FreeCAD Website Design

A forum for research and development of the user interface of FreeCAD
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AR795
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Re: FreeCAD Website Design

Post by AR795 »

kkremitzki wrote: Sat Oct 20, 2018 5:41 am By the way, do you feel up for tackling issue #3328? I can help if you, for example, want to set up a testing environment to experiment in.
Sure, I will give it a go. Thanks for the offer. Last I remember installing XAMPP, but then I got caught up with work and didn't get time to learn how to use it. I will try again. Next I have to setup MediaWiki so I will see if things go well, if not I will post back in the forum.
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kkremitzki
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Re: FreeCAD Website Design

Post by kkremitzki »

AR795 wrote: Sat Oct 20, 2018 10:10 am
kkremitzki wrote: Sat Oct 20, 2018 5:41 am By the way, do you feel up for tackling issue #3328? I can help if you, for example, want to set up a testing environment to experiment in.
Sure, I will give it a go. Thanks for the offer. Last I remember installing XAMPP, but then I got caught up with work and didn't get time to learn how to use it. I will try again. Next I have to setup MediaWiki so I will see if things go well, if not I will post back in the forum.
Hmm, there's probably a better way than that. What OS do you use again? IMO the easiest thing to do would be to install some virtualization tool like VirtualBox, download an Ubuntu Server image, and use the GUI to install it. That way you'd have a sandbox with up-to-date software, tons of new guides and tutorials, and most importantly, somewhere where I can basically just provide a list of commands to run to set up a local web server with a test clone of the FreeCAD Mediawiki installation.

Also, do you have an account on the bug tracker so I can assign that issue to you?
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AR795
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Re: FreeCAD Website Design

Post by AR795 »

I am using Windows. Will download and try Virtualbox and Ubuntu. Also I read about a Windows subsystem for Linux feature that allows users to install Ubuntu alongside Windows, might be useful for this task. As for the bug tracker, I created an account (Username: AR795).
triplus
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Re: FreeCAD Website Design

Post by triplus »

If i compare the experience on how an average Windows users would setup WAMP (using some FOSS solution as mentioned earlier) or LAMP on Linux inside a VirtualBox. I feel that @kkremitzki just gave you some additional work! But note that i do support such suggestions as i like when Windows users give Linux a try. It's just in my opinion first experience should be more GUI oriented. Like using web browser, Blender, Inkscape or yes preferably FreeCAD. And i guess not by setting up LAMP. This is likely where we are doing it wrong. When trying to convince Windows users to give Linux a try. Few days in the console and most Windows users give up (and hard to blame them). :lol:
AR795
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Re: FreeCAD Website Design

Post by AR795 »

So yeah I installed VirtualBox and then Ubuntu Server (hopefully correctly). The next step I guess would be installing MediaWiki, so I found this guide:

https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Manual:R ... _or_Ubuntu

Are these instructions OK for the purpose or is there another recommended guide to setup MediaWiki on Ubuntu?

@triplus
I did give Linux a try a few months ago when I installed Fedora and got to know a few basic terminal commands. Overall it was a good experience but I had to switch back to Windows due to graphic driver issues.
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Joel_graff
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Re: FreeCAD Website Design

Post by Joel_graff »

AR795 wrote: Mon Oct 22, 2018 8:20 pm but I had to switch back to Windows due to graphic driver issues
Now, I'm curious about that. The only graphics driver issues I've encountered are on old proprietary chipsets...
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PrzemoF
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Re: FreeCAD Website Design

Post by PrzemoF »

Joel_graff wrote: Mon Oct 22, 2018 8:56 pm Now, I'm curious about that. The only graphics driver issues I've encountered are on old proprietary chipsets...
Radeon had a tearing problem as well a while ago. I'm ready to help if that's affecting FreeCAD.
triplus
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Re: FreeCAD Website Design

Post by triplus »

