Ubuntu Tricks

Install Sun Java with the Firefox Plugin on an Ubuntu Live CD or USB

2008-06-16T09:46:00.000-07:00

When running Ubuntu from a live cd or live usb, and trying to install java, the following errors appear:

java: error while loading shared libraries: libjli.so: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory

OR

Setting up sun-java6-bin (6-06-0ubuntu1) ...
Error: could not find libjava.so
Error: could not find Java 2 Runtime Environment.

Getting and Preparing the files

Adding the Multiverse and Universe Repositories

Go to 'System', 'Administration', 'Software Sources'.

On the 'Ubuntu Software' tab tick the multiverse and universe boxes.

Click 'Close'. It will ask you to reload/refresh; DO IT!

Getting and Installing Java

Online Install

Do this in a terminal for JRE (basically if you're not a java developer):

* sudo apt-get install sun-java6-jre sun-java6-plugin

Do this in a terminal for JDK (basically if you ARE a java developer):

* sudo apt-get install sun-java6-jdk sun-java6-plugin

Say yes to whatever asks. If you are on a live CD or USB (even if it is Feisty 7.04, Gutsy 7.10, or Hardy 8.04 - I tried them all) you will probably get something like this:

Setting up sun-java6-bin (6-00-2ubuntu2) ...
/usr/lib/jvm/java-6-sun-1.6.0.00/bin/java: error while loading shared libraries: libjli.so: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory
dpkg: error processing sun-java6-bin (--configure):
subprocess post-installation script returned error exit status 127
dpkg: dependency problems prevent configuration of sun-java6-plugin:
sun-java6-plugin depends on sun-java6-bin (= 6-00-2ubuntu2); however:
Package sun-java6-bin is not configured yet.
dpkg: error processing sun-java6-plugin (--configure):
dependency problems - leaving unconfigured
dpkg: dependency problems prevent configuration of sun-java6-jre:
sun-java6-jre depends on sun-java6-bin (= 6-00-2ubuntu2) | ia32-sun-java6-bin (= 6-00-2ubuntu2); however:
Package sun-java6-bin is not configured yet.
Package ia32-sun-java6-bin is not installed.
dpkg: error processing sun-java6-jre (--configure):
dependency problems - leaving unconfigured
Errors were encountered while processing:
sun-java6-bin
sun-java6-plugin
sun-java6-jre
E: Sub-process /usr/bin/dpkg returned an error code (1)
Fixing that Error
Go into a terminal and do the following:
(Copy and paste using right-click so you don't get any of them wrong)

1.sudo su

2. LD_LIBRARY_PATH=CHANGEME dpkg --configure -a

-----The CHANGEME part should be changed to the location of libjli.so
-----Open your File System, go Ctrl+F, search for 'libjli'
-----Mine was in '/usr/lib/jvm/java-6-sun-1.6.0.06/jre/lib/i386/jli'
----------so I used LD_LIBRARY_PATH=/usr/lib/jvm/java-6-sun-1.6.0.06/jre/lib/i386/jli dpkg --configure -a

3.ln -s / /cow

4. Run whichever of these you used before again:

sudo apt-get install sun-java6-jre sun-java6-plugin
sudo apt-get install sun-java6-jdk sun-java6-plugin

-----Say yes to anything it asks.
-----It should work perfectly this time with no errors.

Verification of Success

In a terminal type:

java -version

Something like this should appear:

java version "1.6.0_06"
Java(TM) SE Runtime Environment (build 1.6.0_06-b02)
Java HotSpot(TM) Server VM (build 10.0-b22, mixed mode)
In firefox, where you would type a website type:
Code:

about:plugins

You should see something like this (you might have to scroll to find it):
Quote:
Java(TM) Plug-in 1.6.0_06-b02

File name: libjavaplugin_oji.so
Java(TM) Plug-in 1.6.0_06
With a huge table underneath it.

Go to this website: http://java.com/en/download/help/testvm.xml

An applet will run near the bottom if you java is working correctly.

Howto Re-install Grub after windows wipes it out

2008-06-15T08:33:00.000-07:00

Basically you have a good install of ubuntu and then realise that you want to dual-boot. You don't want to erase ubuntu, so you install windows. Grub then gets erased and there is NO way to get back into ubuntu.

So do the following:

1) Boot off the LiveCD

2) Open a Terminal (Applications-Accessories-Terminal) and type in the following commands, noting that the first command will put you into the grub "prompt", and the next 3 commands will be executed there. Also note that hd0,0 implies the first hard drive and the first partition on that drive, which is where you probably installed grub to during installation. If not, then adjust accordingly.

sudo grub
> root (hd0,0)
> setup (hd0)
> exit

4) Reboot (removing the livecd), and your boot menu should be back.

5) Open the grub file:

sudo gedit /boot/grub/menu.lst

6) Scroll to the bottom and add the following:

title Windows XP
root (hd0,0)
makeactive
chainloader +1

Note that you should also verify that hd0,0 is the correct location for Windows. If you had installed Windows on the 4th partition on the drive, then you should change it to (hd0,3).

Howto Configure Evolution to Work with Yahoo! Mail

2008-06-15T08:25:00.000-07:00

Before we start you have to pay for a PLUS mail account in order to pop3 it with Evolution or any other e-mail tool.

Procedure to follow

1. Open Evolution and click EDIT -> PREFERENCES from the menu.

2. On the left, ensure MAIL ACCOUNTS is high-lighted. Click ADD.

3. Click FORWARD.

4. Enter your personal information here. You don't have to enter your full name if you don't want your full name to appear in outgoing mail. Click Forward when finished.

5. Select POP for Server Type.

Now add the following for RECEIVING EMAIL (heading at top of the window)

SERVER: plus.pop.mail.yahoo.com:995 (Notice port number at the end)

Username: your Yahoo! username WITHOUT @yahoo.com

Use Secure Connection: SSL Encryption

Authentication Type: PASSWORD

Remember Password: Checked (optional)

6. Click FORWARD button.

7. Set the next options to your liking. I place a check mark in the first box and have my yahoo! e-mail checked every 1 minute. That's the only setting chance I make on this window.

8. Click FORWARD.

Now add the following for SENDING EMAIL (heading at top of the window)

Server Type: SMTP

SERVER: plus.smtp.mail.yahoo.com:465 (Notice port number at the end)

Server requires authentication: Check this box

Use Secure Connection: SSL Encryption

Authentication: Plain

Username: your username WITHOUT the @yahoo.com

9. Click FORWARD.

10. Enter a name for this setup. I use: Yahoo!

Click apply and your done. If you've already been trying to get this to work and have a yahoo mail account created, don't click ADD (step 2). Instead click on it and select EDIT. Then enter the above information in the SENDING and RECEIVING tabs.

Howto Improve NVidia Laptop Graphics Performance in Ubuntu

2008-06-15T07:21:00.000-07:00

NVidia laptop cards come with a feature called PowerMizer that dynamically underclocks the GPU when it's not being used much. This is great for battery power but horrible for performance when using Desktop Effects (compiz). Unfortunately, NVidia does not provide a way to configure PowerMizer on Linux however, it's not difficult to create a script that will give you maximum speed while on AC power and maximum power savings while on battery.

This HOWTO is aimed primarily at users of NVidia 8 and 9 series laptop graphics cards (though, it may be useful for 7 series users as well). This HOWTO assumes you are running compiz and have already properly configured the NVidia proprietary drivers. If you are not using compiz, this guide will not be useful for you.

Implementation

The first thing we will need is a utility called nvidia-settings. If you've installed the NVidia drivers directly from the NVidia website or using envyng, you can skip this step

sudo apt-get install nvidia-settings

The nvidia-settings has a unique property that, with essentially no CPU/GPU activity, when you ask the card to print all of its information, it causes the card to go to maximum power. The nvidia card only drops a power level every 30 seconds so, we are going to take advantage these two facts to keep the card at maximum power if we are on AC power.

If you have no custom scripts, follow these instructions first

mkdir -p ~/bin

Then, open up gedit and paste the following script

#!/bin/bash

while true; do
if on_ac_power; then
nice /usr/bin/nvidia-settings -q all > /dev/null
fi
sleep 25;
done

Save the script as ~/bin/nvidia-power.sh. Then, start a terminal and type the following:

chmod +x ~/bin/nvidia-power.sh

~/bin/nvidia-power.sh &

disown

exit

If you are on AC power, the card should now be locked at its maximum power but, if you are on battery power, you should see no difference at all (until you next plug your laptop in).

Next, we will need to add this script to run when you login. On gnome, go to System->Preferences->Sessions, click Add. Add a descriptive name for the startup program (maybe, "NVidia Power") and for Command use, "/home/your_username/bin/nvidia-power.sh" (replace your_username with your username). Now the command should run whenever you login.

Testing

Testing is fairly straightforward. Start a terminal and type:

nvidia-settings

Scroll down to the bottom of the window this command brings up and look on the left side for the PowerMizer option. If your laptop is plugged in, you should see that your graphics card is running at full power. Watch it for a minute (the time it takes for the card to normally drop to lowest power) and make sure it stays at the highest power level. Now, unplug your laptop and wait for another minute. After less than a minute, your card should drop down to minimum power (as long as you keep it idle). Now, plug the cable back in and, in less than 30 seconds, the card should come back to full power and stay there.

The one caveat of this approach is that it can take up to 25 seconds for the card to come back up to full power. There are more complex ways to make the card instantly go to full power when plugged in but, on average, it will be at full power within 12 seconds so, it's probably more hassle than it's worth to use more complex methods.

Howto Create Smart Playlists in Songbird

2008-06-11T23:01:00.000-07:00

Songbird doesn't have the feature for Smart Playlists built into it (playlists that consist of music matching certain conditions, e.g. "Never been played", or "Recently Added").

How to make a Recently Added playlist:

1. Open Text Editor (Applications>Accessories>Text Editor)

2. Copy and paste:

find "/home/user/Music/" -mtime -30 -type f | egrep -vi '\.jpg$' >recentlyadded.pl

Change /home/user/Music/ to the directory where you store your music.

