BeTips.net

I’m assuming your internal network is configured to use TCP/IP. If not, it will need to be.
You’ll need to know the IP address, hostname, and printer share name of the (Windows) machine that the printer is connected to, the username and password for the printer, if any, and the workgroup name. Naturally, the printer must also be one that BeOS is compatible with (Epson, etc).
In my case, the details are as follows:

    IP address of computer with printer: 192.168.0.1
    Computer name: SERVER
    Printer share name: EPSON
    Workgroup name: WORKGROUP
    Username: {none}
    Password: {none}
    

Here’s the step-by-step.

1. Launch a Terminal window.
2. Create a directory for printer files – I created /epson … e.g.

   mkdir /epson

3. Enter the following command.

   cifsmount -I 192.168.0.1 -W WORKGROUP -d \\SERVER\EPSON "" "" /epson

   Breaking that down;
   -I 192.168.0.1 tells it that the IP address of the machine with the printer is 192.168.0.1
   -W WORKGROUP tells it the workgroup name
   -d tells it to display debug output (during the mount only) – useful so you can see what it did
   \\SERVER\EPSON is the server/share name in the correct format „“ „“ is the username & password (see below)
   /epson is the mount point in BeOS. You’ll see why this is needed shortly.
   Note: „“ „“ is username & password. Most of the time with shared Windows printers, there is no username, just a password, so for example if your password was „bunny“ then the above command would read

   cifsmount -I 192.168.0.1 -W WORKGROUP -d \\SERVER\EPSON "" "bunny" /epson

   You can’t just leave these parameters out – if there is no password then you must use „“ „“ – otherwise it won’t work.

4. If that worked, you’ll see in the debug output (that’s what -d does) that the share was mounted correctly. If not, check all the details, check that you can ping the computer, etc.
5. Next, we need to create a printer in BeOS. Go to Preferences | Printers | Add. When it asks where the printer is connected, select „Print to file“. I think the rest should be self-evident. Probably the most crucial thing is to make sure you select the correct printer type.
6. Now you’re ready to print. Launch the application you wish to print from. Load the document and print it. You will eventually be prompted for a filename to save to. Now, you must navigate to the „mount point“ you selected above. This is where it gets curious. On my system, there is no /epson directory, the share is listed as /SERVER/EPSON – weird. Anyway, enter that directory – it should be blank. Now specify a filename, and click Save. The filename is irrelevant.
7. It should now print!

How does it work? Pretty simple. When you write a file to this directory, it’s sent, byte-for-byte, to the share, which in this case is the printer. So really you’re just writing bytes directly from BeOS to the printer, via TCP/IP.
It’s worth noting that using exactly the same procedure, you can mount any Windows share. You just change the share name and mount point. But when you navigate to the mount point, you can see (and read and write) the files on the shared volume.
To make sure your machine stays permanently configured for printing on this network add the mkdir and cifsmount commands above to /boot/home/config/boot/UserBootscript.

If you open any windows large or full-screen, portions of them may obscure access to the Deskbar, depending where you keep it on screen. If you’d like the Deskbar to be revealed automatically when you roll the mouse over it, install Massimiliano Origgi’s WorkspaceSwitcher. The program offers several options that let you control how the Deskbar should behave on mouseover.

For a variety of reasons, R5’s MediaPlayer plays some videos haltingly. There is however, a workaround. First, make sure you have the development tools installed. If you have BeOS Pro edition, launch a Terminal and type:

cd /boot/optional/sample-code/media_kit/MediaFile/mplay/
make

If you use Personal Edition, grab mplay from ftp://ftp.be.com/pu b/samples/media_kit/MediaFile.zip, unpack, and run make.
This will make a much more simple media player called „mplay“. Although it is not nearly as full featured as the full MediaPlayer, it does not skip video at all. To open videos, simply right click them, scroll to „Open With…“ then select mplay.
What would be really nice would be if some nice developer would hack mplay a bit and add some more features, and bring it up to speed with the full MediaPlayer….
[Editor’s note: mplay does not appear to work with DV footage captured from video cameras.]

When editing video with Adamation’s personalStud io, you’ll find that the default transition effect between any two clips is a 2-second blend. The effect is handsome, but if you’d like the more standard jumpcut to be your default transition, click the small checkmark icon in the upper left-middle of the ps interface and set the default transition length to zero. Regardless what transition effect is currently in use, you’ll get a jump cut, since the custom transition will no have no length.
If you want to keep using a transition between clips but don’t want to use the blend, go to the Effects tab and right-click any effect. Select „Make Default Transition“ from the context menu.

The popular Web server Robin Hood’s rhdaemon has trouble staying in the LISTEN state if you restart networking or if you are on a DHCP network and have rhdaemon launch automatically upon startup somehow.
Add the following lines to the end of /boot/beos/system/boot/Netscript :

kill rhdaemon
sleep 7
start home/config/bin/rhdaemon -E

(of course you’ll want to substitute the actual path to rhdaemon on your system).
This launches rhdaemon after the net_server has settled down. If sleeping for 7 seconds before launching rhdaemon does not work then increase that value. Now your web server will not die each time you restart networking!

After editing your .profile or UserSetupEnvironment, you need to „source“ or basically „re-read“ the file’s contents into memory in order for the changes to take effect. I’m lazy, and „source“ is 5 letters too many. Just type:

. .profile

(or . ~/.profile if you are not in your home dir)
instead of

source .profile

Isn’t that much better? ; ^ )

Although NetPositive allows you to reject cookies, there are some sites that won’t give you access unless you accept their cookies.
If you allow NetPositive to accept cookies, and delete them later (script follows), then a new cookie will be issued each time, allowing you access, but making the site unable to track you.
Add these lines to the end of ~/config/etc/ppp-script

: ----begin----
if test ${1} = "up"
then
rm -f /boot/home/config/settings/NetPositive/NetCache/Cookies
rm -f /boot/home/config/settings/Opera/cookies.dat
fi
: ----end----

I can’t find any controls in Opera beta 7 to manage cookies, but this tip works for those users too.

Most people know that BeOS uses standard TrueType fonts, but few realize that BeOS can also use some PostScript fonts. This is documented in the User’s Guide and in the BeOS Bible, but in case you missed it, here’s a quote from the BeOS Bible:

As of R4, BeOS is also able to utilize PostScript fonts as well as TrueType, albeit with some limitations. BeOS is capable of recognizing only PostScript fonts created with standard Macintosh Roman encoding (these are the most common type available). If you need to use other PostScript fonts, you’ll need to represent them with the „Standard Macintosh Roman“ code with the same index values as the characters you want to use. In other words, BeOS will not properly translate from UTF-8 into whatever font encoding you happen to have enabled, so you’ll need to perform the translation manually. To add PostScript fonts to your system, drop them in /boot/home/config/fonts/psfonts and use the Fonts preferences panel to rescan the font cache.

To better distinguish between multiple tracks on the 3dmiX grid, select a track so it becomes opaque. Now hold down your primary modifier key (Alt by default) and drag up and down. The base of the track should expand, making that track stand out visually. This is especially useful in a crowded 3dmiX scene with particles and rotation. Some tracks will allow you set the base dimension smaller as well, though it doesn’t seem to work for all of them. You’ll notice that the one one on the far left has a base with negative values…

Click for full-size version.

With the integrated MP3 playback capabilities in BeOS 5, you no longer have to find or create WAV or AIFF tracks for your system sounds — you can use any MP3 file on your hard drive for the startup sound, system beep, or new e-mail notification.
All system sounds are configured through the Sounds preferences panel.