Back Home for Diwali

My VLSI training at B'lore got over and i returned home for Diwali. I met my buddy Nirmal here at home, and he left to b'lore for training yesterday. Hope he gets posted in Chennai.
I got my posting at Chennai (Tentative). Now my domain has been changed. Its DSP Multimedia, and i'm supposed to report at Chennai on Nov 7th. Most probably will be having a training again at chennai :). This is my second training and i heard that it'll be at IIT Chennai. So, just waiting for it and trying to learn as much as possible. Hope they'll post me at chennai :)
If i dont get this option, then i'll ask for bangalore.. Lots of confusions in out Batch...

Transformer-0.2 Released

Released the transformer version 0.2.
This includes a new module, GXFormer, a GUI for Transformer.

Changes since transformer 0.1.1
* Created directories under src to categorize
* Rewrite plugins, with convert_file (char* source, char* dest)
* tf_config_from_modules - program to return the XML code for config file
* Remove the file transformer.xml
* Checking in sources for the Transformer-GUI, GXFormer 0.1.1
* Adding README file for gxformer
* Script file to generate the executable.
* Add command line help

Gxformer into CVS

Atlast, i checked in the sources of gxformer into CVS. Created the Makefile.am and necessary scripts. I took the script code from PyGtk to create the gxformer executable. Got to put the command line help feature and Release gxformer by today :)

FORK is my Hero

I finished the GUI part of the Transformer and now, i got a new problem. The UI started to Hang :(
I didnt know what to do. I started using Threads in Python, Gtk, Glib, Gobject. But nothing helped me. I was struggling with this for a Day. Atlast, Damu asked me to use FORK.
Voila, It worked well with FORK. Also, got a tip from Nirmal, and he asked to call gtk_main_iteration ().
It also helped me to prevent UI Hangs and it works fine now.

I checked the code into CVS. Now trying my hands with the Makefile and will make it ready soon.
Also, doing final touches :)

Final Touch

Am not happy with the Bottom half of the GUI.
The convert button and progress bar. Everything is over, except to call the shared library. Hope to finish it today :)

Config file parser

I'm learning to use Python. In Transformer, i need to parse the xml config file using the available expat xml parser. I was struggling first to use python. I thought, it would be better to use C. But later, i finished the parser and came to a conclusion, Python is a cool language. Still am learning a lot :).
Now am learning how to write a module for python in C to call a subroutine, in a plugin written in . Hope i finish that today.

Is this O.K.

I just started to design the UI with Glade and use the glade file in PyGtk. Here is the screen shot of the Main UI.
The left frame shows the info of the File Selected and Right frame shows the info of the Output Format being selected. File selector button can be used to select the file. Combo box in the right will show possible type convertions for the selected file depending on the available plugins. Click on Convert to convert the file.
And some more issues has to be discussed.

Bindings for Python

Python is so cool and lots of libraries and languages have bindings to be written in Python. Python/C API reference shows a list of C bindings for Python. We can create our own module in C and import in Python. Similarly, PyGtk, PyScilab, PyGimp, PyGst, Python Java Bindings, and lot more. Thanks to all the developers who have spent their time and written these bindings. I also hope to write one such bindings ;), if any developer has left any for me.

After learning the Python/C API Reference, i started with PyGtk today and now its very simpler to write Gtk programs in Python than in C. Though writing Gtk programs in C must be more flexible. (Am not sure. I have to explore python to learn its capabilities, and only then i can decide)
PyGtk is going on well now and hope to finish it quickly and start programming my transformer-gui module.

