Dungeon Defenders on 64-bit Ubuntu Variants

A while back I found using the ia32-libs package was a way to get Dungeon Defenders going on 64-bit Linux, but that package went away. Here's the process I went through to get Dungeon Defenders working on Xubuntu 14.04.

Graphics Setup

First in general: install graphics drivers. For nVidia this is basically:

apt-get install nvidia-current
nvidia-xconfig

For AMD the process is a little more fraught with danger, I found this process works well with 14.04 though:

apt-get install fglrx-updates fglrx-amdcccle-updates
aticonfig --initial

Then reboot. After, if using AMD, run amdcccle and set the "tear free" option to enabled.

Game Setup

Since ia32-libs is deprecated, I went through and manually found all the packages. Here's the summary that should hopefully include everything needed to run the game:

apt-get install libglu1-mesa:i386 lib32stdc++6 \       libxext6:i386 libasound2:i386 libpulse0:i386 \       libxcursor1:i386 libxinerama1:i386 libxi6:i386 \       libxrandr2:i386 libxss1:i386 libxxf86vm1:i386

Then, before you run DD for the first time, edit the file DefaultDunDef.ini in UDKGame/Config/ and remove "_Valentines2013" from the GameplayLevel parameters, so that they only say "LobbyLevel.UDK". This will prevent the bug when you start the game it goes straight back to the menu.

_{(After using it as a test application for a fresh machine, I want to go back and play the game from a clean start. After the débâcle that is Dungeon Defenders Eternity, the original game feels much more...fun :(. )}

Review: TP-Link TL-WN722N USB Wifi Adapter

Yesterday a friend from work lent me his TP-Link TL-WN722N USB wireless adapter to try out.

I plugged it into a machine running Linux Mint 15 (Cinnamon) 64-bit. At first everything seemed fine: it connected to the router flawlessly, and started getting data as fast as the internet could provide it.

Then I moved the machine into another room, to see how it would go through walls. It was about 8 metres away, going through two brick walls. It could no longer connect.

You mad bro? (Definitely didn't like being moved away from the router)

I gradually moved the machine closer, but found that I had to be in direct sight of the router and less than 1 metre away before it would connect up. I can't imagine this is normal, and must be a fault with the hardware. Bit unfortunate! If you've got one of these and get similar symptoms, I'd be returning it straight away.

Unfortunately I can't really do a proper review (even for me, I'm pretty rough after all) with these results. :(

Installing Canon-MF4140 Drivers on Mint 64-bit

I'd installed drivers for my Canon MF4140 on Linux Mint 11 (32-bit) with a bit of fluffing around. For the 64-bit Linux Mint 13, more fluffing around was required, but of a different sort.

To start with, the drivers from Canon don't have .deb files for 64-bit, so you need to install alien and convert the .rpm files to .deb.

sudo apt-get install alien
sudo alien -k --scripts cndrvcups-common-2.40-2.x86_64.rpm
sudo alien -k --scripts cndrvcups-ufr2-uk-2.40-2.x86_64.rpm

This creates two .deb files, which can be installed with dpkg -i <filename>.rpm. This all worked fine, the printer was detected and added, but nothing would print.

Following this thread, I ended up getting it working, but I did a number of steps suggested, so I'm not sure which ones were necessary.

Overall:

1. Copy the files as suggested here from /usr/lib64 to /usr/lib. Some of the files might already exist.
2. Install some more "silent dependencies" as described here: sudo apt-get install libc6-i386 ia32-libs lib32z1. This adds 150Mb or so of dependencies -- quite a lot. Not sure if they were actually needed...
3. In the end, because this was Mint 13, the important files to copy from /usr/lib64 to /usr/lib were libcanonc3pl.so and libcanonc3pl.so.1. This was the step that got things working, so I'm not sure if steps 1 and 2 were actually necessary. My printer is working, I'm not touching these files again.