By default I've defined "recently added" as music that was added in the past 30 days, but you can change the number 30 to a different number if you prefer.

3. Click File>Save As... and call it RecentlyAddedPlaylist.sh (or something else if you prefer).

4. Navigate to the folder where you saved it, right click on it, click Properties.

5. Go to the Permissions tab and tick the box "Allow executing file as program" and click Close.

6. Double click on the file and click Run in Terminal

7. Open Songbird

8. Click on File>Import a Playlist...

9. Navigate to your home folder.

10. The playlist won't be visible, so just type "recentlyadded.pl" and click Open.

11. You should now see a playlist of all the songs you've added in the past 30 days.

To update the playlist, simply run steps 6 to 10 again.

Howto Install Ubuntu on an external hard drive on an Acer Aspire laptop

2008-06-07T23:28:00.000-07:00

If you want to install Ubuntu on an external hard drive on an Acer Aspire laptop follow this procedure

1) Buy a MyBook 320GB hard drive at Wal-Mart (by Western Digital) for ~$100

**NOTE: The next step is only necessary if you need wireless internet access through a router**

2) Buy a Zonet wireless card (your Aspire's built-in wireless IS NOT compatible with Ubuntu)

3) Follow the MyBook's [sarcasm]extremely difficult[/sarcasm] installation instructions to get it working in Windows Vista.

4) DO NOT USE THE ZONET CARD, Windows can and will mess up its internal settings.

5) Once the MyBook is working, attempt to format it to NTFS. When the format is just A LITTLE BIT done, purposefully end the format to corrupt the drive. I know it sounds stupid, but it works.

6) Download the latest version of Ubuntu (8.04 at the time of writing) as a LiveCD.

7) Write the ISO to a CD, I used a CD-RW. Most Aspire laptops come with NTI CD Maker, so use that if you have it.

8) This step was a mistake. If you're trying to reproduce this, skip to step 9. Restart your laptop to find that the BIOS won't load from CDs. Reenter Windows in frustration.

9) Go into the CD with windows to bring up the Ubuntu menu inside Windows.

10) Choose to use the LiveCD (I think the top option) and use the 3rd option (to get help with startup).

11) It will rewrite your BIOS to allow booting from the LiveCD on startup.

12) Restart again and load the LiveCD.

13) Boot into "normal install" (first button on CD menu).

14) Enter GParted and find your new 320GB hard disk.

15) There should be 1 partition with an "unknown" format. Delete the partition and apply it.

16) Close GParted and restart. Go back into the normal install like before.

17) Hit Install on your Ubuntu desktop.

18) Answer the questions as normal until it asks you where to install it to.

19) Choose to take up the entire 320GB drive.

20) Install Ubuntu as normal, you don't need to change any of the advanced settings.

21) When complete, reboot into the new GRUB bootloader and choose to start Ubuntu.

22) It will start from your external HD and boom, you have Ubuntu!

**NOTE: If you DON'T want wireless internet access, skip to step 29**

23) Shut down and put your Zonet card in. Go back into Ubuntu.

24) In Ubuntu, go to the network options.

25) Set your computer's built-in wireless device to 'roaming mode' if you haven't already.

26) Set your Zonet card to manual configuration. Enter your router's SSID and choose "Automatic DHCP configuration" in the dropdown list.

27) Apply these and let it change the interface.

28) Start Firefox, and with any luck, you're connected now!

29) Enjoy!

Howto install Fedora Directory Server (DS) 1.04 on Ubuntu 8.04 (Hardy Heron)

2008-06-07T23:22:00.000-07:00

A directory server provides a centralized directory service for your intranet, network, and extranet information. Directory Server integrates with existing systems and acts as a centralized repository for the consolidation of employee, customer, supplier, and partner information. You can extend Directory Server to manage user profiles and preferences, as well as extranet user authentication.

Preparing your system

cd /home/

mkdir fds

cd fds

sudo apt-get install ssh

Download Fedora Directory Server Pre-built rpm

wget -c http://directory.fedoraproject.org/download/fedora-ds-1.0.4-1.FC6.i386.opt.rpm

Installing Alien Package

sudo apt-get install alien

Convert .rpm Package to .deb Package

sudo alien --scripts fedora-ds-1.0.4-1.FC6.i386.opt.rpm

Install Dependencies

wget http://mirrors.kernel.org/debian/pool/main/t/termcap-compat/termcap-compat_1.2.3_i386.deb

wget http://mirrors.kernel.org/debian/pool/main/libc/libc/libc5_5.4.46-15_i386.deb

wget http://mirrors.kernel.org/debian/pool/main/l/ld.so/ldso_1.9.11-15_i386.deb

sudo dpkg --install ldso_1.9.11-15_i386.deb

sudo dpkg --install libc5_5.4.46-15_i386.deb

sudo dpkg --install termcap-compat_1.2.3_i386.deb

Installing Java Run Time Environment

sudo apt-get install sun-java6-bin

Installing Apache2-mpm-worker

sudo apt-get install apache2-mpm-worker

sudo ln -s /usr/sbin/apache2 /usr/sbin/httpd

Installing .deb package

sudo dpkg -i fedora-ds_1.0.4-2_i386.deb

Creating a user and group for the daemon

sudo groupadd fds

sudo useradd -s /bin/false -g fds fds

Running Fedora-ds Setup Program

sudo /opt/fedora-ds/setup/setup -k

Please select the install mode:
1 - Express - minimal questions
2 - Typical - some customization (default)
3 - Custom - lots of customization
Please select 1, 2, or 3 (default: 2) 1

Hostname to use (default: facility-srv1.it-mgt.com)
Server user ID to use (default: nobody) fds
Server group ID to use (default: nobody) fds

Fedora configuration directory server
administrator ID [admin]:
Directory Manager DN [cn=Directory Manager]:

sudo cp /opt/fedora-ds/setup/install.inf /opt

sudo chmod 640 /opt/install.inf

sudo pico /opt/install.inf

Add the directive for ApacheRoot at the end of the file
...
[admin]
SysUser= root
Port= 16000
ServerIpAddress=
ServerAdminID= admin
ServerAdminPwd= dsadmin
ApacheDir= /usr/sbin
ApacheRoot= /usr/lib/apache2

Rerun the setup script with the new ApacheRoot directive

sudo /opt/fedora-ds/setup/setup -s -f /opt/install.inf

You can now use the console. Here is the command to use to start the console:

cd /opt/fedora-ds

./startconsole -u admin -a http://facility-srv1.it-mgt.com:/

Adjusting the admin-server's httpd.conf file

sudo pico /opt/fedora-ds/admin-serv/config/httpd.conf

Comment out the following apache module

#LoadModule log_config_module /usr/lib/apache2/modules/mod_log_config.so

Starting the admin-server

sudo /opt/fedora-ds/start-admin

Persistent startup

sudo pico /etc/inti.d/local

#! /bin/sh
/opt/fedora-ds/slapd-fossedu/start-slapd
/opt/fedora-ds/start-admin

sudo chmod +x /etc/init.d/local

sudo update-rc.d local defaults 80

HowTo enable empty password login in Ubuntu

2008-06-07T23:15:00.000-07:00

ou want to enable a password less account in Gnome for your family/friends who have access to your computer.

This is different than not typing a password (autologin)

How to - by example

Create a user (system/administration/user and groups)
You can put fancy characters in the real name but not in the username.
You are obliged to enter a password. We will get read of it afterwards.

example:
username: guest
real name: invité (or guest or whatever you want to display in the graphical greeter later on)
profile: desktop user (DO NOT use administrator)
password: password

click ok and close the users and groups tool.

Remove the password for the guest user
open a terminal

sudo passwd -d guest

Authorize login with no passwords in gdm

sudo sed -i 's/#PasswordRequired=false/PasswordRequired=false/' /etc/gdm/gdm.conf

Authorize login with no passwords in pam

sudo sed -i 's/nullok_secure/nullok/' /etc/pam.d/common-auth

You can now log in with your guest user with no password.

If you want a graphical greeter screen, select it in system/administration/login window [local tab] (example: human list)

Howto Backup all installed programs/packages in Ubuntu/Kubuntu

2008-06-05T23:57:00.000-07:00

PROBLEM: Lets say you have set up your *buntu box. Now you want to backup all the installed deb files so that you can restore them quickly and efficiently.

These commands will do that for you.

Open a terminal and paste the following into it:

$ sudo apt-get install dpkg-repack fakeroot

$ mkdir ~/dpkg-repack; cd ~/dpkg-repack

$ fakeroot -u dpkg-repack `dpkg --get-selections | grep install | cut -f1`

(the last command will take some time)

Now if you scroll to your home folder, you should find a folder called "dpkg-repack" which should have all the deb files of all your installed packages.

Reinstall Packages

If you want to re-install the packages, navigate to the folder with the packages and input the following command in the terminal:

sudo dpkg -i *.deb

HowTo Remove the locked screen login after resume from suspend or hibernate in Ubuntu Hardy

2008-06-03T23:51:00.000-07:00

This is a very short and simple tutorial on how to remove the locked screen login prompt after resume from suspend or hibernation in Ubuntu 8.04 (Hardy).

All you have to do is comment out a single line in a specific configuration file.

First, lets bring up a terminal window. Applications -> Accessories -> Terminal

Now that we have a terminal up, let's enter the command

gksudo gedit /etc/default/acpi-support

This will grant authoritative access to the configuration file which handles suspend and hibernation operations and utility.

Once the file is open in gedit text editor, let's scroll down to the line

# Comment this out to disable screen locking on resume

LOCK_SCREEN=true

LOCK_SCREEN is a boolean variable that has a true and false value. Rather than change its value to false, let's simply comment it out by placing a # before LOCK_SCREEN so that the enter line becomes,

#LOCK_SCREEN=true

Let's now save and we're done. Reboot or Ctrl-Alt-BackSpace (to restart Ubuntu) for changes to take effect and you can now try to suspend or hibernate and your changes should be there.

To set LOCK_SCREEN again, repeat the process, but remove the # instead.