Me and Wiki setup

I wanted to have a wiki at the Fosta site. I saw a module in Drupal called Wiki, so thought that drupal had support for Wiki. But that was only a text filter, that can be used while creating the content.
I was searching about Wiki in Google. I got the a Wikipedia site - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page.
First i didnt notice about the software that this site used (Media Wiki). When i checked out a list of Wiki Softwares, i found that TWiki was mostly used by all so downloaded it.
Twiki has the complete information about Installation, but lots of procedures are involved to install it. Somehow, i managed to install it.
Then i got two more wiki softwares. One was SourceForge Wiki software, and Media Wiki. Since i'm hosting the site at SourceForge.net, i wanted to use SFWiki. Seems, there is no developer developing it. The package is very simple and small. Followed the description and found that some of the files were missing. :(
Then, i wanted to test Media Wiki. I extracted it and read the INSTALL file. Media Wiki is relatively easy to install when compared to other packages. I did have some difficulties with permissions. Even after giving write permission to a subdirectory under ServerRoot, the webserver was not able to write to that dir :(. I didnt know the reason.
I had to hack a bit to make it work. I removed the permission check, and now, the database was successsfully created. Media Wiki was clever enough to print the output to the screen, even if it wasnt able to write to that sub directory. It asked me to copy the output to a file. And after that, it worked well :)
Nice experience today.

Wiki at FOSTA.sf.net

Learnt how to set up a Wiki and added a link to fosta.sf.net
First i tried TWiki, then sfWiki and atlast settled with MediaWiki.
Media Wiki is very nice and has a good interface.

First tarball is a FLOP

I created a first tarball release in my life. Everything went on fine in my side. When i gave the tarball to Vincent, he wasnt able to build it :(
But thats a bug. Ronald figured it out and fixed it in CVS. Though my first attempt was a FLOP, that wasnt my mistake and i learned something new. :)

Working on FOSTA site

Yesterday, i was working on the FOSTA Website the whole day. :) Added the LOGO to the site.
Altered the Footer logos and still designing. Got to add contents to the site now.

Transformer-0.1.1 released

I made another release of the Transformer module today. Check out the project website for the additions and changes. My next plan is to write Transformer-gui probably by using PyGtk. Also, to create the documentation using docbook.

FOSTA Registered

FOSTA got registered at Sourceforge.net. Thanks to them for approving the group. I have uploaded the drupal site, and a database has been created at Sourceforge.net by them. Drupal uses the database (MySQL). The site had some problem initially. But i deleted the contents and copied it again to the Document Root and now its working fine. The design phase of the site is goin on and it'll soon be released. :)

Gnome-media Release

Ronald was busy with his work and was asking someone to roll out the tarball. I volunteered. It was my first time and i didnt know how to release it. I checked out the like http://developer.gnome.org/dotplan/for_maintainers.html
Also Ronald asked me to change the version number and run autogen.sh and them make distcheck. I did that and it took around half an hour in my system to create a tarball. (It was compiling to check for any failures)
I didnt make any changes to ChangeLog and NEWS as Ronald didnt ask me to do so. I asked Vincent and he told that ChangeLog has to be changed. so i changed it and again took half an hour to make the tar file and sent the link to him. Hope he got that and added to the ftp server. There were other things that need to be done before releasing. But i dont know if i have to do that too. Just waiting for Vincent. ;)

FOSTA @ sourceforge

I got a mail from Joe Steeve in Glug-madurai list and came to know that glug-madurai is registered as a user group at Sourceforge.net and can get free Webspace. So, just registered a User Group names FOSTA (Free and Open Source Technology Association) and waiting for the approval.
I have decided to create the site using Drupal and will upload it as soon as the project gets approved :)

First Debian Conference at IIIT, Banglore

I have never used Debian and so didnt know much about it. I went to the Debian Conference held at Indian Institute of Information Technology, Banglore (IIITB). It was organised by IIITB students. The only two debian developers from India shared their Experiences. I was so happy when i came to know that both were from Tamil Nadu. One from Chennai (Ramakrishnan) and Another from Coimbatore (R. Ganeshan) ;)
They exposed the debian to everyone and now i'm planning to switch to Debian and become a Debian developer soon. Their aim was to increase the debian developers in india from 2 to 20. Hope that is achieved. Many people doesnt know about Debian and the target can be achieved, if we are able to spread a word about Debian.
To become a debian developer is not a simple and easy task. We need to learn the Debian Free Software Policy and it might take more than a year to get the GPG key to access the repository.
Check out this article for more details,. :)
http://lwn.net/Articles/147360/

