Create timelapse on Linux

In preparation to create a timelapse of my modeling work, I had to figure out a way how to record it on Linux. It turns out that it is not that complicated and is comprised of the steps:

  1. The periodical screenshots
  2. Compile the images into a movie

The solution I found works for me on a Linux Mint Debian Edition (LMDE), but I see no reason, why it should not work for any other Linux distribution.

All this I figured out with the help of Kvisle’s Post on this issue.

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Integrate antique scanner in Ubuntu

Because I started artwork with blender it became necessary to use my scanner. It is an antiquated piece of hardware  (from the last millennium 1999). Up until now I did not use it very often, because I used a better scanner at the office. Or I started up Windows where it is working.

So basically scanning in Linux works out of the box if sane is installed, unless…

Starting up xsane from the menu I got an error message that did not tell me or anybody else anything. Something along the line device could not be initialized snapscan:libusb:006:002. Therefore I tried the same on the console in the hope to gain more information and I was successful:

[snapscan] Cannot open firmware file /usr/share/sane/snapscan/your-firmwarefile.bin.
[snapscan] Edit the firmware file entry in snapscan.conf.

With this message I searched the web and found Martin Meyerspeer had the same problem with another device. The basic is that you need a binary firmware file that is referenced. The file can be found on the accompanying driver CD. If your are lucky you did not throw it out already.  In my case it was simple because the firmware files were not packed in an archive. There were however several of them. The SnapScan homepage helped me out locating the correct on. The rest is just following Martins description.

Get Civilisation running under Linux

This article describes the steps that you must take to get Sid Meier’s Civilisation running on Ubuntu (Hard Heron). So now I have to clear some things up:

  1. I know that Ubuntu is not Linux, but the process for other distros should be similar enough.
  2. We are talking about the Sid Meier’s civilisation game from 1991


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Wrongfully assigned IP address

If you have no internet connection that may have many causes. I recently had a wrongfully assigned IP address. The computer accesses the internet through a router that assigns an IP address form 192.168.1.0/24 address range.
The first thing if the connection to the internet fails is to check the connection to the router with a ping. In my case this failed. Executing the ifconfig showed why:
ifconfig -a
The assigned IP was not in the defined range by the router. In fact it was a public IP (this might be a sign that someone unauthorised tried to gain access). It seems the IP was defined static since a restart of the system or the router had no effect.
Here is the solution:
sudo ifconfig eth0 down
sudo ifconfig eth0 up

eth0 is the network interface with the wrong IP. If you are on another distribution than Ubuntu you may not need the sudo to bring the interface down and up again.