Howto Set Gnome Calendar First Day of Week in Ubuntu

2008-05-31T14:06:00.000-07:00

This tutorial will explain how to change the gnome calendar first day of the week to Monday.

Check which locale you are using (mine is en_US, don't worry about the .UTF ending)

locale

Next, backup and edit the applicable locale file (use the result of the previous command if not en_US).

sudo cp /usr/share/i18n/locales/en_US /usr/share/i18n/locales/en_US.bak

gksudo gedit /usr/share/i18n/locales/en_US

Locate the following line and change the value. The value for Monday in en_US was 2. Select the appropriate number if you desire another day to be the start day.

first_weekday 2

Save the file and then

Update the locales

sudo locale-gen

Refresh the desktop

killall gnome-panel

The first day should now be Monday

HowTo setup Canon iRC 2880i printer in Ubuntu 8.04 (Hardy Heron)

2008-05-29T23:38:00.000-07:00

If you want to setup Canon iRC 2880i printer in Hardy follow this procedure

1. Goto System->Administration->Printing

2. Create a new printer queue

3. Select the type of connection to the printer (mine is Windows Printer via SAMBA)

4. Input the printer settings eg: 10.0.0.1/NameOfPrinter and authentication if needed

5. For drivers use Generic->PCL 5c->Generic PCL 5c Printer Foomatic/hpijs

6. Give it a name and you're set to go

If you would also like to print in colour then this is where the fun begins.

You will need the UFR Printer Drivers from Canon .

If you're using the iRC 2880 then you can go straight here

Once you have the drivers and have extracted them then follow these steps.

Note: If you are using a version of Ubuntu that is older than Hardy you should just be able to run the deb file in the Debian folder and then you can skip to step 6

1. If you try and run the deb file in the Debian folder in Hardy it will give a dependency error regarding libcupsys2-gnutls10. So...

2. Run sudo apt-get install alien

3. Go to the extracted drivers RPM directory in a Terminal

4. Run sudo alien -c *.rpm (The -c will include any scripts in the package)

5. Run your newly created deb packages. First the cups common one then the driver one.

6. Follow the intructions above for the setting up of only black & white printing up to and including step 4

7. For drivers use Canon->iR C2880/C3380 UFR II->iR C2880/C3380 UFR II (or whatever model you are using)

8. Give it a name and you should now be printing in colour

In case you were wondering why you get the dependency error in step 1, the reason is that the Debian package was converted from a RPM one, using alien. Alien picked up the dependencies that where present on the system that the package was initially created.

Source from here

Howto Install Lightscribe in ubuntu

2008-05-29T11:53:00.000-07:00

LaCie has released the first software that allows burning labels on LightScribe media using LightScribe drives under Linux.

This guide will help you install the base Lightscribe software and the 4L Disk Labeling software on a 32-bit or 64-bit Ubuntu install.

Open a terminal.

1. Create a temporary workspace in your home directory.

Note: You can delete this directory when you are finished installing the software.

mkdir workspace

cd workspace

2. Download the 32-bit .deb files and an icon for Lightscribe

wget http://download.lightscribe.com/ls/lightscribe-1.12.37.1-linux-2.6-intel.deb

wget http://uploads.mitechie.com/lightscribe/4l_1.0-r6_i386.deb

wget http://lawrencecomputing.dyn-o-saur.com/lightscribe/lightscribe.png

Install the .deb files in the console with the force-architecture flag

Important: Make sure to do these steps in this order (lightscribe then 4L)

For 32-bit

sudo dpkg -i lightscribe-1.12.37.1-linux-2.6-intel.deb

sudo dpkg -i 4l_1.0-r6_i386.deb

For 64-bit

sudo dpkg --force-architecture -i lightscribe-1.12.37.1-linux-2.6-intel.deb

sudo dpkg --force-architecture -i 4l_1.0-r6_i386.deb

4. Fix the missing liblightscribe.so.1 error

sudo ln -s /usr/lib/liblightscribe.so.1 /usr/lib32/

sudo ln -s /usr/lib/liblightscribe.so /usr/lib32/

sudo ldconfig

Note: The program should run now. You can test this by pressing Alt+F2 and running

sudo 4L-gui

5. Copy the icon file into Ubuntu's shared icon directory

sudo cp lightscribe.png /usr/share/pixmaps/4L-gui.png

6. Create a shortcut to launch the 4L Disk Labeler as root

a. Right Click on the Ubuntu Menu Bar and choose Edit Menus.

b. In the left pane labeled menus choose either "Sound & Video" or "System Tools".

c. Then, click new item.

Enter this information into the window:

Type: Application
Name: Lightscribe
Command: sudo 4L-gui
Comment: Label a disc with Lightscribe

Note: You can automatically generate an icon by leaving out the sudo from "sudo 4L-gui" in the command field. You must add sudo to the command or the program will not function. Ubuntu will search for an icon in /usr/shared/pixmaps with the same name as the command. Alternatively, you can click the spring icon and browse for the Lightscribe icon.

Note: You can burn a label twice if it is not dark enough. Don't worry about the orientation of the disc, the drive will align it for you.

Ubuntu Tip:How To Get Flash Working in Opera 9.27

2008-05-29T11:41:00.000-07:00

The current version of Flash 9.0.115.0 does not work with the current version of Opera 9.27. but Opera9.27 does work with Flash 9.0.48.0. This is how to get that working without making trouble for firefox or later versions of Opera that are coming and will work with Flash 9.0.115.0

To get flash to work in Opera 9.27 which is the version available in the repository you must do the following:

First go here which is the adobe repository for older versions of flash and download flashplayer 9 to your desktop or wherever. Unpack it. The readme will direct you to the folder with the linux version which is 9r48. Unpack that.

You can use archive manager which is in Applications/ Accessories to do this part. If you can't see it there go to System/Preferences/Main Menu and check the box to make it visible.

This will then create a folder called install_flash_player_9_linux. Take the file in there called libflashplayer.so and move it to /usr/lib/opera/plugins.

Now just type sudo nautlius in a terminal and use two nautilus windows to go to the right locations and did a drag and drop.

Important Note:- Do not use nautlius like this unless you are absolutely sure about what you are doing and be sure to close it right away when you are finished. It is easily possible to put your system in an unrecoverable state by moving random files around as root.

Then navigate over to /usr/share/opera/ini and open the pluginpath.ini file. Scroll down to the section that says ; Flash and comment out the lines:

/usr/lib/flash-plugin=1
/usr/lib/flashplugin-nonfree=1

and add the line:

/usr/lib/opera/plugins=1

so it looks like this:

; Flash
#/usr/lib/flash-plugin=1
#/usr/lib/flashplugin-nonfree=1
/usr/lib/opera/plugins=1

Save it and get out of there.

Now flash should work in your opera and enjoy

When you get Opera 9.5 you can just remove the comment marks and the line you added in /usr/share/opera/ini/pluginpath.ini and just put the old flash in the trash.

How to Create Screenshots via CLI with scrot

2008-05-25T11:04:00.000-07:00

scrot is a commandline screen capture util like "import", but using imlib2.

It has lots of options for autogenerating filenames, and can do fun stuff like taking screenshots of multiple displays and glueing them together.

Install Scrot in Ubuntu

sudo aptitude install scrot

This will complete the installation.

Using Scrot

Example scrot commands
1. Capture screen and save file to working directory:

scrot

2. Capture screen in 5 seconds time:

scrot -d 5

3. Capture screen in 5 seconds time, name file with time stamp and screen dimensions:

scrot -d 5 '%Y-%m-%d--%s_$wx$h_scrot.png'

4. As above, but move file into "images" directory and open the image with GIMP:

scrot -d 5 '%Y-%m-%d--%s_$wx$h_scrot.png' -e 'mv $f ~/images/ & gimp ~/images/$f'

scrot Options
See below for a full list of options:

Usage : scrot [OPTIONS]... [FILE]
Where FILE is the target file for the screenshot.
If FILE is not specified, a date-stamped file will be dropped in the
current directory.
See man scrot for more details
-h, --help display this help and exit
-v, --version output version information and exit
-b, --border When selecting a window, grab wm border too
-c, --count show a countdown before taking the shot
-d, --delay NUM wait NUM seconds before taking a shot
-e, --exec APP run APP on the resulting screenshot
-q, --quality NUM Image quality (1-100) high value means
high size, low compression. Default: 75.
For lossless compression formats, like png,
low quality means high compression.
-m, --multidisp For multiple heads, grab shot from each
and join them together.
-s, --select interactively choose a window or rectangle
with the mouse
-t, --thumb NUM generate thumbnail too. NUM is the percentage
of the original size for the thumbnail to be,
or the geometry in percent, e.g. 50x60 or 80x20.

SPECIAL STRINGS
Both the --exec and filename parameters can take format specifiers
that are expanded by scrot when encountered.
There are two types of format specifier. Characters preceded by a '%'
are interpreted by strftime(2). See man strftime for examples.
These options may be used to refer to the current date and time.
The second kind are internal to scrot and are prefixed by '$'
The following specifiers are recognised:
$f image path/filename (ignored when used in the filename)
$m thumbnail path/filename
$n image name (ignored when used in the filename)
$s image size (bytes) (ignored when used in the filename)
$p image pixel size
$w image width
$h image height
$t image format
$$ prints a literal '$'
n prints a newline (ignored when used in the filename)
Example:
scrot '%Y-%m-%d_$wx$h_scrot.png' -e 'mv $f ~/images/shots/'
Creates a file called something like 2000-10-30_2560x1024_scrot.png
and moves it to your images directory.