Trip to my Native place

Suddenly decided to leave with my cousin to my native, :). Didnt get ticket to go to the place directly, so took ticket to Tutocorin, and from there i had to take another bus, which leave at 5:15 AM. Hopefully, i reached the bus stand at 4:15 AM itself.(Vivegam is fast :)) My cousin took another bus, as he already had booked tickets. He left at 7:00 PM and i left at 10:00 PM. But we both reached home at the same time.
I stayed there for three days. Its really a cool place. A small village near Tiruchenthur. This place is a small desert. So, farmers use ground water for cultivation. I went to a temple there on the first day. Second day i went to tiruchenthur temple. Third day was the actual festival in the village. Enjoyed it and returned to coimbatore the next day.
If i have to share my experiences, i have to write a lot.. :)

Sent off TCS friends.

Yesterday, the TCS training at Coimbatore (Teknoturf) got over for my friends. So i went to meet them to send them off. Met Divi, Vijay Kumar yesterday. Today, i met Praveen, Rathna and many others. Wish them happy journey. Most of them got places at Chennai.

Get-together

Today, i met my class mates,. Varun, Senthil Raja, Bala, Kosu, Maami, Paapa and so on,. We had lunch and had a nice time. After that, i went to meet Murugesh anna, and we went to Then-Tirupathy. It was a nice and different temple, 35 Kms from Coimbatore.
Also, After a long time, i talked with Koundan (Vignesh, Infosys). Happy to know that he got placed at B'lore. I'm just trying to swap with someone and get banglore.

Had a Nice day

Today, i woke up at 10. Murugesh anna called me, and asked me if we could go for a movie. We went to two movies today. "Daas" and "Feb 14". Daas was too bad. Didnt like that movie. Feb 14th was o.k. Also, after a long time, i went to a temple :)
He took me,.. The day went on fine today :)

Learning Gstreamer

Gstreamer is a library used to write any media applications. We can also create any plugins for gstreamer. Its so cool. I started learning the manual and installed the latest Gstreamer from CVS head. Had some prob with installing the gstreamer-plugins, yet successfully installed. Now, i'm just trying out the run a simple Ogg player. But, seems "pad-added" signal is not getting emitted. :(
Still trying to figure it out. Just waiting for Ronald to help me out,. :)

Registered Linux User

Just registered myself as a Gnu/Linux User at http://counter.li.org/

Just another day

Didnt do much today. Went to Ramya's place to install Gnu/Linux, but it was a flop. Her cdrom didnt work. :( Will have to try another day, after she repairs her CDROM.
Filed two bugs in Sound-juicer. Now building Anjuta,.. Will have to try to fix bugs in other modules too.

Met Nirmal's Brothers :)

Today, i went to my buddy's place and met his 2 brothers. Was happy to see them. Spent some time with them, had lunch, and i left. It was a great time to meet them all, but sad thing is that, everyone was here, but Not Nirmal :(
It would have been great with him,. I miss him ..

Friendship Day ?

Today, first sunday of August, being the Friendship day, i had a great fun with my junior friends. But, all my close buddies are not with me. Nirmal has joined Red Hat, Vasanth is doin his project work at Instead Business School, Frankfort, France, and Vignesh (Koundan) has joined Infosys. Havent heard anything from N.K (N. Karthik), hope he is doin fine.

If they were here, then it would have been so coool,. Anyway, i did have a great time today. We went out and had a nice time.
Happy friendship day everyone,.. ;)

Free Ubuntu CDs

We can get Ubuntu CDs for free, no shipping charge and nothing. You are also free to distribute the CD to any of ur friends. http://www.ubuntulinux.org/

Fixed the bugs in GNOME-CD

After filing three bugs in LOOPMODE and SINGLEMODE, i fixed the bug and attached the patch to bugzilla. Just waiting for the patch to be reviewed by Ronald.

