Linux Ideas - Just the Desktop

First, I am not promoting the Linux operating system or any of its distributions. Secondly, in future posts, I just going to talk about how beginning to advanced Linux users can create a unique and appealing desktop of the true gospel of Jesus Christ. I will share how I accomplished this task using the Ubuntu distribution. I will also discuss how to install windows church oriented software to Ubuntu.

Did you test also MLS with wine?

marianomarini wrote:Did you test also MLS with wine?

I have not tested MLS with wine. However, wine will only install one Windows .exe (program) at a time; therefore, wine will not work because MLS requires that you install "other" software for it to run.

So, when you say "church oriented software", what do you mean? Alternate soft for Linux?

I am sorry I meant KJV of the Bible verse Windows software I install using Wine. I never have found the scriptures or any other kind of gospel software for the Linux. I use MLS as second assistant to my High Priest group leader and I really do not think you can install it with Wine. I think I made a little mistake posting here. Thank you for your understanding.

davidwolsen wrote:I use MLS as second assistant to my High Priest group leader and I really do not think you can install it with Wine.

Testing would be problematic at best. I don't think you could do much except see if it works with the test data without violating church policies on not using ward data on personal machines. Unfortunately the test data would not allow you to test and see if you could send/receive or download patches. Bottom line, I don't think that's a project suitable for the community.

However, I think davidwolsen point is to create a LDS theme for personal use where there's no problems with church policy.

I use Ubuntu on my laptop and it work fine with almost all church related soft, both proprietary or free. So I was wondering to what davidwolsen really mean.

RussellHltn wrote:Testing would be problematic at best. I don't think you could do much except see if it works with the test data without violating church policies on not using ward data on personal machines. Unfortunately the test data would not allow you to test and see if you could send/receive or download patches. Bottom line, I don't think that's a project suitable for the community.

However, I think davidwolsen point is to create a LDS theme for personal use where there's no problems with church policy.

I have tested MLS (3.3.1) under Wine (1.2.2). Before the 3.3.1 release there were a number of problems that caused MLS to not run well under wine. Currently, the 3.3.1 release seems to run without any of those previous problems and installs without any difficulties.

I am not a software developer but isn't MLS a java based program? If so, it would be trivial to implement MLS on any operating system.

I think the idea of Linux based church software is very appealing. The church wouldn't even have to create some type of customized distro like Sabily (Islamic Ubuntu). All I would want would be a church repository from which I could access church software like scriptures etc.

mdyoung wrote:I have tested MLS (3.3.1) under Wine (1.2.2). Before the 3.3.1 release there were a number of problems that caused MLS to not run well under wine. Currently, the 3.3.1 release seems to run without any of those previous problems and installs without any difficulties.

So how were you able to fully test MLS on a non-Church computer without violating Church policies? As Russell stated there is more to the full functionality of MLS that is not testable on an installation on a non-administrative computer. The Send/Receive function depends on another program, UDX. How were you able to test that program? Or rather how were you able to test whether the Send/Receive functionality worked?

That is a good point. I used the test data which avoids violating church policy.

11. Ensure that priesthood leaders and clerks do
not install Church record-keeping software
on their home computers, except for training
purposes using test data, and that they do not
reverse-engineer record-keeping software
code.

It seems that the rules where somewhat more stringent between 2005 and 2009, however as of the 2009 Policies and Guidelines for Computers Used by Clerks for Church Record Keeping it is okay to install MLS on personal computers for training purposes (and I am a Ward Clerk).

From Installing MLS (another forum post) I read that,

When MLS normally does a Send/Receive, it uses a Windows-specific communication component (Afaria). This makes MLS run only on Windows at this point, even though the rest of it is Java and so would probably run on Linux and other platforms.

However, if you are running MLS with test data (ward #108 or stake #2224445), MLS does not actually do any transmission when you select the Send/Receive option. Rather it simulates the Send/Receive and creates a couple of messages in the MLS message list. Thus the Afaria client is not actually used when you are using the test data, so that dependency is not an obstacle to running under Linux if you only want to use test data.

The installation program for MLS does install the Afaria client, so I imagine you would get some errors if you tried to run the install on a non-Windows platform, and thus the current packaging of MLS does depend on Windows.