This program is free software see the file COPYING for licensing info.
Copyright Tom Gilbert 2000

Source from here

How to Create Passwordless SSH Private/Public Key Pair on Ubuntu

2008-05-25T10:58:00.000-07:00

An SSH key pair is needed to connect to an SSH server. It is possible to create a passwordless key pair so as to bypass the password prompt when you connect to your SSH server. This is handy for when you need to automate some processes through scripting. Follow the instructions below to create a new passwordless key pair:

1. Install OpenSSH. On Ubuntu, you can install OpenSSH by opening your terminal and typing:

sudo apt-get install openssh-client

2. Once OpenSSH is installed, stay in the terminal and type:

ssh-keygen -t dsa -f ~/.ssh/id_dsa

3. When prompted for a password, leave blank and hit enter, then enter again to confirm. Your key pair will be created and stored in ~/.ssh/ as id_dsa.pub [public key] and id_dsa [private key]

Next, you will need to copy the contents of id_dsa.pub to a file named authorized_keys and transfer the file to the target system you wish to connect to. Follow the instructions below:

1. Create the new file with the following command:

touch ~/.ssh/authorized_keys

2. Apply the correct permissions:

chmod 600 ~/.ssh/authorized_keys

3. Copy the contents of id_dsa.pub to the new file:

cat ~/.ssh/id_dsa.pub >> ~/.ssh/authorized_keys

Finish by transferring the new file to the target server. You should now be able to connect to your SSH server without having to enter a password.

Source from here

How to install RealPlayer on Ubuntu

2008-05-25T10:55:00.000-07:00

The instructions below detail how to download and install RealPlayer on Ubuntu Linux. The instructions also enable the Mozilla/Firefox plugin and optionally remove Real's imposed audio icons:

1. Open a terminal and enter the following command to download RealPlayer:

wget http://www.real.com/realcom/R?href=http://forms.real.com/real/player/download.html?f=unix/RealPlayer11GOLD.bin

2. Make the file executable with the following command:

chmod a+x RealPlayer11GOLD.bin

3. Run the executable as root and enter your password when prompted:

sudo ./RealPlayer11GOLD.bin

4. If everything is working, you should see this message, hit enter:

Extracting files for Helix installation........................

Welcome to the RealPlayer (11.0.0.4028) Setup for UNIX
Setup will help you get RealPlayer running on your computer.
Press [Enter] to continue...

5. When prompted, install to /opt/real/RealPlayer, just hit enter:

Enter the complete path to the directory where you want
RealPlayer to be installed. You must specify the full
pathname of the directory and have write privileges to
the chosen directory.
Directory: [/opt/real/RealPlayer]

6. Enter "F" at the following screen to confirm:

You have selected the following RealPlayer configuration:

Destination: /opt/real/RealPlayer

Enter [F]inish to begin copying files, or [P]revious to go
back to the previous prompts: [F]:

7. If all goes well, RealPlayer should install and you will be dumped back to the prompt:

Copying RealPlayer files...Path setup done.
Succeeded.
installing application icons resource...
installing document icons resource...
....Succeeded.
Configuring Mozilla...
Installing .mo locale files...
Setting selinux context...
Succeeded.

RealPlayer installation is complete.
Cleaning up installation files...
Done.

8. Optional: delete the RealPlayer download with the following command:

rm RealPlayer11GOLD.bin

9. Copy the Mozilla/Firefox plugins to your plugins directory, enter the command:

cp /opt/real/RealPlayer/mozilla/nphelix.so ~/.mozilla/plugins/nphelix.so && cp /opt/real/RealPlayer/mozilla/nphelix.xpt ~/.mozilla/plugins/nphelix.xpt

10. Optional: remove RealPlayer audio icons from system:

sudo /opt/real/RealPlayer/postinst/install_icon_resource.sh uninstall

Source from here

How to install 150 Extra GIMP Brushes for Ubuntu

2008-05-25T10:50:00.000-07:00

By default GIMP comes with a rather limited set of brushes. There's a package available from the Ubuntu repositories to install some extra brushes, however this is also a little limited.This package will allow you to install more packages for gimp brushes.

1. Open your apt sources.list file for editing with the following terminal command:

gksudo gedit /etc/apt/sources.list

2. Add the following two lines to the bottom of the file:

deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/corenominal/ubuntu gutsy main
deb-src http://ppa.launchpad.net/corenominal/ubuntu gutsy main

Save and exit the file

3.Update the source list using the following command

sudo apt-get update

4. Still in the terminal, enter the following command to install the package

sudo apt-get install gimp-brushes

5. Enjoy your new GIMP brushes!

Howto Increase video performance in Ubuntu

2008-05-23T22:24:00.000-07:00

On some reasons by default these modules are not present in X11 config, but, to the measure for me these modules in 2 times accelerate the capacity of performance.

First you need to take the backup of your xorg.conf file using the following command

cp /etc/X11/xorg.conf /etc/X11/xorg.conf.back

Now you need to edit /etc/X11/xorg.conf file using the following command

sudo gedit /etc/X11/xorg.conf

Add the following lines

Section "Module"
Load "i2c"
Load "bitmap"
Load "ddc"
Load "dri"
Load "extmod"
Load "freetype"
Load "glx" # If you have VESA driver, comment this.
Load "int10"
Load "vbe"
EndSection

Save and exit the file.

Howto Setup Lexmark Z55 printer in Ubuntu Hardy Heron

2008-05-23T22:18:00.000-07:00

This tutorial describes how to install a Lexmark Z55 printer on Hardy Heron.

By default the wrong driver is installed for the Z55 which causes the printer to squeal and fail to print. A driver is available from the Lexmark website for Linux rpm distributions.

1. Download

Download the file CJLZ55LE-CUPS-1.0-1.TAR.GZ from the Drivers and Downloads section of the Lexmark website. Select a Linux distribution such as Mandrake.

2. Uninstall the existing driver

System->Administration->Printing

Expand "Local Printers"

Click on "Lexmark_Z55" to select it

Press the "Delete" button and confirm with OK

3. Create directory

Create a directory to work in and move the downloaded file into this new directory.

mkdir lexmark

mv CJLZ55LE-CUPS-1.0-1.TAR.GZ lexmark

4. Extract rpm files from the download

tail -n +143 lexmarkz55-CUPS-1.0-1.gz.sh > install.tgz

tar -xvzf install.tgz

5. Convert rpm files into deb packages

First install the alien package if you have not already done so.

sudo apt-get install alien

Now convert the files ignoring any warnings.

sudo alien lexmarkz55-CUPS-1.0-1.i386.rpm

sudo alien z55llpddk-2.0-2.i386.rpm

Save the deb files in a safe place. For subsequent installations you can use these files.

6. Install the packages

The deb files can now be installed using any method you prefer. To install from the command line type:

sudo dpkg -i z55llpddk_2.0-3_i386.deb

sudo dpkg -i lexmarkz55-cups_1.0-2_i386.deb

7. Unzip ppd file

cd /usr/share/cups/model

sudo gunzip Lexmark-Z55-lxz55cj-cups.ppd.gz

8. Install the new driver

System->Administration->Printing

Press the "New Printer" button

Select "Lexmark Z55 USB #1"

Press "Forward"

Select "Provide PPD file"

Click on the file icon on the right hand side of the box below

Using the file picker select /usr/share/cups/model/Lexmark-Z55-lxz55cj-cups.ppd

Press "Forward"

Press "Apply"

Auto-mounting internal drives in Ubuntu

2008-05-22T14:10:00.000-07:00

So I've noticed when running Ubuntu that while my external drives will show up on my desktop when I turn the computer on, my internal drives don't. They were still accessible from the Places Menu, but they had to mount on the first click, and then I could open them. Obviously, this is not the desired behavior. So I did a bit of digging and I found the problem. HAL apparently tells gnome-volume-manager not to auto-mount internal drives. I found the file containing this policy, and fixed the problem.

The file is this one:

/etc/hal/fdi/policy/preferences.fdi

sudo gedit /etc/hal/fdi/policy/preferences.fdi

To fix it so that internal drives will show up on your desktop when you boot up, change this line

PDF printing from Firefox in Ubuntu Hardy

2008-05-22T14:08:00.000-07:00

Hopefully, this will prove useful to anyone who is trying to print a webpage using the CUPS-PDF virtual printer only to find that the resulting file has truncated text because the webpage was too wide (e.g. menu frame on the side).

Resizing the page using Zoom only changes what you see on the screen rather than what you print.

1. In Firefox, use FILE - PAGE SETUP to change the size to something larger, e.g. A3

2. Then CTRL+P to print, but instead of using the 'Print to PDF' option, choose 'Print to File instead. In the window that opens, then select PDF as 'Output Format'.

Getting your Dell service tag number from command line in Ubuntu

2008-05-21T21:59:00.000-07:00

If you’re using Ubuntu with a Dell computer, there is a handy command to get your service tag number. This is handy in support situations when the service tag number can’t be read because it’s inaccessible, too small, or simply gone.

Open the terminal window in the Accessories > Applications menu and type the following command

sudo dmidecode -s system-serial-number

Howto Join Ubuntu 8.04 (Hardy Heron) To A Windows Domain

2008-05-21T14:21:00.000-07:00

Likewise Open enables Linux, Unix and Mac authentication on a Microsoft network using Active Directory. A user can now interactively log in to the Linux, Unix or Mac machine using Active Directory credentials, and can access any kerberized services that the non-Windows machine hosts.

What it Does

Likewise Open supports over 110 UNIX, Linux and Mac platforms

Joins Linux, Unix and Mac systems to Microsoft Windows Active Directory domains

Authenticates users with a single user name and password on both Windows and non-Windows systems

Enforces the same password policies for non-Windows users as for Windows users

Install and Configure likewise-open

Use the following steps

sudo apt-get update

sudo apt-get install likewise-open

sudo domainjoin-cli join fqdn.of.your.domain Administrator

sudo update-rc.d likewise-open defaults

sudo /etc/init.d/likewise-open start

After that is done, you can log out, then log back in with your domain\username account (You have to add the domain\ first).

How to install Firefox 3 RC1 on Ubuntu Hardy

2008-05-20T13:52:00.000-07:00

If you want to install firefox Firefox 3 RC1 in ubuntu hardy follow these simple steps

You just need to add the following to your /etc/apt/sources.list

sudo gedit /etc/apt/sources.list

add the following line

deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/fta/ubuntu hardy main

save and exit the file

Then you only need to update the source list

apt-get update

and then upgrade with the following command

apt-get dist-upgrade or to install the firefox-3.0 package if you haven’t do it before.

