Playing AVI MP3 DIVX and MP4 in Meego

I recently installed Meego V1.0 on my Asus eee 1000HA and I must say I am very pleased with it. One of the most obvious omissions from this release is the ability to play divx, avi, mp3 and mp4 files. I did some googling and managed to figure out how to do it but the process is rather long and involved so I decided to combine it all into a script so you can install or your codecs with one line at the terminal.

One of the few bits of hardware fully supported by Meego.

Since the release of Meego 1.1 there have been some changes so there are now 2 different scripts.

*Note: because of all the compiling the script does it can take over an hour to run so I strongly advise connecting to AC power before running it.

For Meego 1.0
Download the script from here:
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/6217043/divx1-0

Now open a terminal and type:

chmod a+x ./divx1-0
sudo ./divx1-0

For Meego 1.1

Download the script from here:

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/6217043/divx1-1

Now open a terminal and type:

chmod a+x ./divx1-1

sudo ./divx1-1

*Note: you must first cd to the directory where you downloaded the file. ie. if it is in "Downloads" type "cd Downloads" first.

Now reboot(it wouldn't work for me until after a reboot)

This script is based on information found at:

http://www.garypigott.net/result-ive-got-divx-working-on-moblin-2-1/

Thanks to Eduardo Gonçalves for the advice on the 1.1 script.

Now you can enjoy your MP3's and AVI's on Meego.

You can also check out the thread about this on the Meego forums at:

http://forum.meego.com/showthread.php?p=3897#post3897

XBMC Web Remote Control for Android and iPhone

NOTE:  I have created a new version of the remote that has many more features and is compatible with the latest version of XBMC.  Go here for details.


**NOTE: this will no longer work in the latest releases of XBMC Dharma and is left here in case anyone is still running older versions.

For those of you who don't know XBMC it is Home Theatre PC software. What's that you ask? Basically it is software you can run on you computer when it is connected to your television to give you a nice TV and remote control friendly interface for watching movies and listening to music etc. One of the best things about XBMC is that it runs on Linux, Windows and OSX so you can bask in its awesomeness no matter what OS you run.

Unfortunately the current XBMC web interface doesn't really work too well on small touchscreens like those on Android and iPhone so I decided to go ahead and write my own.

This is the Beta version of what I am calling XMBC Web Remote(XBMC-WR). It uses XBMC's built in webserver so installing it is as easy as copying it to XBMC's web folder. The XBMC Web Remote allows you to easily browse, play and queue up music and video from your phone or other touchscreen device.

Some of the key features:

-Ability to browse your Music, Video and Picture libraries

-Queue up videos and music

-View video and music playlists

-Play, pause, volume, etc.

-Menu navigation buttons

The Main Menu screen:

Selecting a video:



Playback Controls:

Installation on Ubuntu:

Step 1 - Enable XBMC web interface

Open XBMC and from the main menu select "System" then "Network".

In the Network Settings menu select "Enable control of XBMC via HTTP".

Step 2 - Install XBMC Remote

Open a terminal and then run the following commands..

wget http://dl.dropbox.com/u/6217043/remote.zip

sudo unzip -d/usr/share/xbmc/web remote.zip

Installation on Windows

Step 1 - Enable XBMC web interface

Open XBMC and from the main menu select "System" then "Network".

In the Network Settings menu select "Enable control of XBMC via HTTP".

Step 2 - Install XBMC Remote

Download and run the installer

Installation on OSX

Step 1 - Enable XBMC web interface

Open XBMC and from the main menu select "System" then "Network".

In the Network Settings menu select "Enable control of XBMC via HTTP".

Step 2 - Install XBMC Remote

I'm not sure where the XBMC install folder is in OSX, I don't have a Mac to test it on. You should be able to download the zip file here and extract it to the "web" folder in you XBMC installation directory. If someone could test this out and let me know I'd appreciate it.

