[PD] auto login + auto run pd on linux

[Marc Lavallée]

On Thu, Jan 29, 2004 at 05:48:51PM +0100, CK wrote:
> > Any idea how to sort out this :
> > i need to start pd as root (because of parapin) automatically on boot,
>
> I'm not familiar with parapin but if it's /dev/lp* based a simple chmod
> should do the trick. Is this an external you are using ? which one ?

I programmed the parapin external, which is based on the parapin 
library; here's an excerpt of its documentation:
   Programs using Parapin must be running as root when they are
   initialized. Initialization of the library will fail if the process is
   owned by any user other than the super-user because Parapin has to
   request the right to write directly to hardware I/O registers using
   the ioperm function. The security-conscious programmer is encouraged
   to drop root privileges using setuid after a successful call to
   pin_init_user.

I did not program the external securely. 
Running as root is mandatory (sudo works for this purpose),
and chmoding the device would not give root permissions to parapin.

> > but then there is a patch with some controlls for normal user that i want 
> > to run as user. To start another Pd is not a good way.
>
> hmmm .... I guess if you insist on having one pd, started as a user
> you will have to install it suid and patch the source to allow realtime
> scheduling _and_ parport access.

I suggess to start your PD application using sudo, with the -nogui option,
and program some sort of fullscreen GUI with anything that can communicate
with PD. You can use a flash frontend with mozilla in kiosk mode under the
ratpoison window manager. The kdm session manager allows to start X
automatically at startup. Ming is good to create dynamic flash interfaces.

http://www.akustische-kunst.org/puredata/flash/
http://kiosk.mozdev.org/
http://ratpoison.sf.net/
http://docs.kde.org/en/3.1/kdebase/kdm/
http://www.opaque.net/ming/

I hope this helps

(Gee, thats a very good subject for the next pd meeting in Montréal...)
--
Marc