Indexing with Linux

[WelchTC]

Nice find. I'd not seen that problem before but it could be that I've been on the program for a while and they may have changed the way the license page is displayed.

Tom

[rmrichesjr]

In case it might be of help if someone else sees the tiny window problem, I have a short C program I'll try to attach that seems to solve or at least work around the problem. I'm attaching it as a .txt, so rename it to xfixindexwindow.c before compiling.

For me (with Mandriva 2007.0, twm, no Gnome or KDE) the problem happens with a number of other pop-up-style windows, such as the lookup window that displays the authority list for given names and such. At present, the program must be started before doing whatever causes the tiny window to be created, but that would be easy to change if needed.

[WelchTC]

Nice work! For those who use it, let us know if you find any problems.

Tom

[rmrichesjr]

In case it might be of help if someone else sees the tiny window problem, I have a short C program I'll try to attach that seems to solve or at least work around the problem. I'm attaching it as a .txt, so rename it to xfixindexwindow.c before compiling.

For me (with Mandriva 2007.0, twm, no Gnome or KDE) the problem happens with a number of other pop-up-style windows, such as the lookup window that displays the authority list for given names and such. At present, the program must be started before doing whatever causes the tiny window to be created, but that would be easy to change if needed.

Nice work! For those who use it, let us know if you find any problems.

Tom

Okay. I found a problem. With the new release (2.5, IIRC) of the indexing application, the lookup list windows are no longer tiny, and the program's checks for a window being off-screen were broken. This update seems to work fairly well with the new application.

[bobtheubuntuuser-p40]

I'm using Ubuntu 8.04 "hardy heron" I've followed the instructions for installation of indexing software at the beginning of this thread. It installed nicely but whenever I try to open the program I get a message that says "A special update to the FamilySearch Indexing application has been completed. Start the application as you usually do." So I click on the icon again and the same message plays over, what could I do?

[bobtheubuntuuser-p40]

sorry for the double post but I also wanted to say that in Ubuntu "Hardy Heron", the sun javaws files are located at /usr/lib/jvm/java-6-sun-1.6.0.07/jre/javaws

[rmrichesjr]

That's no fun. I haven't run indexing lately, because I have been too busy with nFS and other things. In case you haven't already tried them, here are a few ideas:

Make sure your Java version is compatible with indexing. I think I have seen that the application is much more picky than I would think it ought to need to be about the Java version it runs on.

You might try moving your iArchives and/or .java directories out of the way. Unfortunately, that will lose some of your history with the indexing application.

If you get to a state where the indexing application appears hung, not responding to GUI command operations, you might check for off-screen windows. When I last did indexing, I had to run a separate program that scanned the window tree to find off-screen windows and move them on screen.

[bobtheubuntuuser-p40]

okay, I'll check, thank you!

[kafarnsworth-p40]

Speaking of Ubuntu...
When I index and try to use the name lookup function, two odd things happen. First, lookup isn't in the menu that drops down when I click on the arrow next to the name field. So I use ctrl-f to bring up the lookup window. But the cursor won't go into any of the fields. I have to bring a different application up (any seems to do), then bring family indexing back up, and the cursor is now active in the name field.

Has any one else seen this, and better, found a cure?

Thanks

kafarnsworth

[Matt-p40]

okay, I'll check, thank you!

Hi Bob,

I've just installed Indexing on Ubuntu 8.10 and 8.04 (different machines). They both suffered from the same problem you describe. Unfortunately, the links I could find on how to fix it were broken, so based on what information I could find I came up with this workaround (worked on both versions for me, your mileage may vary):

1. Change ownership of /etc/.java to your regular user ID. This is temporary. Something like "sudo chown -R bob:bob /etc/.java" for example.
2. Make sure you don't have any running java processes. In my case I had been trying several different things to get Indexing to load, and had a couple "stuck" java instances. Use "ps -ef | grep java" to look.
3. Start up Indexing. The "update" notice may appear once, but the program should successfully load.
4. Close Indexing.
5. Reset ownership of /etc/.java back to root: "sudo chown -R root:root /etc/.java".

For me, this worked on both machines. Good luck.

--Matt