[conspire] More Firefox Addon problems - this tie from MS

[Ed Biow]

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I want to thank everyone for their suggestions, I'll have to play
around with various options when I have a chance to visit my buddy
John and I'll update you on my travails.
> Date: Fri, 12 Feb 2010 20:37:34 -0800 From: Mark Weisler
> <mark at weisler-saratoga-ca.us> Subject: Re: [conspire] More Firefox
> Addon problems - this tie from MS To: Ed Biow <biow at sbcglobal.net>
> Cc: conspire at linuxmafia.com Message-ID:
> <1266035854.6498.51.camel at localhost> Content-Type: text/plain;
> charset="UTF-8"
>
> An excellent VNC-like technology is NX from Nomachine ...
> http://nomachine.com
>
> This involves a server that you put on the remote machine and a
> client on your local host used to connect to the remote computer. A
> GPL'd version of the server is freenx at http://freenx.berlios.de/
>
>
> NX seems to be faster than VNC because NX does some spoofing to
> send less data than VNC so NX is very responsive/fast. I recommend
> it and use it about eight hours/day. The server runs on Linux (most
> flavors) and there are clients for Linux, Macintosh, and the other
> one. So you could use this to connect to your friend while he is
> running Linux.
>
I have used NX in the past and it does seem VERY fast.  For some odd
reason VNC seemed to me slower on Linux than I remember TightVNC being
on Windows, I really don't know why, especially given that I've heard
that X is well set up for X forwarding and TCP connectivity.  NX,
however, is even more responsive than Windows TightVNC. In the past I
used the proprietary NX Free Edition to connect to my living room
computer which was hooked up to my stereo via SPDIF and my old CRT TV
with s-video (terrible resolution).  It allowed me to easily play
music using my laptop to interface with my stereo computer without
sitting right in front of the TV or using the compiz Enhanced Desktop
Zoom stuff to make the crummy s-video TV output readable from 12' away
on my couch.

I set the open source freenx server to test it on my Lenny server
using these instructions:
http://wiki.debian.org/freenx

The qtnx client package is in the Debian repositories.  It worked
well, again, but like in my original experience with NX Free Edition,
it started a new X session, it didn't hook up to my already open X
session. Obviously a shared session would be more useful so I can
teach my friend to be more independent with his computer.  I didn't
see any option to change the behavior in qtnx (at least none that
worked). I tried experimenting with setting up various VNC servers on
the server, which didn't seem to help.  I was finally able to get a
shared (Shadow) session with to work on KDE with the proprietary NX
Client, but I was unable to do so when I had a Gnome session running
(I couldn't type my PW in to the unlock the session). The screen
geometry was OK at the default resolution, but I couldn't see the
bottom of my screen on my server.  When I tried to expand the NX Free
window it changed the screen geometry and made the fonts hard to read.
I screwed around a couple of hours, and it was pretty frustrating
compared to my good experience just running the default fresh X
session on NX, but I can see that if I keep at it that I can probably
get it to work well enough. Possibly I'd have better luck if I just
bagged the open source freenx server and went with the NoMachine Free
Edition server.

But first I need to figure out the SSH tunneling issue.

There might
> Date: Sat, 13 Feb 2010 07:59:47 -0800 From: Don Marti
> <dmarti at zgp.org> Subject: Re: [conspire] More Firefox Addon
> problems - this tie from MS To: conspire at linuxmafia.com Message-ID:
> <20100213155947.GA8538 at zgp.org> Content-Type: text/plain;
> charset="utf-8"
>
> begin Ed Biow quotation of Fri, Feb 12, 2010 at 05:45:41PM -0800:
>
>>> I use ssh-server all the time from inside my home network, but
>>> am a
>
>>> little unclear how I'd do if over the net to their house, given
>>> that
>
>>> they don't have a fixed IP address.  Their ISP would just
>>> assign a
>
>>> random IP address, no?
>
> Right, so set the remote system up with an SSH tunnel that will
> come up and down automatically when they get on the net.
>
> http://zgp.org/~dmarti/warez/tunnel-up
> http://zgp.org/~dmarti/warez/tunnel-down
>
> (You'll need to make a special-purpose "tunnel" user on the system
> they're connecting to.)


First, I'd like to thank you again for the cron-apt suggestion, Don,
that has come in very handy.

But I'm afraid I just don't quite have the Unix chops to make much
sense of what to do with those scripts at this point.  Some people are
too dense to run Linux, even after 5 years of daily use.  I still need
somewhat more pre-chewed wisdom for weak teeth, maybe I can find a
nice HowToForge tutorial or something.

