Klink Android app (1.14) and Ubuntu/Linux Client Software (1.02) at Faveset
Kevin Ko
Sean McNamara
On Wed, Aug 3, 2011 at 7:19 PM, Kevin Ko <ke...@faveset.com> wrote:
> Hi, Everyone.
> I've posted two new things to Faveset's download page located here:
> http://www.faveset.com/klink/download
> 1) Klink version 1.14. This is already available in the market, but it is
> also available for download directly from Faveset for those who need it.
Note: I don't see this update available on my phone, and I had
installed Klink from the market. I was able to download the previous
update from the market, with the Clear Cache button. Contact me
directly if you want more details about my setup; I'm not posting it
on the list.
> 2) I've updated the Linux software to version 1.02. This version integrates
> support for Network Manager, and it should eliminate the need to manually
> issue a dhclient command for many people. Some relevant commandline flags:
> -a: This flag enables auto-connect mode, which will cycle the "klink"
> commandline program between waiting (device detection) and starting stages
> automatically unless an error is reported. Note that a device that is NOT
> running Klink will result in an error, so most people will want to use this
> flag in conjunction with the "-r" flag.
> -r: This will retry automatically on errors if the "-a" flag is specified.
> Typical commandline usage might be:
> $ klink -a -r
> This will launch Klink and keep it running until it is interrupted by the
> user (eg., through Ctrl-C). You can subsequently plug and unplug a device
> that is running Klink, and connectivity will start and stop automatically
> with the help of Network Manager.
Tested on Fedora 15 x86_64; it works GREAT! Thanks so much! Running
`klink -a -r` is indeed the best way. I still have to manually start
Klink on the handset, but that's OK. It's still awesome.
NetworkManager does work fine with it, even with another NM connection
currently active. Now I can wrap `klink -a -r` in a detached screen
and run it on startup with systemd. So I shouldn't ever have to worry
about the computer side of setting up Klink again - that is fantastic
:D I am a happy user!!!
I did wish that you would distribute your desktop Linux software in a
tarball, because installing the requisite packages to compile dpkg and
alien on Fedora is not newb-friendly. I did compile alien myself, but
Fedora refuses to package the software in their distribution, and the
average user won't have the technical expertise to compile its
dependencies. There's no need to artificially limit the software to
Ubuntu 8.04+ if many other modern distros work. You can just make a
statement about official support (or lack thereof, as you wish) of
distros other than Ubuntu.
You may be interested to know that BitRock InstallBuilder is able to
generate .deb, .rpm and tarball packages, as well as their special
"installer binary". They provide support for Windows, Mac, 32-bit
Linux and 64-bit Linux, as well as Ubuntu, Fedora, and OpenSUSE
package managers (hence the .deb and .rpm generation support). You do
need a (virtual) machine actually running the InstallBuilder app on a
.deb system to generate .debs, though (and likewise for 32-bit and
64-bit). For that you can install VirtualBox and make a couple little
VMs: 32-bit Debian, 64-bit Debian, 32-bit OpenSUSE, 64-bit OpenSUSE,
and install InstallBuilder on each, copy over your package tree, and
generate. Unlike the Linux packages, you can generate Mac and Windows
packages from whatever platform InstallBuilder happens to be installed
on.
You're thinking, "...but BitRock InstallBuilder is commercial software
that costs money!" -- This is true, to an extent; but BitRock is a
very generous company that gives licenses to open source projects upon
request, as well as projects that seem generally "open-source
friendly", or projects that release software for Linux. I think you
might qualify, if you present your case to them, at least for a
discount. They are very reasonable people!
The nice thing about InstallBuilder is that their .run installer
package provides a much more user-friendly mechanism for the "general
case" of any Linux distribution, not just Ubuntu and Fedora. The
installer is designed to give the user an interactive installer one
way or another: it will try to launch a GTK GUI (with built-in
libraries I believe); if the X11 connection errors out, it will try a
console-based interactive install. So the user just has to make the
binary executable, and run it, like a Windows .exe. And it doesn't
depend on hardly anything on the host platform, except a Linux 2.6
kernel, a semi-recent C library and (optional) an X server.
Sorry if these paragraphs have made no sense; I've been writing them
while really tired after work :D But anyway I am really happy that you
were able to provide NetworkManager support and I will be using it
every day. You rock!
Sean
> Kevin