My Personal Blog

Just a spot for my random thoughts.
Category >> Eek! A Geek

How to set up a VNC web (Java) client for Ubuntu

I've had to play with this every time I reinstall Ubuntu and want to setup a VNC web client which is really handy when I'm work and need to access my PC at home for whatever reason. 

First, make sure you have remote desktop enabled by going to Menu -> System -> Preferences -> Remote Desktop.  Click "Allow other users to view your desktop" and "Allow other users to control your desktop."  For my use, since I VNC into my desktop from remote locations and thus will not be at my desk to accept my own connection, I uncheck "You must confirm each access to this machine" and check "Require the user to enter this password."  Make sure you use a strong password.  Of course, you may need to configure your router to forward incoming communication for ports 5800 and 5900 to your desktop you're wanting to connect into. 

Second, if you do not already have apache installed, install it:

sudo apt-get install apache2

Third, download the tightvnc-java package. I use the latest version at Tightvnc's website rather than the one in Ubuntu's repositories. Download and extract the java Binary *.class and JAR files in Zip archive (or Tar+Gzip) and extract the contents wherever you want.

Finally, open Nautilus as root by hitting Ctrl-F2 and typing gksu nautilus (or if you're a Linux pro, you can use a terminal to copy the contents to /var/www/vnc).  Browse to /var/www and create a folder named vnc.  Copy the contents of the java vnc viewer to /var/www/vnc. Open index.html and replace all the contents with this:

<HTML>
<TITLE>
TightVNC desktop
</TITLE>
<APPLET CODE="VncViewer.class" CODEBASE=classes/ ARCHIVE="VncViewer.jar"
        WIDTH="800" HEIGHT="632">
<PARAM NAME="PORT" VALUE="5900">
<param name="Open New Window" value="yes">
</APPLET>
<BR>
<A href="http://www.tightvnc.com/">TightVNC site</A>
</HTML>

And that should do it.  You can now access it via http://ip.address/vnc or use a dynamic DNS service such s DnsExit to create a domain name that points to your home IP. 

 

 


on May 23, 2010 Posted by: Alan Hartless | Comment (0)
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ATI driver issues in Ubuntu 10.04 Lucid

Well, it never fails that when I upgrade Ubuntu, I run into a few issues.  Gotta love open source. :-)

The issue was with my ATI drivers.  I had initially installed them using ATI's script for the catalyst 10.4 driver which is suppose to have support for Ubuntu 10.04.  But after installing it, every little movement was super choppy and jerky.  So I decided to remove it.  Usually easy enough right?  Just a sudo apt-get remove fglrx and success?  Nope.

Removing fglrx ...
dpkg-divert: mismatch on package
  when removing `diversion of /usr/lib/libGL.so.1.2 to /usr/lib/fglrx/libGL.so.1.2.xlibmesa by fglrx'
  found `diversion of /usr/lib/libGL.so.1.2 to /usr/lib/fglrx/libGL.so.1.2.xlibmesa by xorg-driver-fglrx'
dpkg: error processing fglrx (--purge):
 subprocess installed post-removal script returned error exit status 2
Processing triggers for ureadahead ...
Errors were encountered while processing:
 fglrx

It failed.  After searching for a long time, I finally came across a discreet page that gave me what I needed to make it happen.

sudo dpkg-divert --rename --remove /usr/lib/libGL.so.1.2
sudo dpkg-divert --rename --remove /usr/lib32/libGL.so.1.2 sudo dpkg --force-all --purge fglrx

Success! Afterward, just make sure you reinstall either xorg's open source ATI driver or Ubuntu's fglrx package as you might find yourself in low graphics mode otherwise :-)  You may also need to do

sudo dpkg-reconfigure xserver-xorg

Later...I found this post which helped tremendously as well.


on Apr 30, 2010 Posted by: Alan Hartless | Comment (0)
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Western Digital My Passport SE 1TB Portable Drive

So, my well used WD 160GB portable drive started clicking.  I heavily use it to store my web development files and when the clicks started, I became very nervous.  So, I did a search for a new drive.  Well, as I often do, I impulsively bought the WD My Password SE 1TB drive from Amazon thinking, wow that much space, so portable and decently priced! (It was as much as my 160GB I bought two years ago).  I began nightly backups (wonderful tool rsync is) until my new drive arrived. 