Good placements for the juniors

Am really happy to see that, this year the campus placements are really good. One of my junior, Santosh, got into Trilogy, Three (Sabarish, Padmanabhan, Ramachandran) into CISCO, Sankari got into DeShaw, (Aarthi Anand, and two others) got into A&Z, Aarthi Ramachandran and some got into Deoliete and many.. All these people have got place already and this is their second placements. All this are my ECE juniors and other branch juniors have also made good placements this year. Am really happy about that,. ;)

3 Bugs on Gnome-CD

I just came to know about the Repeat option and Single track option in GNOME-CD, and found some bugs in that. Filed three bugs and fixed two. Now, trying to fix the last bug. Also, one bug depends on another, so only one patch has been comitted into the CVS. Ronald was busy today, so couldnt discuss about the other bugs with him.

SKYPE

SKYPE is a cool tool for Voice chat. We can also make calls to mobile and Landline anywhere in this world, but that is charged.
Skype is available for many platforms and can be downloaded from here
If you have unlimitted download limit, then u can use this cool tool. (30 min chat ~= 25MB (both upload and download))

Learn LibXML

XML is now used widely in most applications. I'm also using XML for the transformer.config file so that user can adjust the config file. To parse the XML file, many tools are available. I prefer LibXML and the tutorial can be found here LibXML Tutorial. It contains sample codes which shows how to parse a XML document.
Hope this tutorial is useful for someone else like me,. :)

Features included in Transformer

Transformer now gives the user the flexibility to allow for any transformation. The user can alter the file transformer.config under the $HOME/.transformer directory. Also, the actions of the transformer are recorded in the transformer.log file in $HOME/.transformer. Enjoy the feature. This is only in the CVS and not yet released.

Waiting for the results

I should have got the results today,. Donno what has happened,. Still waiting for the results,.. One of the patches in Sound-juicer got comitted today.

SAP Labs test

The test was on July 31st at Christ College, Banglore. More than 2000 were called for the test, and it was help simultaneously at Hyderabad too. The test was exactly like CAT Pattern. They asked 75 questions and we were supposed to finish it in 60 minutes. Thought didnt have enought time to complete the test, the test was o.k.

The results will be put up on Wednesday, Aug 3rd. Just hoping for the best... :)

Call from SAP Labs for a Test

After submitting my resume, i got a call from SAP Labs in the afternoon and was happy to get shorlisted for the test.

More than 500 people have got shortlisted and its going to be a tough one. I'm gonna try my best,. ;) Just started brushing up the basics,..

Got to learn RDBMS, OOPs,. I have no idea about RDBMS, but OOPs is okay for me,.. Hope to get into SAP Labs.

Installed FC4 on my PII 350 MHz system

I always wanted to test the latest FC4 version of GNU/Linux and installed it successfully. After i get my new system/Laptop i'll try installing Ubuntu.
Now starting to build GNOME.

Autoficon

Atlast the site has been updated and launched. Also, one of the module of Autoficon, The Transformer Version 0.1 has been released as Tarball and also checked in the CVS Repository.

Atlast learnt how to use GNU Autotools to create configure and Make scripts.
Auto tools ROCKS !!!
Also, thanks to some members of the GNU Autoconf mailing list who helped me clear a doubt in creating the configure.in scripts.

GNOME Foundation Membership

Atlast got my GNOME Foundation membership got approved. But the sad thing is that, i didnt get any mail from the foundation, but i checked that in the site http://foundation.gnome.org/membership/members.html

I have applied for my gnome.org mail alias. Soon i'll be getting madhanrm@gnome.org mail alias. ;)

Patches for GNOME-Media

Attached two patches in gnome bugzilla and comitted one patch. Waiting for the approval of the other patch.
;)

Busy day

After a long time, i created a template for my project website http://autoficon.sf.net Check it out ;)

also i imported the transformer module into CVS. ;)

Will also try to finish the Spy module soon and make out the first full release.

Gnome Love

GnomeLove is an initiative that aims to help people who want to get started contributing to GNOME.

