How-to

So this is certainly a workaround, and we will likely create a redmine plugin just for handling this.  However, the way its working now is pretty nice and flexible, so I really don't consider writing a module to be incredibly imminent - though using the jquery plugin that etherpad lite provides could provide some really powerful tools for users.

Regardless, this is how is what you need:

1. A Running Redmine Instance (A Bitnami redmine stack is always a good choice if you are just getting started)
2. A Running Etherpad Lite Instance (Here is the git repo: follow the instructions and get it running under a daemon!)

Embedding Iframes in Redmine?!

First, you will need to install the Redmine Wiki HTML Utility (unless you have found some other way to be able to embed Iframes in redmine).  Note that, because this is just a simple wiki extension and the database is not involved, you do not need to run rake.  This extension will allow you to 'inject' raw HTML, CSS and Javascript in any redmine textile areas (yes!  wiki, issues, project descriptions - the sky is the limit!).
  Its just handy to have all around!

Throw in a 'lil CSS

Add some CSS to the application.css file of your current theme, or find some other upgrade happy way of adding the css:

#content iframe {border:1px dotted #656565; overflow:hidden; width:95%; height:600;}

You may want to use different or more specific CSS selectors, depending on whether you have iframes.  This CSS seems to work pretty well for me, but I would be glad to take suggestions.  Setting the width using a percentage is a good idea for fluid width themes (we are using the basecamp redmine theme).  The height is static - I could probably do something fancier but it works for now.

Embed that Etherpad-Lite Document!

Now, go into redmine somewhere and embed your etherpad lite document.  You do NOT need to go into etherpad-lite and create a document - a document is created each time you visit a URL beneath the etherpad path (makes writing extensions incredibly easy, huh?).

So I have received quite a bit of attention regarding my post a couple months ago regarding the OpenERP Touchscreen POS System which is currently in Develoment.  Good news - there is much more to talk about here!

I don't have time to prepare it just yet, but I will be putting together a post shortly explaining how to build, deploy and configure the latest and greatest in OpenERP POS Touchscreen awesomeness.

Banshee, in my opinion, is one of the best things that has happened to the Gnome Desktop.  Ever since it became the standard music player packaged with Ubuntu 10.10, it has changed the out-of-the-box Ubuntu experience (I do love me some rythymbox, of course).

One thing that Banshee lacks is some kind of visualization engine.  This is something I overlooked at first, but as I began recruiting friends to become Ubuntu users, this question kept popping up.

Well, after some research, I managed to find a  pretty decent solution.  OpenVP is an open source visualization platform, and since 2008 they have been releasing integrations with Banshee media player.

The banshee integration project is actively developed on gitorious, though you can find a more stable version in the ubuntu/debian package repository

Here is a sample of it at work (this setting is called 'inferno'):

Installing the bugger

Now I bet you want to install it, eh!?  Well, here goes.

1. If you are using Debian, you will need to make sure you have made the sid (unstable) package sources available.  If you are using Ubuntu, no need to worry, because as of this post, the 1.7.6 version was availble in the universe sources.

2. Now you can install the package from the repositories!

richard@localhost:$ sudo apt-get install banshee-extension-openvp

3. Voila!  Restart Banshee (if it was already open), queue up some music, and now you have visualizations in the 'Now Playing' view.  Use the controls in the top right.

Next Step: Installing from the Git Repo

The next installment of the banshee-visualizations deal is going to be to install from the gitorius repo, and thus be able to pull live developments!  Stay tuned!