Want to learn Linux through Webinar?

This wednesday Digit – India’s premier technology magazine brings to you a webinar - The complete guide to Linux Basics. Webinar is great way to learn things in realtime through your net PC conveniently at your own place.

About this Webinar:

The Linux webinar will be a guide to setting up Linux on a target machine using a number of approaches Including an installation CD/DVD and dual booting with another operating systems.The webinar will have step-by-step screenshots for each of these and some basics on getting started, including setting up drivers and installing additional applications. 

Date: Wednesday, 19th August 2009

Time: 1500 Hrs (IST, +5.30 GMT)
Click here to open webinar link or copy paste this link in your browser: http://snipurl.com/qd45t

Meeting Key: thinkdigit

Mark your Calender right now!

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You too can host webinar through free online tool like dimdim

Read / Download Linux Pocket Guide in Hindi for free

Now you can read / download Linux pocket guide in Hindi here all for free. The book is easier than dummis’ and Idiots’ series.

 

Download Link

 

Read in e-paper here: Note that the book is 6+ MB, so it may take a while to load on slow connections.

Linux Pocket Guide in Hindi

Linux Guide in Hindi PDF E-book

I had just published my book - "Linux Pocket Guide" in Hindi  through POD (http://nullpointer.debashish.com/print-on-demand)

You can order / have preview of this book from here :
http://pothi.com/pothi/preview?pFile=558

And, yes, the book has some useful chapters like - How to install Linux in Windows / How to run Windows Apps - like MS Office in Linux etc

How to Run KDE in Windows

 

KDE – the desktop environment for GNU-Linux is true cross platform set of application tools that you can install and use in nearly all top class Operating System environment – and that includes Windows OS too.

Here is no nonsense, straightforward  ‘how to guide’  for you to install KDE 4, the latest version of KDE in Windows XP / Vista / 7 (may work in other Windows versions as well):

Step 1 : Go to this link : http://windows.kde.org/ (direct download link: http://www.winkde.org/pub/kde/ports/win32/installer/kdewin-installer-gui-latest.exe )

and download the latest KDE 4 for Windows GUI installer, and run it. You need to remain connected to Internet since this is an online installer.

It will ask where to download and what to download in its initial Installation wizard , which is pretty straight forward. Please remember to use installation directory such as C:\kde4 that is easily accessible to all. And keep other default settings intact if you are unsure about them. When you are done, click Next.

Step 2 : In its next step, Kde 4 Windows installer will ask you to select download server. Select the one which is close to you and has sufficient bandwidth. Then Click Next.

Step 4 : Now you need to select the supported application to download. You can download source code of some of application / packages too. If you are unsure, click on KDE on package category and  KDE application with all dependency files will gets displayed and you can then select them individually. When done, click Next.

Step 5 : KDE 4 Windows installer will start downloading packages from the mirror server you had selected, and will take a little time to download them that may depend upon your selection. Wait till your download completes. Meanwhile, feel free to perform other windows task till your downloads completes.

Step 5 : After download, KDE 4 Windows installer installs applications and packages you had selected. If you have used 3^rd party tools such as Active perl, then you need to give your input such as agree to their license term by clicking I accept button and clicking on next button.

Step 6 : When installations finishes, KDE Installer tells you that now you can run your KDE application in Windows, else it will give you error message, and you need to act upon that. At times, some files may not be available during setup and you can ignore that file.

Step 7 : Before you run KDE application in Windows, you need to give (presently, to fix certain things) following commands in your command window:

C:\KDE4> bin\update-mime-database C:\KDE4\share\mime

And,

C:\KDE4> bin\kbuildsycoca4 --noincremental

Note that c:\kde4 is the directory in which you have installed KDE 4 for Windows, that may be different according to your choice.

Now, you are ready to run your KDE applications in Windows. Go to Bin sub directory under KDE installation directory, and double click on the exe file of KDE program – for example, Ktuberling.exe if you want to run Ktuberling game. And voila this glossy KDE 4 game pops alive in Windows.

