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[Scobie]

This is more of a VNC query than a MC query but thought I would ask in case anyone has seen anything similar.

I access my MC25 server via VNC viewer (the Docker image spoken about in this forum) and it works well but I find that some Console Windows cannot be closed once open.

For example if I do Help -> About Media Center,  the Splash Screen comes up but there is absoutely no way to get rid of it short of a restart. There are no ok/Close options and nowhere to click to clear it. I get the same with some windows within the DSP.

Anyone seen this?

Cheers

[BryanC]

ESC key?

[shortie]

ESC key?

I tried that on 25.0.44 and it changed nothing. I tried both the physical ESC key as well as the VNC Viewer virtual keyboard key. Not only that but I can't get the MC to respond to ANY other interactions. For me at least, my only option is to terminate and restart the container.

EDIT: I take that back, I can run docker exec -it jrivermc25-latest /bin/bash to get in to the container then kill the mediacenter process. It'll respawn and things are once OK again.

[JimH]

Something is eating the escape key.

[shortie]

Something is eating the escape key.

That's a reasonable hypothesis. And with so many things in the way between the keyboard and the application (VNC client, VNC server, not to mention docker itself) it could be difficult to sort out. I've got a fair bit of experience with the various components and can't imagine what might be in the way but I'll maybe try and start the VNC server in debug mode so I can see what sort of key sequences are being passed in.

JimH, have you and your team considered starting a docker distribution of MC for Linux? It might stop hacks like me from hacking other hack's Dockerfiles to get it working on our systems? Not to mention that it would remove vagaries associated with Fedora vs CentOS vs Ubuntu vs Alpine vs Mint, etc

[bob]

The escape key does nothing in that dialog. Also the dsp studio dialog has the same issue.
They currently depend on the window manager to close.
I assume in your situation you don't have a window manager...

[shortie]

The escape key does nothing in that dialog. Also the dsp studio dialog has the same issue.
They currently depend on the window manager to close.
I assume in your situation you don't have a window manager...

Ah, true enough! It's a minimal X11 configuration that i don't believe includes a window manager. I'll try to look into it a bit more this afternoon or tomorrow and post back

[Scobie]

Thanks guys and yes can second everything added here.

ESC key does nothing, and no combination of clicks / key strokes has any effect. Additionally the various OK/Close/Yes button options that are available in the non-docker versions are not present in the (from what I have seen so far at least) DSP Windows.

Having said that some OK/Cancel buttons do appear, like Tools -> options .

It does smell like the Window Manager is not part of the VNC Server image of that is what's required to add this functionality.

[shortie]

I haven't put my jriver docker setup into my github repo yet (wil do soon and post here) but if anyone wants to install a minimal window manager, in this case fluxbox, this is what I did. You'll need to do these things from within your container and you can get in to your container by doing

docker exec -it <container> /bin/bash

That command will open a command shell and you're now operating in the container.

Once in, make sure the main debian repo is in your container's /etc/apt/sources.list. If it's not then

echo deb http://http.us.debian.org/debian jessie main >> /etc/apt/sources.list

then refresh the repos and install fluxbox

apt-get update
apt-get install fluxbox

Once it's installed, you should just be able to start it and exit from the container

fluxbox -display :1 &
exit

You should have a basic window manager running that will provide a close button on the About box. Note that unless you update the Dockerfile and rebuild or save the current state of your container using something like docker commit, you'll have to rerun these commands every time you restart your container

[Scobie]

Worked beautifully Shortie thank you. Never realised VNC was so granular.

Cheers

Scobie

[bob]

Fluxbox is a good choice, very minimal footprint...

[shortie]

Fluxbox is a good choice, very minimal footprint...

That's why i chose it but it's behavior when included as part of the container can be a bit confusing to the uninitiated. I'm considering incorporating icewm into the container instead. Thoughts?

[bob]

That's why i chose it but it's behavior when included as part of the container can be a bit confusing to the uninitiated. I'm considering incorporating icewm into the container instead. Thoughts?

I'm not familiar with icewm.

I was wondering if we added OK buttons to those two dialogs if we could do without the WM completely.
Since I've not used MC in docker I don't know how useful the WM is. Without the WM you can't move MC's windows (like the options window) around.
Is this an issue at all??

[shortie]

I'm not familiar with icewm.

I was wondering if we added OK buttons to those two dialogs if we could do without the WM completely.
Since I've not used MC in docker I don't know how useful the WM is. Without the WM you can't move MC's windows (like the options window) around.
Is this an issue at all??

As far as I'm concerned the WM would be superfluous if there was a way to dismiss those dialogs. I don't bother moving the windows, i scroll the vnc rendering. I haven't really experimented much with various x11 capabilities in MC tho... Standard x11 programs accept a geometry specification that MC may not accept. A geometry can specify window origin and dimensions. I'll try some experiments this evening when i get home and post my results

To answer your original question, tho, i think a window manager is a lot of unnecessary overhead in a container, if there are options to dismiss dialogs

EDIT: Short answer: yes, it would help a lot if the dialogs had a way to dismiss them! I believe we could get rid of the need for a window manager altogether.

it appears that MC pays attention to the usual X11 command-line arguments. At least, I can get it to open to a particular size (e.g. -geometry 1024x768). The window manager plays a role in location so without providing a window-manager specific configuration file, I'm not sure I can force it to open at 0,0. Also, with both fluxbox and icewm, MC seems to open minimized which means one must go to the bottom of the VNC display to force it to un-minimize (it's been a long long time since I messed with this stuff so forgive me if I've missed something obvious).

[bob]

The next build will have dismissal buttons for those two dialogs.

[shortie]

The next build will have dismissal buttons for those two dialogs.

25.0.48 change summary says they’re in! I’ll remove the window manager from my container setup.

Thanks, guys!

[Scobie]

Brilliant thanks Bob.