can't update a git submodule from github web interface

Short answer - not currently possible to do it from the web interface. Discussion about this is at https://github.com/orgs/community/discussions/15079#discussioncomment-9292900

The same terminal commands are needed as referenced in the earlier post, https://hnsws.blogspot.com/2025/04/change-submodule-for-git-repository.html

In my case, since I'm using github actions to build OpenSpace (which I don't have commit access to), what I can do is to just 

cd whichever/submodule/parentdirectory

rm -Rf submoduledirectory

git clone https://fresh.git.subdirectory.url submoduledirectory
cd submoduledirectory

git checkout whatever-branch

before the configure and build steps. Or, of course, if just updating the branch is needed, only the git checkout line would be needed.

test a Mac app to see if it has everything it needs packaged

One way would be to remove all homebrew packages, which would not be recommended - apparently this can be done like

brew remove --force $(brew list --formula) --ignore-dependencies

(not tested)

But an easier way is to just rename the homebrew directory, for eg on Apple Silicon Macs,

sudo mv /opt/homebrew /opt/homebrew-backup

(and after finishing the tests, rename it back.)

adding a 'slow-send' functionality for Google Apps mailing list

I've updated the github repo Google-Apps-Script-mailing-list with a script file which does 'slow-send' for large mailing lists which can be sent over several days. 

Slow-send-one-by-one.gs

Features - 

• time-based trigger, programmatically created and removed
• sends emails to each recipient individually, ramping up from sending
  24 emails per day (once an hour)
  to 96 (once every 15 minutes)
  to 144 (once every 10 minutes)
  to 288 emails per day (once every 5 minutes). This could be increased further, too.
• uses GmailApp instead of MailApp, so we can have features like name (of sender), alias, reply-to, etc.

uninstalling coderabbit

I had signed up for the free trial of coderabbit, but did not find the free plan's functionality of "summarizing pull requests" to be of much use. In order to "uninstall" it, followed the method at 

https://docs.github.com/en/apps/using-github-apps/reviewing-and-revoking-authorization-of-github-apps

To revote authorization, on any github page after logging in, profile picture on top right > Settings > Integrations (on lhs) > Applications > Authorized GitHub Apps tab > click Revoke button for coderabbit.

how to do a homebrew install - avidemux - example

The workflow of installing an app with homebrew, with avidemux as an example, from https://www.avidemux.org/smf/index.php?topic=9960.msg53651#msg53651

After installation an App will be created in your Applications folder and there is finally a audio output device available (you have to select it in the preferences of the App: Edit -> Preferences -> Audio -> AudioDevice: "CoreAudio").

(1) Install XCode and the Command Line Tools of XCode.

(2) Install Homebrew using the following Terminal command:

ruby -e "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.github.com/Homebrew/homebrew/go/install)"

(Perhaps these steps 1 & 2 are now superceded by the instructions at brew.sh)

(3) Install the latest version of Avidemux (nightly version, recommended) using the following Terminal command:

brew install --HEAD avidemux

(4) When the installation has finished, you are asked to make an alias of the app in your Application folder using this command:

brew linkapps

--------------------------------

If you want to update Avidemux to the latest nightly version:

brew rm -f avidemux

brew install --HEAD avidemux

If you want to install the "stable" version of Avidemux (Milestone):

brew install avidemux

set up file sharing on Mac

In order to move files from the internal drive of the Mac to an external NTFS drive, though Mounty does work, it has the issue that after we finish copying, unmouting the drive seems to make Finder unresponsive. Copying over the network to the Linux machine seems to be more hassle-free.

https://www.howtogeek.com/how-to-share-files-between-mac-and-windows/

This has the how-to, and the official documentation is at

https://support.apple.com/en-gb/guide/mac-help/mh17131/mac

Apple menu > System Settings > (searched for Sharing) and enable "File Sharing" and in my case, allowed full disk access to my user.

Setting up smb share as it would help Windows also.