QT designer running on Windows:

Ktuberling and many other KDE application  running on Windows:

KDE’s Khangman with its glossy semitransparent effect running on Windows XP:

KDE Kmine game in windows:

To SWITCH APPLICATION’S GUI LANGUAGE, click on Help> Switch Application Language then select the language from available list (that depends upon your installed language files that you may have been selected during initial installation dialog ) and restart the application.

Here is the screenshot of multiple applications running in multiple language in Windows XP (Vista and 7 also supports)

You can find latest, further information, support and guide here:

Kde 4 windows how to

http://techbase.kde.org/index.php?title=Projects/KDE_on_Windows/Installation

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How to Dual / Triple boot Windows 7 with Windows XP / Linux

Here is no-nonsense quick take to dual / triple boot Windows 7 with Windows XP and Linux.

What you need additionally : Ubuntu Linux Live (or, any Live Linux CD/DVD) CD/DVD. You can download Ubuntu Live Linux CD from here.

Assuming that you are installing Windows 7 on a separate partition in a machine that had Windows XP and Linux installed already.

If your machine had only Windows XP and no Linux, Windows 7 is generous enough to let you choose to boot older version of Windows through its boot manager.

But, it deliberately ignore other non-windows OS and file system, and hence you can’t boot Linux through Windows 7 boot manager.

In such case, you need to restore GRUB boot manager. Follow these steps carefully and restore your old GRUB:

Boot through Ubuntu Linux Live CD/DVD

Start terminal and give following command:

$ sudo grub

You will then enter in grub configuration mode. Here, give following command:

$ root (hd0,0)

Then give following command:

$ setup (hd%1,%2) - here, %1,%2 is the disk volume and partition value of your original Linux installation where /boot/grub is already installed. For example, in my machine, it is on disk 1, partition 6, so the value will be – (hd0,5). So, be careful here else your Grub will not be restored, and you will get error message instead.

Finally, give following command within grub configuration mode:

$ quit

$ exit

Now, reboot (do not forget to remove Linux Live CD/DVD to boot from HDD). If everything had gone right, your Grub boot manager will load and prompt you to choose to boot from either Linux or Windows 7. Enjoy!

Why not to use Google Chrome in your Power Savvy Laptop?

I had previously used and tested Google chrome for its Hindi (Indic) capabilities, and had quickly abandoned since it was giving trouble here and there. Recently, after going through a report about browser share – yes, Chrome is gaining share - I tested Chrome again.

To my horror, when I opened about 8-10 tabs in Google Chrome, my laptop’s on-demand CPU cycle remain steady at 100% status and because of this, my laptop goes red-hot and its battery drained more quickly than ever. Instead of usual Two-and-half hour back-up, my laptop’s battery drained completely within an hour.

Probably, this is because, Google chrome opens a new process every time when a user opens a tab, and hence it uses your precious CPU cycle, memory and – Well, your computer’s power at an unprecedented rate.

So, beware – use Google Chrome with caution especially when you are on Battery power.

I have used Opera, Konqueror (in Linux), Firefox, Internet Explorer, Epipheny – and found that Firefox uses least CPU cycles on its heavy usage. And, if you use Opera as RSS reader, otherwise a light browser, it too become bloatware.

Yet another reason to use Linux instead of (Windows) Vista

Yet another reason to use Linux instead of (Windows) Vista

Recently I baught BSNL EV-DO card that provides broadband (144 Kbps – 2 Mbps – averaging about 500 Kbps) on the go. I tried to run it on my 64 bit Windows Vista Laptop (a triple boot machine XP, Vista 64 bit & Ubuntu 64 bit) but failed. Driver simply failed to work. However, it works well in Windows XP environment.

Then I tried it on Linux. On my Ubuntu 64 bit Linux machine, running this device is pretty much straight forward. Here is how you can install and run BSNL evdo card in your Linux machine too:  (though you can do this with dozens of different methods with equal number of tools – classic Linux style!) 

