Using MT4 with Linux - prob with adding indicator

[cantagril]

A late Happy New Year to all,

I'm using MT4 with Ubuntu 16.04 on a dual boot i7 Lenovo laptop - had a problem with the version of Wine I originally tried i.e MT4 not starting at all or just displaying rubbish. Had another crack a few days ago and installed a later version of Wine and everything...well, almost everything, is working fine. I installed one indicator (Pivot Points) which I had already downloaded to my shared W10/Linux drive and it worked immediately....

Now, I have just tried an ATR dashboard ( SFX ATR Dashboard MultiPair.ex4) but this doesn't start at all. I'm not getting any error messages, just nothing happens, at all. I used the same procedure of copy the file into the MT4 indicator folder in the Wine directory and to me the only obvious difference was that the PP indicator came with an mql4 file and this one came with just the ex4 one.

Any suggestions? pleeeease

 

[0007]

I'm not an MT4 user although I do use Linux – so this is just a guess which may/may not be helpful. I find Wine to be variable in how it runs Windows programs – sometimes perfect, sometimes almost okay and sometimes not at all. From your symptoms it's difficult to know whether the fault is with Wine or your Linux distribution. (I'm assuming it works perfectly on Windows). My 1st suggestion would be to try running MT4 on a different distro – you could do this on a different PC or from a memory stick on your laptop which would obviate the need for installation. My experience with Linux-lite (although derived from Debian/Ubuntu) is that it's very well integrated and it might therefore be worth giving it a go before moving on to another distro that can be run from a memory stick.

Another solution could be to run MT4 in a Windows virtual machine (but you will need a version – any version that runs MT4 ok – of windows with a license key to keep it working) – Again Linux-lite has a very good integrated VM. The disadvantage is that it's a more inconvenient solution.

If I'm telling you what you've already worked out for yourself – apologies! Nevertheless it will be interesting to see if you can make progress with this – keep us updated!

 

[cantagril]

I'm not an MT4 user although I do use Linux – so this is just a guess which may/may not be helpful. I find Wine to be variable in how it runs Windows programs – sometimes perfect, sometimes almost okay and sometimes not at all. From your symptoms it's difficult to know whether the fault is with Wine or your Linux distribution. (I'm assuming it works perfectly on Windows). My 1st suggestion would be to try running MT4 on a different distro – you could do this on a different PC or from a memory stick on your laptop which would obviate the need for installation. My experience with Linux-lite (although derived from Debian/Ubuntu) is that it's very well integrated and it might therefore be worth giving it a go before moving on to another distro that can be run from a memory stick.

Another solution could be to run MT4 in a Windows virtual machine (but you will need a version – any version that runs MT4 ok – of windows with a license key to keep it working) – Again Linux-lite has a very good integrated VM. The disadvantage is that it's a more inconvenient solution.

If I'm telling you what you've already worked out for yourself – apologies! Nevertheless it will be interesting to see if you can make progress with this – keep us updated!

Thanks for this.

I had sort of worked out that the VM solution would eventually be the way to go for me and in fact a couple of weeks ago I posted just this idea on another thread which had referenced Linux - for some reason the mods didn't like it and it was deleted. Anyway, I have tried a different distro (Mint) with exactly the same result. It was suggested to me by a teccie mate that the quickest way round would be to download the mql file only as the ex4 can create probs. Needless to say, despite it being a freebie, the author won't do this, so currently I'm doing a first boot into windows to scrape the ATR data and then restarting into Linux for the rest of the day. Irritating, but not worth me messing with my entire set-up for the mo.

Not particularly relevant but still of note: I have just installed NVP's excellent correlator tool with no issues and it seems stable and well-behaved.

 

[0007]

Thanks for this.

I had sort of worked out that the VM solution would eventually be the way to go for me and in fact a couple of weeks ago I posted just this idea on another thread which had referenced Linux - for some reason the mods didn't like it and it was deleted. Anyway, I have tried a different distro (Mint) with exactly the same result. It was suggested to me by a teccie mate that the quickest way round would be to download the mql file only as the ex4 can create probs. Needless to say, despite it being a freebie, the author won't do this, so currently I'm doing a first boot into windows to scrape the ATR data and then restarting into Linux for the rest of the day. Irritating, but not worth me messing with my entire set-up for the mo.