For setting up file sharing on Linux Mint - https://www.siberoloji.com/how-to-set-up-file-sharing-on-linux-mint/ (this seems to be an outdated post? It mentions 
sudo apt install samba samba-common system-config-samba
and we get
E: Unable to locate package system-config-samba 

So, not doing this right now.)

file transfer - Android to and from Mac

Macdroid for USB transfers, but only free for Android to Mac - 

https://www.macdroid.app/purchase/

JustBeamIt - works over wifi? but very slow, and link times out after 10 minutes. <1 Mbps. Suitable only for small files.

Filesharing - maybe if we connect both machines with wired connections (Android phone connected via USB to Linux box, and that to Mac with wired LAN), this might be fastest.

hardware accelerated encoding on mac

https://codetv.dev/blog/hardware-acceleration-ffmpeg-apple-silicon

-c:v h264_videotoolbox \ # use Apple Silicon hardware acceleration

Just like

ffmpeg -h encoder=hevc_nvenc

(Trying on Linux running on a PC, 

Codec 'h264_videotoolbox' is not recognized by FFmpeg - will work only on Mac.)

libx265 itself went at 20+fps.

hevc_videotoolbox with warping went at 33 fps.

using py-ffmpeg-warp on Mac

Trying to run py-ffmpeg-warp on the Mac mini, ran into module not found errors.

ModuleNotFoundError: No module named '_tkinter' on mac

had the simple solution as suggested in stackoverflow,

brew install python-tk 

But other modules like scipy, pillow, etc could not be installed this way. ChatGPT suggested a virtual environment to avoid breakage.

1. Create a venv (once per project)

python3 -m venv ~/venvs/gui_env

(this path is just an example.)

2. Activate it

source ~/venvs/gui_env/bin/activate

prompt changes to something like:

(gui_env) %

3. Install the required packages

python -m pip install --upgrade pip

python -m pip install numpy scipy pillow

So, when I want to run py-ffmpeg-warp, I could run the following manually - 

source ~/venvs/gui_env/bin/activate

cd /home/path/to/py/script

python3 py-ffmpeg-warp.py

Or maybe even put those lines in a script as mentioned at https://linuxconfig.org/how-to-use-a-bash-script-to-run-your-python-scripts

ntfs write on MacOS

Current Apple Silicon Macs only have read-only NTFS access out of the box. In order to write to NTFS, we need to jump through some hoops. 

https://machow2.com/read-write-ntfs-drives-on-mac/

free option seems to be via terminal

brew install --cask macfuse

But

brew install ntfs-3g

ntfs-3g: Linux is required for this software.

Then, ChatGPT suggested

https://mounty.app/

which has installation instructions lower down in that page. FUSE is a bit slow compared to the natively supported exFAT etc, but usually sufficient for our use since our low-cost NTFS external hard disks are also slow.  

Mount Google Drive on Linux Mint

https://thelinuxcode.com/mount_google_drive_linux_mint/

has the Gnome method as well as others. Rclone is another way, which I've done before.

sheepit renderfarm statistics for the M4 Mac Mini

Compared to the earlier stats, the CPU speed is nearly double, but lack of NVidia GPU prevents many projects from rendering. Copy-pasting from the session information page (My account > Connected machine > (clicking on the machine) - 

OS	macm1
CPU	Apple M4 x 10
RAM allowed	11.0 GB
RAM available	16.8 GB
Max render time per frame
Power CPU	208 %
Scheduler	default

take a screenshot on Mac

 https://support.apple.com/en-us/102646

Shift + CMD + 3 = full screen capture

Shift + CMD + 4 = capture selected area

Shift + CMD + 4 then press and release spacebar = cursor turns to camera, click on window you want to capture.

Shift + CMD + 5 - capture using screenshot app. (This can also do screen recordings.)

I have put the screenshot app in the menu bar from Control Centre (which is accessed from the icon on top right corner.)