To test that the install is working start XBMC if it is not already running. Next open a browser (preferably Chrome as animations etc will only work in webkit based browsers) and go to the address

http://127.0.0.1:8080/remote

*Note: this assumes you are using the default port 8080

To use the remote from your Android device or iPhone just open a browser and go to:

http://<the ip of your XBMC box>:8080/remote

Any feedback, comments and feature requests are welcome. It is still in Beta so if there is something you would like added let me know and I'll do my best to get it in the final version.

You can check out the XBMC forums thread about the web remote at:

http://forum.xbmc.org/showthread.php?t=74343

Blumpit Firefox Plugin for Touchscreens Review and Walkthrough

I recently tried out a rather nifty Firefox plugin called Blumpit which is designed specifically for touchscreen devices. Blumpit is currently in alpha so it is still a work in progress but the alpha release is relatively stable and functional. My inital thoughts on Blumpit: Almost Awesome! When I say awesome I mean not just the product, but the idea. The use of a Firefox plugin to achieve the end result(ease of browsing on a touch screen) is a very novel idea and also means cross-platform compatibility. When I say almost I mean the product is still in the alpha stage and is not yet considered finished so there are plenty of rough edges. If the Blumpit team can polish it up before the final release then they will have a very slick applic ation which offers a universal touchscreen browsing experience regardless of the OS platform(as long as it runs Firefox).

I think the best feature of Blumpit is the the on screen keyboard. It works well and appears automatically when you click a text input on a web page and slides back into the bottom of the screen when not needed. Another nice feature is the "Web Applications" screen which functions kind of like a desktop, with big glassy icons for all your favourite web apps.

I guess the niche I could see Blumpit filling is for use on convertible netbooks/laptops which combine both a keyboard and a swivel around touchscreen for use in tablet mode. If you are using a touchscreen only device you are probably better off using a touchscreen oriented operating system like Android. I'm using it with the Asus eee T91 and Blumpit provides a quick and easy way for me to switch from a full desktop operating system to a touch based interface without the need to reboot.

One feature that is quite obviously missing from the alpha version is touch screen scrolling, however this can be easily overcome by installing Grab and Drag plugin for Firefox. Another feature that is missing is multi-tabbed browsing which I sincerely hope will be coming in the 1.0 release. Autocomplete on the search box is also missing but will hopefully be in the next release too.

Moblin Netbook Remix Reviewed

One of the best things to come out of the competition between the many netbook operating systems is the innovation in interface design to accommodate the small screen and the new computing niche netbooks occupy. Netbooks, for me at least, are predominately used for "on the couch" computing and a hardy computer to take backpacking. This new style of computing calls for a different kind of user experience and each netbook OS has its own way of trying to do this. Moblin certainly changes things up, with its sleek clean UI, minimalist icons and tabbed layout it offers an interesting take on netbook interface design.

Now with Ubuntu 9.10 Moblin Remix you can have a pretty Moblin interface running on top of Ubuntu 9.10. I decided to take the latest release for a spin to see how well the Moblin Remix interface works.

The main Moblin screen combines a bunch of widget like components. On the top left you can see your calendar entries for the day and below it your shortcuts to commonly used applications. The center column contains a list of recently opened files and websites. On the right is your Twitter feed which is cool but could be made way cooler by integrating your Facebook feed as well, something like the way Gwibber does it would be sweet.

There is lots of potential here for tighter integration with social networking services, for example on the "Status" tab you can update your Twitter and Google Talk status. Integration with more networks would certainly make this a much better and more useful feature.

On the "People" tab you can view your Google Talk contacts but again no Facebook contacts.

Ubuntu Moblin Remix also includes the "Software Center" for installing common applications. It works fairly well but is pretty sparsely populated at the moment. Hopefully we'll see more apps in future releases.

The Moblin UI uses a concept of "Zones" which is an interesting spin on the traditional alt+tab way of managing windows.

I found the browser a bit cumbersome but I could see how you would get used to it(admittedly I just installed Chrome after the first day).

