Maya 2010 on Linux, and Mac, plus answer to 64 bit Mac question

Yep. New version. 2010. In the house, running happily on my Mac and Linux machines.

The procedures are nearly identical for installing the 2009 version, with the exception of the built in extra packages. I’ll Post a step-by-step instruction for installing 2010 soon, and answer the question about “Why is there no 64 bit version of Maya for OS X”, that pops up at about every g.d forum I visit.

Short answer: Maya is Carbon. Carbon is not 64 bit, because Apple decided that’s a waste of time and resources. So. If there will be a 64 bit version for Mac, the WHOLE application must be re-written in Objective-C in native 64bit Cocoa Framework (this is the only way to program native 64-bit applications on the Mac), vs. the 32 bit Carbon C++ API, that’s as mentioned is abandoned by Apple Inc.
Don’t think we’ll see that happen. Maya has some years on its back… But who knows?

Only the future will know.

Think that actually sums up part two of this post.

Happy living!

A list of required Maya 2009 dependancy packages in Linux

Many people out there, are doing great after following my tutorial, but those that does not run Ubuntu, often run into problems.

Before you post questions to this blog (post anywhere else if you want ;-) ) Make sure you install these packages either in .deb, .rpm or compile the shit from source. The names may differ slightly between distributions, so, search for something similar. The package manager and Google are good friends:

Shell Dependencies
• tcsh
General Dependencies
• glibc
• libpng
• libjpeg
• expat
• libICE
• libSM
• fontconfig
• freetype-
• e2fsprogs-libs
• zlib
• mesa-libGL

X/Motif Dependencies
• libX11
• libXext
• libXi
• libXt
• libXpm
• libXmu
• libXp
• libxcb
• libXdmcp
• libXau
• libXrender
• libXft
• libXinerama

Installer Dependencies
• glibc
• libstdc++
• libgcc
• expat
• libxcb
• libXdmcp
• libXau
• libXfixes
• libXrender
• libXrandr
• libXcursor
• libXinerama
• libXft
• freetype
• fontconfig
• libXext
• libX11
• libSM
• libICE

That should keep you busy for a while!

GC

Maya 2009 64bit Font install / missing fonts in Fedora et. al

Missing fonts in Maya on Fedora, and other Linux distros

A problem with missing font files in Fedora, prevents some text and labels from displaying
properly in the program windows. For example, texture names may
not appear as expected below the texture icons in the Hypershade window.
Also some other packages needs to be installed on some distributions, not on Ubuntu, as I know of, but I’ll writ it down anyway.
Download and install the following rpm or .deb files (names vary slightly so make a search for something similar:

1. xorg-x11-fonts-ISO8859-1-75dpi
2. xorg-x11-fonts-75dpi
3. Xinet.d
4. tcsh
5. libXp (for both .i386 .x86_64)
6. libXp-devel (for both .i386 .x86_64
7. mesa-libGLw mesa-libGLw-devel )
8. gamin-devel (for libfam.so)
9. Autofs

Problems with Nokia N Series Phones?

I’ve always been a fan of Nokia’s N series line of mobile phones.
Ever since my first Nokia N72, I’ve used N series, except for a short period where I recently tried the Nokia 5800 Xpress Music phone.
Now it’s back to N series. Anyway, I recently had a problem that I googled about and tried different approaches for solving for days, with no success. The phone would not install software, no matter what. No new Maps, no new apps, no new nothing! I was completely stuck. All the phone said was “Unable to Install”. Not very informative… :-(

This may bee common knowledge for the techno/gadget geeks out there, but I found that by using the command:
*#7370#

I was able to completely format the phone, and it worked again! This command removes EVERYTHING on your phone. Contacts, messages, the works, so be sure to do a backup first…

Just as a tip for those that experience strange problems on Nokia N-Series phones.
I don’t know if this works on other models…

Pyrex

This is a promising project for those who need both speed (not the drug) and Python (not the .. no).

Very easy to combine C and Python with Pyrex, for those who didn’t know.

Check it out!

Pyrex.

A story about Lisp remote debugging

Revised slightly, but mostly taken from the free Apress book online: Practical Common Lisp

REPL = Read-Eval-Print Loop
SLIME = Superior Lisp Interaction Mode for Emacs

Even when the Lisp app is deployed, there’s often still a way to get to a REPL.
you can use the REPL and SLIME to interact with the Lisp that’s running a Web server at the same time as it’s serving up Web pages. It’s even possible to use SLIME to connect to a Lisp running on a different machine, allowing you for instance, to debug a remote server just like a local one.

An impressive instance of remote debugging occurred on NASA’s 1998 Deep Space 1 mission. A half year after the space craft launched, a bit of Lisp code was going to control the spacecraft for two days while conducting a sequence of experiments. Unfortunately, a subtle race condition in the code had escaped detection during ground testing and was already in space. When the bug manifested in the wild–100 million miles away from Earth–the team was able to diagnose and fix the running code, allowing the experiments to complete.

One of the programmers described it as follows:

Debugging a program running on a $100M piece of hardware that is 100 million miles away is an interesting experience. Having a read-eval-print loop running on the spacecraft proved invaluable in finding and fixing the problem.

Support FSF (Free Software Foundation)

I donate money to very few organisations / foundations. Actually only two:

1. The Salvation Army

2. The Free Software Foundation

Give a helping hand to see all the wonderful free software evolve and crush the overpriced  commercial crap, that so many “depend” on these days. Click my FSF member button that links to FSF’s donation page and choose an amount to donate.

