I was sitting at night browsing some friend’s blogs and adding RSS feeds to Akregator, after my new found fondness for KDE 4(more on that in a later post). Then Gaurish Sharma asked how to get webcam and fingerprint scanner to work on linux. I didn’t really have much clue but asked him to dig around with /var/log/dmesg and /var/log/messages to get more info on the webcam to start with. While he was looking around, I decided to dig up my own webcam from the closet.
I connected the webcam to the PC just to see a bunch of errors being spewed out by /var/log/messages. Then I installed gspcav1 kernel module and loaded it
pacman -S gspcav1
modprobe gspca
Still, no go. I still got errors on reconnecting the webcam. Then, I peeked around the Arch Linux wiki and found some other drivers that may be needed by device. Then ran
lsusb
It showed up a microdia webcam but still /var/log/messages spewed out errors. Then I went for verbose option of lsusb to see if there’s anything worthwhile.
Here’s the lsusb -v output for those interested
Still nothing. 
Then I decided to remove bluetooth from the other port and insert the webcam there. And voila! there it works. The webcam was detected, no errors this time and the required device was created.
Now, to test if it works or not. I tried kopete but alas! it doesn’t support all the webcams and mine is in one of those unsupported ones. I started looking at other apps which support more webcams. I started with cheese and ekiga but both looked to install evolution-data-server, why would I want that? Then I installed skype
pacman -S skype
Then add the user to video group and execute
chown :video /dev/video0
Now, logout and log back in for group settings to take effect. Then I ran skype.
Hurray! My webcam worked! Though the picture was hardly visible, I would place the blame on the webcam rather since it hasn’t been used in years now and it has always been throwing out grainy pictures since the beginning.
What is qingy?
Here’s the quote from qingy developers Quote:
qingy is a replacement for getty. Written in C, it uses DirectFB to provide a fast, nice GUI without the overhead of the X Windows System. It allows the user to log in and start the session of his choice (text console, gnome, kde, wmaker, …).
Source :- http://qingy.sourceforge.net
Features:-
- It works
- It remembers last user who logged in, with focus on password
- It also rememebers last session each user chose
- Alternatively it remembers last session on a per-tty basis
- Fully themable
- A theme will look the same on all machines, independently of the resolution
- You can select your favourite theme, or a random one every time
- Both text and X sessions are supported
- You can start more that one X session at once
- You can even start X inside a console when X sessions are already running
- PAM support
- Support for screen savers
- Auto log-in support
- Session locking support
- Session timeout, with lock or logout as available actions
- tty specific options support
- Customizable key bindings
- Text mode support
I came across qingy while browsing gentoo-wiki
Here is the gentoo-wiki qingy guide
The title relates to 2 dependent things that happened in the last 2 days. One is the convocation certificate and other is a visit to Mumbai University.
Last Sunday a friend scrapped me on orkut if I had got my convocation form, other had already received it. Then I called a couple of friends and realised that they'd received their convocation certificates around a month back.
So, on Tuesday I went to Mumbai University's Fort branch and inquired about it. They told me that convocation inquiries are handled by Convocation Department at Kalina. So, this led to my first visit to University at Kalina. Had to travel in train after quite a long time, as I had no idea about the directions. So, I thought It would be better to take public transport.
At the first sight of the University at Kalina I was really surprised. I knew it'd be big but never thought it would be so huge. It must atleast be 5-6 times the Fort campus, even bigger than IIT, Powai I'd guess.
I was promptly directed at the right section, the Convocation section, with short and clear instructions on how to reach there. Simply take left, right, left, right, right from the main gate. I had no difficulty in finding the place, really nice. But, I had to return back home empty handed the first day as I left the recipt in other purse, at home. But, the visit was fun.
Next day I decided to rather go on the bike and explore around the campus.
On day 2 I reached just before the lunch time and hoped to finish the work soon and explore the campus. But, they couldn't find the certificate anywhere or it's entry in the record books. By the time they could search it was already lunch hour. So, I had to wait another hour for lunch to get over.
Then I took my bike and took 2 rounds of the campus as I had an hour to kill and nothing really to do. It took me about 10-15 mins to go around all the corners of the campus. They had so many buildings for different departments. Alas, lot of that space is just lying as a waste. Nothing but some wild grass growing there.
I went again at 2pm once the lunch was over. Again, the search for the certificate started. Unfortunately due to an error in the certificate, it took them really long to find it. They put me in Accountancy and Finance instead of Banking and Insurance. Funnily, my college doesn't even offer Accountancy and Finance. They passed the blame saying confusion was caused becuase we are the first batch of Banking and Insurance. Also, the Accountancy and Finance was the first batch to pass out.
So, atlast I thought I will get my certificate now. Alas, it will take them atleast 1 more month to correct the error. Argh! I so hate the way these people work. A month to correct this one thing . Thankfully they've said I won't have to run around to them again. It will come to me by post.
This way I saw Mumbai University atlast. And hopefully I will get the certificate soon too without to much hassle.
FEBRUARY 4TH, 2007
By MEHUL I had almost given up blogging but came across this nice incident so had to post it.
This is a true incident that happened with my friend rahul, who’s been looking to try linux but he’s a dumbhead when it comes to technology.
This dude, Utsav came on digit forum and announced that he was selling linux 10 cd’s for Rs. 1500 each. But that thread was locked by the Admin before he could get to talk with the fellow
So, next day he decided to add this fellow to my yahoo list and have a good deal with him there.
What follows hereon is the log of what transpired in the deal between them
(23:41:36) utsav: hey
(23:41:39) : Buzz!!
(23:41:46) utsav: want 2 talk or not?
(23:42:09) utsav: r u there?
(23:42:19) rahul: sorry i was away
(23:42:31) utsav: ok
(23:42:43) rahul: which linux have you got?
(23:43:08) utsav: UBunt version 6.1 Read more »