By default, screenshots save to the desktop with the name Screen Shot [date] at [time].

force quit on Mac

https://www.wikihow.com/Force-Quit-an-Application-on-a-Mac

Click outside the problematic app - my test build of OpenSpace in this case - to change focus to another app, then click the Apple Menu > Force Quit ... which gives a choice, to choose the running app we should force quit.

after resetting password for a user, recovery info in Google Workspace

Note to self - even though "no contact information has been added" is seen in the first tab of the user in Google Workspace, the Security tab will have recovery information and 2FA information which also needs to be reset if required.

running OpenSpace on Apple Silicon and modern Intel Macs

As written in the documentation, OpenSpace uses OpenGL double precision floating point operations extensively, and Apple Silicon does not have hardware support for it. Checking if it will downgrade gracefully to software rendering, found that OpenSpace would just crash, with Claude.ai telling me that the crash report 

Crashed Thread:        0  CrBrowserMain  Dispatch queue: com.apple.main-thread

Thread 0 Crashed:: CrBrowserMain Dispatch queue: com.apple.main-thread

0   libsystem_kernel.dylib                   0x190856388 __pthread_kill + 8

1   libsystem_pthread.dylib                  0x19088f848 pthread_kill + 296

2   libsystem_c.dylib                        0x1907989e4 abort + 124

3   libGLProgrammability.dylib               0x1f0ea63e4 glpPrimitiveTypeGetScalarType + 136

4   libGLProgrammability.dylib               0x1f0e8af20 glpLLVMLoadVector + 120

5   libGLProgrammability.dylib               0x1f0e7c8f0 glpLLVMCGLValue + 1160

6   libGLProgrammability.dylib               0x1f0e771b0 glpLLVMCGAssign + 112

7   libGLProgrammability.dylib               0x1f0e7788c glpLLVMCGCommaExpr + 268

8   libGLProgrammability.dylib               0x1f0e7788c glpLLVMCGCommaExpr + 268

9   libGLProgrammability.dylib               0x1f0e771b0 glpLLVMCGAssign + 112

10  libGLProgrammability.dylib               0x1f0e7788c glpLLVMCGCommaExpr + 268

11  libGLProgrammability.dylib               0x1f0e7788c glpLLVMCGCommaExpr + 268

12  libGLProgrammability.dylib               0x1f0e771b0 glpLLVMCGAssign + 112

13  libGLProgrammability.dylib               0x1f0e7788c glpLLVMCGCommaExpr + 268

14  libGLProgrammability.dylib               0x1f0e7b5f8 glpLLVMCGBlock + 516

15  libGLProgrammability.dylib               0x1f0e722c8 glpLLVMCGNode + 632

16  libGLProgrammability.dylib               0x1f0e7b234 glpLLVMCGFunctionDefinition + 2888

17  libGLProgrammability.dylib               0x1f0e70f30 glpLLVMCGTopLevel + 1444

18  libGLProgrammability.dylib               0x1f0e985f8 glpLinkProgram + 10092

19  libGLProgrammability.dylib               0x1f0eb1ea0 ShLink + 208

20  GLEngine                                 0x1f104a3b8 gleLinkProgram + 1140

21  GLEngine                                 0x1f0fc6350 glLinkProgramARB_Exec + 180

22  OpenSpace                                0x1021f8aa4 glbinding::BasicCallHelper<void, unsigned int>::call(glbinding::Function<void, unsigned int> const*, unsigned int&&) + 44

23  OpenSpace                                0x1021f87d0 glbinding::Function<void, unsigned int>::call(unsigned int&) const + 184

24  OpenSpace                                0x1021f3a24 glbinding::Function<void, unsigned int>::operator()(unsigned int&) const + 32

25  OpenSpace                                0x1023470c8 gl::glLinkProgram(unsigned int) + 32

26  OpenSpace                                0x101e5dc2c ghoul::opengl::ProgramObject::linkProgramObject() + 44

27  OpenSpace                                0x101e5e668 ghoul::opengl::ProgramObject::Build(std::__1::basic_string<char, std::__1::char_traits<char>, std::__1::allocator<char>> const&, std::__1::__fs::filesystem::path const&, std::__1::__fs::filesystem::path const&, ghoul::Dictionary const&) + 1456

28  OpenSpace                                0x100a5dbac openspace::RenderEngine::buildRenderProgram(std::__1::basic_string<char, std::__1::char_traits<char>, std::__1::allocator<char>> const&, std::__1::__fs::filesystem::path const&, std::__1::__fs::filesystem::path const&, ghoul::Dictionary) + 316

29  OpenSpace                                0x1016ce084 openspace::globebrowsing::RenderableGlobe::recompileShaders() + 6156

