Re: Book bundles and Read

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Re: Reducing Stick Failures - Was Re: [Marketing] press release opportunity...

On Fri, Jul 31, 2009 at 08:41:29AM -0400, Caroline Meeks wrote:
> 
> 
> On Fri, Jul 31, 2009 at 8:34 AM, James Cameron <quozl <at> laptop.org> wrote:
> 
>     I've arrived late.  I've been listening to this discussion for a week.
> 
>     A general comment ... if any state is preserved by the children on the
>     USB sticks, and there is no copy of the state kept elsewhere, and there
>     is a possibility of power failure, premature removal, or other
>     interruptions, then every software component that uses the saved state
>     must be either capable of detecting corruption of the saved state, or
>     graceful recovery from apparently invalid state.
> 
> 
> Nod.
> 
> Note further down on this page backup and file recovery is listed. That is in
> progress.

There's also a risk that a corrupted saved state could be backed up, in
such a way that a restore would return the "system" to a non-working
state.

> Interestingly enough I have seen kids pull the stick out at the wrong
> time and that does not see to correlate with the stick failures based
> on observation not strong data collection.

Yes, I'm worried that the cause may be more complex, and without
analysis we might all be relying on hope.

> I have both working and nonworking sticks.  I could post images of them.
> 
> Can you send me instructions on how to create images from MacOSX?

Sadly, no.  While I have a Mac OS X system here, I don't yet know how to
access a USB device at a raw block level.

However, it is easy for me to explain on Linux:

1.  while the device is not plugged in, identify the last block device
listed in /proc/partitions,

2.  plug the device in, allow five to ten seconds for settling delay,
and identify the new block device listed in /proc/partitions, for
instance it may appear as /dev/sda and /dev/sda1, the former is the
whole device, the latter is the first partition,

3.  copy the data from the whole device, using a compression program,
for instance:

	# gzip < /dev/sda > usb-stick.img.gz

... where you should replace /dev/sda with whatever the result was from
step 2 above.  This creates an image of the whole device, which is
compressed, and can be used for analysis.

The ideal data set would be a working and non-working image from exactly
the same version ... and as small a stick as possible .

--

-- 
James Cameron
http://quozl.linux.org.au/

Re: Reducing Stick Failures - Was Re: [Marketing] press release opportunity...

On Fri, Jul 31, 2009 at 6:34 AM, James Cameron<quozl <at> laptop.org> wrote:
> A general comment ... if any state is preserved by the children on the
> USB sticks, and there is no copy of the state kept elsewhere, and there
> is a possibility of power failure, premature removal, or other
> interruptions, then every software component that uses the saved state
> must be either capable of detecting corruption of the saved state, or
> graceful recovery from apparently invalid state.

This is a lot more basic.

The current SoaS uses

 - FAT16
 - An overlay FS in a file on FAT16

The most trivial "non-100% kosher" shutdown completely cooks the
overlay. One serious oddity is that the overlay is mounted by
something that depends on X or the gnome / sugar session, so an X
crash unmounts the overlay, somtimes corrupting it.

And more serious hangs or "oops, did I just pull the USB stick"
moments have a very high chance of cooking the FAT partition itself.

We have 2 brittle filesystems, one on top of eachother. The proposals
if using a "fully installed USB", probably using a journalled FS are
definitely a step in the good direction.

Once that is fixed, then it makes sense to look at the app layer that
you mention. But that's the same app layer we have on the XO, and it's
been handling unclean shutdowns pretty well for a while (on 0.82 at
least).

cheers,

m
--

-- 
 martin.langhoff <at> gmail.com
 martin <at> laptop.org -- School Server Architect
 - ask interesting questions
 - don't get distracted with shiny stuff  - working code first
 - http://wiki.laptop.org/go/User:Martinlanghoff

[ANNOUNCE] [ASLO] Suggest users proper activity version to download

Hi all,

Current version of activities.sugarlabs.org analyzes Browse version
and suggests proper activity version to download.

So, click on "Download" button and activity page(e.g. [1]) will
provide activity version compatible with current user's environment.
The full list of activity versions on all Sugar Platforms still
exists in "Version History" list (e.g. [2]).

