yossarian

Sorry for the ignorance, but Belkin is the name of the brand? Do you use also PCMCIA card? And thank you for the reply.

I know, the problem is I'm meeting this guy tomorrow, and I don't believe he will know the exact model he is using. My impression was that he is a not-sophisticated user, not in the bad sense, but in the sense that he doesn't care that much for the specs and models he is using. That's why I want to see the computer myself and examine it before I buy it. Thanks for the detailed answer!

Hi all, I plan to buy a used laptop, probably IBM X31. It doesn't have internal WiFi card, so I thought using a USB dongle (or PCMCIA card). My question is what are the chances that Mandriva will recognize the card and run the appropriate driver for it automatically? Do all the dongles use the same driver, or each of them has its own? I also thought running MDV 2008.0 from the live CD before I buy the computer, just to check for general compatibility. Did anyone run a WiFi external card from the One CD? And if we are here, if anyone has anything to say about buying the X31 in general, or running it with MDV 2008.0 particularly, this is the time! [-how come there isn't any emoticon for time?-]

I'm not at home right now, but I'm also positively sure that I'm not using compiz 0.6.2. I did the installation from the live CD (2008.0 One) and didn't configure any backports repositories, so there is no reason I'll run with 0.6.2. And besides, the fact that one user has a working environment makes me think it's not about compiz or drivers or anything to do with the packages (which apply for all users), but with the specific configuration files of this user. But of course, I'll check when I get home just to be sure.

I'm logging into one account at a time. I have. It's enabled. More than that, it works for the other user. I'm afraid they are. But you gave me another idea. I can backup the /home/Problematic_Username directory, and delete the user. Then I can start putting back items from the backup library one at a time, and only those items which are important for me (especially the directories starting with dots that save configurations of applications). This way I can control the process and isolate the disturbing item, or get back my environment functioning. Thanks for the tip! :)

I have just noticed something awkward: I have two users on the computer (both of them were defined in 2007.1). For the other user I DO get all the 3-D effects. So there is something wrong with the definitions and configuration of the user, not with the system (probably there aren't any drivers missing or something like that, otherwise it wouldn't work for both users). Does anyone have any idea what can be the reason? Thanks.

Hi all, After having some problems with my nvidia graphic card upgrading from 2007.1 to 2008.0, I decided to do a fresh installation to 2008.0 from the Gnome live CD. Running from the live CD I had all the effects of Compiz (I also had them in 2007.1), but after installation I lost all the graphical features of 3-D. From the MCC I made sure I'm running with the proprietary driver and that the Compiz fusion option is enabled, and got no special error messages. What did I miss?

I ran it. I got the message: Package dkms-nvidia-current-100.14.19-1mdv2008.0.i586 is already installed Furthermore, I tried installing the driver I downloaded from nVidia manually using the sh command, but got the original error message from the MCC: Failed to initialize the NVIDIA kernel module! Please ensure that there is a supported NVIDIA GPU in this system So the driver is installed from the repos, I can't install it manually, and the xorg.conf file looks ok. Unless you have some other idea, I think I'll do a fresh installation of 2008.0 tomorrow . Thank you all for all the support, especially Greg, scoonma and John. Don't worry, give me a day or two, I'll be back with some new problems. :)

scoonma, I appreciate your help very much, it's a bit late mow, but I promise to try your way tomorrow and see if it helps. I have no problem with "complicated" instructions; vice versa - I'm here to learn, and enjoy every minute of it. Anyway, for sure you are not the one who should apologize for the system's disadvantages. Furthermore, even with all its cons I like it a lot and prefer it much better, so you are not going to get rid of me so easily. :P Of course I have. I am a male, after all. Besides, otherwise it wouldn't be a challenge. I did not login as root even once to the full gui. From my user I opened a terminal, su'd to root, and used gedit. I also followed your advice and installed gksu and used it. The file is now correct (the lines you referred to are not there any more), but the display is the same, even after a reboot: Section "Device" Identifier "device1" VendorName "nVidia Corporation" BoardName "NVIDIA GeForce 3 - GeForce 4 (96xx)" Driver "nvidia" Option "DPMS" Option "RenderAccel" "true" EndSection You understood it totally wrong: It's the Mossad working for me, not the other way around. Bu-ha-ha-ha-ha! [-Laughing like Dr. Evil-]

