Pidgin GTalk "mail.google.com" Certificate Issue

Here is how I dealt with connection problems this morning using Pidgin. I am writing this in hopes other people with this problem can benefit from my stumbled-upon fix.

This morning my router stopped working around 2am (much to my annoyance because this interrupted other things). But it was only a partial failure. The wireless stopped working. It still presented an active access point, but nothing could connect to the access point, despite everything else looking okay. (I tried to laptops and one cellphone. Nothing worked.)

However wired connections partially worked. Some machines seemed to have decent Internet access but very slow response times. My main desktop worked alright, except that Pidgin seemed to have trouble connecting to GTalk.

To enable Wireless back for other devices, I power-cycled the Router, which seemed to fix the problem. Wireless came back and I proceeded to debug Pidgin with GTalk. Important note: I did NOT reboot my desktop during the network down/up cycle, which I believe lead to problems later.

I began to debug the Pidgin GTalk problem. The details seemed to be this (taken from the console debug output):

proxy: Error connecting to gmail.com:5222 (Connection timed out).

I began investigating, and fiddling with the settings. At one time I managed to get a connection by setting the account connection security to "Use old-style SSL". However then I received this message once a connection was partially (successfully) established, in brief:

Verify certificate for "mail.google.com":

Finger (SHA1):
59:29:78:a7:2a:90:61:f7:0a:d7:c4:4c:4d:44:9d:cf:25:8c:d5:34

I became really puzzled at this. While investigating the problem, I was forced to reboot for another reason. Upon reboot, Pidgin worked perfectly again. I restored the setting back to default and now I'm writing this post.

All I can figure is that my Router had a hiccup, probably some corrupt data table and partial crash (the wireless going down), but the power-cycling fixed that. However I needed to reboot my system to clear the DNS and other Network info cache. (You can do this without rebooting, but I don't know the commands off hand, so it was quicker to reboot.)

Okay, this was an old post made in anger and I do apologize. :( I don't like making these things. Thankfully the problem I was ranting about with OpenOffice / LibreOffice, seems to have been fixed. Good times.

Old post for archive's sake:
Sigh. I'm posting in annoyance/anger here. This is just a (short) rant. I like OpenOffice (I mean LibreOffice, but that name is lame and sucks) as an Office Suite, but MY GOD their search-and-replace dialogue sucks mountains of hairy wet ass. I cannot fucking click in the text field with my fucking mouse. If I type something that remotely resembles previous text, once I move my focus from the text input field to one of buttons, it IMMEDIATELY auto-selects previously entered text.

It is abjectly and utterly useless. I have to use another application to do search-and-replacement of text in, especially if it is regular expression. This is so fucking sad, because I know I had this problem years ago with the program. I would have thought they'd have fixed this by now.

Okay, /rant.

Force Enable KDE File Chooser Previews (KFileDialog)

Just a quick post. In Kubuntu 11.10, running KDE 4.7.2 (and possibly earlier) I have noticed a problem. When using the File-Choosing dialog, I click enable Aside Preivew, which works for the time. Once I choose a file and the dialog closes, if I reopen the File Chooser, the preview option is disabled again and I have to manually re-enable it.

This is a quick fix for force enabling Previews in QT/KDE's File Chooser (KFileDialog).

Open the configuration file '~/.kde/share/config/konquerorrc'. Find the section marked '[KFileDialog Settings]'. Find the line which reads "Previews=false" and change it to "Previews=true".

Save the file and exit it. Restart whatever program you want this to take effect it, and Aside Previews should be enabled by default.

IF YOU NEED HELP EDITING CONFIGURATION FILES UNDER LINUX, please see this link: http://awesomelinux.blogspot.com/2010/09/how-to-edit-configuration-file.html

Ubuntu Logitech diNovo Edge Bluetooth Wireless Keyboard (Part 2)

I reported on problems with Ubuntu Logitech diNovo Edge Bluetooth Wireless Keyboard, and now in Ubuntu 11.10 Oneiric and Ubuntu 12.04 Precise the problem resurfaces each time you do a fresh install or Distribution Upgrade. But the solution is slightly different than before.

Update: The problem appears in Ubuntu/Kubuntu 12.04 Precise also, but the solution is the same.

This solution is using for the Logitech diNovo Edge in Ubuntu/Kubuntu. Symptoms are the bluetooth-device-manager kept prompting me to connect to the device but nothing I did ever worked.

Here is the solution / fix for getting the keyword to work. The source for this information is here.

The problem is in the udev rules. In 11.04 there was a special line in '/lib/udev/rules.d/70-hid2hci.rules' for Logitech devices that started with KERNEL=="hidraw*".
These seem to be missing in default configurations. This fix adds this line into another file instead which makes things work.

