I posted a related (but not the same) question a few days ago, bumped and got no answer. This is not (intentionally, anyway) a double post, just an attempt at a different angle of the problem... Please forgive me. I've googled extensively and think I might have discovered sort of what my problem is...

I am trying to get Opera to run as sort of a kiosk mode at a public library. I am using SuSE 9 as the Linux base. I've got .xinitrc reading exec opera, and opera works just dandy for HTML and such, but I can't seem to get any of my plugins to work. I have read opera's documentation, and read their support files (and have Flash and PDF working just fine on SuSE at home), and I've come to the conclusion TODAY that perhaps it's something in my .xinitrc file. Opera isn't executing entirely or something, or a needs a reference to a folder or something.

I am a total newb, and this is my first attempt at anything like this, so be easy.

File begins...

exec opera

...xinitrc file ends...

I am assuming that this is where my error is. Do I need to add any text to get the plugins to work?

Any hints. Pleeeeeeaaase?

one really confused linux chick
shoe

I tried it with mozilla-firebird0.7. Here is something I noticed:

1. all plugins work when I have another X-session running with KDE (e.g. KDE on ctrl-alt-f7, just mozilla on ctrl-alt-f8)
2. java works even when mozilla is running by itself, but others like flash seem not to work without a fullblown kde session running somewhere

which makes me think that the problem is not how the browser is started but that these plugins need something that doesn't get started when you just start the browser.

you could rename the xinitrc to something like .xinint-opera and then start a full blown desktop environment with

startx

and then move to another virtual console with ctrl-alt-f2 and start another X session with just the browser with

startx ~/.xinit-opera -- :1

the browser will be on ctrl-alt-f8, the other one on ctrl-alt-f7. There is a way to prevent people from switching using the ctrl-alt key combination. I don't remember what it was but it is somewhere in the documentation for XF86Config.

That's heartening, that it's not just me, or Opera, or SuSE, for that matter. I was beginning to think I was losing my mind, because I have the EXACT same set up at home, just running Windowmaker, and it was all working flawlessly. I will try your suggestion and see if it's something the staff can live with (the problem being, they know computers less than I do, and because the computer will be shut on and off regularly, I need something they feel comfortable with).

shoe

BRAINSTORM:

Think it might have something to do with operamotifwrapper-2...? It is a helper application running off (I guess) libXm.so.2 that is called on, as Opera says, as needed... and is housed in the plugins folder. I would have thought Opera would call on it on its own if started by exec opera, but perhaps not, since it is a separate executable not in the usr/bin/opera class or even the usr/lib/opera-7.50 folder.

I will give that a try on Monday. Would I start it the same way?
exec opera
exec operamotifwrapper-2

Or do you think I am off? I'd try it at home, but lacking an "always on" connection here...

thanks again