One of my favourite things about Ubuntu Moblin Remix is the Ubuntu bit. Being able to have a nice netbook UI but with the application and driver support of Ubuntu behind it is really nice. But in the end while the interface looks better than Jolicloud and UNR(IMHO) it seems less usable. I will definitely be trying the next version when it is released but at the moment I just don't think it is ready to be my full time OS. The main problem with Moblin Netbook Remix is that it is not quite finished. There are some glaring omissions from the current release and the whole thing just feels a bit beta-ish. Hopefully the next release will see some big improvements, in particular better use of it's potential to integrate with social networking services.

Installing Ubuntu(Jolicloud) on Acer Aspire Revo R1600

I recently purchased an Acer Revo R1600 ($249CAD) and seeing as it only came with FreeDos I decided to install Ubuntu on it.

It also comes with a keyboard and mouse

First I tried a live boot with Ubuntu 9.10 and noticed everything was working except the wireless card(Atheros 5000). The wireless did not seem to be detected at all, ifconfig showed no wireless entries and the network manager did not show it either. I decided to install anyway and see if I could get the wireless working. After a lot of googling compiling drivers etc. I still didn't have working wireless. Seeing as wireless is crucial because I am setting up my R1600 as a Home Theatre PC(HTPC). I decided to give the Ubuntu 10.04 Beta a try. Things were a little better, the card was detected but did not function at all.

At this point I figured I would try Jolicloud. If you are not familiar with Jolicloud it is an Ubuntu variant based on version 9.04 designed specifically for netbooks. It has some great features including an "App Store" and the Ubuntu Netbook Remix(UNR) interface which is ideal for small screens or touchscreens. The thing I love most about Jolicloud is the Hardware support. Basically all netbook hardware runs out the box(and on a live boot) including wireless cards, webcams, graphics cards including NVIDIA and the problematic GMA 500 and it even comes with codecs pre-installed.

I tried a live boot of Jolicloud from a usb stick and all the hardware worked flawlessly. The screen was running native resolution at 1920X1080 and the wireless card was detected and working. After an install to the hardrive and an install of XBMC my HTPC is up and running.

Even though Jolicloud is a netbook OS it scales well to larger resolutions, automatically switching to window mode rather than using Maximus which is specifically for small screens. It still uses UNR at higher resolutions but seeing as I am using it as a HTPC and have XBMC running on the occasions when I need to jump out of XBMC to do something UNR works quite well when using the PC from the couch.

All in all 5 stars for Jolicloud. The installation was easy, the hardware support is amazing, I haven't installed a single driver or codec myself and everything is working perfectly.

Some useful links:

Jolicloud Installation Guides

How to install XBMC

Acer Revo R1600 Technical specs

Configuring the D-link DWA-552 PCI Wireless card for Ubuntu 9.10

When I initially installed Ubuntu 9.10 Karmic Koala on my new dev box with a D-link DWA-552 PCI Wireless card it worked out of the box but experienced frequent dropouts. The dropouts were very frequent(every couple of minutes) and could only be fixed by disconnecting from the network and the re-connecting. After some serious screwing around I installed wicd and the card has worked flawlessly since.

To install wicd simply go to System->Administration->Synaptic Package Manager and search for "wicd" then mark for installation and hit apply. This will remove the default network manager and install wicd. You will then need to reboot for the changes to take effect.

After playing around with wicd for a while I think it is better than the default network manager(although not as pretty). It has a lot more options etc.

Hope this helps and good luck!

Enabling Screen Rotate Button for Asus t91 in Ubuntu 9.10 Karmic Koala

After a fresh install of Ubuntu 9.10 Karmic Koala on my Asus T91 the screen rotation button was not functioning. After a bit of googling I found this post:

http://www.ced-network.net/blog/2009/08/14/asus-eeepc-t91-and-ubuntu-904jaunty/

The instructions on the are for Ubuntu 9.04 so i have tested them in 9.10. To enable the screen resolution button open a terminal and type the following:

sudo gedit /etc/acpi/events/asus-rotate-t91

then place these two lines in the file and save:

event=hotkey (ATKD|HOTK) 0000007b

action=/etc/acpi/rotatescreen.sh

Now reboot and your screen rotate button should work.