[Pan-users] Re: Two instances of PAN

[Duncan]

Rick Barry <address@hidden>
posted address@hidden, excerpted below, on 
Sun, 09 Nov 2008 05:51:51 -0800:

>> OK, let's get real basic, then.
>> 
>> 1. home directory?
> 
> /home/rick
> 
>> 2. [Pan instance names]
> 
> Giga and Astra (after the servers I'll be using for each one)

Before we get carried away with the below, you do know you can simply 
setup separate servers for each, in the same pan instance, right?  If a 
group exists on both servers, pan would then download from both, unless 
you set one as a backup server instead of both as primary servers.  If a 
group exists on only one server, it would automatically download from 
there.  You'd have a single combined group list, however, and a single 
set of settings that applied to both.  That may not be what you want.  If 
so, continue with the below.  If a single setup for both is fine, ignore 
the below and ask if you need to how to set up the second server, instead.

>> 3.  Do you already have a bin dir in your home dir, ~/bin?
> 
> No, it resides in the file system at apparently at the same level as
> home.

That's the system bin dir.  Actually, there's /bin and /usr/bin.  I was 
wondering if you had one just for your user.  Apparently not.  We'll make 
one.

>> 4. Start with [duplicate] instances, or second one from scratch?
> 
> I'm not quite sure what you mean by the starting with the same thing. I
> don't want the 2 set ups to share anything for downloads and the groups
> accessed won't be the same either, if that helps answer the question.

Yes, perfect. =:^)

OK, let's see:

1. Create a new subdirectory /home/rick/bin

This will be for user specific, not system-wide, scripts.  We'll put our 
two pan starter scripts there, but you can put others there later if you 
want.  It's not just for pan scripts, IOW.

You can do this from your file manager of choice, or use the bash 
commands below in a terminal window (assuming bash as your shell, it will 
be unless you've changed it):


cd /home/rick
mkdir bin

2. Create a new subdirectory /home/rick/pan

This will hold the data for both pan instances.

Bash commands:
cd /home/rick
mkdir pan

3. Create two subdirs of that pan dir:

/home/rick/pan/astra
/home/rick/pan/giga

Obviously, one for each of the instances.

Bash commands:
cd /home/rick/pan
mkdir giga
mkdir astra

4. Make sure pan isn't running from here to step 10.

5. Optional: If you want to start with your existing instance as one of 
the new ones, move everything from the (normally hidden) /home/rick/.pan2 
location it should be in right now, to the appropriate one.

This assuming you want to keep what exists now as giga, change the giga 
to astra if you want to keep the existing instance as astra, instead.

Bash commands:
cd /home/rick
mv .pan2/* pan/giga/

6. Now, create the following files and save them in the bin dir we 
created above.  I'll assume you know how to use a text editor for this 
step: 

/home/rick/bin/pan.astra should contain three lines:

#!/bin/bash
export PAN_HOME=/home/rick/pan/astra
exec pan $*

/home/rick/bin/pan.giga should contain the same lines,
but of course with astra replaced by giga, so:

#!/bin/bash
export PAN_HOME=/home/rick/pan/giga
exec pan $*

7. Set those new scripts executable.

Bash commands:
chmod u+x /home/rick/bin/pan.astra
chmod u+x /home/rick/bin/pan.giga

8. Remove the old pan dir, ~/.pan2

Bash commands:
rmdir -i /home/rick/.pan2

9. Edit /home/rick/.bashrc to add your user's bin dir to your executable 
search path.

This bit should work for most distributions, but might not for some if 
they're setup to use a different mechanism for this.  There's a way 
around it if it doesn't work, but it'll mean more typing each time you 
start one of the instances.

Again, I'll assume you know how to use a text editor.  Note that the 
leading dot on .bashrc means it's normally hidden, so you may have to 
type it into your editor's open dialog directly.

In this file, look for a line starting with PATH= .  It'll probably look 
something like this, but maybe longer, with other directories as well:

PATH="/usr/bin:/bin/:/opt/bin"

If you find such a line, add the bin dir we created above, 
/home/rick/bin, separating it from the other dirs with a colon (:) as 
necessary.  Thus, if the line looked like the example I used above, it 
would be something like this after editing:

PATH="/usr/bin:/bin:/opt/bin:/home/rick/bin"

If there's no path line, create one that looks like this:

PATH="$PATH:/home/rick/bin"

If there's no such file, you can try creating it and adding the line with 
the $PATH element as above.

10. Logout and back in.

>> We'll start with that.

Indeed.

You should be setup now for two separate pan instances.  Don't start pan 
from the old launcher any more since that will create a new default 
instance in the default ~/.pan2 location.  Instead, either from a 
terminal window or from your environment's open dialog, type in the 
command to start the instance you want:

If step #9 worked, or if you're lucky even if it didn't, the following 
commands should work:

pan.giga  (or)
pan.astra

Regardless of whether step #9 worked or not, you should be able to use 
the full path version, like so:

/home/rick/bin/pan.giga  (or)
/home/rick/bin/pan.astra

If you want you can run both instances at the same time.  The settings 
will be totally separate so they shouldn't interfere with each other.  
Just don't get confused which one you're in, if you do. =:^)

Once you've tested those, you can if you like setup menu entries for each 
of them and delete pan's now unused original menu entry.  Unless it's 
KDE, however, you'll need to find someone else to tell you how to do 
that, as I only know how to do it with KDE here, not GNOME or XFCE or any 
of the other window managers.  However, you don't have to.  You can 
always continue launching your pan sessions from the open dialog or 
terminal window, if you like.

If that doesn't work, maybe if you tell me how far you got...  Or, check 
in your area for a LUG, Linux User's Group.  There's nothing like someone 
who's actually there to show you in person. =:^)  (Of course, if you 
happen to be in the Phoenix Arizona area, where I am...)

-- 
Duncan - List replies preferred.   No HTML msgs.
"Every nonfree program has a lord, a master --
and if you use the program, he is your master."  Richard Stallman