/Netscapte on my desktop.) And that is exactly what I downloaded; a "ajr" file.

Supper was on the table, so I left it as that and (later) sat in the bedroom (with my laptop that has the same combination of software) and (since I still hadn't read you issue) downloaded another copy of the issue. That copy was downloaded as a 'gz' file which I then decompressed, stored and read. It didn't come to me that (earlier) I had downloaded a 'ajr' file before. Now this morning, using the deaktop computer, I downloaded another copy and that copy was (again) a 'ajr' file.

What is a 'ajr' compressed file? Do you have any idea why (with my desktop computer) I download a 'ajr' file but with my laptop, download a 'gz' file. I really don't think that I have made some 'silly' mistake or that I have different versions of the OS or Netscape (as far as I can remember, both machines were derived from the same CD/disk file (Win98 from the CD; Netscape from a downloaded installation file).

I just started to download the base files (from the next 'here' in the web page) and the same thing happened again. The status bar for Netscape indicated that I would be accessing a 'gz' file, but the 'Download To' dialog file indicated that I would be receiving a 'ajr' file.

I've been around computers and the Internet long enough that I am considered an 'expert'. But this one kind of flips me out.

--
TIA - KAS

Date: Tue, 23 Mar 1999 23:18:25 -0000
From: "Monaghan Consultants Ltd",
Subject: fdisk

My fdisk (Debian 1.3) does not recognize my SCSI drive correctly. I'm using a Future Domain TMC8xx card using the ST01 setting in the kernel config, this is fine on my current small SCSI drives, but I'm wanting to replace these with a couple of HP C2247's.

When running fdisk the initial message (and also at boot time) is showing >64 heads, but fdisk will only allow me to set 64 heads.

How can I create a partition to use all of the disk ?

Is this a limitation of fdisk, the kernel or the SCSI card ? Thanks

--
Alex Monaghan

Date: Mon, 22 Mar 1999 14:34:08 -0000
From: "Victor Gibson",
Subject: winmodems

Being a complete newbie where Linux is concerned and working for a company that has few Unix servers running WINS and DHCP and hosting a few websites. I was asked if I would be interested in learning Unix to cover sysadmin. I jumped at the chance, although the training is not for a few months I decided to ditch my win98 system at home and go head long into a Linux install(Red Hat 5.1)

It has taken me all weekend to get it up and running, with the X Window System configured, now this is not a long time as I like to read all the instructions, learn from past mistakes and many hair pulling moments that manuals and HOWTOs and FAQ are there for a reason. My next step along the Linux path is to get my modem working............It's a winmodem so I appear to be stuck, I do not really want to spend any more money on a modem; is there anyway I can get a winmodem (internal) to work under Linux, I read somewhere this is not possible as the CPU does most of the modem's work (driven by software.

Can anyone point me in the direction of any info on getting winmodems to work under Linux? Thanks,

--
Victor

(To my knowledge, there's no way to get a winmodem to work with Linux. Anyone out there have a different answer? --Editor)

Date: Fri, 19 Mar 1999 17:14:04 +0600 From: "sujon",
Subject: Red Hat and sendmail

I installed Red Hat 4.2 and sendmail 8.5.Recently I upgraded to Red Hat 5.1 and sendmail 8.9.Sendmail is working on server. But when other user (work station/dialup line) send a mail it does not work and give a message recipient must be change.......
Please help......................

--
Sujon

Date: Tue, 16 Mar 1999 16:26:53 -0000
From: "Matthew Pearson",
Subject: Article ideas for you...

I've only just discovered your site, and it looks very useful.

A decent collection of how to set up and use a DAT drive with Linux would have made my life a lot easier recently. There are bits about it all over the place, but they really are all over the place.

I'd like to be able to centrally administer my Linux boxes (we now have 6 in the office). The boxes are used for file serving, mail, and anything else to software development (we've got about 10 engineers here). I know that one way of centrally administering Unix is to centralize the /usr partition and NFS mount it. It doesn't look like RPM will allow that very easily. I don't need to be able to boot via the network, but it would be useful to have a more centralized system, than a whole bunch of boxes that have to be updated with every new fix or application to be added. Do you have any ideas/inspiration on this?