Howto Duplicate Audio CDs using cdrdao in Ubuntu

2008-05-20T11:40:00.000-07:00

This guide aims to show how to duplicate audio cds from the command line using one of my favourite programs: cdrdao.

Identify your drive

First of all cdrdao needs to know where to find your drive and the following command will give you the required information. I show the results from my own computer, your results will of course differ slightly:

$ sudo cdrdao scanbus
[sudo] password for andrew:
Cdrdao version 1.2.2 - (C) Andreas Mueller
SCSI interface library - (C) Joerg Schilling
Paranoia DAE library - (C) Monty

Check http://cdrdao.sourceforge.net/drives.html#dt for current driver tables.

Using libscg version 'ubuntu-0.8ubuntu1'

1,0,0 : Optiarc , DVD+-RW AD-5560A, DD11

So the scsi address for my drive is 1,0,0 for bus,id,lun and since this is a single drive computer it will be both the source and destination drive in my command line. The results of this command give a hint as well concerning the driver that cdrdao will use. Have a look at the URL given and see if your drive is mentioned there but you will probably find that the generic-mmc driver will work well enough with most modern drives.

All the other settings

With the drive and the driver successfully identified it remains only to decide on a few other elements to form our command line:

* Write speed: There are a thousand theories regarding the correct speed to burn an audio cd. I prefer to burn slowly so I have selected a speed of 8.

* Buffers: This specifies the number of buffers available to prevent under-run. Each buffer holds 1 second of audio data so divide the buffers by the write speed to give the maximum time for which reading of audio data may be stalled. With buffers of 128, as I have selected, and write speed of 8 this gives 16 seconds before under-run will occur..

* Error Checking: It is possible to set error checking for the digital audio extraction and I prefer to set this to maximum. This slows the whole process down a little but guarantees better quality.

So now all the settings are decided and it is time to assemble the command line.

If you really want you can type out the whole command line each time you want to duplicate an audio cd but there is a easy way. First create the following file:

$ sudo gedit /etc/cdrdao.conf

Next open it with your favourite text editor and then simply add all the settings that we have discussed above into this file in the following format:

#---- cdrdao.conf ----#
write_buffers: 128
write_device: "1,0,0"
write_driver: "generic-mmc"
read_device: "1,0,0"
read_driver: "generic-mmc"
read_paranoia_mode: 3
write_speed: 8

Now when you wish to duplicate an audio cd place the source cd in your drive and use the following command:

$ sudo cdrdao copy

And the rest of the process will continue with the only intervention required by you being the replacement of the source cd with a blank, writeable cd when prompted. How cool is that!

========================
Other useful commands:
========================

The man page for cdrdao is well written and quite comprehensive and I strongly suggest that you read it well. Below are a few 'high points', options that may be useful with the syntax above:

* --keepimage: If you are using the 'copy' command the cd image is automatically removed at the completion of the write process. This option allows the image to remain and to then be written to another cd if you wish.
* --simulate: Used in the writing process as: 'sudo cdrdao write --simulate'. This will perform the write process fully but in simulation only. Very useful to test settings.
* --blank-mode minimal: Add this option in to blank your cd quickly. If you wish to blank the cd completely use the option '--blank-mode full'.

HOW TO Enable Additional Print Preview Buttons in Firefox

2008-05-20T11:36:00.000-07:00

step-by-step tutorial on how to make these print preview buttons appear:

1. Open Firefox.

2. In the URL area (i.e., the bar that displays the internet address), clear the existing text and then type: "about:config"

3. If propmpted, click OK to by-pass the warning.

4. In the Filter field near the top of the page, filter for the phrase "print.while"

5. Find the "print.whileInPrintPreview" option -- it may be the only one displayed. Double-click on the option to set it for true

Now, when you enter print preview, you should see the buttons for page scaling as well as options for landscape and portrait page orientations.

Fix boot GUI resolution in Ubuntu

2008-05-20T11:33:00.000-07:00

Everytime I install Ubuntu, my usplash (the boot GUI) is 640x480. So here is howto make the usplash resolution fit your display resolution:

1. Open a terminal and type:

sudo gedit /etc/usplash.conf

This will ask you for your userpasswd, so you can edit that file with root permissions.

You will get something like this:

# Usplash configuration file
# These parameters will only apply after running update-initramfs.
xres=640
yres=480

OR

# Usplash configuration file
# These parameters will only apply after running update-initramfs.

2. Adjust xres and yres to your tagrgeted resolution, e.g. for 1280x1024:

# Usplash configuration file
# These parameters will only apply after running update-initramfs.
xres=1280
yres=1024

Save via

3. You now must update your initramfs so the changes take effect:

sudo update-initramfs -u

4. Finish. Enjeoy your well-sized usplash-boot-screen

Installing Rubyripper on Ubuntu 8.04

2008-05-20T11:27:00.000-07:00

Rubyripper is a digital audio extraction algorithm that uses cdparanoia in a sophisticated way to make sure that a CD rip is done successfully and accurately. It is very similar to and inspired by EAC. Rubyripper is written in the ruby programming language.

How is Rubyripper different from other CD rippers?

This differs from programs like K3b and Sound Juicer because it is much more thorough. Rubyripper rips each audio track at least twice, then compares each rip for differences and attempts to make the most accurate compilation of rips it possibly can. The result? Higher quality CD rips.

Installation

1. First, let's make sure that all the dependancies to Rubyripper are met. There are several packages that Rubyripper depends on that need to be installed prior to installing Rubyripper. Let's install these packages by opening up the terminal and typing

sudo aptitude install cd-discid cdparanoia ruby ruby-pkg-tools libgettext-ruby1.8 libgtk2-ruby

This command should install all the packages you need to run Rubyripper

2. Next, download the Rubyripper, version 0.5.0 here, on the official Rubyripper site.

3. Extract the files in the Rubyripper archive. You can either do this either through the GUI or through CLI:

* GUI: Right click on the file you just downloaded and select the "Extract Here" option.

* CLI: Open up the terminal, navigate to the directory where you downloaded Rubyripper, and run

tar xjvf rubyripper-0.5.0.tar.bz2

4. From here on out, it will be CLI only, so keep that terminal open!

5. In the terminal, navigate to the file you just extracted using cd. For example, if you extracted the file to your desktop, then you would write

cd /home/USERNAME/Desktop

6. Next, we'll tell Rubyripper what features we want to be installed. Copy and paste the following into the terminal:

./configure --enable-lang-all --enable-gtk2 --enable-cli --prefix=/usr

The above installs the GUI and CLI options, along with all the language support available. This is the recommended and most complete way to configure Rubyripper.

7. Finally, run

sudo make install

to finish the installation.

Rubyripper should now be in Applications -> Sound & Video.

Uninstallation

If you find you are unhappy with Rubyripper, for whatever reason, uninstalling is a snap.

1. First, you basically replicate Step 4 from the Installation process: open up your terminal again and navigate back to the directory you extracted in Step 3.

2. Next, run the following command to uninstall Rubyripper:

sudo make uninstall

3. Finally, run the following command to clean up all files left by Rubyripper:

sudo make clean

How to Upgrade Ubuntu Server from Feisty (7.04) to Hardy (8.04)

2008-05-15T12:09:00.000-07:00

This tutorial will explain how to upgrade Ubuntu Server from Feisty to Hardy

Step 1: Feisty to Gusty Upgrade

first be sure your feisty up-to-date

sudo apt-get update

sudo apt-get upgrade

sudo apt-get dist-upgrade

if everything ok, ready for upgrade to gusty.

nano /etc/apt/source.list

all change "feisty" to "gutsy"

save and exit (ctrl-x, yes)

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get dist-upgrade

(one package doesn't upgrade : mailscanner
but this step its fix:
nano /etc/init.d/mailscanner

around 124 line (do_stop function) add 'exit 0'

do_stop()
{ exit 0
# Return
# 0 if daemon has been stopped
# 1 if daemon was already stopped
# 2 if daemon could not be stopped
# other if a failure occurred
start-stop-daemon --stop --retry=TERM/30 --name $NAME
RETVAL="$?"
[ "$RETVAL" = 2 ] && return 2

# Remove lockfile for cronjobs
if [ $RETVAL -eq 0 ]; then
rm -f /var/lock/subsys/mailscanner
touch $stopped_lockfile
fi

}

save and exit.

and re-apply
sudo apt-get dist-upgrade

command. its works. there some warning related with mailscanner but not important (for now)

and reboot

my server is gutsy, now.

step 2. Gutsy to Hardy upgrade

nano /etc/apt/source.list

all change "gutsy" to "hardy"

save and exit (ctrl-x, yes)

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get dist-upgrade

one package doesn't upgrade : mailscanner
but no problem

reboot

mailscanner fix:

first backup your mailscanner folder. (/etc/mailscanner)

sudo cp -R /etc/mailscanner /etc/mailscanner_backup

sudo apt-get remove --purge mailscanner

(if removing results same error, around 124 line (do_stop function) add 'exit 0')

wget http://http.us.debian.org/debian/pool/main/m/mailscanner/mailscanner_4.68.8-1_all.deb
sudo dpkg -i mailscanner_4.68.8-1_all.deb

and

nano /etc/default/mailscanner

# Uncomment this line once MailScanner has been fully configured.
#
run_mailscanner=1

save and exit..

replace your backup mailscanner folder (/etc/mailscanner)

sudo cp -R /etc/mailscanner_backup /etc/mailscanner

/etc/init.d/mailscanner start

How To Replace ScreenCapture with KSnapshot

2008-05-15T12:06:00.000-07:00

On Windows I've become quite happy with Snag-It. In searching for something comparable on Ubuntu, I've found KSnapshot.

I miss the Ctrl-Shift-P shortcut to launch the application, so I've decided to get Fn-PrtSc to launch KSnapshot. Maybe you will find this more to your liking ...