Not particularly relevant but still of note: I have just installed NVP's excellent correlator tool with no issues and it seems stable and well-behaved.

........... Interesting stuff. Talking of having to boot into Windows 1st and then Linux (or vice versa) I sometimes have to do this and have found a very useful (free for personal use) utility at https://neosmart.net/EasyBCD/ It works really well with a beautifully simple uncluttered interface. I find it especially easy because I have Windows & Linux on 2 separate (physical) drives and it saves a whole lot of messing around with BIOS settings and other Linux settings.

 

[cantagril]

...if I knew then what I know now

........... Interesting stuff. Talking of having to boot into Windows 1st and then Linux (or vice versa) I sometimes have to do this and have found a very useful (free for personal use) utility at https://neosmart.net/EasyBCD/ It works really well with a beautifully simple uncluttered interface. I find it especially easy because I have Windows & Linux on 2 separate (physical) drives and it saves a whole lot of messing around with BIOS settings and other Linux settings.

I do like that utility. I've got a grub bootloader on my linux set-up which is probably the equivalent but it's a bit clunky.

When I set up my Lenovo laptop (T520) a couple years ago I was just not thinking about separate physical drives simply because this model doesn't have the 2nd bay...unlike my lovely but venerable Toshiba Satellite. With hindsight, I could very easily have used a caddy adapter and installed a second drive in the CD bay......maybe that would have been simpler all round.


Ah well.

 

[0007]

...if I knew then what I know now



I do like that utility. I've got a grub bootloader on my linux set-up which is probably the equivalent but it's a bit clunky.

When I set up my Lenovo laptop (T520) a couple years ago I was just not thinking about separate physical drives simply because this model doesn't have the 2nd bay...unlike my lovely but venerable Toshiba Satellite. With hindsight, I could very easily have used a caddy adapter and installed a second drive in the CD bay......maybe that would have been simpler all round.


Ah well.

Thanks for that thought on caddys. Think I might just add a 2nd SSD to my trusty Dell latitude i5. SSD + caddy £26 on Amazon - bargain!

 

[cantagril]

Thanks for that thought on caddys. Think I might just add a 2nd SSD to my trusty Dell latitude i5. SSD + caddy £26 on Amazon - bargain!

A bit late in the day.
I've been meaning to post about the following but just haven't got around to it until now. I was reminded of it when I saw you lurking on another thread...
I still didn't change my set-up but some kind soul suggested I was barking up the wrong tree with my caddy idea when my Thinkpad already has a vacant Msata slot which would be perfect for this application. Some Latitudes have them and some don't and if you haven't already gone the caddy route it might be worth checking.

 

[0007]

Thanks for that. In the end I just swapped in a cheapo 120 GB SSD – That particular laptop is only used for presentations so the only spec I'm really interested in with the SSD is read speed (take as long as it wants to write!) and the dead cheap Kingston compared very favourably with anything in its price bracket. Later I also saw data reports that some of the unknown/unbranded and even cheaper SSDs outperformed the big names at a similar price point! It's amazing how good the old Dell latitude E6410 (still) is with i-5 processor. I picked up a couple of ex-corporate models (seemingly barely used) – very cheaply one each for myself and her Ladyship. She uses hers on the desktop and it's perfect for light office work and browsing as is – for more serious work I just hook up a bigger monitor.

While on IT matters, the best improvement I made some time ago to my desktop was to replace the OS hard drive with SSD. Because it only needs to contain the OS it doesn't have to be big (240 GB more than adequate) and is therefore very cheap. Main storage (old-fashioned spinning hard drives) is now incredibly cheap but it looks as if it's only a matter of time before they will be entirely replaced by SSD.

 

[cantagril]

I intend to go that route as well - i.e swap the main clunker drive for an SSD with enough space to give me common storage as well as a Windows OS. I'm looking into various flavours of Linux to put on the Msata and it seems that whomsoever I talk to has nothing but praise for their particular distro...be it, Puppy, Tiny or Lite. I need to do some more serious testing (wine et al) before I take the plunge but simply haven't got around to it.