AR795 wrote: Mon Oct 22, 2018 8:20 pm Are these instructions OK for the purpose or is there another recommended guide to setup MediaWiki on Ubuntu?
Likely they are OK. But what usually happens is more steps are needed and not all are mentioned in such tutorials. I tried this option:

https://www.turnkeylinux.org/mediawiki

Basically i downloaded the OVA image (V 15.0 461MB VM) and imported it in VirtualBox. At the first run i have set up the passwords and didn't bother with the rest. With default config i was able to access MediaWiki after on the host system by entering the provided local IP in the web browser. Accessing the file system directly in guest system is possible. And SSH access is possible. Therefore maybe this option could get you started. Without fighting the console for a few days. Note that i didn't check what default settings are and don't know how your network is set up. Therefore it likely make sense to check if such solution is accessible from outside by default or only from the local network.
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kkremitzki
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Re: FreeCAD Website Design

Post by kkremitzki »

AR795 wrote: Sun Oct 21, 2018 9:29 am I am using Windows. Will download and try Virtualbox and Ubuntu. Also I read about a Windows subsystem for Linux feature that allows users to install Ubuntu alongside Windows, might be useful for this task. As for the bug tracker, I created an account (Username: AR795).
Great, I upgraded your user account to developer and assigned you the issue. Feel free to kick it back to me if you change your mind, etc.

The Windows subsystem for Linux is an interesting option but I wouldn't recommend it because introducing the compatibility layer makes some things more convenient, but also makes other things more complex. That's why I recommend a virtualization solution, because so long as the virt. program is not too difficult to use, then the end result (the VM) will be almost exactly like working with a real machine.
AR795 wrote: Mon Oct 22, 2018 8:20 pm Are these instructions OK for the purpose or is there another recommended guide to setup MediaWiki on Ubuntu?
Yep, those instructions look good. The only thing I didn't see while scanning them is actually connecting to the wiki. As soon as you've done sudo apt install apache2 (installing your web server on the VM), you should be able to open a browser in your host machine and navigate to http://<your VM's IP address> and see the default Apache2 page. In order to find out that address, you can run the command ip a. That will give you an overview of your network devices. You should see one that has a line like inet 192.168.122.234 .... That'll be your VM's IP address. Once you've completed the full Mediawiki installation instructions, visiting that same address should show the Mediawiki installation.
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AR795
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Re: FreeCAD Website Design

Post by AR795 »

Joel_graff wrote: Mon Oct 22, 2018 8:56 pm Now, I'm curious about that. The only graphics driver issues I've encountered are on old proprietary chipsets...
The problem I faced was that my laptop has dual graphic cards (Nvidia + Intel) and it uses automatic graphics switching on Windows but on Fedora, I wasn't able to achieve the same level of functionality. Open source drivers had issues with some applications and proprietary drivers locked me into one of the two cards. So for convenience I switched back to Windows.

PrzemoF wrote: Mon Oct 22, 2018 8:58 pm I'm ready to help if that's affecting FreeCAD.
I had no problems with FreeCAD, it worked fine, but I did face some issues with Blender.

triplus wrote: Mon Oct 22, 2018 10:39 pm I tried this option:

https://www.turnkeylinux.org/mediawiki

Therefore maybe this option could get you started. Without fighting the console for a few days.
kkremitzki wrote: Tue Oct 23, 2018 2:29 am As soon as you've done sudo apt install apache2 (installing your web server on the VM), you should be able to open a browser in your host machine and navigate to http://<your VM's IP address> and see the default Apache2 page.
I followed the instructions provided on the MediaWiki page using Ubuntu Server but I wasn't able to access MediaWiki on my host pc. I also tried TurnKey Linux and it also gave me some error. So then I installed regular Ubuntu, followed the instructions and I was able to access MediaWiki on the virtual machine:

VirtualBox_xubuntu_25_10_2018_15_40_21.png
VirtualBox_xubuntu_25_10_2018_15_40_21.png (94.39 KiB) Viewed 1605 times
However, I wasn't able to connect from the host machine. It's likely that there is some issue with my network, so I will see if I can sort it out.
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