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Google earth on porteus1.2 x64 with nVidia

Posted: 13 Aug 2012, 19:15
by sams
I've got Google earth 6.2 running perfect on Porteus 1.2 64 bit with the latest nVidia drivers. Since I found this trickier than expected I write this howto. Googleearth is a 32 bit application so it needs some special attention on 64 bit porteus. The nVidia x64 drivers on Porteus site are not compiled with 32 bit support, so I downloaded the latest driver from nVidia and compiled it myself; the build script asks if you want to additionally build the 32 bit compatible drivers and you must answer in the affirmative and then make your module with the result. I mostly just use the xorg.conf file that nVidia generated but I add a line to the device section that enables the backlight to be dimmed via software control or buttons:

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Section "Device"
    Identifier     "Card0"
    Driver         "nvidia"
    Option         "RegistryDwords" "EnableBrightnessControl=1"
EndSection
Here's the modules required to make googleearth work:

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$ pwd
/media/toshPlap/porteus/modules/eaarth

$ ls
compat32-libraries-1.1.02_13.37-x86_64-2ftm.xzm  
earthFontsT2.xzm  
earthLatest.xzm  
mesa32.xzm
The compatLibraries are from the porteus site. The fonts here are pruned from this module: http://www.mediafire.com/?q4jr22ecb0j016s , mentioned here: http://forum.porteus.org/viewtopic.php?f=51&t=586 . Googleearth seems to be crazy sensitive to fonts and (though I use other fonts in porteus) I haven't been able to get earth working with fonts other than from this exact list... My Google earth module was created from the 64 bit RPM download @ google, I didn't have any success with the .deb version (and didn't investigate the problem). The mesa32 module is from the slackware 13.37 package, you can find it via pkgs.org if you don't know another way.

The only other additional module to make this work is here:

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sams@porteus:/media/pmedia/porteus/optional
$ ls nV*
nVidia-304.32-x86_64_32compat01a.xzm
This driver is automatically invoked by the booter via the 'vga_detect' cheatcode.

I have NOT been able to get googleearth working 100% yet with Intel video drivers. Everything works except the earth surface textures are missing (black) so you see roads and borders rendered on an empty black earth. I don't know the problem but I suspect that the Intel video drivers do not have proper 32 bit compatibility.

[Edit:] One more thing, one of the modules has to include a softlink for LSB compatibility, ie:

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ln -sf /lib/ld-linux.so.2 /lib/ld-lsb.so.3
cheers!

Re: Google earth on porteus1.2 x64 with nVidia

Posted: 08 Dec 2012, 08:26
by sams
Sadly, while this howto describes a working setup on porteus1.2-x64, I have not been able to get google-earth working on the porteus1.2update-x64.

I tried nVidia driver version 304.37 (which is what I have working on the original porteus1.2-x64) and driver 310.19 and some versions in between. No luck with porteus1.2update-x64.

It's possible that the problem is some omission of mine (I may test that theory by trying to make a working driver again with old porteus) but my current guess is that running 32 bit google earth on porteus x64 is fragile, broken on the latest kernel, and ill-advised on a 64 bit setup. YMMV.

My present workaround is to keep an old version of porteus x64 with working google-earth and another porteus with the current kernel. Yuck. I expect I might also try 32 bit porteus; 32 bit compatibility has to be easier there.