I made another discovery recently in that I found that my Lenovo will take muuuuch more RAM than the advertised 8gb max, i.e 16gb. I don't need that much but when I'm doing multiple p&f charts in real time things are painfully slow with the mere 4 I have atm and it is more a memory problem than a processor one...I've a 3rd (or 4th, I forget which) gen I7 which should still be quite nippy. The other day I tried out some p&f on a mate's gaming machine with 32gb RAM on an I7 and it didn't even notice whilst it was streaming movies, unicycling along the bar-top, juggling plates and singing Abide with Me...impressive stuff

 

[0007]

I've had very good experience with LINUX lite distro. It's very similar to Windows in its presentation & that makes the transition very easy for non-geeks. It's very light on resources and is ideal for updating machines which either don't work or struggle on the latest Windows. E.g. I have an old Toshiba netbook which had XP and was never really very fast but with a 32 bit version of LINUX light it works fine. I now run all my LINUX on virtual machines – Oracle Virtual box – brilliant + you can't beat its price (free). I've got 16 GB RAM which is more than adequate for someone who doesn't do gaming or any really serious video editing. There's some really good stuff to use on Linux but unfortunately I still have a few Windows programs that will only work satisfactorily on Windows – the main one being speech recognition: Nuance Dragon it's the only one that really works and is any good (currently dictating this message with it – so easy!) But it just won't work on LINUX no matter what you do with Wine et cetera et cetera. Fortunately some of the LINUX programs also work very well on Windows and it's one of the greatest myths put forward by the software industry that you've got to pay good money to get good results – it's sometimes true but not always. I'd be lost without speech recognition software and having just updated my main PC with an AMD Ryzen 3600 it now goes like greased weasel droppings! (Previously using Intel i-5 from years ago).

 

[cantagril]

I've had very good experience with LINUX lite distro.....and having just updated my main PC with an AMD Ryzen 3600 it now goes like greased weasel droppings! (Previously using Intel i-5 from years ago).

I've led a sheltered life, so I don't dare ask how and whence you obtained these and will therefore take it on trust. I'll have a look at Linux Lite...I was beginning to lean toward Lubuntu as the need for Wine is a determinant for me.

BTW - since I last tried Dragon about 10 yrs ago, things have obviously moved on without me and I haven't clue where things stand. ATM I hammer away at the kb for my consulting work which is very heavy on text - think many thousands of words per job I do like the idea of being able to rant away with all the grunt being done by an app...as a serious user, are there any problems that get in the way of working efficiently? I'd also like some decent language support, French and Italian would be good for starters - any ideas about that?

 

[0007]

cantagril said:

I've led a sheltered life, so I don't dare ask how and whence you obtained these and will therefore take it on trust.
Amazon itself - not a trader on their site, though to be fair I've used them for cheaper items and never had a problem. It's just that with Amazon over 15 years I've never had a problem with returning goods, even when I've just changed my mind. I just like good prices, good service, & no problems with returns.

I'll have a look at Linux Lite...I was beginning to lean toward Lubuntu as the need for Wine is a determinant for me.
Linux Lite is a derivative of Ubuntu plus Debian - they’ve just put a very nice front-end, made installation a breeze, and basically everything is just like working windows (not exactly but if you’ve got half a brain cell you’ll be okay!). Easy access to "Wine" and all the necessary Linux packages. Like many of the light installations you can run it off a memory stick without having to install it, to see if it suits you first.

BTW - since I last tried Dragon about 10 yrs ago, things have obviously moved on without me and I haven't clue where things stand. ATM I hammer away at the kb for my consulting work which is very heavy on text - think many thousands of words per job I do like the idea of being able to rant away with all the grunt being done by an app...as a serious user, are there any problems that get in the way of working efficiently? I'd also like some decent language support, French and Italian would be good for starters - any ideas about that?