It finally arrived yesterday.  I was so impressed with my slick, little drive with so much data capacity.  I quickly reformatted (to ext3 of course) and synced my files from the old to the new.  Then I had the wake up call.  I picked up the drive to move some cables around and bam, connection was lost and bye bye all unsaved data.  What the crap?  Turns out, the slightest little touch of the cable causes it to lose connection, and I do mean the slightest touch.  Wouldn't mind it so much if this wasn't a portable drive.  Who designed this thing?  They should be fired.


on Jan 24, 2010 Posted by: Alan Hartless | Comment (0)
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Tasktop - A must have Eclipse plugin

I'm always on the search for a decent piece of software to help track the time I spend on various coding projects for clients.  Before I found Tasktop, I was already using Mylyn tasks to plan out items I needed to do for various projects.  But I used a timer no my phone, then manually recorded the time into another project tracker such as Zoho Projects, JForce, or Trac.  A pain in the you know what if you know what I mean.  As I usually do when I have had enough with my current method of doing things, I do a google search to see if anything new presents itself.  Well, this time my search led me to Tasktop and I was sold as soon as I tried the trial.

Tasktop is not the perfect solution for me.  The perfect solution is an all-in-one project tracker, invoice and quote manager.  The project trackers above fall short and/or are expensive for small-scale freelancers like myself.  However, Tasktop has solved my time tracking issues and has made it very convenient to code for clients within Eclipse and track billable hours.  And, if I use a supported connector, Tasktop will keep my tasks and time in sync with various project trackers! 

I'm not going to layout all of Tasktop's feature as you can head over to Tasktop.com to see and experience it for yourself.  However I will layout a couple of my favourite features.  

1) I love the feature that opens all the windows you were working on when you deactivated a task.  This makes sure that only windows (editor or built-in browser) that are pertinent to the task are open.  It is such a convenience and a time saver!

2) I live off Google calendar and Tasktop allows syncing tasks as calendar events to my calendar!  It will even display the current events in the bottom left hand corner of Eclipse.  It gives you the option to sync the due date/time and or scheduled date for the task. 

3) Of course my most favourite and the reason I found Tasktop to begin with, is the time tracker capability.  I can add/edit/remove time items to be billed.  The ONLY thing I do not care for and have communicated to Tasktop is the way the "No Task Active Time."  Basically it tracks the time that Eclipse is open but a task is not activated.  However, I'm bouncing back and forth between items for clients and I have not found a way to tell it to divvy out  no task active time between the clients appropriately.  So, I'm forced to just ignore it.  Myabe I'm configuring it wrong, I dunno.  I hope I am and will be enlightened soon ;-)

 

Anyway, Tasktop pro is $99 bucks but for me, it is well worth it.


on Nov 7, 2009 Posted by: Alan Hartless | Comment (0)
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New Google Apps Mail Look

I like it.  Looks much more professional and not so "bright and bubbly."    I like the label drop down where I can select as many labels as I want by selecting or deselecting the check boxes then clicking Apply.   Rows look more tight as well.  The colors are more tame and appealing.

I was looking forward to themes but I like the new look so much, now I really don't care.

Do you like the new look?  Why or why not?


on Feb 4, 2009 Posted by: Alan Hartless | Comment (0)
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I've been invited to join the jFusion team!

I recently came across jFusion, a powerful and revolutionary Joomla component to bridge Joomla with various softwares.  I started testing out its plugin for vBulletin (the forum software used on this site).  After posting some questions, hacks, and suggestions, I offered to help out in developing the vBulletin plugin.  I was soon afterward invited to join the team!  I, along with another gentleman named Haythem, will be maintaining the vBulletin plugin.

 We have already made huge leaps in getting the vBulletin plugin working well with Joomla!  The next release of jFusion (set for December 25th) will include the newly enhanced vBulletin plugin!  But if you can't wait, check out our SVN at http://code.google.com/p/jfusion.


on Dec 6, 2008 Posted by: Alan Hartless | Comment (1)
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Getting 32bit Eclipse with Aptana to work on Ubuntu Ibex 64bit

UPDATE 2010 May 23: For Ubuntu 10.04 (Lucid), it is no longer required to download and install the individual 32bit libraries.  Just follow step number 2 and 9-12.

 

I decided to upgrade my version of Eclipse to the latest, 3.4.  I have a 32bit laptop and a 64 bit desktop.  I hate having to maintain two copies of Eclipse so I maintain one 32bit version of Eclipse on my jump drive.  Obviously, this poses some problems with my 64bit desktop.  There a ways to get a 32bit version of Eclipse fully functional on a 64bit OS.  With 3.3, I had no problems doing this.  But with 3.4, I ran into some new issues.  Specifically with getting the Aptana plugin to work properly.  Nothing in the aptana perspective would display and it would crash with errors relating to it not finding a suitable xulrunner.

 This is how I ended up doing it.  I used parts of the how to found here on the Ubuntu forums posted by linuxed.

1)  I downloaded the following packages: 

Eclipse
libnss3-1d 32-bit
xulrunner-1.8 32-bit
libnspr4-0d 32-bit
libstartup-notification0 32-bit
libhunspell-1.1-0 32-bit

2)  Install the following via apt

sudo apt-get install ia32-libs ia32-sun-java6-bin

 3) Create a temporary folder lib32

mkdir lib32

 4) Extract the above packages, then extract data.tar.gz in each of the library packages.  

