[vox-tech] Newbie DSL router question

[Bill Kendrick]

On Sun, Sep 15, 2002 at 08:47:24PM -0700, Dick McCabe Jr wrote:
> I am relatively new to Linux (3 years off and on, 4 months exclusively)
> and would lie to set up a network at my house between three computers. 
> My computer is running Mandrake 8.2 while my 22 year old daughter has a
> Win98 laptop and my 19 year old has a win98 desktop.  I am using SBC DSL
> using ethernet cards. I definitely want to share the DSL, but would also
> like to share at least the printer and maybe file sharing.
> My question is this:  what is the best way to go about this?  Do I use a
> router with printer port or Linux's networking software?  Or both?

Personally, I went the easy way and bought a D-Link 'router/hub/firewall'
appliance and plugged it into my DSL modem (and plugged our PCs into it).

It's confurable using a web browser (I _guess_ that's cool ;^) ),
and I have had no trouble with it.  It's small, it's low-power, and I can just
forget about it and it works.


For printing, I have my printer (parallel-port style HP Deskjet) connected
to the fairly 'unused' PC in the house - the Pentium-133.


I then set up printcaps on my desktop and Melissa's desktop with:

lp:\
        :lp=/dev/null:\
        :rm=zen:\
        :rp=lp:\
        :sd=/var/spool/lpd/lp:\
        :sh:


("zen" is the hostname of the P-133)


I frankly forget how I set up 'zen' to listen for remote hosts trying to
print on it, but _I_ figured it out, so it couldn't have been too hard. ;^)



> Also I recently bought an Olympus D380 digital camera with a built in
> USB connection.  How do I access the camera through Linux?  The camera
> uses SmartMedia, so perhaps a card reader is in order.

You could get a card-reader and see if that works.  You'll probably end up
with some USB-based one, and will therefore need to get the "USB mass-storage"
stuff working.


For the cheap solution, I suggest looking into GPhoto and PhotoPC.
Check to see if they support your particular model (it's highly likely).


I used to use GPhoto with my Olympus D620-L, but found that it was
a little cumbersome.  I don't need to look at my thumbnails and stuff,
I just want the pictures dumped in a directory!


So, I looked into PhotoPC, which is a command-line tool, and
now I can just do:

  mkdir 2002.09.15
  photopc image All 2002.09.15/

...and it drops all of the pictures into that new directory.


My camera has a serial cable, though.  I'm not familiar with USB digital cams
and Linux.  YMMV.


PS - Apparently the new "Gphoto 2" project is breaking the GUI interface
apart from the actual 'download pictures from camera' code, so you'll be able
to run it via command-line, too.



Finally, you didn't ask, but recently Mike Simons was kind enough to
re-configure Melissa's kernel for me so that it would work with the SCSI card
I purchased (to replace the piece-of-junk one that came with my scanner).


Now, even though the scanner is connected to _Melissa's_ computer,
I can fire up The GIMP, click "File", "Aquire", "Scan" and _voila!_,
the XSANE scanner interface pops up and I can preview and pull down
scans off the flatbed!

Nifty! :)



Don't get me started with how I was installing software on my Zaurus,
even though it was downstairs and I was upstairs. :)  (VNC is cool ;) )


-bill!