No. All I get is: gksu: command not found (I tried it both as a regular user and as root.) But the weird thing is that I just logged in as another user, and I did have partial effects: The desktop, for example, was 3-D, but the menus were not jumpy. Besides, the fonts were still tiny. I checked the xorg.conf file as the other user, it was the same.

Hey, you have a point there. I'm using Gnome. In order to change the file I opened a terminal, logged in as root, edited the file using gedit, saved, and rebooted the computer. I have just repeated this process, this time making sure the file was saved correctly before rebooting, and it was fine. Again the changes were not saved. So I guess something modifies the file during start-up. Does it have a remedy?

That doesn't work. Tell me the truth, doctor, how much time do I have left? :) xorg.conf: # File generated by XFdrake (rev 230776) # ********************************************************************** # Refer to the xorg.conf man page for details about the format of # this file. # ********************************************************************** Section "Files" # font server independent of the X server to render fonts. FontPath "unix/:-1" # minimal fonts to allow X to run without xfs FontPath "/usr/share/fonts/misc:unscaled" EndSection Section "Extensions" Option "Composite" EndSection Section "ServerFlags" #DontZap # disable <Crtl><Alt><BS> (server abort) AllowMouseOpenFail # allows the server to start up even if the mouse does not work #DontZoom # disable <Crtl><Alt><KP_+>/<KP_-> (resolution switching) EndSection Section "Module" Load "dbe" # Double-Buffering Extension Load "v4l" # Video for Linux Load "extmod" Load "type1" Load "freetype" Load "glx" # 3D layer EndSection Section "InputDevice" Identifier "Keyboard1" Driver "kbd" Option "XkbModel" "pc105" Option "XkbLayout" "us,il" Option "XkbOptions" "grp:alt_shift_toggle,grp_led:scroll,compose:rwin" EndSection Section "InputDevice" Identifier "Mouse1" Driver "mouse" Option "Protocol" "ExplorerPS/2" Option "Device" "/dev/mouse" EndSection Section "Monitor" Identifier "monitor1" VendorName "Generic" ModelName "1024x768 @ 60 Hz" HorizSync 31.5-48.5 VertRefresh 50-70 # TV fullscreen mode or DVD fullscreen output. # 768x576 @ 79 Hz, 50 kHz hsync ModeLine "768x576" 50.00 768 832 846 1000 576 590 595 630 # 768x576 @ 100 Hz, 61.6 kHz hsync ModeLine "768x576" 63.07 768 800 960 1024 576 578 590 616 EndSection Section "Device" Identifier "device1" VendorName "nVidia Corporation" BoardName "NVIDIA GeForce 3 - GeForce 4 (96xx)" Driver "nvidia" Option "DPMS" Option "RenderAccel" "false" Option "AddARGBGLXVisuals" Option "IgnoreEDID" "1" EndSection Section "Screen" Identifier "screen1" Device "device1" Monitor "monitor1" DefaultColorDepth 24 Subsection "Display" Depth 8 Modes "1024x768" "832x624" "800x600" "640x480" "480x360" "320x240" EndSubsection Subsection "Display" Depth 15 Modes "1024x768" "832x624" "800x600" "640x480" "480x360" "320x240" EndSubsection Subsection "Display" Depth 16 Modes "1024x768" "832x624" "800x600" "640x480" "480x360" "320x240" EndSubsection Subsection "Display" Depth 24 Modes "1024x768" "832x624" "800x600" "640x480" "480x360" "320x240" EndSubsection EndSection Section "ServerLayout" Identifier "layout1" InputDevice "Keyboard1" "CoreKeyboard" InputDevice "Mouse1" "CorePointer" Screen "screen1" EndSection

My bad. I already have in the module section the glx entry. In the MCC there is a flag for Render Acceleration. It is said there that it may hurt the way fonts are displayed and was unchecked by default, so I didn't touch it. EDIT: I changed it from the MCC, and restarted the computer. This line is not in the file anymore. Still no improvement. No double entries in my file. I already have this entry in the file. Still no luck though...