1 – install kppp if you don't already have. Skip to section 2 if you already have kppp. Connect to Internet with some alternative method, and then use following command to install kppp in Ubuntu:

# apt-get install kppp

2 - Now, run kppp by giving command:

# kppp

On the kppp window that appears, click on Configure, then click on Accounts tab that appears. Click on New, and then provide connection name such as BSNL, and in telephone number, fill #777. Click OK. Further, click on Modem tab and then click on New. Give it a name such as evdo, then onModem Device dropdown menu, select /dev/ttyUSB0. Click OK twice to save setting. Finally, click on Connect button on KPPP main window. And, Bingo! Your evdo device connects to internet instantly.

Except KPPP installation, the method given above will work well in all  major latest Linux Distributions such as Fedora, Mandrive, SUSE etc.

Chhattisgarhi Operating System will now be a reality very soon

I was dreaming for this since long-long ago. Now it will be a reality. Sarai had accepted to support Chhattisgarhi Localization of KDE. Here is the mail by which  Gora announced this. Maithly and Gujarati were another language among accepted projects :

 

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Hello everyone,  It gives us great pleasure to announce the list of fellowsfor the 2008 Sarai FLOSS fellowship programme.

The number of fellowships
this year represents a dramatic increase from pastyears. We are thankful to NIXI, and in particular, to theirCEO, Mr. Rajesh Aggarwal for their
generosity in making somany fellowships possible. Below is the list of 21 awardees.

The list is also availableonline at <http://www.sarai.net/fellowships/floss/2008-sarai-floss-fellowships-list> .

We will be in touch with each of the fellows, andalso with anyone who sent in a proposal by the coming weekend.Please feel free to write to me with any queries, and/orconcerns. The final list is:   1. Debayan Banerjee/Sawood Alam: Joint award for OCR in Urdu, Bengali, etc., based on Google Tesseract 

2. Abhishek Choudhary et al: Hindawi is a system to allow programming in Indian languages. This project proposes to build online courseware to introduce the various components of Hindawi, to improve the project documentation, create a syllabus around Hindawi, distribute live CDs, and hold lectures.  

3. Hassath: Making of a short film using FOSS tools, documenting the process, and listing pros and cons of the applications.  

4. Sachin Joshi: Integrating automated speech recognition (ASR) for Hindi into the Linux platform.  

5. Aadil Kak: Kashmiri font completion, and localisation of KDE 4.2.  

6. Friji Karthikeyan: Internet Radio framework, with interface to, and hosting on Giss.tv  

7. Satya Komaragiri: Speech-to-text support in OLPC, with Hindi ASR.  

8. Manu Konchady: FOSS online tutor to teach students new languages, using text-to-speech, and a web-based framework.  

9. Ajay Kumar: Sahana client on Openmoko mobiles. Sahana is the disaster relief management system used for the Bihar floods, tsunami, etc. 

10. Sangeeta Kumari: Maithili localisation of KDE4.2, Fedora, and the Chatzilla IM client. 

11. Pranav Madhyastha / Sriram Chaudhary: Joint award to develop a system of machine translation (MT) from English to Hindi.
This will consist of a web framework to assist improvement of the background engine, and work on an open-source MT engine, Anusaaraka. 

12. Helen Mary: Open-source database, and tools to study mental retardation. 

13. Kartik Mistry: Gujarati localisation of KDE 4.2, usability workshop, and some internationalisation work for KDE 

14. Rajeev Sebastian: Indic text rendering in Scribus, a page layout (DTP) application, using the Harfbuzz library. 

15. Shishir Sharma et al: Intelligent Transliteration from Romanised English to Hindi 

16. Syed Shikeb: Urdu localisation of KDE 4.2. 

17. Ravishankar Shrivastava: Chhatisgarhi localisation of KDE 4.2. 

18. Sreeraj R: Adding feature to System Verilog support for ICARUS. System Verilog is a hardware description, and verification language (HDVL) used, e.g., to program FPGAs. 

19. Srujanika: Addition to Oriya dictionary, including scientific and technical terms. 

20. Shamail Tayyab: Web-based secure P2P. Promotes sharing in a community-based way 

21. C S Yoganada: Extend Sagar (TeX) to Tamil, Telugu, Punjabi,Gujarati and Oriya

Regards,

Gora

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Congrats to all!

