Slax author's Blog (RSS)

I decided to write a buildscript and make my own module for kshutdown.

One thing surprised me, when I found out I need automoc4 tool to compile the source code - the web search for modules isn't "fulltext". I searched for "auto" and when there was no automoc in the results, I wrote new buildscript for it. Only to realize later, that the automoc4 module is already there. So this is suggestion for Tomas to make the search better, if there's time ;-).

Speaking of modules... the modules section was recently updated and is far better, so thanks Tomas for that!

Secondly, I have a question about the cleanup part of the buildscript. I put there commands for removing the temporary directories and files (source code etc.), so after the buildscript is finished, there remains only the buildscript and the created module. Is it correct that way? Or is it better to not delete the files? (maybe to reuse them for next build, but it would gradually use a lot of space on the build server) Because when I wrote the buildscipt I checked a few another buildscipts and the cleanup sections were empty.

And lastly, after my module was created, the application and KDE menu were missing icons. For some reason, the icons installed to /usr/share/icons/hicolor weren't used/found. I had to adjust the buildscript to copy those icons from hicolor theme to the oxygen theme. I see now, that in the system-settings is only oxygen theme. So what is the correct way to handle this situation?

Thanks for your feedback. I will try to improve the search capability. The problem is that if there are too much search results, it may be confusing. So if you search for 'auto' and you get 50 modules while you're looking for 'automoc4' only is not ideal. At the moment you should be able to use auto* keyword (with asterisk at the end) to match automoc4.

Cleanup is not necessary. In general, it doesn't matter what files are left in the system after your buildscript ends. At the server side, there are several virtual machines with Slax running. Those machines get instruction to run your buildscript in order to produce the module binary file. As soon as the module is ready, it is uploaded to Slax server and the virtual machine reboots, effectively losing all modifications. Every buildscript is started on a fresh Slax operating system. It is even described in the buildscript template that you should not care about cleanup, quote: cleanup is not performed. I think I should improve that message to explain that it is not even needed.

Missing icons, you should put them to oxygen theme.

Ok, removing files is not necessary, I will update the buildscript. I was confused by the note "You have to remove everything from the current working directory manually". Thanks for clarification ;-).

I tried the asterisk wildcard as you suggested. It works in the command line search using slax command. But on the web search it doesn't work that way. I will bear this in mind next time.

Hello!
My wife for work regularly uses a KRDC ( remote desktop client for KDE).
not find it in modules. i think, also VLC \ mplayer is good to be, midnight comander, sure, opera, chromium webbrowsers, kmail, yaWP, system monitor, gimp, dolphin, freeciv, kopete, ktorrent? XBoard,Kmines, diablo 2 :) gwenview...at that time, no more ideas. also, i see in "modules" section "enlightenment", and think about download it, and go down via "required modules", but there is so much, and that knotty, as i not download it. i think, it must be very good to have a button "download module with all depend modules in one click"...

Drago: Some software you mentioned is already part of the Slax base system, so there aren't standalone modules - for example dolphin, midnight commander, system monitor, etc. Other modules (not part of Slax by default) needs to be created, so you have to wait till someone writes a buildscript for them, or create them by yourself.

An Opera module would be appreciated by myself as well...I have been able to use the "tar.gz" downloaded from Opera
and install on the fly without saving any settings, very early
test at this time. Another that I think would be a nice addition
is something like KOffice, maybe KDEPIM with KMail and
other PIM apps.

Doomsday Engine is my favorite. :D But you need "freepats" for midi sound. For more details: http://dengine.net/

Also from old, good games rocks n diamond is very good, imho.
BTW, about a Order Slax on USB drive - there is an option with 32 Gb flash too? on some sides 16 gb is bit too small.

I have another problem writing buildscripts. There are two ways: build the module from txz archives of existing slackware packages, or compile it from source code.

The problem I am facing is what to do when the txz archive contains more than one application. Like the kdegames package. I would like to make a module for just one game (klines), but how to do that? I don't know, so I decided to build the module from source code. But here's the thing - the compilation fails because of missing file in /usr/share/apps/ksgmltools2/. Same happened during Krusader compilation and will probably happen with a lot of other KDE applications.

The content of the directory /usr/share/apps/ksgmltools2/ should be provided by kdelibs package, but it is missing (probably removed to make Slax smaller). I could (and did) compile my own kdelibs, but that isn't the proper way I think. As I see it, there are three ways how to deal with this:

1) add the ksgmltools2 directory to Slax
2) create new kdelibs module and activate it, so the compilation uses the files from this module instead of the default Slax kdelibs
3) build the module from txz package and manually select only files needed by the one application (for example klines), but this is very difficult (I don't know which files are needed)

Tomas, could you help me out here? Or anyone, maybe someone is in the same situation...

Just missed Google Chrome

The web search engine has some problems. many modules exist but can't be found by that engine. It seems can't handle sign plus ("+"), you can try gtk+3 (http://www.slax.org/en/modules.php?detail=gtk+3), the download link is bad.

