3E VPN/Remote desktop icon
Just a quick one this. I’ve just posted a quick how to add an icon to your desktop for remote vnc and remote desktop connections. Enjoy
Archive for the ‘technology’ Category.
VPN on the 3e asus laptop
Wrote up a quick how-to on my site about using VPN on the ASUS eee.
I still need to get some icons done for the desktop, but for now, this is what I have.
GPRS on your 3e
The next thing I’ve added to my 3e laptop is the ability to connect to the net via gprs on my mobile phone. You can do this via usb or bluetooth and i’ve opted for the latter event though it’s a bit more hassle to get it going.
Credit for this has to go to SublimePorte over on the eeeuser.com forums, he has packaged the installer up into a .deb package that can be downloaded and installed straight onto your Xandros system, so I did, it didn’t work 
So after checking into things and testing, I eventually got things working using wvdial rather than the scripts included in Porte’s package. It did however mean that I got an icon on the home page to use to start and stop the connection so I adapted what was already installed. I will try and give you the full instructions on how to do this without Porte’s deb package.
Firstly, plug your bluetooth adaptor in! Once you have done this run the following from a terminal on your 3e:
hciconfig hci0 up
You shouldn’t see any response back, if you do then their was a problem and you will need to check into this before carrying on.
Next run the following command which will search for devices with bluetooth enabled and DUN (dial up networking enabled). If you get a failed response back here then you have a problem with your bluetooth dongle or your mobile phone:
eepc:/root> sdptool search DUN
Inquiring ...
Searching for DUN on 00:01:02:03:04:05 ...
Service Name: Dial-Up Networking
Service RecHandle: 0x10027
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
Make a note of the bluetooth address and channel (00:01:02:03:04:05 and Channel 2 in the example above). Next, edit /etc/bluetooth/hcid.conf and enter the following config:
options {
autoinit yes;
security auto;
pairing multi;
passkey "1234";
}device {
name "phone";
class 0x3e0100;
iscan enable;
pscan enable;
lm accept;
lp rswitch,hold,sniff,park;
}
This file is available to download here
Change the passkey line to something that only you will know, this is the passkey you will use when you synch your 3e with your phone. Also change the name to something a bit more descriptive for the phone. Now edit /etc/bluetooth/rfcomm.conf and paste the following code into it
rfcomm0 {
bind yes;
device 00:01:02:03:04:05;
channel 2;
comment "Mobile";
}
This file is available to download here.
Change the device to match your bluetooth address from earlier, the channel and set the comment to something descriptive so you can identify this connection.
Ok, bluetooth should be now setup, if you try and find and pair with your dinky 3e using the passkey you set. If everything has worked ok then you should be able to pair successfully. This needs to be done from your mobile phone of choice using the bluetooth wizard most have installed. - Note, thanks to a reader for pointing out that I didn’t make it clear that you should now start the pairing from your mobile.
Now it’s onto the wvdial setup, firstly you need to install it though so add an additional repo to your apt configuration - I’m not going to show you how to do that here and then run apt-get install wvdial. Once installed you will need to setup the wvdial.conf in /etc/ to use the settings applicable for your mobile network provider. Mine was O2 in the UK so my settings reflect this. Anyway, edit the wvdial.conf file and put this in it:
[BluetoothMobile]
Modem = /dev/rfcomm0
Baud = 912600
SetVolume = 0
Init1 = ATZ
Init2 = ATQ0 V1 E1 S0-0 &C1 &D2 +FCLASS=0
Init3 = AT+CGDCONT=1,”IP”,”mobile.o2.co.uk”
FlowControl = CRTSCTS
ISDN=0[Dialer GPRS]
Username = mobileweb
Password = password
Phone = *99#
Stupid Mode = 1
Inherits = BluetoothMobile
This file is available to download here. You need to replace the mobile.o2.co.uk with the APN (access point name) for your mobile provider, the username and password need to be provided by them as well. Nothing else needs changing in this file so you should be good to go.
Next paste this into the /usr/sbin/gprs script (if you are creating this yourself then don’t forget to chmod 755 /usr/sbin/gprs when done):
#!/bin/sh
wvdial_running=$(ps xa | grep -v grep | grep 'wvdial GPRS' | awk '{print $1}')
pppd_running=$(ps xa | grep -v grep | grep 'pppd' | grep wvdial | awk '{print $1}'
if test $wvdial_running > 0 && test $pppd_running > 0
then
sudo kill -9 $wvdial_running
sudo kill -9 $pppd_running
kdialog --msgbox "GPRS Connection has been stopped!"
else
kdialog --msgbox "Please make sure your bluetooth dongle is inserted then press OK to continue"
sudo /usr/bin/wvdial GPRS &
kdialog --msgbox "GPRS Connection has been started!"
fi
This file is also available to download.
Ok, nearly finished now. Time to get the icons we need and place them in /opt/xandros/share/AsusLauncher/:
accessibility_gprs_hi.png
business_gprs_hi.png
gprs_norm.png
gprs_hi.png
home_gprs_hi.png
student_gprs_hi.png
You will also need to edit the /opt/xandros/share/AsusLauncher/simpleui.rc and add the following line somewhere above </simpleui>:
<parcel simplecat="Internet" extraargs="/usr/sbin/gprs"
icon="gprs_norm.png"
selected_icon="grps_hi.png">
<name lang="en">GPRS</name>
</parcel>
Now all that you need to is restart your X session (CTRL+ALT+BACKSPACE) and once you log back in, you should have a GPRS icon on your home page which you can click to lanch the GPRS connection and stop it.
