This week on twitter 2009-07-19

General
  • Why you should limit login attempts http://ff.im/5g8sm #
  • setting up pppoe in ubuntu/network manager just a few clicks. Huge improvement since last time I had to do this (a few years ago ) #
  • reset thunderbird's master password: thunderbird -chrome chrome://pippki/content/resetpassword.xul #
  • Mowing the lawn http://ff.im/5iwc1 #
  • I wish I could merge more then 10 contacts in gmail #
  • finally found the path to publish_post: wp_publish_post calls wp_transition_post_status which calls do_action #
  • did anyone manage to use ddiwrapper on ubuntu 9.04? maybe with canon pixma mp830 ? 🙂 #
  • RT: @lorelleonwp: I vote for death & destruction of #followfriday and all follow-memes. They are sheer time wasters. STOP the chain tweets. #

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ddiwrapper on ubuntu 9.04

Patches, , , , , , , ,

I have a Canon Pixma MP830 printer. This printer supports high resolution printing up to 9600x2400 dpi, but the gutenprint driver only supports 600x600 dpi.

So what do I do to make it print with higher resolution?

I wanted to use ddiwrapper, a system that would let you use the native win2k/winxp drivers from the manufacturer. Basically it uses wine to load those drivers feed the print job into the driver and feed the driver's output to the printer.

Note:

This is an incomplete solution. I managed to get as far as being able to install ddiwrapper and the driver. I didn't manage to actually print a test page. When trying to print the test page I don't get any errors, and the printing system reports printing has finished but nothing is actually printed.
I wrote this post in case there are others that might want to try this and maybe can find the final solution.

There were two problems with ddiwrapper:

  1. it didn't compile on my system ( Ubuntu 9.04 x86_64 with Wine 1.1.25 ), complaining that : "Relocatable linking with relocations from format elf32-i386 (gdi32.o) to format elf64-x86-64 (gdi32.e8IuDu.o) is not supported" . This was fixed as soon as I added -m32 in a few Makefiles
  2. the excanondriver utility that is used to extract the driver is meant to be used with executable archives, zip or lha files, but the driver for MP830 is just an executable so I modified this file to work with driver files from a directory.

The fixes to both problems are provided in the diff file bellow.

Compile ddiwrapper

  1.  

apply the diff file [download id="13"] , compile and install:

  1.  

Install the drivers

Insert the driver's cdrom that came with the printer, it shoud be automounted.
Copy drivers from the cdrom to a local folder ~/cdrv :

  1.  

Delete the drivers for fax and scanner:

  1.  

Move all drivers from ~/cdrv/Print to ~/cdrv :

  1.  

Now install the driver:

  1.  

Add the printer ( usb://dev/usblp0 should be replaced with whatever is the location of your printer) :

  1.  

or you can use the Printing admin application from System->Administration->Printing and load the ppd file in ~/ddiwrapper/doc/ddiwrapper.ppd

Apparmor setup

Ubuntu 9.04 has apparmor installed, and there is a profile for cupsd. The ddiwrapper tries to access files that are not specified in this profile, but by looking at the error messages generated in the logs I managed to find all the files and add them to the profile. Here's a diff file with the changes I did : [download id="12"]

Apply the diff file to cups apparmor profile and restart apparmor:

  1.  

Testing

The new printer should show up in the Printing admin and I thought I  should be able print a test page but it didn't work.
The README file for ddiwrapper mentions there is a way to "dry" test this by feeding the driver a ps file and verifying if the output is correct but there are no details about how to do that.
Now what ? Has anyone managed to make this work for Pixma MP830 ? Any idea about how to debug it ?

This week on twitter 2009-07-12

General
  • @spam @joinmeat4 in reply to joinmeat4 #
  • Run a program on one CPU core in Linux http://ff.im/4TNea #
  • @bobbyvoicu nice, acum cativa ani oamenii ziceau: linux nu are driver pentru X hardware...inapoi la windows. in reply to bobbyvoicu #
  • if you want to setup #bind on #centos don't forget to install caching-nameserver unless you want to write the whole config by yourself #
  • calling wp_update_post from a plugin creates duplicate published post. Why? #
  • @adiPintilie suport pentru revolutia din iran in reply to adiPintilie #
  • Firefox stability to get a boost with multiprocess browsing http://ff.im/50CM5 #
  • SmushIt for WordPress http://ff.im/50Vmd #
  • godaddy has the worst domain management interface #
  • @spam @Mark_ze how spammy is your message? godaddy isn't even on that list. And I didn't even care about hosting in reply to Mark_ze #
  • Dealing with Qmail's TAI64N format | Uno-Code [pic] http://ff.im/52FEf #
  • you produce an email marketing app, and you want my details to let me see the demo, you ask for name,phone,etc but not email 🙂 #
  • I just love dropbox. I use it to sync file between 3 computers. Even if I cange the password on my account, the computers are still linked. #

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Webmin 1.480: Bulk add ip addresses

Patches, , , ,

A few months ago I published a patch for webmin that would allow you to easily add a lot of ip addresses to an interface in webmin. At that time I mentioned that the patch could only be applied on webmin 1.410.

Now I needed this patch again but this time on webmin 1.480 so I adapted it to work with the new version.

For usage instructions please see the original post

You can download the new version here: [download id="11" format="1"]

Notes

This only works for interfaces activated at boot. The code could easily be copied to work with the other interfaces too but I didn't see a use for that.

After you add the ip addresses ( aliases ) you have to go to the list of interfaces, select the newly added interfaces and click the "Apply selected interfaces" button if you want the new aliases to be activated without having to reboot.

This week on twitter 2009-07-05

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This week on twitter 2009-06-28

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This week on twitter 2009-06-21

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This week on twitter 2009-06-14

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MYC4 bid Importer plugin

wordpress, , ,

MYC4 is a micro credit platform that enables anyone to invest in small businesses and entrepreneurs in poor countries in Africa. MYC4 enables you to help poor people in Africa ( people that can't get a loan from banks ) get a loan to improve their business.

This wordpress plugin will fetch the details of the businesses in which you invest and create posts on your blog from those details.

By using this plugin you can create exposure for those businesses, enabling them to raise the funds they need more quickly and thus to ensure a shorter way to success.

The plugin was developed after an idea by prof. David Costa of Robert Kennedy College. He runs a blog about microfinance and teaches microfinance as part of the investment management course at Robert Kennedy College.

Download the plugin

This week on twitter 2009-06-07

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