Edit the file: /lib/udev/rules.d/##-bluez-hid2hci.rules (where the ## is the number on your system. Just search for the keywords 'bluez-hid2hci.rules' in the /lib/udev/rules.d/ directory. For example, on my system in Ubuntu 11.10 it was number 62 and on Ubuntu 12.04 is was 97.)

(If you need help editing a file, see bottom section.)

Change this line:

# Logitech devices
KERNEL=="hiddev*", ATTRS{idVendor}=="046d", ATTRS{idProduct}=="c70[345abce]|c71[34bc]", \
RUN+="hid2hci --method=logitech-hid --devpath=%p"

to

KERNEL=="hidraw*", ATTRS{idVendor}=="046d", ATTRS{idProduct}=="c70[345abce]|c71[34bc]", \
RUN+="hid2hci --method=logitech-hid --devpath=%p"

I have made the changed sections BOLD. Save the changes to the file. I also turned bluetooth off from the icon in the system tray.
After making this change, I turned on my wireless keyboard, unplugged it's bluetooth dongle, plugged it back in, paired the keyword with the dongle, and a few seconds later it worked. I did not even have to reboot.
IF YOU NEED HELP EDITING CONFIGURATION FILES UNDER LINUX, please see this link: http://awesomelinux.blogspot.com/2010/09/how-to-edit-configuration-file.html

Shadows Removed / Missing in KDE 4.7

Overview: Window / Widget shadows are suddenly and COMPLETELY gone in KDE 4.7.

Background Info: So I haven't blogged in a while about any personal issues with the KDE 4 series, because by and large I like what they are doing and I've come to accept the things I don't.

However I just upgraded my system to KDE 4.7 and I noticed a feature is gone that, initially I really hated, but now I really really like. Shadows. Yep, shadows on my windows. Not quite sure how to describe it but my transparent console

Details: Actually, the shadows are both missing and removed, while still present and there. (Big flub-up on KDE's part, IMO. Thumbs way down this time.)

Please see http://blog.martin-graesslin.com/blog/2011/08/shadow-and-no-oxygen/

All users who do not use our default Oxygen widget style and window decoration might have had an unpleasant surprise after upgrading to 4.7. Our old shadow effect provided generic shadows for all windows no matter which widget style or decoration is used. In case the decoration provided its own shadow that one was preferred.
The new shadow system does not provide any generic shadow. The compositor is just providing a service to the widget style for rendering the shadow. This means that the widget style has to implement support for the new shadows.

So, apparently they are still here, but I cannot find any information on getting the shadows back. Neither from their new system or from the Oxygen theme, or whatever. I'm disappointed.

A big thumbs down from me.

Beta Gimp 2.7.x Segment Fault problem and workaround

I have been using the beta version of the Gimp 2.7.x series and I encountered a problem I want to share. Obviously I also want to share the workaround solution.

Long story short, the program will have a segment fault if it is run and the directory ~/.gimp-2.7 does NOT exist. So make sure it is there. I had deleted mine.

Similar symptoms occur if the file ~/.gimp-2.7/contextrc DOES exists. So make sure it does not.

KMix Lockups, Freezes, and Performance

Recently I experienced serious problems with using KDE's audio system, which I eventually tracked to the program 'kmix.' The symptoms were extremely slow response on volume-changes and mutes. By slow, I mean taking a full minute or more to apply. Also, it was taking up 100% of the CPU sometimes for minutes at a time (when it was not responding). Thank goodness I have a quad-core.

I am not sure if the problem is the result of using KDE 4.6.0 or not, since it is very recent and it might have introduced some bugs.

Regardless, I eventually figured a solution to the problem: Quit kmix. You may need to actually kill the program. Next move (or delete or rename) the folder 'kmix' in the folder '~/.kde/share/apps/. Restart kmix, and it will recreate a default '~/.kde/share/apps/kmix/' folder with default settings.

This fixed my problem. Hopefully it will help with yours.

Hamachi for Linux / Ubuntu

Hamachi is a Zero-Configuration VPN (Virtual Private Network) service. Unfortunately getting the Hamachi service to work well in Linux requires a few steps, and until recently it was more difficult. Here is my guide for how I get it working with as few hurdles and hassles as possible:

There is a progam called 'Haguichi', which supports the Hamachi protocol and is an up to date program. It has a PPA available for Ubuntu. Go and add the PPA to your system, and then update and then install Haguichi.

Hamachi backend itself must be installed, which must be downloaded, compiled and installed. You can grab the official legacy client from here: http://files.hamachi.cc/linux/. To compile it, extract and run 'sudo make' which will auto-install.

After that, the program 'tuncfg' must be started. Running 'sudo tuncfg' on command will do this. (NOTE: That is 'tuncfg' NOT 'tunecfg'.)

If you have connection problems, try disabling your computer's firewall. This is probably blocking the Hamachi port. (I have no idea which port it uses.)