1. Use the Synaptic Package Manager and install 'ksnapshot'
2. Open a Terminal window, after 'ksnapshot' is installed
3. Type the following commands:

cd /usr/bin
sudo mv gnome-screenshot gnome-screenshot.orig
sudo ln -s ksnapshot gnome-screenshot

Now, when you press Fn-PrtSc, KSnapshot will be launched.

The only downside is ... if you're trying to get a screen capture for something going on at that very moment - something that's possibly fleeting fast - this won't be good for you.

But, KSnapshot offers window-under-cursor, section-of-window, screen, and region capture capabilities.

How to Disable "Smarter" Address Bar in Firefox 3

2008-05-15T12:02:00.000-07:00

The "smarter" address bar might be help for some people.if you want to disable follow this.

The first step, in the address bar, enter in
about:config

It should give you some warning. Just disregard it.

In the search bar, enter:
browser.urlbar

Change the browser.urlbar.matchOnlyTyped boolean to True.
(Double click it)

Next, change the browser.urlbar.maxRichResults integer to 0.
(Double click and enter in 0 instead of current number)

Install Ubuntu 8.04 ( Hardy Heron) without a CD-ROM

2008-05-09T00:03:00.000-07:00

Things you'll Need

1) Ubuntu Hardy Heron (8.04) ALTERNATE .iso (see below)

2) At least 2 partitions on your HD

3) vmlinuz & initrd.gz files from Hardy - NOT the ones included on the .iso (see below)

Steps:

1) Download the ALTERNATE .iso from the Ubuntu download site:

http://www.ubuntu.com/getubuntu/download

REMEMBER: mark the "Check here if you need the alternate desktop CD." option, on the botton.

2) Download both vmlinuz & initrd.gz files, Hardy's version, from this site:

http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/dists/hardy/main/installer-i386/current/images/hd-media/

3) Create an /boot folder on your secondary HD partition, and move the alternate .iso and the vmlinuz & initrd.gz from step (2) onto it.

4) If you don't have Grub already installed, install it on a removable media or Hard Disk. Then, edit your /boot/grub/menu.lst and add the following entry:

title Install Ubuntu Hardy
root (hd0,2)
kernel /boot/vmlinuz vga=normal ramdisk_size=149720 root=/dev/rd/0 rw --
initrd /boot/initrd.gz

**(hd0,2) refers to the 1st hard drive 'hd0' and the 3rd partition '2'.

The counting of partitions and hard drives starts at zero. Linux loves making life complicated

Change (hd0,2) to match the drive and partition of your .iso file.

e.g (hd1,3) Refers to drive 2 and partition 4.

5) OK! You are ready to go! Now reboot your system (with the removeable media if you installed Grub on it) and choose the "Install Ubuntu Hardy" entry.

6) Now follow the installation as usual, which should be working as if the disk was in the CD-ROM tray.

How to Backup using Rsync in Ubuntu

2008-05-08T23:57:00.000-07:00

rsync is a software application for Unix systems which synchronizes files and directories from one location to another while minimizing data transfer using delta encoding when appropriate. An important feature of rsync not found in most similar programs/protocols is that the mirroring takes place with only one transmission in each direction. rsync can copy or display directory contents and copy files, optionally using compression and recursion.

In daemon mode, rsync listens to the default TCP port of 873, serving files in the native rsync protocol. rsync can also be used to synchronize local directories, or via a remote shell such as RSH or SSH. In the latter case, the rsync client executable must be installed on both the local and the remote host.

The rsync command

sudo rsync -av --progress --delete --log-file=/home/your-username/Desktop/$(date +%Y%m%d)_rsync.log --exclude "/home/your-username/.gvfs" /home /media/HomeBackup

the -av bit: 'a' means archive, or copy everything recursively preserving things like permissions, ownership and time stamps. The 'v' is verbose, so it tells you what its doing, either in the terminal, in in this case, in the log file. --progress gives you more specific info about progress.

--delete checks for changes between source and destination, and deletes any files at the destination that you've deleted at the source. --log-file saves a copy of the rsync result to a date-stamped file on my desktop.

--exclude leaves out any files or directories you don't want copied. In my case, the .gvfs directory in Hardy Heron was a pain as even with sudo it errored and wouldn't copy properly, so I excluded it (Its not necessary to copy it anyway) If you don't use Hardy yet, or any distro using the latest Gnome, skip this line, or upgrade!

/home is the directory I want copied. /home copies the directory and its contents, /home/ would just copy the contents

/media/HomeBackup is the separate drive. Change this to whatever your backup location is. You can actually have this drive off-site and use ssh, but that will be a tutorial for another day!

The bash script

I was just pasting this command into Terminal each day, but wanted something automatic, so step one was a bash script.

Very easy, just open a new document in your favourite text editor, and type #!bin/bash followed by the command itself on a new line. So:

#!/bin/bash
sudo rsync -av --progress --delete --log-file=/home/your-username/Desktop/$(date +%Y%m%d)_rsync.log --exclude "/home/your-username/.gvfs" /home /media/HomeBackup

Save that as rsync-shell.sh on your Desktop and make it executable by typing
sudo chmod +x /home/your-username/Desktop/rsync-shell.sh

or by right-clicking the file, select Properties, Permissions and then checking the Execute box

You can now double click that .sh file, choose 'Run in Terminal', it will ask you for your password and run, then leave a log file on your desktop.

or, you can make a cron job to do it for you!

The cron job

My biggest obstacle with this was the sudo bit. rsync won't be able to backup all files, or delete any, without root privileges. I didn't want to have to be there when it runs to type in my password, but after a bit of searching I found out how to make a root cron job.

Copy your .sh file to /root by typing
sudo cp /home/your-username/Desktop/rsync-shell.sh /root

Then type
sudo crontab -e

You'll see a line which reads: # m h dom mon dow command

Under that type
0 22 * * * /root/rsync-shell.sh

What this all means is:

1. The number of minutes after the hour (0 to 59)
2. The hour in military time (24 hour) format (0 to 23)
3. The day of the month (1 to 31)
4. The month (1 to 12)
5. The day of the week(0 or 7 is Sun, or use name)
6. The command to run

So at 22:00 (10pm) every day root will run the shell script, without prompting you for sudo password (because its running as root already)

Now press Control-X, then type Y, then press enter.

You'll see crontab: installing new crontab

Souce From here

Crack a WPA/WPA2 Wifi Network using Ubuntu 7.10 (Gutsy)

2008-05-08T23:50:00.000-07:00

what is the Difference Between cracking a WPA network and WPA2 network,Nothing !! There is no difference between cracking a WPA or WPA2 networks at all.In order to sucessfully crack any WPA/WPA2 network,there are 2 main things must happen

1) U must capture the Full 4 Way Handshake.

2) Your Passphrase must be in the DICTIONARY you choose in order to sucessfully BruteForce.

We will be using the aircrack-ng suite of tools and a small dictionary file on Ubuntu.

There are a few ways to crack a WPA / WPA2 PSK password this is just one of them.

This method is usally vunerable because of the end user, as most people will use a pass phrase thats easy to remember.
bcz evry body doesnt want to keep long password.

You will need the following details

A Client connected to the AP to Deauth

ESSID = this is the Name of your wireless network i.e MYWIRELESS
BSSID = this is the MAC address of your AP and will be in this format 00:1C:10:26:A9:39 everyone’s is different so make sure
you write it down correctly or the following will not work

Channel = This will be the channel your AP is Broadcasting on i.e channel 7

ALSO you will need a decent dictionary file you can find many of these around on the internet google is your friend on this one,then lets start below are the Steps

Step 1 - Start the wireless interface in monitor mode

Airmon-ng strat wifi0 (starts ur Interface with Monitor mode)
Airodump-ng ath0 (Monitors the Access point available)

Step 2 - Start airodump-ng to collect authentication handshake

Airodump-ng -c 11 -w psk –bssid 00:1C:10:26:A9:39 ath0

Where:

-c 11 is the channel for the wireless network

- -bssid 00:1C:10:26:A9:39 is the access point MAC address. This eliminate extraneous traffic.

-w psk is the file name prefix for the file which will contain the IVs.

ath0 is the interface name.

Important: Do NOT use the ”- -ivs” option. You must capture the full packets.

Step 3 - Use aireplay-ng to deauthenticate the wireless client

aireplay-ng -0 3 -a 00:1C:10:26:A9:39 -c 00:0F:B5:EC:99:6F ath0

Where:

-0 means deauthentication

3 is the number of deauths to send (you can send muliple if you wish)

-a 00:1C:10:26:A9:39 is the MAC address of the access point

-c 00:0F:B5:EC:99:6F is the MAC address of the client you are deauthing

ath0 is the interface name

Step 4 - Run aircrack-ng to crack the pre-shared key

aircrack-ng -w dictionary.txt -b 00:1C:10:26:A9:39 psk*.cap

Where:

-w password.lst is the name of the dictionary file. Remember to specify the full path if the file is not located in the same directory.

*.cap is name of group of files containing the captured packets. Notice in this case that we used the wildcard * to include multiple files.

Done now wait for some time It depends upon ur Dictionary file and the passphrase ,

You should now have your PSK passphrase

&<>evilmonkey000<>&

Howto Loop Movie, Video, and Display Screensaver as Desktop Wallpaper in Ubuntu

2008-05-02T17:19:00.000-07:00

Want to loop a video clip or movie on your desktop? I did and found a nice little tool that does just that

First lets grab some essential building libraries via the terminal: Applications->Accessories->Terminal

sudo apt-get install build-essential libx11-dev x11proto-xext-dev libxrender-dev libxext-dev cvs

Now lets Install xwinwrap:

cvs -d :pserver:anoncvs@cvs.freedesktop.org:/cvs/xapps co xwinwrap
cd xwinwrap
make
sudo cp xwinwrap /usr/bin

Now lets start our video/movie as the Desktop Wallpaper!
First find a video/movie you would like to set as your backround and issue this command:

xwinwrap -ni -fs -s -st -sp -b -nf -- mplayer -wid WID -nosound "Steal This Film II.Xvid.avi" -loop 0

Now everything should be working fine, if you would like sound, remove -nosound

You can also display Screensavers as your background:

nice -n 15 ./xwinwrap -ni -o 0.20 -fs -s -sp -st -b -nf -- /usr/lib/xscreensaver/glmatrix -root -window-id WID

Howto Compile and Install TrueCrypt 5.1a on Ubuntu 8.04 LTS (Hardy Heron)

2008-04-26T11:15:00.000-07:00

On-the-fly encryption software which can create a virtual encrypted disk within a file and mount it as a real disk. It can also encrypt a hard disk partition or storage device, such as USB flash drive. Moreover, TrueCrypt supports plausible deniability.

