Common sense about immigration

Got this email from my grandma...

This is what I am afraid of and I want to stay as far away as possible from.

North American religion is basically a consumer religion. Americans see God as a product that will help them to live well, or to live better. Having seen that, they do what consumers do, shop for the best deal. Pastors, hardly realizing what we are doing, start making deals, packaging the God-product so that people will be attracted to it and then presenting it in ways that will beat out the competition. Religion has never been so taken up with public relations, image building, salesmanship, marketing techniques, and the competitive spirit. . . I found that gathering a religious crowd was pretty easy, provided I didn't get too involved with God. . . . Religious consumers are like all other consumers, easily attracted by packaging and bargains. But I also knew that to follow this route I would have to abandon the very thing that gave the life of a pastor its worth: a passion for God.

- Eugene Peterson

Getting Started with Kdenlive in Ubuntu

I recently got a JVC MS120 digital camcorder. I tried for a while to get something to work for me in Ubuntu as far as video capture and editing was concerned, but couldn't figure it out. I decided to go ahead and give the software that came packaged with the camera a whirl - FAIL. It is awful. It requires that iTunes be installed, and I dislike iTunes, so that's one strike against it. Whenever I add video content to the application it doesn't show up until I restart the application. It serves about the same purpose as Windows explorer - shows you your videos. LAME.

So I went back to Linux. After two days of poking and prodding around, I finally have a solution that works VERY well. Note that I have an Acer 5920 running Ubuntu 9.10, and the solution I have found here works for my purposes. If you follow these steps and it doesn't work for you, then your PC probably hates Linux.

#1: Get your codecs
This url is a trouble-shooting page from the kdenlive website (which we will be using, but there are specific installation instructions for that, so keep reading). Basically if you run the following apt-get instructions you'll have all of the codecs you need:
sudo apt-get install libavcodec-unstripped-52 libavdevice-unstripped-52 libavfilter-unstripped-0 libavformat-unstripped-52 libavutil-unstripped-49 libpostproc-unstripped-51 libswscale-unstripped-0

#2: Get kdenlive
I found these instructions here but have summarized them below.
Go to System > Administration > Software Sources, click on the "Other Software" tab, then click "Add", then insert the following line:
ppa:sunab/ppa

Yes, that is correct. Confirm the repository reload then run the following from the command line:
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install kdenlive

#3: The Project Monitor in kdenlive on my system works as far as video is concerned, but the sound is horribly choppy and just bad. I found out how to fix this from this video. To fix this, get the following library:
sudo apt-get install libsdl1.2debian-pulseaudio

Once this is installed, open kdenlive, go to Settings > Configure Kdenlive, go to Playback, and select "PulseAudio" for the audio driver.

Now you should have the latest version of kdenlive, the codecs necessary to encode to virtually any format, and a project monitor that looks AND sounds good. All you need to do now is get crackin'.

[EDIT] - one more thing - I have to adjust the pixel aspect ratio to 1.19 for all of the videos I import - the software doesn't import the JVC MOD files quite right, but once you adjust the pixel aspect ratio it's fine. To do this, right-click on a clip you have imported, select Clip Properties, then go to Advanced, and plug in the number. I'm also going to try this Slideshow Creator out, it would be good to integrate it into some videos.

[EDIT 2] - just discovered "OpenShot Video Editor", it is Gtk native as opposed to KDE as Kdenlive is. I tried to get it and run it but some sort of Python errors prevented it from running. After some tweaking I finally got it to run. After a few minutes of poking and prodding around, I quickly determined that this would not give me the flexibility I need that Kdenlive offers. So I'm sticking with Kdenlive.

Scanner Sharing over Network CAN Work in Ubuntu 9.10!

Can't sleep so I thought I'd share today's Linux-wrangling experience.

I have a Xubuntu 9.10 system designated as my file/print/everything else server. It has an HP All-In-One Deskjet F4135 printer/scanner combo attached to it. I wanted to be able to acquire images from my scanner directly to Gimp (image editing application) on my laptop from the comfort of my couch without having to bother with remote desktop connections, file transfers, etc., so I decided to share my scanner over the network. I had done this a few years back via xinetd, but after reading this link I was under the impression that they had greatly simplified the process of setting up a scanner as a network resource.