--
Matt Pearson

Date: Sat, 13 Mar 1999 15:23:19 +0600
From: "sujon",
Subject: Multi-login protect

I am looking for a software multi-login protect for (RED HAT 5.1) Thanks

--
sujon

Date: Thu, 11 Mar 1999 08:43:02 -0600
From: "Jonathan",
Subject: ext2fs problems

I recently bought a copy of partition magic 4. I used it to steal more space from windows and add it to my / ext2 partition .... apparently it resized the partition but not the file system. Is there any way I can tell the file system to non-destructively rebuild itself using more space?

--
Jonathan

Date: Mon, 1 Mar 1999 12:56:46 -0000
From: "Thorp, Alexander",
Subject: Own domain over part-time dial-up (article, issue 36)

Interesting article. Just a couple of comments about the script:

First, the comment "for some reason this didn't work". It's not altogether clear what you expected it to do, but the exit 0 is entirely superfluous. If you hoped to exit from the entire script, this cannot be done from within a sub-shell. Is there any reason for executing such a phenomenal number of sub-shells? It is not as if you are doing the sorts of things which sub-shells make easier, such as localizing changes to the environment or to the current working directory.

If one assumes that really you wanted to exit from your script here, then you would be better off writing:

  if [ -f /var/lock/LCK..modem ] ; then
    echo "modem not available" 1>&2  # redirect stdout to stderr
    exit 1                           # error exits should not exit 0
  else
    /etc/ppp/ppp-on
    sleep 45
  fi

It is not altogether clear whether you think that the line #!/bin/bash half way down the script as the first line of a sub-shell section will have an effect, but this could be confusing to a reader less familiar with shell programming.

--
Alex Thorp

Date: Wed, 03 Mar 1999 13:26:07 -0500
From: Siddharth Kashyap,
Subject: Wharf

I am using Red Hat Linux 5.2. In FVWM95 I start Wharf. From this Wharf I click at xterm icon I get a blank xterm window. This is because the person who wrote the code in the file fvem2rc.modules.m4 is calling xterm as :

 
  xterm -bg black  -fg black

--
Siddharth Kashyap

Date: Fri, 12 Mar 1999 18:34:16 +0000BR From: Paul Dunne,
Subject: Linux & the impeachment -- is there a link I'm missing?

Sorry to gripe, but just browsing through the Linux Gazette mail bag, and... what are all those letters about the US President and his, er, "recent problems" doing there? The title is `Linux Gazette', right? Please, let's keep this sort of irrelevant material out of LG.

--
Paul

(Sorry Paul -- they are there because I wrote about it in the "Not Linux" section and felt they had a right to reply to my remarks. Guess I should have put the responses in the "Not Linux" section too. Just didn't think of it at the time. --Editor)

Date: Fri, 19 Mar 1999 09:11:55 -0600
From: "Louis C. Lohman",
Subject: KDE - so what?

Am I just being obtuse, or does KDE feel like a heavy, bloated, resource-intensive desktop environment? If that's what I wanted, I would stay with M(I'm sorry, I can't say the word)t. Features and benefits be damned, FVWM2 comes real close to the type of responsiveness I feel should be expected of the desktop ... KDE doesn't even come close.

And WHY hasn't anyone else complained? At least, not in a forum that I've been aware of. Is it that everyone is so enamored of the acceptance that Linux has been getting that they are afraid to rock the boat?

On the other hand, I suppose that we (the Linux user community) feel like we can pass this KDE thing off as a ready replacement for W(I'm sorry, but I can't say that word, either)s, given that it is so slow and bloated that W(you know)s users will feel right at home.

Yeah, that's the ticket, we'll make 'em feel right at home.

--
Lou Lohman

This page written and maintained by the Editor of Linux Gazette,
Copyright © 1999 Specialized Systems Consultants, Inc.