Nuudelisoppa

  • Ubuntu: how to cut MPEG2 streams

    I went looking for a Cuttermaran equivalent for Ubuntu, for cutting the MPEG2 streams recorded in MythTV. First I tried GOPchop, but despite indexing the file, it didn’t show it in its file listing after opening it and so I couldn’t really do any editing with it.

    Then I found Avidemux. Despite the unfortunately limited -sounding name and repository description I decided to try it and boy, am I glad I did. It’s quite capable of cutting MPEG files as well as dealing with many other codecs, so I highly recommend it. It’s even available for Windows.

  • Ubuntu: can't drag windows between workspaces in Workspace Switcher

    Looks like I’ve run into Bug #15069. What’s strange is that, I’m pretty sure I remember that prior to activating the Extra settings (with the default setup after installing Ubuntu), I did have some of the fancy stuff that’s apparently provided by compiz, such as the simple Viewport Switcher (or Desktop Wall), but now I have to go back all the way down to None to make dragging windows work. Either the default setup uses some clever hack which was lost when I turned on Extra visual effects, or my memory is failing. There’s a Workarounds utility in compizconfig settings manager, which would seem like a fitting place for a fix for the issue, but there’s none at the moment.

  • Solved: jerky picture with live MythTV (non-free ATI drivers)

    I had a problem with the live (Watching) TV picture stuttering badly in MythTV. The recordings worked just fine when played back with Totem, so the problem was not with the signal but with MythTV’s playback.

    The solution for me turned out to be uninstalling the non-free binary drivers for my ATI Radeon display adapter. I had installed them right after installing Ubuntu, but after uninstalling them I can now safely say that it was a mistake installing them in the first place.

    Apart from Miro now playing back FLVs with the colors all wrong, I’ve had no problems, MythTV no longer suffers from jerkyness and I get to enjoy all the nice desktop effects which didn’t work either with the proprietary drivers.

  • MythTV: how to start/stop recording

    When watching live TV in MythTV, press R to start recording. Now, I have yet to find a simple hotkey to stop the recording right then and there – pressing R again does stop it, but it also deletes the recording (or cancels it).

    To stop the recording, you first need to exit the watching mode by pressing Esc. Next, from the main menu, go to Manage Recordings and then Upcoming Recordings. From the list available there you can then select the program currently being recorded with the up and down arrows. When selected, pressing Enter finally gives you the choice of stopping the recording (again, selectable with up and down arrows and the Enter key).

    When I began to look for the solution for this problem, I was amazed (and truth be told, extremely frustrated as well) that Google didn’t have a direct answer to what seemed to me to be a pretty obvious question. However, it looks like the operating logic behind MythTV is based heavily on using program guides and scheduling instead of on what is perhaps a little old-fashioned way, controlling the start and stop of recording manually.

  • Ubuntu (Gnome): roskakori työpöydälle

    Quakenetin #ubuntu.fi:n wikin vastaavaa ohjetta suomenkieliselle Gutsylle soveltaen: päävalikon (käynnistä-valikon) kuvakkeen päällä oikean hiirennapin valikosta Muokkaa valikoita, siellä Sovellukset > Järjestelmätyökalut > Asetusten muokkaus -kohtaan väkänen. Sen jälkeen päävalikosta Järjestelmätyökalut > Asetusten muokkaus ja /apps/nautilus/desktop/trash_icon_visible -kohtaan väkänen.

  • Solved: Ubuntu: Miro 1.1.1 crashing on start

    This one was pretty easy, as the working solution for me was available directly from Miro Forums. After shutting Miro down (or rather, after it has shut itself down), do:

    cd ~
    rm -rf .miro
    rm -rf .gconf/apps/miro
    sudo apt-get remove sun-java6-plugin

    Obviously, this is not a good solution if you need to use Java on the web. For me it’s not a problem, since I like to have the Java plugin disabled anyway, for security and speed.

  • Super Lego Mario

    M. Hickox (via Shoutwire)

  • Hollywood ei salli HD-bokseihin digitaalista ulostuloa

    Aamulehti via Killinki

  • Ubuntu: combining Applications, Places and System menus under one Launcher

    Took me quite a while to find a way to do this, because the default Gnome menu bar is not very intuitively customizable (you can’t drag and drop System into Apps, and Places is nowhere to be found in the customization window), and yet that’s how I first conceptualized what I was trying to achieve should be done.

    But you’re not meant to be able to combine these launchers into one on your own; instead, you need to remove the entire menu bar from the panel and then replace it with the Main Menu applet (from the Add to panel window). The Main Menu combines all three menus under one launcher, visualized with the Ubuntu circle logo by default.

  • Notes and a workaround: Firefox 2.0.0.11 (Ubuntu) Segfaults at restart, & Stylish problem with userstyles not being applied

    I began migrating my Firefox extensions from Windows to Ubuntu by installing Extension List Dumper in Windows’ Firefox, and then working my way through the list generated by it in Ubuntu. However, at some point I discovered that Stylish‘s userstyles were no longer being applied, and that Firefox could no longer restart itself using the Restart button which becomes available after installing an extension.

    What’s worse, using the command-line to start Firefox I discovered that it did attempt to restart when told to, but it only resulted in a Segmentation fault.

    I initially suspected that there was some sort of a conflict between the beautiful NASA Night Launch theme and Stylish, but after starting with a new, clean profile and installing extensions one by one instead of en masse, I finally traced the problem back to Colorzilla, one of my favorite extensions. Without it, everything seems to be working, and with it, Firefox segfaults two, sometimes three times in a row before finally restarting. So the workaround to the problems listed in the title is to uninstall Colorzilla.

    The problematic version of Colorzilla I was using was the one currently available from Mozilla’s Add-ons page, 1.0. A new Beta version is available from Colorzilla’s official home page, which also mentions problems with Ubuntu and FC5, and suggests a solution which, if it works, should allow you to keep using the non-Beta version of Colorzilla. I haven’t tested either of these solutions.

    I haven’t come across these issues with Colorzilla under Windows.

    When tracking down this problem, the Restart Firefox extension turned out to be quite handy.