[1] http://activities.sugarlabs.org/en-US/sugar/addon/4024
[2] http://activities.sugarlabs.org/en-US/sugar/addons/versions/4024

--

-- 
Aleksey

Re: [IAEP] community influence on development

Walter Bender <walter.bender <at> gmail.com> writes:

> Maybe someone more
> deployment oriented should run for the Oversight Board to ensure we
> have better representation there
> (http://wiki.sugarlabs.org/go/Sugar_Labs/Governance/Oversight_Board/2009-2010-candidates).

I jumped in.

I hesitated because I won't be reachable from now till August, 17th, 
and I will be poorly connected till the end of August.

Let me know if that makes my application irrelevant.

Regards,

--

-- 
 Bastien

Re: safer customization key (was Re: will the one true browse please stand up?)

On Fri, Jul 31, 2009 at 20:23, Daniel Drake<dsd <at> laptop.org> wrote:
> 2009/7/31 Joshua N Pritikin <jpritikin <at> pobox.com>:
>> On Fri, Jul 31, 2009 at 03:52:06PM +0545, Daniel Drake wrote:
>>> 2009/7/31 Joshua N Pritikin <jpritikin <at> pobox.com>:
>>> > That was not my experience. Where does the customization key code live
>>> > in GIT?
>>>
>>> Here:
>>> http://dev.laptop.org/git/users/mstone/irfs-udebs/tree/src-olpc/init?h=unpack-bundles
>>
>> Well, I'd feel a lot better if prior to the unzip you added something
>> like:
>>
>>  if ext == '.xo':
>>    dest_dir = re.sub(r'\-\d+\.xo$', '', f) + '.activity'
>>    shutil.rmtree(join(tgt['.xo'], dest_dir))
>>
>> I know this does not work as written because the filename can (and often
>> does) mismatch unzip's idea of the directory name. Any idea how to get
>> directory prefix from the zip?
>
> The customization key has always been sweet and simple like this; I
> don't suggest changing it as some deployments rely on this.
> Documenting the limitations would be sensible, though. In my opinion
> the real solution is moving away from .xo which has outgrown its
> original design...

What do you propose doing?

Thanks,

Tomeu

> Daniel
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>

Re: [RELEASE] Browse-110

On Fri, Jul 31, 2009 at 20:38, Sayamindu Dasgupta<sayamindu <at> gmail.com> wrote:
> Hi,
> I think the version jump is intentional to allow for intermediate
> stable releases targetted for 0.84 if the need arises. If someone
> finds a critical issue in Browse 103, Simon can always release 104
> with the fix and nothing more.

One day we may be able to agree in a different numbering scheme ;)

Regards,

Tomeu

> -sdg-
>
>
> On Fri, Jul 31, 2009 at 11:40 PM, Christoph
> Derndorfer<christoph.derndorfer <at> gmail.com> wrote:
>> Out of curiosity: How did we end up at Browse-110?
>> Maybe I missed something here but wasn't the latest version 102, 103 or
>> something when this issue was last discussed less than 72 hours ago?
>> Slightly confused,
>> Christoph
>>
>> On Fri, Jul 31, 2009 at 8:04 PM, Simon Schampijer <simon <at> schampijer.de>
>> wrote:
>>>
>>> == Source ==
>>>
>>>
>>> http://download.sugarlabs.org/sources/sucrose/fructose/Browse/Browse-110.tar.bz2
>>>
>>> == News ==
>>> Toolbar redesign
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> Sugar-devel mailing list
>>> Sugar-devel <at> lists.sugarlabs.org
>>> http://lists.sugarlabs.org/listinfo/sugar-devel
>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> Christoph Derndorfer
>> co-editor, olpcnews
>> url: www.olpcnews.com
>> e-mail: christoph <at> olpcnews.com
>>
>> _______________________________________________
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>> http://lists.sugarlabs.org/listinfo/sugar-devel
>>
>>
>
>
>
> --
> Sayamindu Dasgupta
> [http://sayamindu.randomink.org/ramblings]
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>

Need Help: usb drive not visible in the journal

Hi all,

I am facing a sort of weird problem at this point. On my xo, my usb
drives are not visible in the journal. I mean the icons at the bottom
of the journal are not visible. However, to my surprise my usb
drives(pendrives) are mounted and I can access them from the terminal.
I have tested it with 3 pen drives so I don't think its due to my pen
drive. Moreover, these pen drives are not even visible in the
objectChooser widget when I invoke it through any of the xo activities
like write or paint.