Scan (and clean) your Windows XP/Vista computer for viruses through a Live Linux CD

You can do a lot of things through Live Linux CD – including playing Lara Craft game – oh, sorry, you are right – the game had some other silly, non sexy name.

You also can Scan and wipe out viruses off your Windows Machine (both from Fat32 as well as NTFS) through Linux Live CD equipped with F-Secure antivirus.

Download the zip file that contains iso image of the Virus Scanner Live CD from here.

The system scan remain Complete and thorough and hence you may experience it as a bit slower. But Virus cleaning is guaranteed with latest virus database from F-Secure (Need your computer be connected to internet.)

How to download and install phonon.dll, phonon4.dll, libphonon.dll – phonon.dll download

Many *nix applications are being now ported to Windows and when you try to run them, they display missing phonon.dll file error messages specially if the program is Multimedia kind.

Here are the files you can download :

 

phonon.dll

phonon4.dll

libphonon.dll

libphononexperimental.dll

 

Download these files and copy them in application’s directory. For example, if you are using KDE 4 Windows, then place these files in KDE4’s bin directory – where all KDE4 executables are placed.

 

You can try placing them in Windows system directory too.

Hindi speech to text free program download

There is a nice demo program released for Hindi (can be extended for Indic languages as well) speech to text conversion. Now you simply need to speak in a microphone and record your word directly in Unicode Hindi text. Alternately, you can give oral commands in Hindi to do computing tasks like “Thunderbird Kholo” to open thunderbird.

This Hindi speech recognition program is currently available for Linux as it is based on Sphinx and Perl. Still, a port to windows is possible in near future. The project is currently maintained by Sachin Joshi as a part of Sarai FOSS project.

Download Hindi Automatic Speech Recognition System from here

Finally, Wine is out after maturing for 15 years

Wine – the program that lets you run Windows Applications in Linux was finally released as Version 1 today. Wine was under rigorous development since last 15 years and had never been released as stable version.

 

With Wine1.0 stable release, now you can run thousands of Windows Applications directly on Linux that includes – MS Office, PhotoshopCS2, Lotus Notes, Half-Life, Command & Conquer etc.

 

Chances are, Wine is already available in your installed Linux distribution. All you need is to upgrade it to latest, stable version. Download wine from here.

 

Still, you may face occasional glitches in running Windows Applications in Linux through Wine. But, then Windows Vista don’t let you run all Windows applications either!

 

Three cheers for Wine.

How to delete Windows Vista Folder ?

Deleting Windows vista folder is next to impossible. You cannot delete it even in multiboot environment - while booting from other partition having other versions of Windows OS. Windows Vista folder contains whopping 8GB space and at times it becomes essential to claim this unused space. To reclaim this space, you need to reformate the partition and eventually face risks of data loss. In some cases, you need pricy third party tool. Here is free easy workaround for you.

Download and burn Knoppix 5.1.1 (or later) Linux live cd from here and boot your machine using this live CD.

Knoppix 5.1.1 Live CD will automatically detect and place icons for your computer’s all available harddisk partitions on Knoppix desktop. Right click and select read write mode to mount the partition which contains Windows Vista files that you want to delete. The partition will be mounted in read write mode.

Now double click over this partition’s icon to open it with Konqueror. Go to Windows Folder, right click on it and select delete. Some time it will ask for root privilege – in that case, open terminal and with sudo Konqueror command, run Konqueror in root user mode and then delete the Windows folder.

How to recover corrupted NTFS data through Knoppix Linux Live CD / DVD

Recently one of my PC having Windows XP failed to boot. I tried to reinstall the OS. But Windows XP installer gave the error message that C drive having NTFS partition contains undefined File system, and it needs to be formatted. The partition in question contained valuable data, and an alternate way was needed.

 

I tried to boot with Knoppix 5.1.1 Live CD. It was a breezy success. It showed all the partitions of hard disks on my desktop. When I tried to mount the corrupted partition (C drive in Windows), it asked me to Force mount it since the partition in question had some problem. I said yes, and voila! It worked.