I think Slax should be able to handle hicolor icons since many applications put their icons there. It's kind of low-efficiency to move them per application.

@Drago 2013-01-19 04:36

--- "chromium webbrowsers" [...]
I agree that Chromium is a must have software...

@Tomas M

I forgot this:
Are there any firmware for intel pro wifi 2xxx ?
AND is kernel compiled with this firmware ?
Someone ask this in your forum and I've noticed that many people uses intel chips [graphics, wifi, etc.]

Off topic, but I finally got the 3.7.3 compiled with the aufs tools and squashfs. The zram patch is in mainstream already I think, so I didn't use it. Running on Slax well so far.

I had to compile the aufs-utils first before compiling the kernel and installing the headers in the tree because for some reason, it kept complaining about the new aufs_type.h. Issues compiling aufs-utils under 3.7, even using absolute paths as mentioned in some websites as a fix.

The mount.aufs seems to work but keeps generating this error about mount.aufs.c and invalid arguments if the parameters are incorrect, instead of a proper error message:

mount.aufs:mount.aufs.c:161::Invalid argument

However, this seems to be the same error with stock Slax 7.0.4 as well.

librehat: I agree with you about the icons. There is only oxygen theme in Slax, but a lot of applications install only hicolor theme. A had to adjust the buildscript to copy the icons from hicolor to oxygen theme, for the application to find them.

About ksgmltools2: I think what you need is to patch the software you are compiling, edit CMakeFile.txt and remove add_subdirectory(doc) everywhere. You can see this script which I am using to compile KDE applications in Slax:

http://ftp.slax.org/Slax-7.x-development/sources/Slax-7.0-sources/kde4/build-apps/compileit

@MarkDS

I've compiled aufs with Porteus.
The only issue is that mount.aufs doesn't run...
(honestly I haven't made many test, just one )

Tell me if you've found something around the slax universe...

Thanks.

Hi Kadalka,

What I found is that the aufs-utils don't compile with the 3.7.3 kernel. I've followed the instructions, doing make header_install in the current kernel tree, even using absolute paths to point to the aufs_type.h, but it doesn't compile. So what I did was to compile aufs-utils against 3.6.11 - then put the utils into the package tree for 3.7.3. The mount.aufs seems to work the same as how it did with slax 7.0.4 with the 3.6.11 kernel. If you submit without parameters it gives the error I mentioned above, but thats exactly how it is for the 3.6.11 as well. I don't think there is any issues with it, but then again I haven't robustly tested it either. If Tomas can suggest some tests that we can do to ensure its working properly, I'd be happy to test it.

Sorry I'm skipping 3.7 and will try AUFS on 3.8 when it's released.

Hi Tomas,

Thats cool with me, anyway my 3.7.3 is running fine so I'm assuming all is ok.

By the way, what exactly do the aufs tools do in terms of normal running? I see the auchk, aubusy, etc, but are they actively used in system? Even mount.aufs to be very honest, as a user, I've not used it. Does the system use any of these in its running?

Tomas M: Thanks for the hint. I used parts of your script to remove the add_subdirectory(doc) string and to move icons from hicolor to oxygen theme. If anybody is interested, it is buildscript for klines. Now I can make some other modules too :-).

But I have just one more thing - what's with the ktorrent and k3b modules? Both are there, but both aren't built properly. When I use "slax search" or "slax info", I get this:

root@slax:~# slax search ktorrent
Error: no matching bundles found for ktorrent
root@slax:~# slax info ktorrent
name: ktorrent
version: 4.2.1
required bundles:
maintainer: Tomas M <tomas@slax.org>
last update: 2012-12-16 02:00:47
categories: system, network, multimedia
32bit module: N (build attempt failed, bug in script)
64bit module: N (build attempt failed, bug in script)
size: 0 KB
description: KDE BitTorrent program
description: KTorrent is a BitTorrent program with many features:
description: Download torrent files (of course :-), upload and download speed
description: capping, Internet searching, UDP trackers, port forwarding with UPnP,
description: IP blocking, importing of partially or fully downloaded files,
description: support for distributed hash tables, protocol encryption,
description: bandwidth scheduling, and much more.
description: KTorrent's developers are Joris Guisson and Ivan Vasic.

Maybe there is a lot of unresolved dependencies and it is time consuming to get them built, but I think those two are quite important applications. Do you think you can chek them out?

Few non official (but really great) modules can be found here:

http://old.slax.org/forum.php?action=view&parentID=83576

and

http://old.slax.org/forum.php?action=view&parentID=83194

Can someone write a buildscript for VirtualBox?

Many thanks and regards.

@ Firefoxjet 2013-01-21 20:49
Pending the buildscript , you can get virtual box here:-
http://old.slax.org/forum.php?action=view&parentID=83194

Can any one help me getting "eclipse" module

hi... after activate abiword and gnumeric, i dont get menu category for abiword in office, but in utilities menu, it's right?