Can anybody please suggest me a solution. Moreover, is there any way
to access the data in the journal through the terminal, I mean there
are many activities which saves data into the journal and I am in
severe need to access that data. Is there any way to do so. I got this
link-  http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Copy_to_and_from_the_Journal#Copy_from_Journal_script
, but I think the names of files are hashed and I won't be able to
recognize my file in this case.

Kindly give your suggestions.

Regards,
sumit

Re: Need Help: usb drive not visible in the journal

What version of Sugar are you running?

re copy-from-journal, if you use the -q flag, it will search on the
title and description fields.

copy-from-journal -q 'title of some journal object' filename

with copy-to-journal, it is it important to use a -m flag

copy to journal foo.png -m image/png

-walter

On Sat, Aug 1, 2009 at 6:46 AM, sumit singh<sumit.coder <at> gmail.com> wrote:
> Hi all,
>
> I am facing a sort of weird problem at this point. On my xo, my usb
> drives are not visible in the journal. I mean the icons at the bottom
> of the journal are not visible. However, to my surprise my usb
> drives(pendrives) are mounted and I can access them from the terminal.
> I have tested it with 3 pen drives so I don't think its due to my pen
> drive. Moreover, these pen drives are not even visible in the
> objectChooser widget when I invoke it through any of the xo activities
> like write or paint.
>
> Can anybody please suggest me a solution. Moreover, is there any way
> to access the data in the journal through the terminal, I mean there
> are many activities which saves data into the journal and I am in
> severe need to access that data. Is there any way to do so. I got this
> link-  http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Copy_to_and_from_the_Journal#Copy_from_Journal_script
> , but I think the names of files are hashed and I won't be able to
> recognize my file in this case.
>
> Kindly give your suggestions.
>
> Regards,
> sumit
> _______________________________________________
> Sugar-devel mailing list
> Sugar-devel <at> lists.sugarlabs.org
> http://lists.sugarlabs.org/listinfo/sugar-devel
>

--

-- 
Walter Bender
Sugar Labs
http://www.sugarlabs.org

Re: Additional data for corrupted SoaS

BTW, the SoaS Caroline gave me on SugarCamp (thanks!) is quite 
unreliable in one of my computers (it also confirms my suspection about 
the trouble she was having with my Assimilator software: hardware 
flakeyness). If you're using this run of sticks at the GPA, you can add 
it to the list of potential causes for stick failure.
As you're about to buy the next run: Do you have a "sample" model that 
you can try out in lots of different computers? Just run the following 
command in Linux, with only the to-be-tested USB stick plugged in:

dd if=/dev/disk/by-id/usb<press TAB once> of=/dev/null

e.g. for the stick mentioned above:

dd if=/dev/disk/by-id/usb-CHIPSBNK_USB_2.0_260917004B813900-0\:0 
of=/dev/null

If there's a problem, an error message will be printed as part of the 
output:

sascha.silbe <at> twin:~$ dd 
if=/dev/disk/by-id/usb-CHIPSBNK_USB_2.0_260917004B813900-0\:0 
of=/dev/null
dd: reading `/dev/disk/by-id/usb-CHIPSBNK_USB_2.0_260917004B813900-0:0': 
Input/output error
468448+0 records in
468448+0 records out
239845376 bytes (240 MB) copied, 14.7675 s, 16.2 MB/s
sascha.silbe <at> twin:~$

If it's sucessfull, the whole stick will have been read:

sascha.silbe <at> elaine:~$ dd 
if=/dev/disk/by-id/usb-CHIPSBNK_USB_2.0_260917004B813900-0\:0 
of=/dev/null
2046976+0 records in
2046976+0 records out
1048051712 bytes (1.0 GB) copied, 67.108 s, 15.6 MB/s
sascha.silbe <at> elaine:~$

CU Sascha

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http://www.infra-silbe.de/

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