(cross)Building the kernel on a real machine
- Grab the kernel source package from the Acer AA1 Linpus repo. If your version (uname -a) for some reason isn’t 2.6.23.9lw fish around to the correct package.
- Pick a directory to hold your AA1 stuff, say ~/acer, and unzip the source into it
- Copy the kernel config from /boot/config* on your AA1 (mine is config_080627 - might change on future updates) to your real computer
Go into the kernel source dir and say
export INSTALL_MOD_PATH=~/acer/
export ARCH=i386 # this is only important if you're a diferent arch
make mrproper
Copy the you got from the AA1 (config_080627) to .config and say
make oldconfig
make modules
- Now you should have all the “default” modules built. If you don’t, you screwed up somewhere
- Say
make menuconfig and chose the modules you want
Say
make modules
make modules_install
- You new modules are in ~/acer/lib/… . Copy them over to the /lib/modules tree in the AA1
Note: This will not let you use VirtualBox or VMWare or the likes on the AA1 as you didn’t setup a build tree there!
Instaling extra packages
The very first thing you do is
yum update fedora-release
cause there was a little snafu with the security of the signing keys and
that will transition you to the new repo (8.5) signed with the new keys.
Remeber to be careful with what you install and do not do yum update.
The “extra” stuff like mplayer comes from DAG instead of freshrpms just to
make things a bit more insteresting….
Getting rid of the broken NetworkManager
NetworkManager and nm-applet that shipped originally nearly worked but an
updated totally broke it and I was ifuping eth0 for life and network. Good
news you can update do fc8-updates NetworkManager which actually works
(apart from nm-applet dying on susped which I haven’t figured out yet) and
knows about some 3G cards.
- Get current gnome-menus and redhat-menus from a fc8 mirror
Say
rpm -Uvh --force --justdb gnome-menus-2.20.2-1.fc8.i386.rpm redhat-menus-8.9.11-2.fc8.noarch.rpm
#replace the version numbers with whatever's current
The param —justdb is very important. NetworkManager requires these but they
conflict with the linpus menus so you tell rpm to record on the database
they’re installed but never actually write any files to disc.
Say
yum update NetworkManager
Edit /etc/rc.d/slim/nowait.sh and move the line
sudo /usr/bin/nm-applet &
from around 1/3 up to the end of the file. In my boot nm-applet was starting
before gnome-keyring and it couldn’t fetch wireless keys. This delays
nm-applet startup a bit and WorksForMe.
Not using the Acer Email client
The “Acer Email” that comes preinstalled on the AA1 looks like an old
version of Evo. Don’t use it as it’s a un utter piece of crap. As an
example, if you use an IMAP server that says explicitly it doesn’t want
plaintext passwords on an unencrypted connection Acer Email will send your
password in the clear anyway. That will not only not work but also means
there’s a good chance someone else is reading your email if you did it over
a open wifi.
TaoOfMac
has instructions on how to install thunderbird (or any other, it’s easy as
long as you can yum it) and how to edit the acer desktop menu.
Getting Bluetooth HSDPA to work
First, you need the bluetooth kernel modules. You can either build them yourself as I instructed above or you can get my bluetooth modules pack and unpack it as root into /lib/modules/2.6.23.9lw/kernel/drivers/net .
Then you need the bluetooth stuffs. Do
yum install bluez-libs bluez-utils bluez-gnome
then edit /etc/rc.d/slim/nowait.sh and add
sudo /etc/init.d/bluetooth start
after the udev-post line. Execute the bluetooth start command on a shell and start the bluetooth-applet.
Pair your phone your the AA1 using the bluetooth applet. Go into preferences, make your computer discoverable and add it from your phone. You should get a PIN dialog on both sides. Proced as usual.
Go into a shell and do
sdptool search DUN
you should get something back like (if you don’t try making your phone discoverable)
Searching for DUN on xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx ...
Service Name: Dial-Up Networking
Service RecHandle: 0x1004f
Service Class ID List:
"Dialup Networking" (0x1103)
Protocol Descriptor List:
"L2CAP" (0x0100)
"RFCOMM" (0x0003)
Channel: 2
Language Base Attr List:
code_ISO639: 0x454e
encoding: 0x6a
base_offset: 0x100
Profile Descriptor List:
"Dialup Networking" (0x1103)
Version: 0x0100
Edit /etc/bluetooth/rfcomm.conf and add
rfcomm0 {
bind yes;
device xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx;
channel 2;
comment "My Phone";
}
where xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx and chanel number are copied from the output on the command above.
Execute
sudo /etc/init.d/bluetooth restart
Start system-config-network (yum install it if you didn’t already), go to the Hardware tab, press New and fill in /dev/rfcomm0 on the Modem device input, press OK this should be your Modem0. Go back to the Devices tab, press New, give a nickname to your new connection and check “Allow all users to enable and disable”, go to Advanced, choose Modem0 as your modem port and fill in the appropriate GPRS config line for your provider on modem initialization string,
AT+CGDCONT=1,"IP,"internet"
in my case.
Save and exit system-config-network. If you followed the instructions correctly and I didn’t leave out anything you should be able to do on a terminal
ifup yourconnectionnickname
and ppp0 should come up.
I tried long and hard to get NetworkManager to work with bluetooth dial up network on my phone, failed, decided it would be way to much trouble hacking it in and went low tech. There’s a nifty (albeit slightly broken) xfce4 applet called modemlights that’s perfect for the job. Install it
yum install xfce4-modemlights-plugin
and add it to your panel
xfce4-panel -a
The current version is buggy and ignores Device so you have to fill in /sbin/ifup yourconnectionickname and /sbin/ifdown yourconnectionnickname on the command inputs. Your lockfile should be /var/lock/LCK..rfcomm0.
Done, clicking the little phone icon on your pannel should bring up the connection.
Apple launched new MacBooks that make the MBP I’m using look and feel like a toshiba. 
from amazon.co.uk.
which is as close as Neil Gaiman can come to a children’s book. It’s a much lighter story than The Story but it’s highly fun and not childish at all. Why does The Graveyard Book reminds me of The Day I Swapped my Dad for Two Goldfish ? Because the edition I have is not only beautifully illustrated but also comes with a bonus audio cd with Neil reading. That, I believe, is well worth buying 