I followed the directions, then went to test my newly network-enabled scanner, but got nothing. I poked and prodded and checked help forums for a while, but got nothing. I even tried the old method of setting up a network scanner (via xinetd) but still nothing. Eventually I came across a suggestion on the sane FAQ page to run the sane daemon in debug mode by adding the "-d" flag. I ran it with the saned user, but still got nothing. I decided to try running as root and I was able to connect! After a little more poking around I found where my USB port was located in the file system - /dev/bus/usb/001 and saw that its owner was root but group was "lp". This is why I was able to share my scanner as root but not as saned - saned is neither root nor is it in the lp group, so it didn't have access to the scanner. I added the saned user to the lp group, restarted the saned daemon (under the saned user) then bam, network scanner access.

All this to say, scanner sharing over your LAN is as easy as the Ubuntu guide would lead you to believe, you just need to run the following command:
sudo adduser saned lp
...and you should be good to go. Just remember to restart the server daemon:
sudo /etc/init.d/saned restart

I found a bug report a few minutes ago indicating this has been a bug since Ubuntu 8.04. You can read there for more information. If I had read it earlier it would have saved me a lot of headache, but I wouldn't have had the satisfaction of figuring it out myself :)

Slow down, Ubuntu

For those of you unfamiliar with Ubuntu, it is a Debian Linux distribution for netbooks, notebooks/desktops, servers, and whatever else it will fit on. If you have no clue what I'm talking about at this point, then you might as well move along.

I have mixed feelings about the Karmic Koala (9.10) release. I will say without any hesitation, it is by far the best release I've installed on my laptop (which has seen it's fair share of releases). Today, however, I had the "fortune" of experiencing the painful procedure of getting it (Xubuntu, by the way) to run on my old desktop that I use as a file/print/everything else server. My old desktop is by no stretch of the imagination a top of the line, current system. It's the very first generation Pentium 4 (Willamette), 1.7 ghz, with 512 MB of RAM and about 570 GB of disk space. This was before multiple cores existed on a chip or the notion of hyperthreading was conceived (in the consumer sector, at least). However, after some researching and tweaking, I'm convinced that the problems I ran into are not due to the near-obsolescence of my hardware, but simple coding/configuration errors that Karmic has out of the box.

I ran into two pretty significant hurdles: problems with the boot loader and static IP configuration. Basically, after installing the system, my first attempt to boot the system without the Live CD failed hardcore. It said it could not detect the device with UUID ####....blah blah blah, or something to that effect. I had to do a substantial amount of research to find that the script that configured the GRUB configuration script was in error and needed to be corrected, along with some updates to some GRUB-related packages. Failing to boot would without a doubt shut down a potential Ubuntu user immediately. This is a very serious error that should have never gotten through testing, but somehow it did.

Secondly, the static IP configuration problem. I tried using the Network Manager in Xubuntu to configure my static IP. I got weird results. A couple times I got disconnected altogether. Some times I could connect within my LAN, but could not make outgoing connections to the Internet. I ended up having to remove the Network Manager and related packages and set up my static IP manually in /etc/network/interfaces. I restarted the networking subsystem and it worked like a charm. I remember having problems with Network Manager since 6.10. Over three years and this thing still sucks. Come on, guys.

Lastly, this was not a critical error, but I lost the ability to view my CUPS printer status via the web app on port 631. This isn't critical but is pretty useful (to me) for diagnosing printer problems. Came to find out that all of the scripts that are supposed to run in /etc/rc2.d/ either aren't running at all or only some of them are running.

The six-month release schedule Ubuntu maintains has been pretty cool up to this point; we get to see all of the cool new stuff that's coming out, but we also get to fight through all of the unanticipated bugs. Things like what I've ran into today would send any potential Linux user away from Linux, or at least Ubuntu, back to their Microsoft/Apple comfort zones. Not only does this discourage potential users, but it could very well damage Ubuntu's reputation. Ubuntu is without a doubt the number 1 Linux distribution, but if things like this keep falling through the cracks, it will be pretty easy to find a new number 1.