5) Copy the following files from the corresponding packages' data.tar.gz to the lib32 folder you created

libnss3-1d: usr/lib:

  • libnss3.so.1d
  • libnssutil3.so.1d
  • libsmime3.so.1d
  • libssl3.so.1d

libnss3-1d: usr/lib/nss:

  • libfreebl3.so
  • libnssckbi.so
  • libnssdbm3.so
  • libsoftokn3.so

Copy all the files in usr/lib for  libnspr4-0d, libstartup-notificaton0 and libhunspell-1.1-0

6) Place the entire xulrunner folder in the lib32 folder

7) Place the entire eclipse directory wherever you want to run it from.  For me, it was my jump drive.  For you it may be /opt, /usr/lib32, or whatever.

8)  Copy the entire lib32 directory to /usr/lib32

sudo cp -R lib32/* /usr/lib32/

 9) Create the following file:

sudo gedit /usr/bin/eclipse

 10) Place the following into the file and save it

export PATH=/direct/path/to/eclipse/installation/:/usr/lib/jvm/ia32-java-6-sun/bin:/usr/lib32/:$PATH
export JAVA_HOME=/usr/lib/jvm/ia32-java-6-sun/
export MOZILLA_FIVE_HOME=/usr/lib32/xulrunner/ cd /direct/path/to/eclipse/installation/
./eclipse $*

11) Make it executable

sudo chmod +x /usr/bin/eclipse

 12) Run eclipse from either the application launcher or a terminal

To get Aptana installed and working, do the following

1) Open Eclipse and intall the SDK.  Click Help->Software Updates.  click on the Available Software tab and type in"eclipse sdk." Click on "Eclipse SDK" and then install.

2) Once installed, restart eclipse.  Then go to Window -> Preferences -> General -> Capabilities  and check "Classic Update"

3) Go to Help -> Software Updates -> Find and Install. Select " Search for new features to install" and click next.  Click "New Remote Site" and add "http://update.aptana.com/update/studio/3.2/site.xml"

4) Click Ok then Finish.  Install Aptana.

5) Restart and you should be good to go!

Comment below if you have any questions or run into roadblocks.


on Nov 7, 2008 Posted by: Alan Hartless | Comment (2)
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Assembla.com

So I stumbled upon assembla.com back in the early stages of phpScheduleEm and instantly fell in love.  At the time I was hosting my own SVN/Trac server but was a pain because of issues with my ISP.  I did a search to see if there were any services out there to host svn/trac for me.  During that search, I happened to stumble upon assembla, a feature rich site full of tools for the software developer.

At the time, assembla was completely free.  But just within the last week they are beginning to roll out a subscription based service and making all future free acounts public.  They are charging $2 per user and $3 per gigabyte of space used.  I immediately bought a $100 dollars worth of subscription credits.  The price was absolutely unbeatable for the services I get.

It is at assembla.com where I keep track of all my tasks, bugs, and features and host the latest code.  Users do not report bugs here, but I put the bugs into the trac system once they are confirmed for this is strictly my development workspace.  (Bugs should be reported using this site.)  I use eclipse to develop my applications which has a mylyn trac connector which allows me to easily manage my tickets as I'm developing.  Eclipse also allows me to manage my svn repository.

Anyway, I digress.  I highly recommend assembla.  It not only provides svn and trac but a slew of other services such as Mercurial, Git, time keeping, wiki, milestones, tickets, files, chat, and other to collaborate between users developing the same project.  The space interface is customizable giving it the look and feel of however you want.  I have not had any problems with it thus far except for the minor detail of not being able to edit a comment of a svn commit.  I've contacted support and will hopefully get this worked out soon.

Check them out!


on Oct 21, 2008 Posted by: Alan Hartless | Comment (0)
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Received my 16gb microSDHC card today

Yahoo!  I received my 16gb microSDHC card today.  It doubles the capacity of my ATT Tilt.  I now do not have to be so picky as to what music to place on the Tilt.   I can now adequately test  if I like TomTom or CoPilot better because I can fit both sets of maps on the card.  And best of all,  I only spent $86 bucks which includes shipping by ordering it from the UK because it isn't available in the states yet :-)  (And when it does, it is suppose to retail at $99 bucks.)  I spent $120 on the 8gb when it came out.  Crazy.  Will the 32gb card be cheaper when it comes out :-)


on Oct 16, 2008 Posted by: Alan Hartless | Comment (0)
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Launched www.hartlessbydesign.com

I've launched http://www.hartlessbydesign.com.  It will be where I host the web applications I release.  I created an application for work to streamline the scheduling of our employees.  We haven't had a chance to use because of Ike but hopefully we will within a couple months.  Anyway, check it out!

on Oct 9, 2008 Posted by: Alan Hartless | Comment (0)
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