Enhancement in Gnome-screenshot

I thought that the screenshot of the selection is not there in gnome-screenshot. So just filed a bug at bugzilla.gnome.org. But, i decided to do that enhancement myself. Sat in front of the computer for hours, started hacking gnome-screenshot code and finished the feature. But, i wasnt able to do the selection triangle part. I tried several hacks, but was in vain,..
Here is the link for the bug and patch is put there,..
http://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=155061

Texas Instruments

Atlast i decided to send my resume to Texas Instruments (TI). I wasnt confident attending it, yet i wanna give it a try. I'm confident in C, Data structures and Micro processors, but not in Signals and systems and DSP.
Will try my best.

Plone behind Apache

Plone runs on a different port and so, i created a virtual host in apache and made plone to work behind apache. I referred to the online document from the Plone site.

Steps to setup Plone in GNU/Linux

First i started with Plone 2.0.5 and Zope 2.8.0
But i got some errors while publishing. I posted the query in the plone users mailing list and got a solution that Zope 2.8.0 doesnt support Plone 2.0.5.

So i downloaded Zope 2.7.0 and installed it.
Installation steps for Zope: (As an ordinary user)

[webtest@headnode bin]$ tar -vxzf Zope-2.7.0.tgz

[webtest@headnode bin]$ cd Zope-2.7.0

[webtest@headnode bin]$ ./configure --prefix /opt/zope


Configuring Zope installation

Testing for an acceptable Python interpreter...

Python version 2.3.5 found at /usr/local/bin/python

Python version 2.3.5 found at /usr/local/bin/python2.3

Python version 2.3.3 found at /usr/bin/python


The optimum Python version (2.3.3) was found at /usr/bin/python.


- Zope top-level binary directory will be /opt/zope.
- Makefile written.

Next, run make.

[webtest@headnode bin]$ make install
(do it as a super user)
.
.
.At the end of the installation, you will see

Zope binaries installed successfully.

Now run '/opt/zope/bin/mkzopeinstance.py'

[webtest@headnode bin]$ /opt/zope/bin/mkzopeinstance.py
Please choose a directory in which you'd like to install
Zope "instance home" files such as database files, configuration
files, etc.

Directory: /home/webtest/zope
Please choose a username and password for the initial user.
These will be the credentials you use to initially manage
your new Zope instance.

Username: admin
Password:
Verify password:
[webtest@headnode bin]$ cd /home/webtest/zope/bin
[webtest@headnode bin]$ ./runzope
------
2005-07-06T16:09:12 INFO(0) ZServer HTTP server started at Wed Jul 6 16:09:12 2005
Hostname: headnode.ececluster.com
Port: 8080
------
2005-07-06T16:09:12 INFO(0) ZServer FTP server started at Wed Jul 6 16:09:12 2005
Hostname: headnode.ececluster.com
Port: 8021
------
2005-07-06T16:09:14 DEBUG(-200) FileStorage create storage /home/webtest/zope/var/Data.fs
------
2005-07-06T16:09:14 DEBUG(-200) TemporaryStorage create storage temporary storage for sessioning
------
2005-07-06T16:09:14 BLATHER(-100) ZODB Commiting subtransaction of size 722
------
2005-07-06T16:09:14 BLATHER(-100) ZODB Commiting subtransaction of size 1813
------
2005-07-06T16:09:16 INFO(0) Zope New disk product detected, determining if we need to fix up any ZClasses.
------
2005-07-06T16:09:16 BLATHER(-100) Z2 Installed sighandler for SIGTERM
------
2005-07-06T16:09:16 BLATHER(-100) Z2 Installed sighandler for SIGINT
------
2005-07-06T16:09:16 BLATHER(-100) Z2 Installed sighandler for SIGHUP
------
2005-07-06T16:09:16 BLATHER(-100) Z2 Installed sighandler for SIGUSR2
------
2005-07-06T16:09:16 INFO(0) Zope Ready to handle requests

Now Zope is ready and it can be tested in the browser
http://127.0.0.1:8080/
If you are using the port 8080 for someother application, then you can change the port numer in the file ~/zope/etc/zope.conf

Zope has been successfully installed and configured. Voila!!!