Hi Thomas,

kdeplasma-addons module is a essential one for us because it contains kimpanel which is a good fronted GUI for fcitx(a input method). Its buildscript is also failed to compile slax bundle. Please fix it. :-)

Another thing is the server didn't send me emails about the result of compiling sometimes. :-(

Well, Opera browser module is completed.

@jcsoh

Many thanks, I was not aware of this. Unfortunately, after SB activation, Virtualbox did not start (I use X86 Slax 7.0.4).

I went to /opt/VirtualBox and executed at the shell level VirtualBox receiving the following message:
root@slax:/opt/VirtualBox# VirtualBox
WARNING: The vboxdrv kernel module is not loaded. Either there is no module
available for the current kernel (3.6.11) or it failed to
load. Please recompile the kernel module and install it by

sudo /etc/init.d/vboxdrv setup

You will not be able to start VMs until this problem is fixed.

There is no /etc/init.d/vboxdrv, therefore, I looked for vboxdrv via the command: find / -name "*vboxdrv*"
and found it at: /etc/rc.d/rc.vboxdrv

I have executed the setup with the following error:
root@slax:/opt/VirtualBox# /etc/rc.d/rc.vboxdrv setup
Stopping VirtualBox kernel modules ...done.
Recompiling VirtualBox kernel modules ...done.
Starting VirtualBox kernel modules ...failed!
(modprobe vboxdrv failed. Please use 'dmesg' to find out why)

I tried also the following with error:
root@slax:/opt/VirtualBox# depmod -ae
WARNING: -e needs -E or -F
root@slax:/opt/VirtualBox# modprobe vboxdrv
ERROR: could not insert 'vboxdrv': Exec format error

Any idea? Please note that 341-kernel-source.sb is already activated.

Thanks in advance and regards.

I have downloaded Em's vbox bundle but I haven't tried it. But with slax 6 , I do recalled having to run the script , but if I recalled there is vboxdrv setup
and sometime another script with a different name.

If the script is sucessfull then vbox will be able to work.

It is not my module , so you should post your querry at em's bundle posting where you download . Perhaps he can give an answer.

@jcsoh

Many thanks for your prompt reply. I posted the query on the old.slax.org wedsite.

I hope to get a reply with the instructions on how to solve the issue.

I wish someone creates the buildscript in the near future. My Linux experience is really limited.

@Tomas

just to point out that as per this HOWTO:
http://linuxwireless.org/en/users/Drivers/b43#Device_firmware_installation

redistribution of b43 firmware is prohibited.

Cheers

@fanthom I mentioned this thing about the legality some posts ago, but there seems to be a little confusion distinguishing between redistributing it as part of the distro or as a seperate downloadable module. I noted that in Porteus, the b43XX is blacklisted, but the b43-open firmware is included in 001-core.xzm? Or at least I thought I saw it when I opened up the base modules.

@Mark
"there seems to be a little confusion distinguishing between redistributing it as part of the distro or as a seperate downloadable module"
dont think there is a confusion. please show me a distro which has b43 proprietary firmware in the repositories.

"I noted that in Porteus, the b43XX is blacklisted, but the b43-open firmware is included in 001-core.xzm?"
correct. b43-open is an open source version of b43 firmware so we can ship it legally.

@fanthom, I see. You are right that I can't find a repo with the b43 firmware for any distro, however I mentioned "confusion" as in the docs state "since the firmware cannot be included with the distro itself" and makes no mention about separate installation packages. A package may even consist of a simple tar.gz file with the appropriate directory tree and files and not a specific distros installation package. It does make little sense for each person to cut their own firmware with tools that are freely available when packages can be created.

Open firmware from here:
http://www.ing.unibs.it/~openfwwf/

Perhaps Tomas would like to take note of this for future slax builds.

@Mark
"I mentioned "confusion" as in the docs state "since the firmware cannot be included with the distro itself" and makes no mention about separate installation packages."
there is no mention about separate installation packages because they should never exist.
this is explained clearly here:
"To get such firmware on your system, you must download the driver from a legal distribution point, extract it, and install it."

Cheers

@Fanthom - thanks. Something to make note of on my own distro. Looks like I'll have to use the open drivers like Porteus does.

So we will continue to burn bliilons of tons of carbon, and global temperature will continue to rise. The Arctic ice cap will be gone in summer within the decade perhaps as early as 2015, just 3c2bd years away. We will hit 2c2b0C above pre-industrial temperature by about 2040 perhaps earlier if the positive carbon cycle and ice albedo feedbacks are stronger and sooner than expected. Recent research finds that the terrestrial carbon sink will fail by mid-century and the ocean sink by 2100 under a BAU scenario. I think it\'s too late to stop this now, even if we had the practical technology to substantially reduce carbon emissions, which we don\'t. We\'ll soon reach a point where warming is out of our hands, regardless of what we do (if we haven\'t reached that point already).

I have a Dell D620 laptop and have the b43 driver .sb file in the modules folder. Is this all i have to do to get it to recognize wifi? If not please someone tell a very very linux novice how to get it working.

I am using the usb setup of running the os. Thank you for your time!