Linux for Desktop: Tips n Tricks for PCQLINUX 2004

Internet connects using Reliance cellphones



To use your Reliance cellphone as a modem, you first need to activate data calls in it. To do so dial *412 and wait for a confirmatory SMS. Then get a data cable (easily available from any mobile shop for about Rs 250, for all models of Reliance CDMA phones) and connect your cellphone to your PC/laptop. We tested this on PCQLinux 2004 using Samsung’s N191 CDMA phone. Kudzu (the hardware-detection tool for Linux) will automatically detect the phone as a USB/COM modem, depending on which data cable interface you’ve connected it with, once your OS reboots. Now, you have to configure the wvdial.conf file to dial to the Net. For accessing the Internet, all CDMA providers use a standard number (#777). Now create a dialer in /etc/wvdial.conf which will dial to this number. Don’t use any graphical utility to create it as it may not work







properly. The contents are:









Modem = /dev/input/ttyXYZ


Baud = 230400


SetVolume = 0


Dial Command = ATDT


Init1 = ATZ


FlowControl = Hardware (CRTSCTS)





Username = your_phone_number


Password = your_phone_number


Phone = #777


Stupid Mode = 1


Inherits = Modem0


















In the second line, replace ttyXYZ to ttyS0 (For Com1) or ttyS1 (For Com2). If you are using the USB interface, then replace it with ttyACMx. Here x is the number of devices minus one, which you have connected to your USB port. If you have three USB devices connected, then x= 2. Remember that if the number of devices change, then the value of x also changes. You can also find its value by running the usbview command.

Now enter the number of the cellphone you are using, along with the STD code of the home circle, without the first 0, in both the username and password fields. Enter #777 in the Phone field. Don’t forget the Stupid Mode = 1 line or your modem will not work. Now, run the following command from any terminal.






#wvdial cdma





Here, cdma is the name of your dialer (the line in the wvdial.conf file). You can replace cdma with another name.

If you have another modem in the machine, then it will need a similar block of its own in the wvdial.conf file. Obviously, depending on the type of modem and the phone line used, the values in the block will change.

CD does not unmount/eject



Linux mounts and locks (against eject) the CD-ROM/DVD drive for reading. By default, the CD-ROM is mounted onto the directory /mnt/cdrom. Sometimes, it may happen that while trying to unmount the CD drive using the umount command or in X Window, you may not be able to do so and get a ‘device is busy’ error. In this case, first ensure that the /mnt/cdrom directory is not the current working directory or not open in X Window by changing to a different directory or by closing the File manager. You must ensure this at all the opened Linxu terminals and X Window workspaces. Now try umount with —f (force unmount) option. If all this does not work, as a last resort, issue the following command.





fuser —mv /mnt/cdrom





Note the PID (Process ID) number in the output and issue the command: kill -9 where is the number that you noted down.

Running Java applets in Mozilla



PCQLinux 2004 ships with JDK 1.4.2. It will be already installed if you had selected it during installation, else read the section Install JDK in the article Writing J2EE Apps on page 77, in this issue. Next, issue the following command to set up the Java applet plugin for Mozilla. 






ln -s /usr/java/j2sdk1.4.2_03/jre/plugin/i386/ns610-gcc32/libjavaplugin_oji.so 


/usr/lib/mozilla/plugins/libjavaplugin_oji.so





Launch Mozilla. Click on Edit>Preferences>Adavanced and click the option labeled ‘Enable Java’. 









Printing from PCQLinux



Configuring printers in PCQLinux 2004 is quite simple. Launch the System Settings>Printing, which opens a printer configuration tool for you. To add new printer, select New from its tool bar, which runs a wizard to add a new printer on your PCQLinux machine. After lunching the wizard, it will ask for a queue name and type of print setup (local, Unix, Windows or Novell printer). Select the printer according to your requirements. For instance, if the printer is connected to your machine’s parallel port, select Local Printer, and click forward. This sets the print device as /dev/lp0.

If you have a printer elsewhere on a network, then you need to use one of the other printer setup options mentioned above. The wizard in this case asks you for the printer driver, and also for the print queue name or the print server name. PCQLinux 2004 provides a very large number of printer drivers for the printers available in the market. Finally, click the Apply button in the printer configuration tool to start the printing service and you are ready to start firing printouts from your Linux machine.



Running a remote Windows desktop

You can access a Windows machine running Remote Desktop Sharing from a PCQLinux 2004 machine with the help of tsClient. tsClient is a GUI front-end for rDesktop, which is a Terminal server client for Linux. Both of these are installed if you choose the ‘Personal Install’ installation type. But, if you want to install it manually then just place the PCQLinux 2004 CD 3 and double click on mnt/cdrom/PCQuest/RPMS/tsclient-0.12.0-1.i386.rpm and it will get installed.

To start using a networked Windows desktop on your Linux machine, go to Start button>Internet and select the Terminal Server Client icon. It t will ask you for the IP address of the Windows Terminal Server. After that, click on the More button and include additional details like user name, password and domain of that machine. You can also change the window size and color depth of the remote desktop from the display tab. This software also gives you the flexibility to set which local resources like key combinations (Alt + tab or Alt + Ctl + Del) will run on which machine (Local or Remote). It also allows you to set caching for improving connect speed even when you have opened many terminals in your machine. If you have used the Remote Desktop Connection Application in Win 2000 or XP, you will recognize this interface immediately. Note: To get tsClient to connect the Windows PC, you need to enable Remote Desktop Sharing in Windows.

Anindya Roy and Shekhar Govindarajan