Preparing your system

You need to install the following packages

sudo apt-get install build-essential linux-headers-`uname -r` linux-source-2.6.24 libfuse-dev libgtk2.0-dev

Then create a tmp directory in your home directory

mkdir -p ~/tmp

Now download TrueCrypt source from here

Go to the path where you saved TrueCrypt source and untar the file in your ~/tmp directory

tar -zvxf TrueCrypt\ 5.1a\ Source.tar.gz -C ~/tmp

Now you should download wxAll source code. You can pick it from here

Go to the path where you saved wxAll source and untar the file in your ~/tmp directory

tar -zvxf wxWidgets-2.8.7.tar.gz -C ~/tmp

Now go to your ~/tmp/truecrypt-5.1a-source directory

cd ~/tmp/truecrypt-5.1a-source

and launch this command line

WX_ROOT=~/tmp/wxWidgets-2.8.7 make wxbuild

This will build the ./wxrelease subdirectory in the truecrypt source path. You'll probably will have some warning from the compiler, but you can safely ignore.

Once you have your shell back, launch this command line to compile truecrypt

WX_ROOT=~/tmp/wxWidgets-2.8.7 make

Probably you will get a lot of warning from the compiler, but you can ignore it. They are just warning.

Now go Main directory in TrueCrypt source

cd ~/tmp/truecrypt-5.1a-source/Main

and start truecrypt gui

./truecrypt

If everything is ok, you should have now the truecrypt gui running.

Now close you application from the Gnome notification area and copy your just compiled truecrypt binary in you /usr/local/bin directory

sudo cp ~/tmp/truecrypt-5.1a-source/Main/truecrypt /usr/local/bin/

Now you have truecrypt binary in your path so you can run it simply with

truecrypt

Now you can safely remove you working directories

rm -rf ~/tmp/truecrypt-5.1a-source ~/tmp/wxWidgets-2.8.7

Howto install JS3tream and backup to Amazons S3

2008-04-26T11:01:00.000-07:00

JS3tream was written to provide easy streaming of data to and from Amazons S3 data storage service. JS3tream is NOT a backup solution by itself. But, coupled with tar or zip, JS3tream provides a very powerful backup solution.

Install the Sun JVM using the following command

sudo apt-get install sun-java5-bin

You will need the zip/unzip utility to extract the JS3tream utility

sudo apt-get install unzip

Go to the JS3tream web site, and download the latest zip file. Extract this file to a directory of your choice. Eg /usr/local/bin

cd /usr/local/bin

unzip js3tream-0.6.2.zip

Test to make sure both java and JS3tream are correctly setup. Start by going to the directory you put JS3tream.

cd /usr/local/bin

Make sure java is correctly installed. I happen to have 1.5.0.11

sudo java -version

java version "1.5.0_11"
Java(TM) 2 Runtime Environment, Standard Edition (build 1.5.0_11-b03)
Java HotSpot(TM) Client VM (build 1.5.0_11-b03, mixed mode)

Test that JS3tream can be executed.

sudo java -jar js3tream.jar --help

JS3tream v0.6 - December 17, 2007
Protected under the LGPL
Copyright (c) Shane Powell 2007
http://js3tream.sourceforge.net

At this point JS3tream should be correctly installed. Now, it's simply a matter of following the examples and howtos on the JS3tream web site.

Howto Disable CTRL-ALT-DEL from shutting down in Ubuntu

2008-04-26T10:47:00.000-07:00

If you want to disable CTFL-ALT-DEL from shutting down their server use the following procedure.

For Dapper, and earlier Users

1)If you are using Dapper Drake, or before, you will have to edit /etc/inittab with the editor of your choice.

sudo gedit /etc/inittab

2)Now, look for the line that looks like this:

exec /sbin/shutdown -r now "Control-Alt-Delete pressed"

This is what we want to change. delete whole line. Now, its up to you what you want to do. If you want it to just print a message, and then do nothing, enter this

"CTRL+ALT+DEL is disabled!!"

or any other message of your choice.

If you want it to execute a script, change the line to

exec /path/to/your/script.sh

Thats it! Now, you can leave your server in peace, and not have to worry about anyone pressing CTRL+ALT+DELETE, and shutting it down!

For Edgy,Feisty,Gutsy,Hardy Users

In Edgy, you have to edit /etc/event.d/control-alt-delete. Then, just follow the steps in step 2 of Dapper and Earlier.

HOWTO: Install your Canon PIXMA MP130 Printer using the iP1500 Printer Driver

2008-04-20T13:32:00.000-07:00

If you want to install Canon PIXMA MP130 Printer follow this procedure

Add the following to the /etc/apt/sources.list:

deb http://mambo.kuhp.kyoto-u.ac.jp/~takushi/ubuntu ./

Then:

sudo apt-get update

Then:

sudo apt-get install libcnbj-2.5 bjfilter-2.5 pstocanonbj

Cupsys will be automatically restarted and you can select printer in cupsys configuration which is

http://localhost:631

To add the printer through the cups, the first thing you do is click on add a printer. The next screen will ask you for the name of you printer, location and description. The only thing you really have to fill in is the name – anything you want will do. After you have filled in the information click continue. The next page asks you to select your printer which should be Gutenprint USB Printer #1 (Canon MP130). Hit continue and then it will ask you for your driver. Select the Canon Pixma iP1500 Ver.2.50 (en) then click on add printer. Printing a test page should work! I've used the method on both Gutsy and Hardy.

How to Save Streaming Videos in Mplayer

2008-04-20T13:29:00.000-07:00

1. Copy the url of the streaming video mms://etc... or http://...

2. Open up a terminal.

3. mplayer -dumpstream -dumpfile stream_video_name.wmv mms://etc...

4. Wait for the stream dump.

Source from here

Mount .ISO's in Ubuntu Linux The Easy way

2008-04-13T08:58:00.000-07:00

I download .iso's all the time, and wanted to be able to mount iso's for winblows games on wine. What this does is map your iso to a filesystem directory. Here is what I did, and here is what you can do as well.

First grab fuseiso

sudo apt-get install fuseiso

Then lets add ourselves to the fuse usergroup

sudo adduser myusename fuse

If you were not in the fuse group you will need to log off, then back in right now.Now lets create ourselves a fuseiso folder to mount our iso

sudo mkdir /media/fuseiso

Now we just grabbed an iso off the net, so lets mount it!

sudo fuseiso myisofile.iso /media/fuseiso

Ok now the iso is mounted and we can use it like its a cd/dvd Nautilus/cd your way to /media/fuseiso and the files from the iso will be mounted readonly.

Source from here

Create a SSH Tunnel for Firefox to surf securely

2008-03-30T11:24:00.000-07:00

A ssh tunnel for Firefox to a remote computer is good security measure. Especially when connecting via an untrusted network like a wifi hotspot or other public networks. The tunnel encrypts and sends the data to your remote machine then it is sent over the web to your destination. This tutorial assumes you have an account on a remote machine you can ssh into. This is a pretty easy set up.

Now all you need to do is login your remote computer that you have access to with SSH then issue this 1 command

ssh -D 9999 -C me@ipaddress.com

The -D switch - Specifies a local “dynamic” application-level port forwarding. We are also adding the -C switch for compression.

Next we need to put the settings into Firefox.

Firefox> Edit> Preferences> Advanced tab> Network tab> Settings button.

Select Manual proxy configuration

SOCKS Host: localhost Port: 9999

SOCKS v5

No Proxy for: localhost, 127.0.0.1

Note: Sometimes localhost can cause a problem. If your settings are right and it still is not working replace localhost with 127.0.0.1.

Source from here

Howto Setup Vidalia TOR GUI with Ubuntu

2008-03-22T01:41:00.000-07:00

Tor is the open source leader to anonymous connections on the internet, you can anonymize your internet presence from AIM/ICQ/MSN/ Jabber/IRC/WWW/FTP and you can even issue a torify command at the command prompt to anonymize your wget/ssh/lynx/ftp/perl or whatever. Basically tor is for the people by the people, it is only alive because we make it so, we can choose to use it freely or use it freely and help it out by running a server on your computer to make the internet safer. Basically tor encrypts your data communications through chained/linked proxies all over the internet.

Vidalia is a cross-platform controller GUI for Tor, built using the Qt framework. Using Vidalia, you can start and stop Tor, view the status of Tor at a glance, and monitor Tor’s bandwidth usage. Vidalia also makes it easy to contribute to the Tor network by helping you set up and manage your own Tor server.

Vidalia runs on most platforms supported by Qt 4.1 or later, including Windows, Mac OS X, and Linux or other Unix variants using the X11 window system.

Prepare your system

sudo apt-get install libevent

Now you need to get the latest tor source code from here

wget http://www.torproject.org/dist/tor-0.2.0.22-rc.tar.gz

tar zxvf tor-0.2.0.22-rc.tar.gz

cd tor-0.2.0.22-rc

./configure

make

sudo make install

Install Vidalia GUI

You need to edit the /etc/apt/sources.list file

sudo gedit /etc/apt/sources.list

add the following lines

deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/adnarim/ubuntu gutsy main
deb-src http://ppa.launchpad.net/adnarim/ubuntu gutsy main

Save and exit the file

Update the source list

sudo apt-get update

Install vidalia

sudo apt-get install vidalia

Once installed press alt F2 and open the run prompt and type in “vidalia” without the quotes, this will start tor, vidalia and you can configure tor/vidalia by right clicking on the tray applet and click on settings, right there you can view all the nodes and choose what to connect to, see node uptimes, os’s and locations with a graphical map.