30  OpenSpace                                0x1016cc82c openspace::globebrowsing::RenderableGlobe::initializeGL() + 208

31  OpenSpace                                0x100b47b88 openspace::SceneGraphNode::initializeGL() + 584

32  OpenSpace                                0x100ae4bb0 openspace::Scene::update(openspace::UpdateData const&) + 132

33  OpenSpace                                0x100a5a6d0 openspace::RenderEngine::updateScene() + 196

34  OpenSpace                                0x1007eb428 openspace::OpenSpaceEngine::loadAssets() + 972

35  OpenSpace                                0x1007ed234 openspace::OpenSpaceEngine::preSynchronization() + 156

36  OpenSpace                                0x1004303ac (anonymous namespace)::mainPreSyncFunc() + 80

37  OpenSpace                                0x100ce8b90 sgct::Engine::exec() + 288

38  OpenSpace                                0x10042d170 main + 14684

39  dyld                                     0x1904eeb98 start + 6076

indicates that 

The crash is happening in Apple's OpenGL shader compiler (libGLProgrammability.dylib) when OpenSpace tries to compile shaders for the globe rendering. Look at the stack:

Frame 26-29: OpenSpace is compiling shaders for RenderableGlobe

Frame 19-21: Apple's OpenGL implementation tries to link the shader program

Frame 3: The shader compiler encounters something it can't handle and aborts 

Now, this could possibly be due to some filesystem issues, restrictions due to running OpenSpace from command-line from a sub-folder of my home folder instead of Applications folder, but I got a similar crash when running OpenSpace inside UTM on Ubuntu 24.04 (using the daily build deb file yesterday) if I enable hardware acceleration. 

Unfortunately, mesa on MacOS doesn't seem to enable software rendering - 
brew install mesa

# Set environment variables to use Mesa's software renderer

export LIBGL_ALWAYS_SOFTWARE=1

export GALLIUM_DRIVER=llvmpipe

# Run OpenSpace

./OpenSpace.app/Contents/MacOS/OpenSpace 

But the same crash is observed. Claude says,

Unfortunately, Mesa on macOS is limited. The Homebrew Mesa package primarily provides: OSMesa (off-screen rendering) and some utilities

But it won't override Apple's OpenGL framework the way it does on Linux. macOS applications are hardcoded to use /System/Library/Frameworks/OpenGL.framework. 

Then, tried disabling hardware acceleration and running the same OpenSpace deb file on Ubuntu 24.04, and that works. Around 8 fps, and the frame-rate does not seem to improve much beyond 20 fps or so even if we use something like onlyEarth.profile or loading individual assets to the empty profile, etc. But this could be still useful for offline work, validating single-precision builds and so on.

And so now to single-precision builds - I'll try to build for Mac Apple Silicon and see what happens.

Also, maybe I can try building for Intel Macs with these patches - with XCode for MacOS26, many of the incompatibilities and unsupported implementations are now ironed out, so we need far fewer patches. And github now has MacOS26 public runners.

Edit: 11 Jan 2026 - Finally OpenSpace for MacOS - Apple silicon - is up and running. Lots of shader patching, especially a tricky one here - Mac build - crashes when shader is called · Issue #75 · hn-88/OpenSpace-AppImage

Cloudflare timeout - how to use admin site without cloudflare

Copy-pasting from an email thread, about a connection timeout Cloudflare error seen by one of our Wordpress site admins - 

The screenshot shows that you were trying to open a WordfenceScan page. Such pages usually take a long time to load, and it is natural for Cloudflare to time out. 

In case those pages don't have any option to email you the results of the scan or such workarounds, you can disable cloudflare for yourself by directly accessing the site, without cloudflare proxying, by editing the hosts file on your computer.

On Windows, you would do this by going to the start menu, and start typing notepad.exe, right click on Notepad, choose Run as Administrator, and open the file

C:\Windows\System32\drivers\etc\hosts

(since it is just hosts and not hosts.txt, when using File->open to find it, you must choose the drop-down "All files *. *" option.)

In that file, you can add extra lines at the end,

1.2.3.4 ourserver.org

4.5.6.7 staging.ourserver.org

When you are through with your admin work and if you want to access through cloudflare again, you can comment out each of these lines by adding the # symbol as the first character on those lines. This is optional, you can continue to access without cloudflare also.