Installation steps for Plone:

[webtest@headnode webtest]$ tar -vxzf Plone-2.0.5.tar.gz

[webtest@headnode webtest]$ cp -R Plone-2.0.5/* zope/Products

Note: The Products folder should contain list of folders as shown and not the Plone-2.0.5 dir as such

Thats it, The installation of Plone is over. Now restart Zope.

[webtest@headnode bin]$ ./runzope
.
.
.
.
2005-07-06T16:16:55 INFO(0) Zope New disk product detected, determining if we need to fix up any ZClasses.
------
2005-07-06T16:16:56 BLATHER(-100) Z2 Installed sighandler for SIGTERM
------
2005-07-06T16:16:56 BLATHER(-100) Z2 Installed sighandler for SIGINT
------
2005-07-06T16:16:56 BLATHER(-100) Z2 Installed sighandler for SIGHUP
------
2005-07-06T16:16:56 BLATHER(-100) Z2 Installed sighandler for SIGUSR2
------
2005-07-06T16:16:56 INFO(0) Zope Ready to handle requests

Now to create a Plone site and test:
On the browser type:
http://127.0.0.1:8080/manage
Enter the user name and password.
In the page that loads, on the top right, select Plone site and click add.
Enter the necessary details , like id = test,.. and click on Add Plone Site.
To access the newly created plone site,
http://127.0.0.1:8080/test

Plone Setup

I started testing Plone to create a website for our club, FOSTA. Free and Open Source Tech Association. It was started with the name PSG GNU/Linux Club.

Treat for the Juniors

Yesterday, we went to Alalkar and around 11 juniors joined the Treat. Had a great time yesterday. :) Now got to get the treat from them for getting placed.

Sound-juicer player

After a long time, i decided to finish the bug i reported on Bugzilla for sound-juicer module to Remove the progress dialog and bring it to the Main Window. Just few more testing left. This is the snapshot of the changes.
Got to fix some more issues.

Project at Instead Business School

My friend studying at BITS, Pilani left to Paris today for his Practice School at Instead Business School, Paris. The project is for one year and hope he have a great time there,.. :)
All the best to him.

CVS access from behind the Proxy/Firewall

Normally, in educational institutions, every computer is behind a firewall/proxy. A proxy is usually configured to access the Web (Webserver Port: 80). ie the destination port is 80.
So it wont allow any other connections like cvs, ftp, irc etc. Inorder to configure the proxy, u need to configure the proxy/firewall to allow connections to CVS Server (Port: 2401) and IRC server (Port: 6667, think so) and so on. Firewall configuration is done using the command IPTABLES. So to configure the firewall/proxy, just ask the network administrator to add the following lines to the Firewall script.
iptables -A FORWARD -s IP_ADDR -p tcp --dport DEST_PORT -j ACCEPT

Eg:
iptables -A FORWARD -s 192.168.1.55 -p tcp --dport 2401 -j ACCEPT

This command will now allow CVS access to the computer with IP address 192.168.1.55
Similarly, you can change the Port number and IPaddress as per your requirements.

You might sometime get the error "Unknown Host". The problem is that, you have to configure the setting for DNS server properly or try to include the ipaddress of the host in the /etc/hosts file.

Note: Please ask your network administrator to do the following changes and only he can do the above changes.

GNOME Membership

Atlast after a month, my application got processed. It was sent to Ronald and got a good reply from him too. Thanks to Ronald (BBB). :)
Am still waiting for the approval of the GNOME membership and hope to get it soon.

Understanding Linux Kernel

Its really a cool book to learn about the Linux Kernel. I'm basically an Electronics and Communication Engineer and much oriented towards GNU/Linux and Networks.
I have covered three chapters. After completing this book, its sure that one can become a Kernel Hacker, if one learns with interest. I just wanna know the basics of Linux kernel, so am not concentrating too much on the Datastructures and Variable names used. Still its very interesting and lots to go....

Resume to RED HAT

Talked with a RED HAT guy and was happy to hear that, RED HAT has openings for GNOME-Hackers. So sent my resume to Sankar and waiting for a reply from him.

Madhan Raj 

After a long time, i have planned to hack evolution and gnome-media again. Just started to build them and its almost over. Got to finish the the patch for Sound-jucier.