 

I changed the attribute of other mounted harddisks NTFS partition to read-write mode (right click on partition in question and select read write attribute) and copied all my data to other, safe partition. Knoppix 5.1.1 had built in NTFS partition READ-WRITE capabilities. You can also use USB Key or Burn a CD / DVD to backup data.

 

After backing up my data, I reformatted the C drive and finally I was able to clean reinstall WindowsXP again.

 

You can download latest Knoppix Live CD / DVD image for free from HERE

Finally, Windows XP / Vista goes true Multilingual

Finally, Windows XP / Vista goes true Multilingual, the way I had always wanted.

Thanks to KDE4 port to Windows, NOW you can run your applications and programs (you can choose among 100s such from KDE4) within Window in true Multilingual style. Here is how:

Download the Latest KDE4Windows installer from here. And run it.

Select applications, program packages and LANGUAGES you want to use among many supported languages at KDE4Windows installer options.

Once the KDE4Windows installed, start KDE4 applications and click on Help. You will see “Switch Application Language” dropdown menu. Select the language you want, and click OK. Restart the application. Your application will be up and running in new language environment. You can start as many applications in as many languages as you want (only one instances of one application) and there is virtually no limitations!

(click on image to see larger picture)

The above screenshot shows running some popular KDE Games apps in Hindi, Nepali, Tamil and Panjabi languages simultaneously within Windows XP.

For detailed instructions to how to install KDE4 in Windows, refer this and this articles.

Update : New kde4windows installer can add Windows Program Menu entries, from where you can run kde 4 applications. See screenshot below. As you can see, menu appears in Localized languages (here,Hindi) too:

(click on image to see larger image)

How to run KDE 4 applications in Windows XP / Windows Vista directly off CD/DVD ROM?

Run KDE 4 Desktop applications in Windows XP / Windows Vista directly off CD/DVD ROM.

Here is how:

Install kde4 for Windows in your computer as described here.

Copy entire install directory of KDE 4 and burn it on a DVD (you can use CD ROM too, if you have installed few apps. A full KDE install takes about 2.5 GB).

Now put DVD on any Windows XP / Windows Vista computer and run KDE applications directly by executing .exe files from DVD’s Kde 4 bin sub-directory under installation directory.

For example, you can double click kate.exe under bin sub-directory on CD/DVD Rom to run it.

You can copy the entire KDE 4 install directory to another Windows XP / Vista computer’s hard disk and can run kde applications without the need of cumbersome installations.

How to run KDE applications in Windows ?

Run KDE in Windows

Ktuberling and many other KDE application running on Windows:

(Click on the picture to see enlarged picture)

KDE – the desktop environment for GNU-Linux is true cross platform set of application tools that you can install and use in nearly all top class Operating System environment – that includes Windows OS.

Here is no nonsense, straightforward ‘how to guide’ for you to install KDE 4, the latest version of KDE in Windows XP (may work in other Windows versions as well):

Step 1 : Go to this link : http://download.cegit.de/kde-windows/installer/

and download the latest KDE 4 for Windows GUI installer, and run it. You need to remain connected to Internet since this is an online installer.

It will ask where to download and what to download in its initial Installation wizard , which is pretty straight forward. Please remember to use installation directory such as C:\kde4 that is easily accessible to all. And keep other default settings intact if you are unsure about them. When you are done, click Next.

Step 2 : In its next step, Kde 4 Windows installer will ask you to select download server. Select the one which is close to you and has sufficient bandwidth. Then Click Next.

Step 3 : Now you need to select the supported application to download. You can download source code of some of application / packages too. If you are unsure, click on KDE on package category and KDE application with all dependency files will gets displayed and you can then select them individually. When done, click Next.

Step 4 : KDE 4 Windows installer will start downloading packages from the mirror server you had selected, and will take a little time to download them that may depend upon your selection. Wait till your download completes. Meanwhile, feel free to perform other windows task till your downloads completes.

Step 5 : After download, KDE 4 Windows installer installs applications and packages you had selected. If you have used 3^rd party tools such as Active perl, then you need to give your input such as agree to their license term by clicking I accept button and clicking on next button.

