[[LFS Note: The below procedure works fine with LFS 3.0]] In my continuing search for compatibility, stability and performance, I decided to compile XFree86 4.1.0 from source and install it. I removed the RPMs for my version earlier version of X, as well as Freetype. I also removed my old fonts. I didn’t have any […]

I discussed compiling XFree86 from source in my article XFree86 4.1.0 from Source. One problem if you nuke all associated RPMs, is that the Athena Widget Set is included in the XFree86 distribution. This is in xc/lib/Xaw of the XFree86 source tree. What is a Widget Set? Well, this is the style of buttons and […]

[[LFS Note: the following was from a Redhat 7.1 perspective. It may or may not work well on an LFS system. For LFS, use the LFS hint to install zlib-1.1.3, jpegsrc.v6b, libpng-1.0.12, lcms-1.07, libmng-1.0.3, tiff-v3.5.5, qt 2.3.1 (change -system-mng to -system-libmng), Openssh (LFS HINT) , lesstif-0.93.9. I added: pcre-3.4, audiofile-0.2.2, libxml-1.8.16, libxml2-2.4.5. After you get […]

Storing cookies on workstations has both privacy and security issues associated with it. Generally, we like to nuke our cookie files. There is way too much information stored in them and created during web surfing. I (Agatha) visited a site I’d never seen before and was prompted by name to donate money to the site […]

I posted some earlier stories in the NetAdminTools Desktop area about struggling with GNUCash. I did eventually build up an LFS system, which I’m writing and posting this article from. There is some good information on the LFS site about getting various combinations of software running on LFS in the hints area. In particular, the […]

We have not found a way to easily disable the Windows Messenger service on XP via the application. You can use the MMC (Microsoft Management Console) to do this, though. Select start–>run, enter mmc, and click OK. Select Add/Remove Snap-in, Add, Group Policy, Add, Local Computer, Finish. Here is a graphic of the appropriate part […]

There are a variety of issues surrounding ACPI on XP workstations. XP is tied very tightly in to ACPI. The immediate result is, by default, Microsoft’s support for ACPI saves the world a lot of electricity. That is, the information economy kills a lot less wildlife and puts less toxins in the air that we […]

Ever wish you could dynamically update the background image of your desktop? Here is a perl script that takes an existing background, finds out the current stock/index prices, and adds the prices to the image. Just put it in your crontab. You could just as easily put ping response times for various servers on your […]

One of the most likely parts to fail on a typical workstation is the hard drive. The user powers on in the morning, and the BIOS screams “Unable to Boot!”. Now, much work can often be done via the web, or at least, the user won’t freak as much if they can at least access […]

If you have a Linux box and an NVIDIA card, the best drivers are available directly from NVIDIA here. If, after installing the drivers, they don’t start up automatically, you may need to add the correct alias to your /etc/modules.conf file. I’m going to assume that you are running a 2.4 kernel with loadable modules […]

We had a workstation that wasn’t getting updates properly. Here are some items in the logs we noticed: Event ID 43: Windows Management Instrumentation ADAP failed to connect to namespace \\.\root\cimv2 with the following error 0x80041002 And: Event ID 1090: Windows failed to record Resultant Set of Policy (RSoP) information, which describes the scope of […]