So, Ubuntu, slow down. Take more time to review code, for unit testing, integration testing, etc. I know testing every combination of hardware isn't feasible, but analyzing code up front is. Focus more on quality to ensure Linux as a whole and Ubuntu maintain the reputation that has been established so far. Extending the six month release schedule to a yearly release schedule would be perfectly fine with me.

The Church and Socialism

I woke up this morning with a forwarded email from my mom in my inbox containing the following article:
http://www.newmediajournal.us/staff/m_bruce/2009/11212009.htm

Later on, my wife and I went to church. The theme of the past few weeks has been "The Blessed Life," which has had a large focus on giving. As my pastor was discussing some of the aspects of giving, I began to think of some of the impacts of giving. I thought of James 1:27, which states, "Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world." God expects us to take care of those that cannot take care of themselves, through giving of our money, our time, abilities, etc.

All of a sudden it hit me, we aren't in a downward spiral to socialism because of Obama or a corrupt government; we're in this situation because the church has stepped down. We've failed to take a proactive stance in taking care of people. On top of that, we've failed to share Jesus with people like we should have. For this reason, people in general care less about what is moral or what is right in God's eyes, which I believe has in turn led people to have a decreased regard for those in need and an increase in selfishness and interest in personal gain. This leads to more people being in need.

The government sees this need and tries to bring human solutions to the table to correct this. Some have good intentions, but as the saying goes, "the road to hell is paved with good intentions." Add to the equation those that are seeking their own personal gain (i.e., corruption), and you get a system that is doomed to failure. God's plan was that everyone give generously to each other according to their need. A good example of this is Acts 2:24 - 27. People stepped up and eagerly took care of each other in the early church. Although I'm sure this still goes on today, there is plenty of opportunity to do more, on everyone's part.

I can give more. We all can give more. It may encroach on our lifestyles for now, but the rewards are eternal. We could even turn this nation around.

"Church": A thing of the past?

Something that's been on my mind for probably a year now is the state of the church. When we think of church, we think of at least a weekly assembling together of ourselves. This may include Sunday School, Sunday Evening Services, Discipleship Training, Wednesday Evening services, etc. This is all in a traditional sense. For my church it's a Sunday morning assembly where we come together, worship, fellowship, get a good word, and go home. This also includes various lifegroups throughout the week, etc.

Despite all of this to describe what church is, however, I've left out what the church is - the body of Christ. Strip away the traditional/non-traditional methodologies of "doing church" and - I hope - the body still remains. The body is not what I consider to be the "thing of the past"; it is all of the decor and frills and traditional/non-traditional things surrounding the body that act as a glue to make it all work together.

My concern with the church begins with the lost person's perspective. If I invite a person that does not know Christ and has absolutely no knowledge of Jesus to a church service, I think it's a pretty safe assumption to say they're going to be a no-show. We're inviting them out of their comfort zone into a completely unfamiliar place where we will do completely unfamiliar things, and place them into a state of complete awkwardness. Furthermore, let's be honest - these freak-show Christian programs on channels like TBN don't do anything to quell the awkward level. To make matters worse, we'll provide them with a self-fulfilling prophecy of the hypocrite stigma: that the church is filled with hypocrites. Everyone brings their Sunday morning faces to church, nobody brings their "I'm hurt", "I'm alone", "I'm desperate", "I'm lacking", "I'm sorry" faces, because we have learned that church is not the socially acceptable place to bring these faces. Not only that, but there will undoubtedly be people there that at some point in their week have not lived up Christ's expectation and have fallen. Showing this environment to a person I would like to introduce to the love of Christ is not where I would want to start off.

Where did Jesus start? He went to them. He didn't bring the tax collectors and thieves and beggars and whores to the synagogue. He confronted them where real life happened, and I think that's what the body of Christ needs to start migrating toward, is where real life happens. Real life doesn't happen in church. Real life happens in the safety of a few brothers or sisters sharing that they're hurt, alone, desperate, lacking, whatever the case may be, and coming to Christ to give those things to Him. That is what the world needs to see, that there is a real solution apart from all of the flair. They don't need to see another steeple or choir or dude in a funny robe and wonder, "what is all that for?"

So how can we show the world real Christian life? Not the "Happy Sunday" face paint, but the war paint on our faces from being faced with battles of insecurity, temptation, insufficiency, and loneliness, and seeing Christ conquer all as He is glorified above it all.