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Author Topic: MC for Linux on a Thecus NAS (N5550)  (Read 6041 times)

astromo

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MC for Linux on a Thecus NAS (N5550)
« on: November 30, 2014, 03:10:42 pm »

Thought I'd see whether this 3rd party module would work with MC on my N5550:
[ Debian x86 & x64 ] [ 7.2.0 ] Chrooted Debian

The N5550 uses x64 hardware so I opted for the matching module, then followed this advice:
How-to: Install on Debian Wheezy 64-bit
because the distro from Thecus is Wheezy and I thought it best to keep everything aligned.

There was a need to greatly expand the sources list, so did some edits along the lines of the install advice in the link above. The offering out of the box was quite limited. Ran update, upgrade and <apt-get install -f> to sort out a lot of missing odds and ends until I ultimately ended up with:
Quote
0 upgraded, 0 newly installed, 0 to remove and 0 not upgraded.

Grabbed the latest copy of MC, installed the dpkg and at the command, mediacenter20, I get:
      Segmentation fault


 :'(   ?


Thought: I'm doing this via a Bitvise xterm via SSH and a command line. Do I need a command switch to make MC fire up in effectively headless mode?

Note that I don't think I can / haven't worked out how to run a desktop on the N5550. I think the best idea would be to keep it very simple rather than fancy, anyway.
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JimH

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Re: MC for Linux on a Thecus N5550
« Reply #1 on: November 30, 2014, 03:47:56 pm »

Do I need a command switch to make MC fire up in effectively headless mode?
In the options for Startup, tell MC to start Media Server.  I'm not sure whether this works yet on Linux.
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mwillems

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Re: MC for Linux on a Thecus N5550
« Reply #2 on: November 30, 2014, 06:11:56 pm »

Thought I'd see whether this 3rd party module would work with MC on my N5550:
[ Debian x86 & x64 ] [ 7.2.0 ] Chrooted Debian

The N5550 uses x64 hardware so I opted for the matching module, then followed this advice:
How-to: Install on Debian Wheezy 64-bit
because the distro from Thecus is Wheezy and I thought it best to keep everything aligned.

There was a need to greatly expand the sources list, so did some edits along the lines of the install advice in the link above. The offering out of the box was quite limited. Ran update, upgrade and <apt-get install -f> to sort out a lot of missing odds and ends until I ultimately ended up with:
Grabbed the latest copy of MC, installed the dpkg and at the command, mediacenter20, I get:
      Segmentation fault


 :'(   ?


Thought: I'm doing this via a Bitvise xterm via SSH and a command line. Do I need a command switch to make MC fire up in effectively headless mode?

Note that I don't think I can / haven't worked out how to run a desktop on the N5550. I think the best idea would be to keep it very simple rather than fancy, anyway.

If you run MC with the commandline switch /mediaserver, it will try not to open windows, but MC isn't truly headless even then, you still need to have some kind of xserver running (either locally or on the machine that's remoting in).  What kind of config did you do to get a display going (dummy or otherwise)?  If the Thecus device you're using doesn't have a screen/video output of any kind you may need to generate a dummy display using a VNCserver like x11vnc or tightvnc.  

If you can spell out the steps you took to sort out the xserver issue I can offer some more specific suggestions.  Thoughts for exploration:

1) How are you sshing into the machine (what is your specific ssh commandline; does it include the -X or -Y switches?  Did you do any port forwarding)
2) What is the output of
Code: [Select]
echo $DISPLAY 3) Did you install any kind of window manager or xterminal on the remote box? If so which ones?
4) What happens if you try the commands xterm or startx?
5) What's in your .xinitrc on the remote box (assuming you have one)?  
6) You mention bitvise; are you trying to set this up from a windows box?  Bitvise doesn't appear to offer an xserver natively, what are you using for an xserver in windows?  Cygwin?  Ximg?  Something else?  What happens if you try setup from a linux box that has a native xserver?
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astromo

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Re: MC for Linux on a Thecus NAS (N5550)
« Reply #3 on: December 01, 2014, 05:19:23 am »

If you can spell out the steps you took to sort out the xserver issue I can offer some more specific suggestions.

Thanks for the enthusiastic response.

I didn't know I had an xserver issue. Ignorant me.

I haven't done anything special other than follow the MC Install advice for Debian Wheezy 64 bit as advised.

The N5550 does have an HDMI port and I do have a Linux box that I can use to SSH into the N5550. I loaded up MC and its various dependencies via a Windows session of Bitvise as explained.

I'll need to research things like VNCserver and setting up xserver in greater depth (any pointer would be welcome)

If it all seems haphazard, it's because it is. I didn't set out a plan other than to just take a punt and see what would happen. Thought I'd go organic and see what would grow.

I'll give your suggestions a bit of a once over and see where I get to and report back.

Thanks
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mwillems

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Re: MC for Linux on a Thecus NAS (N5550)
« Reply #4 on: December 01, 2014, 07:28:58 am »

Thanks for the enthusiastic response.

I didn't know I had an xserver issue. Ignorant me.

I haven't done anything special other than follow the MC Install advice for Debian Wheezy 64 bit as advised.

The N5550 does have an HDMI port and I do have a Linux box that I can use to SSH into the N5550. I loaded up MC and its various dependencies via a Windows session of Bitvise as explained.

I'll need to research things like VNCserver and setting up xserver in greater depth (any pointer would be welcome)

If it all seems haphazard, it's because it is. I didn't set out a plan other than to just take a punt and see what would happen. Thought I'd go organic and see what would grow.

I'll give your suggestions a bit of a once over and see where I get to and report back.

Thanks

Sorry about the information overload: you and I had previously chatted in a thread (http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?topic=84477.msg642377#msg642377) about the xserver/DISPLAY issue so I thought you were already grappling with it or I wouldn't have laid it out at that level of detail  ;D  

Before you start on any of my troubleshooting steps, read that thread from the top: http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?topic=84477.0.  That's where bob gives the official recommended method for headless setup that resolves the xserver/DISPLAY issue.   Keep reading after the first post though as there are some points of clarification in the replies.  If you need help navigating his method, post back and we can work through it (my questions above will also help with troubleshooting it if you're having trouble). His method works great, especially if you don't need to interact with the MC instance on the Thecus very much.  

If you plan on using the MC instance on the Thecus for tagging or other operations requiring extensive GUI interaction and you find xforwarding to be a little slow, I'd recommend checking out this thread for my VNC remote access method: http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?topic=91227.0.  If you decide to go that route, you'll need to install some x dependencies and a lightweight window manager on the Thecus first: I'd recommend installing xinit and openbox (you may already have xinit installed as a dependency, but maybe not).  After that you should be able to follow my steps with no trouble.  

But, and I can't stress this enough, try Bob's method first because it's much simpler (and easier on the memory/CPU), and it may work perfectly for what you need.  
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astromo

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Re: MC for Linux on a Thecus NAS (N5550)
« Reply #5 on: December 01, 2014, 02:20:37 pm »

Sorry about the information overload: you and I had previously chatted in a thread (http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?topic=84477.msg642377#msg642377) about the xserver/DISPLAY issue so I thought you were already grappling with it or I wouldn't have laid it out at that level of detail  ;D  

Thanks. I went looking for that thread but missed it. Knew it was there, somewhere.

I'll go away and chew this over and take my time. Really appreciate the suggestions. I'll go simple first up for sure.
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