From my experience Dragon has improved considerably over the years – certainly 10 years ago I was getting good results with it but not as good as standard achievable today, but then I was using a Pentium 4. I’m using version 13 which is now obsolete and unsupported but it more than adequately meets my needs. Apparently the latest version (15 – there didn’t seem to be a 14) has a much changed speech engine and can do many wonderful things (but it still won’t go into the kitchen and get you a cup of tea) but in terms of speech to text I get the impression from reviews/reports that it is not significantly better. I think it all depends what you want out of it: I suspect that like me, you just want speech into text – I’m quite happy to do everything else with the mouse and the keyboard. The proponents of Dragon will explain how you can do absolutely everything by voice and of course for anybody with physical disabilities this is a tremendous advantage. But it would take some learning and quite frankly I’d rather put my effort in elsewhere. They do make versions of Dragon for many other languages – I’m sure French and Italian are included but not being fluent in those languages I can’t say how well it works. I think it's also used quite extensively (certainly in the states) in the legal & medical professions. Some years ago when I was working in the IT department of a government agency we introduced Dragon for the lawyers to use – and it was reasonably successful, certainly with those who actually wanted it to be that way!

I think you can now pick up Dragon 13 on Amazon for about £80 whereas the latest version is somewhere in the region of £300. My suggestion would be to buy the cheap version for trial purposes and if it works okay for what you want why spend more? Over the years I’ve spent far too much on IT kits/software which purportedly are “improved” only to find that all they’ve done is put chromium plated bumpers on it and changed the colour of the dashboard.

The best place for discussion and information on Dragon is: http://www.knowbrainer.com/forums/forum/index.cfm and http://www.knowbrainer.com – the guy who runs it does happen to be a reseller but he’s an absolute expert with many good contributors (bit like T2W for speech recognition). Also, if you are looking for decent support kit e.g. microphones or the full Monty software I would recommend there (if you want to know why send me a PM).

My experience with Dragon is that it works well if it is used and set up properly:
1. You need to annunciate clearly when dictating – apparently accents can be confusing (in version 13 but apparently later kit is better) so a jolly good Oxford accent will suit well.
2. You need a decent sound card capability in your computer (the right microphone will include this)
3. You need a decent + suitable for your wearing preferences microphone
4. You need a powerful but not necessarily fast processor
5. You need sufficient RAM (8 GB will allow plenty of activity but 16 GB is now becoming the norm and should be sufficient for most people’s needs.

MICROPHONE – I don’t like things stuck in my ear hole or over my head so I’ve got a tabletop microphone which is incredibly good (and was incredibly expensive – “Speechware TableMike”) which enables me to get good dictation (like what I am getting right now) and works very well regardless of distance from the mouth over 6 to 24 inches (has automatic gain). This connects directly into a motherboard USB slot (not a front panel extension) and just works. Interestingly I did many years ago purchase a cheap 7 pounds headset mike from Amazon and I got pretty good results with that but it did have to be in a constant position near the mouth and after a while it becomes quite irritating.

Processor – apparently it’s the level III cache which determines how well the system works & speed is not particularly relevant, certainly with modern processors any speed is good enough. Until fairly recently I was using Intel I-5 Sandy Bridge purchased about 10 years ago and I chose that CPU because it was the “sweet spot” in terms of capability/price but importantly it had what was a fairly decent amount of level III cache (6 MB). The new AMD processor has 35 MB cache and the improvement in performance is noticeable – not necessarily in accuracy but in the time it takes to get the words onto the screen. In the program settings you can vary the emphasis towards speed or accuracy – with the new processor I can emphasise accuracy without sacrificing speed.

Insert: I've just remembered another very useful capability of Dragon. You can dictate into a portable voice recorder/microphone (I've actually got a very neat little Sony job which I rarely use) and transcribe it into text on the PC at a later time. I would imagine that's very useful for people like surveyors & doctors and for those who have sudden brainstorming ideas away from their computer.

I first started using Dragon because I don’t like typing and with long reports/other similar texts it becomes very difficult if you are not a touch typist. Also, with my standard of typing it is not possible to keep up with the rubbish coming out of my brain that needs to go on the screen – the result is that the limited brainpower available all goes into manipulation of the keyboard instead of thinking clearly et cetera et cetera. So as far as I’m concerned if Dragon did nothing other than get the words on the screen I would be very happy.