Step 6 : When installations finishes, KDE Installer tells you that now you can run your KDE application in Windows, else it will give you error message, and you need to act upon that. At times, some files may not be available during setup and you can ignore that file.

Step 7 : Before you run KDE application in Windows, you need to give (presently, to fix certain things) following commands in your command window:

C:\KDE4> bin\update-mime-database C:\KDE4\share\mime

And,

C:\KDE4> bin\kbuildsycoca4 --noincremental

Note that here, c:\kde4 is the directory in which you have installed KDE 4 for Windows, that may be different according to your choice.

Now, you are ready to run your KDE applications in Windows. Go to Bin sub directory under KDE installation directory, and double click on the exe file of KDE program – for example, Ktuberling.exe if you want to run Ktuberling game. And voila this glossy KDE 4 game pops alive in Windows.

KDE’s Khangman with its glossy semitransparent effect running on Windows XP:

(Click on the picture to see enlarged picture)

You can find latest, further information, support and guide here:

Kde 4 windows how to

http://techbase.kde.org/index.php?title=Projects/KDE_on_Windows/Installation

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How to connect to Reliance Internet in Linux using RIM LG / Nokia / Samsung CDMA mobile phone and USB data card/stick ?

Here is a no nonsense quick guide for you to connect to Reliance Internet in Linux using LG / Nokia / Samsung CDMA mobile phone and USB data card/stick ?

 

1

Open terminal and give command –

# dmesg | grep ttyACM

If you get some output, fine. You can go ahead. (Else your Kernel is not ready. It means it require additional steps to enable USB module upgrade/recompile your Linux Kernel)

2

Give this second command in terminal as Super user.

# ln –s /dev/ttyACM0 /dev/mobile

Please note that 0 in ACM0 is ZERO (Number) and not O (character).

3

Give third command as super user :

# chmod a+rw /dev/mobile

4

Open gedit as super user, copy paste following code and save it as mobiles.rules file in /etc/udev/rules.d folder :

Content: BUS=="usb" SYSFS{product}=="Qualcomm CDMA Technologies MSM*" KERNEL=="ttyACM*" SYMLINK=="mobile" MODE=="666"

Now Start KPPP. You need to configure it. Click on Configure button to create a new account. Phone number will be #777 and User Name and Password both will be your mobile phone number. Further, you need to specify modem. For this, in KPPP Configuration window, Click on Modem tab, and click on New and then select /dev/ttyACM0 from dropdown list as your modem and click OK.

Now you are ready to connect to Internet through KPPP with this newly created connection.

 

Related : How to connect in Reliance Internet in Windows Vista with LG mobile phone?

(Courtesy - An article by Prabind Kr Singh in Linux For You, January 2008, regarding connecting TATA indicom USB stic. Method will be similar, only User name and Password will be different - use internet as username and password.)

How to type Unicode Hindi in Remington (Krutidev series) Keyboard in Linux?

Online, the easiest way-

Use this online tool (you can use it offline too by saving it at appropriate location,)

http://raviratlami.googlepages.com/Remington-Krutidev-Online-Hindi-Easy-Editor.htm

Offline way, you need to install a remington binary file for scim:

Make sure you have installed latest version of SCIM.

Download this binary file - dev.remington.bin from here:

http://oriya.sarovar.org/download/dev.remington.bin

And copy it to /usr/share/scim/tables.

Restart SCIM.

There should now be an entry for Remington
under Hindi.

You can also copy
http://oriya.sarovar.org/download/dev.remington.png
to /usr/share/scim/icons.

(thanks to Gora Mohanti, gora at sarai dot net for the offline tip)

How to install Tally 9 in Linux?

There is an interesting article appeared in Linux For You Nov. 2007.

 

Now you can install and run Windows version of Tally 9 - the most popular Accounting software in Linux.

 

Here are some simple steps-

 

Install latest version of WINE , if it is not installed already.

 

Copy Tally 9  installer to your hard-disk, and install it through WINE.

 

You will find Tally 9 Menu in Wine program menu after successful installation. Though I myself had not tested it, but the article said that it runs perfectly - including printing and saving.

 

For more detailed instructions, refer Linux For You November 2007.