How to make StarOffice 3.1 work on Lxrun

Written by Robert Lipe and edited by Ron Record

Get and install lxrun 0.8.8 or higher. Get and install ftp://dontask.caltech.edu/pub/lxrun/linux-libs/linuxlibs.tar.gz

Alternately, you can ala carte' the libs, but this package requires many relatively obscure ones. If you place any value on your time (even with a slow link) you'll find that using the above library package (and thanking Ron Record and Steve Ginsburg for making it available) productive.

# mount /dev/cd0 /mnt

The first obstacle is to get RPM running under the emulated environment. We decide instead to circumvent this obstacle instead of tackling it. StarOffice comes with an RPM package that contains a utility to convert an RPM to a cpio image. Since the StarOffice package is well-contained in a single directory (/opt/StarOffice-3.1) it's "safe" to just extract everything.

$ cd /mnt/rpm
$ cp rpm* /tmp
$ cp /tmp
$ gzcat  rpm-2.2.6-1.i386.cpio.gz | cpio -ivd usr/bin/rpm2cpio
$ lxrun usr/bin/rpm2cpio < /mnt/*common* | (cd / ; cpio -ivd)
$ lxrun usr/bin/rpm2cpio < /mnt/*e-english* | (cd / ; cpio -ivd)
$ lxrun usr/bin/rpm2cpio < /mnt/*statbin* | (cd / ; cpio -ivd)
$ cd $LINUX_ROOT
$ mkdir -p usr/X11R6/lib/X11
$ ln -s /usr/lib/X11/XKeysymDB usr/X11R6/lib/X11

You want the statbin images above unless you have a compatible Linux(R) Motif. I didn't. If you do, good luck.

If you want to try to run the setup scripts, start with this patch to /opt/StarOffice-3.1/setup. Personally, I never found them necessary or useful. Besides, it drops core, and I didn't feel like disassembling it to find why. :-) Dink with setup program if you like.

Ultimately, the primary purpose of setup is to emit a shell script that should be sourced from your shell. I ran it on rjlinux, then modified it slightly for the lxrun environment. You may have to do the same. You could just start with mine.

*** setup_ Mon Oct 20 22:49:40 1997
--- setup Mon Oct 20 22:51:13 1997
***************
*** 46,51 ****
                        echo your hardware is not supported
                        exit 1;;
                esac;;
        *)
                echo this UNIX version is not supported
                exit 1;;
--- 46,60 ----
                        echo your hardware is not supported
                        exit 1;;
                esac;;
+       SCO_SV)
+               case `uname -m` in
+                       i?86)
+                               lxrun ${pfad:='.'}/linux-x86/bin/$name;;
+                       *)
+                       echo your hardware is not supported
+                       exit 1;;
+               esac;;
+
        *)
                echo this UNIX version is not supported
                exit 1;;



sd_inst=/opt/StarOffice-3.1
sd_fonts=$sd_inst/fonts

case `uname -s` in
	SunOS)
		case `uname -r` in
			5.[4-5])
				case `uname -p` in
					sparc*)
						sd_plat='solaris-sparc'
						;;
					i?86)
						sd_plat='solaris-x86'
						;;
					ppc)
						sd_plat='solaris-powerpc'
						;;
				esac
				;;
		esac
		;;
	SINIX*)
		case `uname -r` in
			5.4*)
				case `uname -p` in
					R4000)
						sd_plat='sinix-mips'
						;;
				esac
				;;
		esac
		;;
	Linux|SCO_SV)
				case `uname -m` in
					i?86)
						sd_plat='linux-x86'
						;;
				esac
		;;
esac

PATH=$sd_inst/${sd_plat:=.}/bin:$PATH
LD_LIBRARY_PATH=$sd_inst/$sd_plat/lib:$LD_LIBRARY_PATH
XPPATH=$sd_inst/xp3
HELPPATH=$sd_inst/modules
XENVIRONMENT=$sd_inst/starview.xres
SVFONTPATH=$sd_fonts/75dpi:$sd_fonts/75dpi/bdf:$sd_fonts/type1
SVHOME=/home/robertl/star
# LANG=us
unset sd_inst sd_fonts sd_plat
export PATH LD_LIBRARY_PATH XPPATH HELPPATH XENVIRONMENT SVFONTPATH SVHOME LANG

Now, if you look in /opt/StarOffice-3.1/linux-x86/bin you will find scalc3, schare3, sdraw3, simage3, smath3, and swriter3. I have successfully started all six application simultaneously. Yes, my 48Mb system was in the hole for available memory, though it worked just groovy.

You may wish to configure lxfront for these binaries. See that doco for more info.

RANDOM NOTES:

I don't know *what* Star is doing when any of the X clients start, but they all completely freeze the native X server on my system (dual P100 running 5.0.4c) for about 30 seconds while they start. After that, X performance is fine.

If you have compiled lxrun with tracing while running these, you're in for a treat. These are large, complicated programs and will generate dozens of megabytes of log files just during startup.

Don't ask me StarOffice questions. My grand total of experience with them was beating on lxrun until they booted, spending about sixty seconds in each to give them the acid test. "Hey, I can type numbers in these rows and columns. Yep, looks like a spreadsheet allright."

Some additional training is likely necessary to teach Star to build pipes to SCO's lp systems. I *think* (actually, I pray) that lxrun will actually get pipes between emulated and native binaries right as a result of much bludgeoning that I and others have done in the 0.8.7 and 0.8.8 families.

I have no idea how to work out the licensing issues on this. It claims that it's free for non-commercial use, but my spin on this is that if you're going to use it in a commercial environment, you should buy the commercial LINUX license and complain that a native version should be created. All the whining in the world about wanting applications won't garner nearly the attention of a large number of Purchase Orders coming through their system that say "Operating System: OpenServer" written in. Money talks. If you like the program, pay the people to get your vote in.

(R) Linux is a trademark or registered trademark of Linus Torvalds in Australia, Germany, Japan, the United States, and other countries.