So why using wine? Wait, just to make sure, because I'm no expert in those things, wine means you are going to run virtualized Windows program, right? There is Matlab version for Linux also. A friend of mine (from the Hebrew University) uses Mac. His lab bought a general license for Matlab, so he asked the system administrator to get him a Mac version. As far as I know, it's the same version as for Linux.

Haven't. I guess you referred to Octave, or am I wrong? What is the benefit?

Under root - glx: command not found. Thanks a lot - found it in the MCC.

But I'll make it, right? Please doctor, tell me what are my chances! :) xorg.conf: Section "Device" Identifier "device1" VendorName "nVidia Corporation" BoardName "NVIDIA GeForce 3 - GeForce 4 (96xx)" Driver "nvidia" Option "DPMS" Option "RenderAccel" "false" Option "AddARGBGLXVisuals" Option "IgnoreEDID" "1" EndSection I also have a file called xorg.conf.old (not sure if it's relevant): Section "Device" Identifier "device1" VendorName "nVidia Corporation" BoardName "NVIDIA GeForce 3 - GeForce 4 (96xx)" Driver "nv" Option "DPMS" EndSection

My lost brother! I have used both. Before I begin, I must say that I have never encountered a scientific language that is 100% Matlab compatible. First of all, Matlab is not always consistent with itself. Between releases you can find minor syntax differences (like between R2006b and R2007a) or major ones (like between 5.3, 6.0 and 6.5). Furthermore, I do not believe you will find a free program that is compatible to even one of the releases. And third, the details in certain components are just too different between the environments (like the properties of axes and figures - if they exist in open programs, their names will be different). Octave is closer to Matlab when it comes to syntax computability. They really made an effort. The down-side is that it has no IDE (besides one which is old and not supported for a few years now. It does have a plug-in for Xemcs, haven't tried this one). For graphics it uses gnuplot, which has a few disadvantages, in my opinion (for example it has no tool bar for zooming and rotating the graphs). It is capable of reading mat files quite well. It has quite a good documentation, but I haven't found yet a good community/forum around it. Scilab is not so similar to Matlab, IMO. The syntax in many commands is quite different. Furthermore, if I understood correctly, Scilab was written in Fortran, and it forced the developers to make some substantial differences in the concept of operation of the enviornment. For example, the concept of paths definition does not exist in Scilab; one needs to load manually the function into the workspace before calling it, and the function itself is an object, just like a variable. Also, not all types of variables are supprted (e.g cells). So for someone who is very used to Matlab, the programming itself is not so fluent. Another example is that although it supports reading mat files, the syntax itself is C-like (fopen, fread and so on). On the other hand, it has a full IDE (command line and a text editor with a debugger built-in - a big advantage), and the figures are much more well supported (zooming, 3-D rotation, File-Edit-Help menu and all that jazz). Anther big plus for Scilab which is not relevant for everyone - it has a tool called Scicos, which is the equivalent to Simulink (graphical programming and automatic time-axis generation though of course no compatibility whatsoever to Simulink). My impression is that the documentation was not as good as Octave's. To conclude - it depends what your needs are and what you are going to do with it. If the compatibility to Matlab is crucial for you, I think Octave will be more suitable. But if you just need to create some variables and plot some nice graphs quickly, the IDE and menus in Scilab are reacher. And in any case, I highlight again that 100% compatibility is not patr of the deal, no matter which you choose. Of course you can also look at the documentation at both sites and get an impression about the pros and cons of each. If you know what you need it for and I can help in any way, don't hesitate to ask my advice.