>> that might not help him FIND the server when the IP address
>> changes.
>>> ...if I understand the problem correctly.
>>
>> Run the tunnel from the friend's machine either to the admin's
>> machine, or to a "meet me" host with a static IP address.  Then
>> ssh to the other end of the connection to get in.  Ssh over ssh.
>> (And you only have to run sshd on lo on the friend's machine.)

Actually, my cousin Mike (who has attended a few CABALs) does have a
static IP address & though my 3-year old login no longer seems to
work, I suspect I could get him to update it for me, so that might be
an option.

>
>>> I really would like to figure out how to control other folks'
>>> PCs
>
>>> remotely with VNC or whatever.
>
> Should be able to do that over a tunnel too.
>
>>> find a document.  He dual boots Windows & Hardy.  Yesterday I
>>> couldn't
>
>>> coach him through printing out a document in either (I know I
>>> set up
>
>>> his printer in both environments, but he's in his 70s and his
>
>>> description of what was happening on the screen just left me
>
>>> flummoxed).  That's when I started looking at GoToMyPC.  I
>>> could use a
>
>>> good belting with a clue-stick.
>
> Dual-booting is good for one thing: hobbyists who want to use the
> same hardware for long PC gaming sessions and for long productive*
> Linux sessions.
>
> End users should not be dual-booting.  The thing you need is always
> on the other OS.
I'm hesitant to blow away an operating system that people have already
paid for and that will run lots of software and hardware that they
already own that Linux will not play nice with (at least not without a
lot of knowledge & work).  It only takes a couple of minutes to reboot
and in any case, these days it is pretty easy for Windows & Linux to
write to each other's file systems if you aren't too cutting edge
(e.g. ext4).  Plus, something can always go wrong with an install, it
is nice to have an alternative to keep you connected so you can figure
out what is mucking with your system.  I would have been lost if I
hadn't had extra computers or been able to dual boot the first time
Linux failed a file system check and gave me the "Enter root password
for maintenance or hit Control + D" message.
>
> * as long as you heartily believe that no habit-forming games are
> out for Linux.  Tetris for Linux?  No such thing.
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Tetris_Company
Actually, I'm trying to encourage an interest in Linux by loading up
plenty of habit-forming games on a Linux system I gave to a child.

> From: Tony Godshall <tony at of.net> Subject: Re: [conspire] More
> Firefox Addon problems - this tie from MS To: David Rosenstrauch
> <darose at darose.net> Cc: conspire at linuxmafia.com Message-ID:
> <3424dc901002170738q2334b376la6c6897ef012d7c7 at mail.gmail.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1
>
> Important details omitted: Proprietary software, pricing here:
>
> http://www.yuuguu.com/pricing/yuuguu-pricing
>
> Best Regards.
>
>
>
> On Tue, Feb 16, 2010 at 10:13, David Rosenstrauch
> <darose at darose.net> wrote:
>> On 02/12/2010 11:37 PM, Mark Weisler wrote:
>>> You might have to use something like GoToMyPC to connect to his
>>> computer when he's booted into Windows.
>> I've also found yuuguu to be a decent alternative to GoToMyPC,
>> when you're forced to deal with non-*nix-inclined people.
>>
>> HTH,
>>
>> DR
Thank you for the suggestion, blokes.  It seems like yuuguu's free
service might do the trick for us, I've downloaded and installed the
deb and will sign up for the service and play around with it & report
back at my earliest opportunity.

> Date: Tue, 16 Feb 2010 05:30:12 -0800 From: Tony Godshall
> <tony at of.net> Subject: [conspire] ssh to remote machine when remote
> machine changes ip    addr [Re: More Firefox Addon problems - this tie
> from MS] To: conspire at linuxmafia.com Message-ID:
> <3424dc901002160530l47b54d5eq17fa297966f02e46 at mail.gmail.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1
>
> ...
>>>>>>>>> I use ssh-server all the time from inside my home
>>>>>>>>> network, but am a little unclear how I'd do if over
>>>>>>>>> the net to their house, given that they don't have
>>>>>>>>> a fixed IP address.  Their ISP would just assign a
>>>>>>>>> random IP address, no?
> ...
>
> http://www.torproject.org/docs/tor-hidden-service.html.en
>
> High latency but works even when IP addresses change and routers
> aren't port-forwarded.
>
> Best Regards.

Very interesting, I will certainly give that a spin if yuuguu doesn't
pan out.  I've used tor/privoxy just to browse the net when reading
about things the government might not approve of in the land of the
free (e.g. visiting Cuba) and 'high latency' is a good description.
Things are so slow I feel like I am actually IN Cuba using the local
dial-up through a proxy.

Thanks again to everyone for their suggestions, it has certainly given
me some ideas.

Obeisances,

Ed Biow



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