My longest blog so far? I think so 
phpBB3 Released
Been a while since I used phpBB - probably about 2-3 years now but I must have been subscribed to their mailing list for new releases as I just got this in the post.
http://www.phpbb.com/community/viewtopic.php?f=14&t=615945
If they have indeed sorted out the code problems they were plagued with previously then this could be a php forum of choice, in general it used to be pretty good at what it did and the main reason I moved to vBulletin was because of the security issues that came to light ever few weeks. A few extra options in vB also swayed me but these wouldn’t have been enough on it’s own.
Gotta say, I do like the user details being on the right hand side, it’s something you rarely look at in a forum so having it ‘out of the way’ seems a lot better, I know this is skinable in most forums but if phpBB comes like that then t00t
Xterm icons and config for Asus EEE PC
Been spending a bit of time setting my 3e up just how I like it - that happens to be basic mode using the default installed Xandros OS.
I’ve been installing some extra software from the extra debian repos so that the little blighter will do everything I need it to Anyway, I like to have a shell (terminal/console) open so that I can edit files, connect to other systems via SSH etc. As default you can just hit CTRL+ALT+T for an xterm window and that is probably how I would launch it all the time but I thought I’d have a go at modifying the standard desktop and add it as an Icon/Application launch in the Work section of the desktop - hey it worked 
Now, edit the file /opt/xandros/share/AsusLauncher/simpleui.rc
You can put this next bit of code anywhere within the <simpleui> </simpleui> tags but I put it just below the Notes application. So, do a search for Notes and then below the </parcel> tag for this application, paste this config:
<parcel simplecat="Work" extraargs="/usr/bin/xterm"
icon="xterm_norm.png"
selected_icon="xterm_hi.png">
<name lang="en">Terminal</name>
</parcel>
Save the file and when your ready, restart your X display by doing CTRL+ALT+BACKSPACE. Your new program should now appear in the work folder using icons that already exist on your system. If you want to have a go at replacing the icons with your own then in the directory /opt/xandros/share/AsusLauncher re-place the following files:
xterm_norm.png
xterm_hi.png
accessibility_xterm_hi.png
business_xterm_hi.png
home_xterm_hi.png
student_xterm_hi.png
Mobile provider mangling your images?
Got sent this link just now about how to get around T-Mobile mangling content on mobile devices/3g cards.
Can’t say I’ve ever noticed it on o2 so not sure if they do it or not but this is a nice work around for those who use Firefox.
Free games…………………….
Got some games that I no longer want so if anyone wants to give me p+p costs for them then feel free. Only request a game if you really want it.
http://forum.lathwood.co.uk/showthread.php?t=8074
Grand Theft Auto - Vice City
Hidden & Dangerous 2
Black & White 2 Collectors Edition
Doom 3
Halo
The Settlers III
Call of Duty 2
6 copies of Farcry.
Remote working
Well it’s the first time I’ve had my laptop that I’ve actually used it from a remote unsecure location for anything work related and in turn, needing a secure connection to do it. My own stuff isn’t important enough and I don’t do online banking if I’m using a wireless hotspot or anything.
However, I’ve been in Southampton since 23:20 yesterday after a lovely 4 hour drive from Manchester with the need to login into one of the company firewalls to check into a suspect customer, so after fixing an issue with my vpn connection (lack of split tunnel) by vpn connection to our DC, then over to the office to make a change to the firewall to allow split tunnel I disconnected and re-connected to the vpn account on our office firewall to start looking into the problem. Gotta hand it to to Swisscomm who manage the connection into this place, it’s been stable as anything and extremely quick!
Anyway, it’s night time for me now - my room mate is trying to sleep and I doubt what he needs is hearing my fingers clicking away on the keyboard all night and my face lit up by this lovely screen I’m looking at
Site changes
I’ve always tried to keep all of the stuff I do in a single place, that’s started to change. Recently I’ve split this blog off from the main site and also changed over to using Wordpress rather than using blogger.com. Seems to be pretty good and I have much more control over it than I did with my last one - and it imported all of the posts and comments
The forums have now also gone to a new home which is here, this is where you can find the gaming side of my life. I’m not into it anywhere near as much as I used to be but it needed to be seperate from my stuff and that way I can give Mannos access to it all as he pretty much runs the show now!
The gallery is on it’s way out as well, it’s new home will be, yeah you guessed it, gallery.lathwood.co.uk, this will house my standard gallery and the digital slr one I have as well so stay tuned for that.
The old you feedback me first and I’ll feedback you back!
Getting a bit sick of this now on ebay. Having just bought a couple of things from Ebay in the past couple of days, I’ve seen how different people go about leaving feedback for you.
One guy who I collected the new cannon lense from on Monday night was one of the nicest people I’ve met on/from ebay, before I even got home he’d already posted neg feedback from the sale as his part of the deal had been completed - i.e he had my money.
The same can’t be said of another guy who I’ve just bought from, used bin to purchase the item and paid instantly via paypal (don’t even get me started on the stories I’ve heard about using paypal either). So, same thing as above except I want this to be posted to me. So I get an email from the seller saying thanks for the purchase and that my item was being shipped. (S)He requested that I post feedback once I receive the item and in good condition and he will then do the same.
Now forgive me if I’m thinking that I should already have positive feedback posted for this sale as I’ve completed my side and paid but no, instead I have to post pos feedback for him so that he does the same to me, basically threatning that if I leave anything other than that then he would probably do the same. Well they can get stuffed, I’ll not bother leaving feedback at all or just neutral feedback stating why.
Ebay idiots!