I have used Dragon a lot for academic work but if I were writing to earn my daily crust I would consider it to be a very good investment and essential business tool. Don’t waste your time trying to get it to work in Linux – myself and many other (much more technically competent) people have tried without success. There are various other open source/paid speech recognition programs but they all have shortcomings. For instance many of them are cloud/Internet-based which is fine for things like Google speech et cetera but for serious textual work you need Dragon. If you want an idea of what Dragon was like many years ago give the inbuilt windows speech recognition program a go – if used carefully it can produce passable results but it’s nothing like as clever as Dragon. That’s not surprising seeing as it appears that Microsoft have done no work on it for many years, it does however make you realise how good Dragon is.

Hope that helps, if you have further questions just ask.

 

[cantagril]

Many thanks for that 0007. I'll follow up shortly.

 

[cantagril]

See Ebay ad below for Dragon 13...and 15. My kind of prices

 

[0007]

See Ebay ad below for Dragon 13...and 15. My kind of prices
View attachment 275877

They do seem incredibly cheap! One of the things you need to know about Dragon is that it is subject to "activation" just like Windows. It's fairly common knowledge among users (Though it's never been admitted by Dragon ) that you are allowed five activations for each instance of the product. So if you remove it from a computer to transfer to another it's important to do it while connected properly to the Internet so that your total number of activations remain at five. It also seems evident that while you could install it on up to 5 computers you can only use one at a time – so if somebody else has got one of your activations running, you might be in trouble. Perhaps these products have been lifted from scrapped computers (Corporates? – the outfit that I worked for at one time, purchased loads of licences but used very few of them {that's how governments spend your money!] and the PCs they were installed upon would have been disposed of, had the discs wiped and resold). My suspicion with these products is that their activation may have been "borrowed" – who knows? I believe a similar situation occurs with Windows where you can buy an activation key very cheaply and many times it works but sometimes it doesn't if it's been used too many times.

Considering how ridiculously cheap those quotes are it may be well worth giving it a try. I would suspect a better chance of authenticity with the version 13 which is now been discontinued rather than the version 15 which is on sale circa £300. Dragon do allow upgrades for two versions back & I can get a legit upgrade to my version 13 for $150 from the Knowbrainer resellers. I'd be very interested to see how you get on with those eBay purchases.

PS – while I think of it: it's sometimes remarked that product support quality at Nuance is totally useless questionable even if you have a fully paid-up registered maximum green shield points product.

 

[cantagril]

Much claret has flowed under the bridge since I started this thread but now I need some more help.

I have done what I wanted to my Lenovo T520 - hardwarewise anyway:
16gb RAM - realtime p&f charts on multiple tabs are now a doddle
Dual boot on separate SSDs (W7pro on Full size and LL on a 30gb internal mSATA)
3rd caddy mounted SSD for shared storage

I went down the Linux Lite route thinking that 30gb would be more than enough BUT I now find that I might have wrong-footed myself.

On my previous Ubuntu set-up I was using a bigger drive (350gb circa) and space was not an issue. Rather late in the day, I have realised that about 8gb progs installed to /home by default.

Not a huge problem you might say...but in my case, I cheerfully partitioned my new 30gb mSSD thinking that as I was going to use a separate drive for storage and I only wanted the OS and a few programmes, I would need nearly all my space on /root and sfa on /home.....so I left 4gb only on home. I'm sure that you can guess where this is going.

Yep, half my 4gb has gone with Wine etc and I can see that I'm going to run out of space very shortly whilst I have plenty of room on my /root.

So the questions are:
1. Why do certain programmes install to /home and not /root?
2. If there is good reason to leave things as they are, can I easily change the size of my partitions using a utility with an idiot-resistant GUI? Gparted seems clunky and nerve-wracking.....

I'd quite like not to have to reinstall the OS again as (due to the Log-In Loop of Death coming to visit) I have done this 5 times already. With this practice, I've got quite good but would still prefer to avoid having to hone my skills yet further, if possible.