IBM / Lenovo Thinkpad Trackpoint Scroll

If tou, like me, use a thinkpad, and are addicted to the efficiency gained by not having to move your hands away from the keyboard to scroll a page, or use the cumbersom scrollbars on webpages and other apps, you’d like to know how to configure this behavior in Linux, right?

The advent of Udev and HAL in modern Linux distributions makes changes to xorg.conf pretty much obsolete. Instead you interface with the hardware through different configuration files in HAL and Udev, respectively.

If you’re using a modern distribution, you can follow this:

To enable vertical scrolling with the middle trackpoint button, create the file /etc/hal/fdi/policy/mouse-wheel.fdi as root with the following content:

<match key=”info.product” string=”TPPS/2 IBM TrackPoint”>

<merge key=”input.x11_options.EmulateWheel” type=”string”>true</merge>

<merge key=”input.x11_options.EmulateWheelButton” type=”string”>2</merge>

<merge key=”input.x11_options.YAxisMapping” type=”string”>4 5</merge>

<merge key=”input.x11_options.XAxisMapping” type=”string”>6 7</merge>

<merge key=”input.x11_options.Emulate3Buttons” type=”string”>true</merge>

<merge key=”input.x11_options.EmulateWheelTimeout” type=”string”>200</merge>

</match>

Do a reboot, and your Trackpoint should work as expected.

You might also want to disable the trackpad (the one that always annoys you when writing, or laying on the couch with the ThinkPad in an upright position), so that when you work, you use either the trackpoint only, or an external mouse via USB or the likes.

If you are using Gnome, you could fine-tune the trackpoint with an application like this:

http://tpctl.sourceforge.net/configure-trackpoint.html

Houdini – Still the underdog? No! Never has been.

Well, to put it right: NO. Not in a million miles. Houdini is an expensive tool for creating expensive solutions. Mostly.

But what other company would you list that offers the prime product for 99$, without time restrictions and rebates to the next major release?
None. Go ahead and check, I’ve already did.

And as important for refugees from the Softimage XSI camp (I also have a license for XSI 7), that will rather sleep on pin-needles than “upgrade” to the 7.5 release that doesn’t actually do anything other than brand your purchase as Autodesk (hereafter “the mob”) and throwing in an improvement to the UV Unwrapping functions in XSI, that most of the people I know have outsourced to either Blender (*nix guys) or one of the “Windows Only” software packages, that floats around.

Even in times of trouble, I must insist that for a measly amount of 99$ you get access to almost every component of Houdini Master, including fluid effects, particle systems, crowd simulation, and, well anything you would ever want for a unlimited period of time.

Myself has been trying out the Beta of Houdini 10 (goes stable in late april 09) and I can’t push this enough: This is the creme de’la creme of 3D packages around. It has a steep, and I mean STEEP learning curve, but once you get it, you can do what ever your heart desires.
All the talk about POP’s and CHOP’s wil be second nature.

The one limit you get when “converting” to Houdini Apprentice HD, is that you are limited to rendering (without watermark) up until HD resolution, and that goes for me. Another thing is that you will not get the benefit from network rendering or exporting to other renderers than Houdini’s native renderer, called Mantra.

Being a Buddhist, this is no boundary for me. Mantra is a micro polygon renderer that is definitely a world class renderer when it comes to quality.
Just learn it, and you won’t miss a thing. (except that you might miss some off Mantra’s features in your previous renderer.) Here comes stereoscopic rendering, micro polygon rendering, and heaps of cool abilities, that you would have a hard time getting elsewhere without paying a nice amount of dollars, for say a Renderman renderer. (The commercial Houdini, off course exports and is capable of using external renderers as well). But for 99 bucks, you will not find a better deal. I Promisio.

Go for it! Download a completely free and not time restricted Apprentice edition or go for the no-watermark, up until HD resolution Apprentice HD from:

Just as a sidekick, I would like to mention that Houdini runs on Windows, Linux and OS X…

http://www.sidefx.com

Stereo Rendering with Maya on Linux (OpenGL)

Many folks out there get’s a message like: Warning: Unable to get OpenGL visual with a stereo buffer, trying without //.

Yes that is annoying. But, guess what? It is easy to fix. As long as your graphics card supports it, all you have to do is to add these lines to the “Device” section of your Xorg.conf file:

Driver "nvidia"
Option "AllowDFPStereo" "true"
Option "Stereo" "3"


Also, you can’t work with two hats on at the same time, so in order for this to work, you HAVE to disable the composite extension.
Many people don’t know that Xorg has changed a lot lately, so now you must rather exclude functionality you don’t want, as opposed to before, when every module had to be loaded in the “Module” sections. All you need to load is:

Section "Module"
Load "glx"
EndSection


All the other extensions will be autoprobed by Xorg and the defined driver in the “Device” section.
This brings us to the point. You must disable unwanted extensions, or they will get loaded by default. If you don’t take my word for it, check your Xorg log file.
This includes basic loading of fonts as well.

So, in the “Extensions” section of xorg.conf, MAKE SURE to have:

Section "Extensions"
Option "Composite" "false"
EndSection

If it does not exist, write it.

Now you should see that the driver includes support for stereo buffer rendering, and no more error messages while rendering in Maya.
My Nvidia Controlpanel now looks like this: (after restarting the X server, or rebooting) Also, to be on the safe side, delete the .nvidia-settings-rc file in your home directory with:

cd
rm .nvidia-settings-rc


Notice the stere column in the nvidia controlpanel:

Nvidia with stereo support