Why this solution is better than just disabling cloudflare - this can allow general users to have the snappiness of cloudflare proxying while only admins can access the unproxied direct URL.

(After making changes to the hosts file, you may need to close your browser, open it again, and perhaps re-login for the changes to take effect. Or perhaps restart your computer.)

steps to creating an iOS app via wpmobile.app

wpmobile.app creates an app from a wordpress site, and one of our institutions wanted support with uploading such an app to Google Play Store and Apple App Store.

For Apple App Store, the first step would be to enrol into Apple Developer Program

... looks like enrolling into the Apple Developer program is a long-drawn-out process. Currently it says, "You will be sent an email soon." (2 working days). 

How long does it take for Apple to process your Apple Developer Program enrollment? : r/iOSProgramming

didn't get it within 2 working days, I contacted support and asked them to expedite, then it came through.

From https://wpmobile.app/en/help/

needed account / pw of wpmobile dashboard 

then to create app specific password for the apple account which has the Apple developer account

https://support.apple.com/en-us/102654

Where to find my Team Name and Team ID

Log in to your account at https://developer.apple.com/account/
Go to Subscription details
The Team ID is the team identifier
The Team Name is displayed at the top right of the page (your first and last name if it’s an Individual account).

Next, the 2FA will come on the iOS device (iPad in my case) when trying to log in to the apple account via the wpmobile.app dashboard. After a few minutes, the dashboard shows App generated with success.... The build will be pushed to your Apple account in few minutes. Download the certificate file for notification and upload it on the WPMobile plugin > Notifications > Settings > iOS. (on the wordpress site).

It seems XCode (the platform used to compile Mac and iOS apps) will push the build to our App Store Connect account. ... the app is seen there....  need to go through the process of editing the description etc and related online paperwork, and then send for review. appstoreconnect.apple.com/apps

In order to install the app before reaching the app store, we need to invite that particular user using testflight - and we need to invite using the Apple id which is associated with that particular iOS device. 

Edit - In our case, the app review said that since this app was supposed to be used by the members of a particular organization, they would not approve public distribution. So, applied for unlisted distribution (where searching the app store will not find it, but we can link to the app from our website). And that was approved.

Initially submitted Dec 5
Rejected Dec 6
Applied for unlisted on Dec 8
Approved for unlisted distribution Dec 11
Again sent for review with this approval Dec 11
(respond to App Review directly in the App Review section in App Store Connect)
Review passed Dec 12
(available for distribution at apps.apple.com)

building an iOS app using github actions

 Just like building Android apps on github actions, we can build iOS apps too - https://www.andrewhoog.com/posts/how-to-build-an-ios-app-with-github-actions-2023/

But of course, the Apple Developer program is $99 per year.

tuning lossless ffmpeg command-line with Claude

The ffmpeg command

ffmpeg -y -r 30 -i in_%05d.jpg -i ../NormPeak-6dBENG.wav -c:v hevc_nvenc -preset lossless -global_quality 18 -pix_fmt nv12 -c:a aac -b:a 192k ~/Downloads/4kframes.mp4

gives the following warnings - 

[aist#1:0/pcm_s16le @ 0x59f7e96fbfc0] Guessed Channel Layout: stereo
....

[in#0/image2 @ 0x59f7e96f4e40] Thread message queue blocking; consider raising the thread_queue_size option (current value: 8)

[swscaler @ 0x59f7e97ae500] deprecated pixel format used, make sure you did set range correctly

    Last message repeated 3 times

[hevc_nvenc @ 0x59f7e9701880] The selected preset is deprecated. Use p1 to p7 + -tune or fast/medium/slow.

[hevc_nvenc @ 0x59f7e9701880] Using global_quality with nvenc is deprecated. Use qp instead. 

Claude's suggestion to fix - 

ffmpeg -y -r 30 -i in_%05d.jpg -thread_queue_size 512 -i ../NormPeak-6dBENG.wav -c:v hevc_nvenc -preset p7 -tune lossless -cq 0 -pix_fmt yuv420p -c:a aac -b:a 192k ~/Downloads/4kframes.mp4