glxinfo |grep rendering: direct rendering: No (If you want to find out why, try setting LIBGL_DEBUG=verbose) average FPS: 1725 frames in 5.4 seconds = 320.907 FPS 1820 frames in 5.4 seconds = 339.660 FPS 1690 frames in 5.2 seconds = 323.634 FPS 1690 frames in 5.1 seconds = 328.795 FPS 1170 frames in 5.3 seconds = 220.295 FPS 1170 frames in 5.1 seconds = 230.382 FPS 1430 frames in 5.1 seconds = 278.125 FPS 1430 frames in 5.2 seconds = 277.499 FPS 1430 frames in 5.1 seconds = 281.984 FPS What does the doctor have to say, what is the diagnosis? And what's next?

Greg, we are actually heading somewhere! I hope it's not backwards. OK, my bad: there was an option to choose the newer kernel in Grub (some other time you are going to show me how to change the "Mandriva 2008.0" option to run the new kernel), so I chose it and now uname -a gives me: Linux localhost 2.6.22.9-desktop586-1mdv #1 SMP Thu Sep 27 03:58:17 CEST 2007 i686 Intel(R) Celeron(R) CPU 2.80GHz GNU/Linux After that I re-installed the driver, got the test screen working fine, and... no 3-D effects. I activated the option from the MCC, both with native support and Xgl, bet neither worked. Furthermore, all my fonts on the screen are really tiny, so I guess I still have a problem with my graphic card. Do you have any more good ideas in the place where the first one came from?

What Mandriva are you using? I'm asking that because my laptop at work (IBM T-42) has the same wireless card and sometimes I run it from the Live CD (Mandriva One). I've never had any problem with the network. So if you didn't install from the live CD, you may want to try and find it in the repositories, it can save you a lot of headache in the installation. The only problem is that I don't know the name of the package you are looking for, maybe someone else would know.

Hi John, I already have installed a package called kernel-desktop-devel-2.6.22.9-1mdv, and not 2.6.29.2 like you mentioned. But I believe mine is the one suitable to the kernel I'm running.

