Eclipse Oxygen.1 on MacOS fails at startup with Java 9 as system default

I’m a few days late to the Java 9 party, but installing Eclipse Oxygen after installing Java 9 on MacOS, I get this:

Looking in the .log file:

java.lang.NoClassDefFoundError: javax/annotation/PreDestroy
 at org.eclipse.e4.core.internal.di.InjectorImpl.disposed(InjectorImpl.java:450)
 at org.eclipse.e4.core.internal.di.Requestor.disposed(Requestor.java:156)
...snip...
Caused by: java.lang.ClassNotFoundException: javax.annotation.PreDestroy cannot be found by org.eclipse.e4.core.di_1.6.100.v20170421-1418
 at org.eclipse.osgi.internal.loader.BundleLoader.findClassInternal(BundleLoader.java:433)

Following instructions here, I added:

--add-modules=ALL-SYSTEM

Now Eclipse starts up, but adding Java 9 path on MacOS as /Library/Java/JavaVirtualMachines/jdk-9.jdk/Contents/Home, Eclipse doesn’t want to see this as a valid jdk:

Continuing to follow the instructions, installing the Java 9 Support plugin from:

https://marketplace.eclipse.org/content/java-9-support-oxygen/

This still didn’t help but pressing the ‘Search’ button finds the Java 9 install and adds it to the list, which is odd because it points to exactly the same path:

At this point, things are still not good, as the System Libraries are not picked up:

It looks like official support is coming in the 4.7.1a release due on 10/11/17. Maybe at this point it’s best to wait for the official release.

Downloading Proxmox Container images

Before you can create a LXC container on a Proxmox virtualized environment, you need to download the template images first from an available list. You need to pre-download the images first befoe you can create new containers from them in the web ui.

From the docs here, there steps are (while ssh’d into your Proxmox server):

Update catalog of available templates:

pveam update

List the available templates:

root@pve:~# pveam available

system          alpine-3.3-default_20160427_amd64.tar.xz

system          alpine-3.4-default_20161206_amd64.tar.xz

system          alpine-3.5-default_20170504_amd64.tar.xz

system          archlinux-base_20170704-1_amd64.tar.gz

system          centos-6-default_20161207_amd64.tar.xz

system          centos-7-default_20170504_amd64.tar.xz

system          debian-6.0-standard_6.0-7_amd64.tar.gz

system          debian-7.0-standard_7.11-1_amd64.tar.gz

system          debian-8.0-standard_8.7-1_amd64.tar.gz

system          debian-9.0-standard_9.0-2_amd64.tar.gz

system          fedora-24-default_20161207_amd64.tar.xz

system          fedora-25-default_20170316_amd64.tar.xz

system          gentoo-current-default_20170503_amd64.tar.xz

system          opensuse-42.2-default_20170406_amd64.tar.xz

system          ubuntu-12.04-standard_12.04-1_amd64.tar.gz

system          ubuntu-14.04-standard_14.04-1_amd64.tar.gz

system          ubuntu-16.04-standard_16.04-1_amd64.tar.gz

system          ubuntu-16.10-standard_16.10-1_amd64.tar.gz

system          ubuntu-17.04-standard_17.04-1_amd64.tar.gz

For each of the templates you wish to use, download using for example for Ubuntu 14.04:

pveam download local ubuntu-14.04-standard_14.04-1_amd64.tar.gz

Now from the web ui, you should be able to click the ‘Create CT’ button and pick from your available templates:

 

Amateur Radio CQ WW RTTY contest 9/22-9/23/17: 40m contacts using an end fed wire antenna at 5ft

I worked a few hours in the CQ WW RTTY contest today and logged 30 contacts so far, mostly on 20m, a few on 15m, and then this evening several on 40m.

For 20m and 15m I have homebrew wire dipoles in my attic at about 33ft above ground. They probably don’t work as well as they would at the same height outside in the clear, but I logged contacts (from Davis, CA – grid CM98dn) with Japan, Mexico, Chile, Uruguay, Hawaii, British Columbia, and across the US. I’ve worked my Worked All States (WAS) with these antennas, they’ve been working well for me so far.

I haven’t worked out a 40m dipole that will fit in my attic (without some serious bending back and forth), so for 40m and 80m I have a Maple Leaf 160-6m 60ft end fed, which runs along my backyard fence line. Now at about 5ft above ground a 40m antenna is far below it’s optimal height above ground (at least for a 40m dipole which should be 66ft above ground), and yet this antenna works. Does it work well? Probably not as well as an equivalent 40m dipole up at 66ft, but using this antenna this evening to work some RTTY contacts on 40m, I made 6 contacts all between 500 to 600 miles out to the East and South, and then one slightly further out, up to BC at about 700 miles.

I think at 5ft above ground this antenna probably qualifies as an NVIS antenna, but working contacts out to 700 miles is ok for what I’d consider a compromise antenna, or at least with a compromised installation. Or am I misunderstanding how these end feds work?

River City ARCS weekly SSTV Net 8/30/17 9pm

This was my second time joining the weekly River City ARCS SSTV net and it had been a few weeks since the first time, so I had to go back and work out how I setup MMSSTV again. Since MMSSTV is a Windows app, on my Mac I booted WIndows 10 in Parallels and ran it from there. Unfortunately the combination of MMSSTV’s flaky soundcard settings and sharing a USB soundcard device with Windows in a Virtual Machine is probably not the best combination, but for future reference here’s the steps I used that finally worked:

  • Plug in the USB Rigblaster before starting Windows 10
  • From Mac System Preferences, Sound, set in and out to default mic and speakers, make sure Rigblaster not selected for either
  • Boot Windows 10 then from Parallels menu, Devices, Sound, select Rigblaster for both input and output
  • Start MMSSTV, go to Options, Setup MMSSTV, Misc tab, select Default for In and Out – this is shown in screenshot below:

The above steps seemed to work fine. Plugging in the Rigblaster after booting Windows 10 and then assigning it to the Windows 10 running VM when prompted by Parallels didn’t seem to work for me (although probably makes more sense), despite seeing the Rigblaster showup in the MMSSTV soundcard settings. No idea why this didn’t work.

Here’s a selection of the pictures received on the net this week:

Between each of these I was trying different settings and trying to get the Rigblaster selected in MMSSTV. By the time of the last couple of pictures sent on the net, I’d got the setting setup just right.

The River City Amateur Radio SSTV net is held weekly at 9pm, on the clubs 440Mhz repeater (which has coverage of Sacramento, CA and surrounding area). Details are on the club website here.