Unable to get lirc to work - please assist

[HC B. <hcb...@gm...>]

Hi,

New to this mailing list, and I'd thought I'd ask here, since nobody 
I've asked or googled for so far knew an awnser.

I run ubuntu hoary, 2.6.10 kernel, and have compiled the latest cvs 
snapshot from lirc.org, lirc-0.7.2pre1
I bought a serial reciever, and it was delivered yesterday, so spent 
most of the night making it work.

So far, I can manually load the lirc_serial module if I  do the following:

hidde@system:~$ sudo setserial /dev/ttyS0 uart none
hidde@system:~$ sudo modprobe lirc_serial

hidde@system:~$ lsmod
Module                  Size  Used by
lirc_serial            13216  0

hidde@system:~$ mode2
mode2: error opening /dev/lirc
mode2: No such file or directory

hidde@system:~$ sudo link /dev/lirc0 /dev/lirc
hidde@system:~$ sudo link /dev/lirc0 /dev/lircd
hidde@system:~$ mode2
mode2: error opening /dev/lirc
mode2: Permission denied
hidde@system:~$ sudo chmod 666 /dev/lirc
hidde@system:~$ sudo chmod 666 /dev/lirc0
hidde@system:~$ sudo chmod 666 /dev/lircd
hidde@system:~$ mode2
pulse 24

Now it works, as in it'll at least get signals from the reciever.
I still haven't figured out what I need to do to make irexec run nicely tho.

hidde@system:~$ irexec
irexec: could not connect to socket
irexec: Connection refused

My problem is twofold:
I need to figure a way to make lirc_serial load cleanly at boot, where I now get messages that the serial port 03xf8 is already taken (i'm assuming the kernel takes control)
I've tried setting setserial /dev/ttyS0 uart none to /etc/serial.conf, but no luck
I've tried adding it to /etc/init.d/bootmisc.sh, no luck
Secondly, I need to know what irexec is choking on, and how I can make it Just Work(tm)

I'm no techy, and unfamiliar with linux under the hood, exhausted google, #debian, #ubuntu, and some other places, and I'd really like to make this work.
Any help appreciated.

Regards,

Hidde Brugmans