Yeah, I'm a known trouble-maker. All the law enforcement agencies are after me. :) uname -a: Linux localhost 2.6.17-13mdvlegacy #1 SMP Fri Mar 23 19:05:24 UTC 2007 i686 Intel(R) Celeron(R) CPU 2.80GHz GNU/Linux rpm -qa | grep kernel: nvidia-current-kernel-2.6.22.9-desktop-1mdv-100.14.19-1mdv2008.0 nvidia96xx-kernel-2.6.17-13mdvlegacy-9631-1mdk nvidia71xx-kernel-2.6.17-13mdvlegacy-7184-1mdk nvidia96xx-kernel-desktop-latest-1.0-1.20071003.9639.4mdv2008.0 nvidia71xx-kernel-2.6.22.9-desktop586-1mdv-1.0-7185.5mdv2008.0 madwifi-kernel-2.6.17-13mdvlegacy-0.9.2-1mdk kernel-desktop-latest-2.6.22.9-1mdv2008.0 nvidia96xx-kernel-2.6.22.9-desktop-1mdv-1.0-9639.4mdv2008.0 kernel-source-2.6.17.13mdv-1-1mdv2007.1 nvidia71xx-kernel-2.6.22.9-desktop-1mdv-1.0-7185.5mdv2008.0 kernel-desktop-2.6.22.9-1mdv-1-1mdv2008.0 kernel-desktop-devel-2.6.22.9-1mdv-1-1mdv2008.0 nvidia96xx-kernel-2.6.22.9-desktop586-1mdv-1.0-9639.4mdv2008.0 nvidia-current-kernel-desktop586-latest-100.14.19-1.20071003.1mdv2008.0 nvidia71xx-kernel-desktop-latest-1.0-1.20071003.7185.5mdv2008.0 kernel-source-2.6.22.9-1mdv-1-1mdv2008.0 hcfpcimodem-kernel-2.6.17-13mdvlegacy-1.10full-1mdk kernel-legacy-2.6.17.13mdv-1-1mdv2007.1 kernel-desktop586-2.6.22.9-1mdv-1-1mdv2008.0 nvidia96xx-kernel-desktop586-latest-1.0-1.20071003.9639.4mdv2008.0 nvidia71xx-kernel-desktop586-latest-1.0-1.20071003.7185.5mdv2008.0 ati-kernel-2.6.17-13mdvlegacy-8.34.8-1mdk hsfmodem-kernel-2.6.17-13mdvlegacy-7.47.00.03full-1mdk kernel-desktop586-latest-2.6.22.9-1mdv2008.0 nvidia-current-kernel-2.6.22.9-desktop586-1mdv-100.14.19-1mdv2008.0 nvidia97xx-kernel-2.6.17-13mdvlegacy-9755-1mdk slmodem-kernel-2.6.17-13mdvlegacy-2.9.11-1mdk kernel-desktop-devel-latest-2.6.22.9-1mdv2008.0 nvidia-current-kernel-desktop-latest-100.14.19-1.20071003.1mdv2008.0 rpm -qa | grep nvidia: nvidia-current-kernel-2.6.22.9-desktop-1mdv-100.14.19-1mdv2008.0 nvidia96xx-kernel-2.6.17-13mdvlegacy-9631-1mdk nvidia71xx-kernel-2.6.17-13mdvlegacy-7184-1mdk nvidia96xx-kernel-desktop-latest-1.0-1.20071003.9639.4mdv2008.0 nvidia71xx-kernel-2.6.22.9-desktop586-1mdv-1.0-7185.5mdv2008.0 dkms-nvidia96xx-1.0-9631.6plf2007.1 nvidia96xx-kernel-2.6.22.9-desktop-1mdv-1.0-9639.4mdv2008.0 x11-driver-video-nvidia96xx-1.0-9639.4mdv2008.0 nvidia71xx-kernel-2.6.22.9-desktop-1mdv-1.0-7185.5mdv2008.0 dkms-nvidia-current-100.14.19-1mdv2008.0 dkms-nvidia96xx-1.0-9639.4mdv2008.0 nvidia96xx-kernel-2.6.22.9-desktop586-1mdv-1.0-9639.4mdv2008.0 nvidia-current-kernel-desktop586-latest-100.14.19-1.20071003.1mdv2008.0 nvidia71xx-kernel-desktop-latest-1.0-1.20071003.7185.5mdv2008.0 nvidia96xx-1.0-9631.6plf2007.1 x11-driver-video-nvidia-current-100.14.19-1mdv2008.0 nvidia96xx-kernel-desktop586-latest-1.0-1.20071003.9639.4mdv2008.0 nvidia71xx-kernel-desktop586-latest-1.0-1.20071003.7185.5mdv2008.0 dkms-nvidia71xx-1.0-7185.5mdv2008.0 nvidia-current-kernel-2.6.22.9-desktop586-1mdv-100.14.19-1mdv2008.0 nvidia97xx-kernel-2.6.17-13mdvlegacy-9755-1mdk x11-driver-video-nvidia71xx-1.0-7185.5mdv2008.0 nvidia-current-kernel-desktop-latest-100.14.19-1.20071003.1mdv2008.0 John - I'll be with you right after dinner. Thanks for your advise.

I installed kernel-source-2.6.22.9-1mdv, but still no luck. When I try to activate the proprietary driver and test it, I get the same error message. Now I have both kernel-source-2.6.22.9-1mdv and kernel-source-2.6.17.13mdv. the only two available for me. Any more ideas?

First of all, thank you. I still have a few more questions: If I updated my system from the repos (through urpmi), should I still update make, gcc etc. manually? How do I install the new kernel? Just mark it on MCC and things will be updated automatically? Thanks.