Things that don't work in Linux - RedHat 9

[M. en T.E. Alejandro Diaz Infante]

On Sunday 25 January 2004 09:41 am, RCS wrote:
> Here are a few things that do not work in Linux RedHat 9:
>

[snip]

And, I would add to them:

-The xanim file bundled never worked for me. I always have to use the one 
bundled with the distro (I use SuSE)

-There is a conflict in KDE which don't let you to use the demo or anything 
that have a backdrop window. There is a workaround: 

The workaround is going to be not have it show the backdrop window on Linux 
systems.  If you want to see the demo, you can do this yourself with "edit 
script of stack mcdemo2.mc" in the MB and just comment out the section at the 
bottom of the preOpenStack handler where it sets the backdrop.  Then "save 
stack mcdemo2.mc" and then "go mcdemo2.mc" to run it. (Scott Raney)

-There is a conflict between KDE clipboard manager and MetaCard. When active, 
it renders the script editor useless. There is a workaround:

Did you desactive the KDE's clipboard (visible in the KDE's toolbar as a
red and white icon) ? Else, i don't have this kind of problem in using
Suse 8.2 Pro (KDE 3.1.1). [Pierre Sahores]

-and, the worst to me is spotty sound support, particularly in the area of 
simultaneous sounds. I had to write the following lengthy troubleshooting 
file in Spanish and English, to help my users!

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TROUBLESHOOTING

AUDIO PROBLEMS
Q: I can't hear any sound!
A: You need to have xanim installed, otherwise, no sound is going to be 
played.
Open a terminal, and type "xanim". If you receive a message like "command not 
found", you don't have xanim in your system. Please download a version of 
xanim appropiate for your distro.

Q: I hear music, but no sound effects! or
Q: I hear sound effects, but no music!
A: I was afraid you reach this point, but, well...

CircusTux requires you have a soundcard capable of playing different audio 
files simultaneously (like mine, a SoundBlaster Live! card).
If you don't have such card, is still possible to hear music AND audio effects 
if you use a sound server, such as aRts or Enlightenment Sound Daemon (esd).

If you want to use aRts on KDE, do the following:
1. Open Control Center, Sound & Multimedia, Sound System.
2. Select "start aRts soundserver on KDE startup".
3. Make sure that "enable full duplex operation" in the "Sound I/O" tab is 
unchecked, because it messes the operation of the program in some sound 
cards.
4. In a Konsole, go to the directory where CircusTux is located, and type 
"artsdsp ./circus" (Of course, you can also create a KDE Menu or Desktop 
Entry to ease access)

If you use GNOME or Enlightenment with a sound card or driver not capable of 
handling simultaneous sounds, there are a few issues...

The esd daemon likes to startup with the following parameters:

esd -terminate -nobeeps -as 2 -spawnfd [some number]

Unfortunately, CircusTux does not like the "-terminate" and "-as 2" 
parameters.

So, if you have a GNOME desktop, you would need to do the following:

1. Deactivate "Enable sound server startup" in Sound Preferences, close and 
restart the session
2. Open a terminal, type "esd" (you can still use the "-nobeeps" and "-spawnfd 
[some number]" parameters if you like)
3. In a gnome terminal, go to the CircusTux directory, and type "esddsp ./
circus" (Of course, you can also create a GNOME Menu or Desktop Entry to ease 
access, or recompile your GNOME environment without the offending 
parameters ;P)

If you have an Enlightenment desktop:

1. Right click on the desktop, Audio Setting, deselect "Enable Sounds"
2. Open a terminal, type "esd" (you can still use the "-nobeeps" and "-spawnfd 
[some number]" parameters if you like)
3. In a Enlightenment terminal, go to the CircusTux directory, and type 
"esddsp ./circus" (Of course, you can also create a Menu Entry to ease 
access, or recompile your Enlightenment environment without the offending 
parameters ;P)


Q: I did all the above, but the sound is all choppy/incomplete/delayed/
randomly appearing!
A: CircusTux requires a Pentium III equivalent or better to work properly. 
However, it is possible to run the program in older computers, with partial 
sound support, or even without sounds :(
To run CircusTux without sound support, click the "Sound" button, and deselect 
"Ambient music" and "Sound Effects". You could also try only one sound option 
(music OR effects) to see if that fits in your configuration.

If you use aRTs Sound Server and KDE, you can try to augment the audio 
response time by going to Control Center, Sounds & Multimedia, Sound System, 
Sound I/O. There you can experiment with some value in the Audio Buffer Size 
bar.

VIDEO PROBLEMS
Q: The images in CircusTux look awful!
A: The program works better in 24 bpp. If you have your display in 16bpp is 
fine, too. However, less than that would cause the images to display very 
poorly.
You can check which mode is working CircusTux by clicking on its "Info" 
button. If the section "Screen Depth" shows something less than 16bpp, you 
should upgrade the video mode to more colors... or replace your old video 
card :)

OTHER PROBLEMS
Q: Found a bug in CircusTux!
A: Let us know! write us to linux at enmac.net

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