I wasn't aware that the test data "send receive" is a simulated transmission which doesn't actually communicate with church HQ, which is good to know since newer audit forms come down via the "send receive" function and without it you are stuck with the older audit forms unless you have access to a unit's machine.

It is interesting that you don't get any errors when installing MLS on a non-Windows machine, though if I were to try again I would now pay closer attention to the terminal to ensure that there aren't any silent errors. I do wonder if Afaria (or other communications clients like UDX) is being installed and if it would work though obviously I shouldn't and won't test that since it requires actual data.

Anyway, what I had intended for the post was that MLS, at least the part which doesn't depend on the communication software like Afaria, is working better then it had before the 3.3 release.

And while I find it interesting to speculate on what implementing Linux might be like, I generally agree with WelchTC who said in MLS=Windows!,

While I think that it is nice to find the advantages and disadvantages of different solutions, let's leave this topic for our IT department to handle. Different operating systems tend to be polarizing and debating the merits of the different OS's is outside the scope of this website.

What I personally think would be very interesting is what the original poster had in mind and that is customizing your desktop environment to reflect your needs as a member. I think the Church could provide a PPA repository with software not unlike what it provides for mobile devices like the iphone and android smart phones. I would be very interested in having applications like "Gospel Library" and especially "LDS Tools" available in the desktop environment though I understand the real advantages of these tools is having them on the go.

I haven't tried this yet, but you could try installing "LDS View" through wine and that would provide you a very robust "Gospel Library" like feature for Linux.

I think a really good question is what would you want to have on your computer to help in your church service and personal religious life that is provided on Windows and not on Linux?

What's LDS View?

"LDS View" is basically the Gospel Library app for windows mobile devices 5.x and 6.x. It also has a desktop client.
Here is the windows mobile installation instructions from the lds.org mobile app site.

I had some difficulty with library files for the scriptures. I couldn't make them install correctly on my windows mobile device.

You can also look here at the BYU site for the desktop client and the desktop based installation client for windows mobile.
Again, I had some problems with the mobile client because I couldn't find where it installs the *.cab files for the 5.x and 6.x windows mobile editions.
You can find all of the files for installation without the clients by going here which is the cached google page (so it might not last very long) but all the files here worked excellently for me.

Oh, I see. Thank a lot.

I, too, am running the latest MLS under Wine and it is just great! My current purpose, besides seeing if it works at all (install was perfect), is to be able to create some training materials, or respond to others' questions on how to do something in MLS without driving into the Stake Center to use the real version of MLS. Using the test data version is just fine for these purposes and is running faster within wine than it does back in the office anyway. Three cheers to the devs for any changes made to help with this setup.

As mentioned previously, obviously I am not using send/receive, though does that use Afaria if using a non-modem connection? I'll assume so but don't know that to be the case.

AB

It would be great if CHQ could give a connection to a "test unit" database.
A simple test connection process could be: Receive data (make some changes), Send changes, Receive for confirmation.
From server side, database could be reset to starting data after every send!

I am a user of Linux. My favourite distrobution is Linux Mint. However, apart from GRAMPS, there is nothing really suitable for the Linux desktop. I know that the Church has the New FamilySearch website, but I find it a bit "clunky" to use. :(I use a dual boot operating system, Linux and Windows. For Windows, I use RootsMagic. But I have this love affair with Linux. It's just a resource friendly and robust, and very use operating system. I'm not a Linux programmer, and sometimes battle with the CUI. Maybe there is a Linux geek who is a Church member that do something in programming a open source genealogical program suited for the LDS members.

"apart from GRAMPS"?
What do you mean with "genealogical program suited for LDS members"?
GRAMPS has, indeed, a section for LDS member.
Which are the features in RootsMagic that make it preferable to GRAMPS? (From an LDS point of view). Personal preferences are obviously never satified 100%.

yo uso lds view y realmente no me funciona bien ya que solo me deja ver libro de mormón, doctrina y convenios, perla de gran precio y guía de estudio para las escrituras, por esa razón ando buscando como obtener la aplicación de biblioteca del evangelio para ver si se puede instalar con wine, pero hasta el momento la iglesia tiene bien protegida la aplicación de gospel librery y aun sigo buscando tal vez alguien a logrado extraer la aplicación de la tienda de windows.