For web browsing in firefox I prefer using an extention named FoxyProxy it works well with firefox and swiftfox, you can grab this extention directly from here

If you prefer stronger anonymity & protection I strongly Suggest Torbutton for firefox you can download from here

Install the addon and go through the Tor wizard and it will set you up for you and you can view which tor nodes you connect through actively via vidalia

Speed Tweaks for tor

Lets get to editing our torrc so we can improve the speed!

gedit ~/.vidalia/torrc

Paste this at the beginning of the torrc:

# Set the Tor Circuit Build time to find faster tor servers, increments of seconds

CircuitBuildTimeout 2

# connections while Tor is not in use.

KeepalivePeriod 60

# Force Tor to consider whether to build a new circuit every NUM seconds.

NewCircuitPeriod 15

# Set How many entry guards we should we keep at a time

NumEntryGuards 8

Source from here

Dstat - Versatile resource statistics tool

2008-03-12T00:38:00.000-07:00

Dstat is a versatile replacement for vmstat, iostat, netstat, nfsstat and ifstat. Dstat overcomes some of their limitations and adds some extra features, more counters and flexibility. Dstat is handy for monitoring systems during performance tuning tests, benchmarks or troubleshooting.

Dstat allows you to view all of your system resources instantly, you can eg. compare disk usage in combination with interrupts from your IDE controller, or compare the network bandwidth numbers directly with the disk throughput (in the same interval).

Dstat Features

* Combines vmstat, iostat, ifstat, netstat information and more
* Shows stats in exactly the same timeframe
* Enable/order counters as they make most sense during analysis/troubleshooting
* Modular design
* Written in python so easily extendable for the task at hand
* Easy to extend, add your own counters (please contribute those)
* Includes about 10 external plugins to show how easy it is to add counters
* Can summarize grouped block/network devices and give total numbers
* Can show interrupts per device
* Very accurate timeframes, no timeshifts when system is stressed
* Shows exact units and limits conversion mistakes
* Indicate different units with different colors
* Show intermediate results when delay > 1
* Allows to export CSV output, which can be imported in Gnumeric and Excel to make graphs

Dstat External plugins

Here are the existing plugins

* dstat_app - the most expensive process on the system
* dstat_battery - the percentage of battery charge (needs ACPI)
* dstat_cpufreq - the CPU frequency (needs ACPI)
* dstat_dbus - the number of dbus connections (needs python-dbus)
* dstat_freespace - see the disk usage per partition
* dstat_gpfs - the GPFS read/write IO
* dstat_gpfsop - the GPFS filesystem operations
* dstat_nfs3 - the NFS v3 client operations
* dstat_nfs3op - the extended NFS v3 client operations
* dstat_nfsd3 - the NFS v3 server operations
* dstat_nfsd3op - the extended NFS v3 server operations
* dstat_postfix - counters of the differnt queues (needs postfix)
* dstat_rpc - RPC client calls
* dstat_rpcd - RPC server calls
* dstat_sendmail - counters of the queue (needs sendmail)
* dstat_thermal - CPU temperature
* dstat_utmp - number of utmp sessions (needs python-utmp)
* dstat_wifi - wireless link quality and signal/noise ratio (needs python-wifi)

Install Dstat in Ubuntu

sudo aptitude install dstat

This will complete the installation.

dstat Syntax

dstat [-afv] [-cdgilmnpsty] [-D..] [-I..] [-N..] [delay [count]]

If you want to use dstat just use the following command

dstat

Output looks similar to the following screen

Dstat Examples

Using dstat to relate disk-throughput with network-usage (eth0), total CPU-usage and system counters:

dstat -dnyc -N eth0 -C total -f 5

Checking dstat's behaviour and the system's impact on dstat:

dstat -taf --debug

Using the time plugin together with cpu, net, disk, system, load, proc and topcpu plugins:

dstat -tcndylp -M topcpu

this is identical to

dstat -M time,cpu,net,disk,sys,load,proc,topcpu

Using dstat to relate cpu stats with interrupts per device:

dstat -tcyif

Howto: Create ISO File From CD/DVD in Ubuntu Gutsy

2008-03-06T23:08:00.000-08:00

Have a CD or DVD lying around that you are sick of putting in the drive every time you need something on the disc How about just making an .iso file that you can mount as you need? Or maybe you just want a “master” copy of the media so you can create another copy at a future date.

At any rate it is rather easy to accomplish in Ubuntu:

sudo umount /dev/cdrom dd if=/dev/cdrom of=file.iso bs=1024

You can also do the same with folders:

mkisofs -r -o file.iso /location_of_folder/

Don’t forget to make a checksum:

md5sum file.iso > file.iso.md5

Monitoring Realtime network interface Using Slurm

2008-03-05T13:00:00.000-08:00

slurm started as a pppstatus port to FreeBSD. As I ripped off several functions here is an overview of the features:

* realtime traffic statistics divided into incoming and outgoing
* optional combined view
* can monitor any kind of network interface
* shows detailed statistics about the interface.
* it's themeable (since 0.3.0)
* contact me if you need anything else.

Install slurm in Ubuntu

sudo aptitude install slurm

This will complete the installation.

Slurm Syntax

slurm [-hHz] [-csl] [-d delay] -i interface

If you want to monitor the eth0 network interface use the following command

slurm -i eth0

Output looks similar to the following screen

Sopcast with GUI and sop:// URLs in Ubuntu

2008-02-24T08:21:00.000-08:00

This guide will help you install sopcast on Ubuntu 7.10 Gutsy. It will also help you get a special modified version of the GUI running and setup firefox to send sop:// links to the program.

Installing packages

Make sure you have all universe and multiverse repositories switched on. Then, in terminal:

sudo apt-get install qt3-apps-dev vlc build-essential

Downloading the latest SopCast binary

Link: Sopcast ix86 binary

Unzip it and cd into that directory using terminal. Then run:

sudo cp sp-sc-auth /usr/bin/sp-sc

Downloading and building the latest GUI

Download this specially modified source package. I have added URL handling.

Link: RKMOD version of QSopCast

Aga*in, unzip it and cd into that (src) directory using terminal. Then run

sudo qmakesudo makesudo make install

This should compile the source and install the binary into the correct location.

Creating a menu shortcut

Go to System / Preferences / Main Menu... then 'Internet' and 'Add New Item'. Give it the name "QSopCast" and command "qsopcast". You should now be able to launch from the main menu.

Setting up the GUI

Once the gui is open, goto config then config again. Make sure that the player settings are all set to "vlc" and that the channel URL is set to "http://www.sopcast.com/gchlxml"

You should now be able to watch sop casts by selecting a channel, launching it and then hitting player when the stream is at 100%

Firefox sop:// URLS

Go into firefox and enter URL: "about:config". Right click, select new and string. The string name is "network.protocol-handler.app.sop" and the value is "qsopcast". It should now send sops to the modified version of QSopCast ready to be launched.

Howto Setup iTunes-compatible Media server in Ubuntu

2008-01-02T12:53:00.000-08:00

mt-daapd is a DAAP server that works with most POSIX compatible operating systems. It allows you to share your music collection over the local network using the same protocol iTunes uses, so real iTunes users may peruse your music.

Moreover, if your music is in more esoteric formats like FLAC, Ogg Vorbis, or Musepack, these can be converted on the fly to different formats (usually WAV), so that your entire music collection can be listened to by normal iTunes clients.

It also features a web interface that can be used to control components of the server, trigger database updates, and create playlists.

Preparing your system

First of all install ID3 tag support (so mt-daapd can read mp3 files)

sudo apt-get install libid3tag0

Now install mt-daapd using the following command

sudo apt-get install mt-daapd

Configuring mt-daapd

Configuration file is located at /etc/mt-daapd.conf, so make your changes there and test this file using the following command

sudo mt-daapd -f

Also you have to remember to add the Avahi Daemon to your startup scripts with the following command

sudo update-rc.d avahi-daemon defaults

that provides mt-daapd the Apple ZeroConf services (also known as "Rendezvous" or "Bonjour"). Otherwise your iTunes machines won't be able to discover the mt-daapd server even thou the server itself is running properly.

To enable smart playlists you have to use the administration WebUI with http://localhost:3689.
Now it will prompt for the username and password as admin and your password setup in mt-daapd.conf file
Once it opens you should see the following screen

You can edit smart playlists under the smart playlists tab either directly as logic script or using the wizard (provided) to fill the rules for playlist generation point-n-click way.

Configuration setup screen

Ubuntu Tip : Mount/Unmount .iso Images in One click

2007-12-02T02:17:00.000-08:00

Gmount-iso is a small tool written using PyGTK and Glade. It allows you to easily mount your cd images. This is a frontend to the 'mount -o loop -t iso9660 foo.iso /mountpoint' command.

Install gmountiso in Ubuntu

sudo aptitude install gmountiso

This will complete the installation.

Using gmountiso

If you want to open go to Applications--->System Tools--->Gmount-iso

Once it opens you should see the following screen here you can specify your .iso file and mount point where you want to mount.

Example for gmountiso

I am having dsl-4.0.iso image on my desktop and i want to mount this under dsl directory so i have menctioned all the details and click on mount

This will prompt for root password enter your root password and click on ok

Once it finished mounting you can see these details under mounted images

You can see the files and folders inside dsl directory

If you want to unmount just select the your mount point and click on Unmount

This is very simple and easy process.

Howto Tweak Ubuntu

2007-11-25T02:57:00.000-08:00

This tool is for ubuntu which makes it easy to change hidden system and desktop settings.Ubuntu Tweak is only for GNOME desktop environment.This is still under heavy development and very good utility for ubuntu users.

Ubuntu Tweak Features

GNOME Session Control
Show/Hide and Change Splash screen
Show/Hide desktop icons or Mounted Volumes.
Show/Hide/Rename Computer, Home, Trash icon or Network icon
Use Home Directory as Desktop
Compiz Fusion settings, Screen Edge Settings, Window Effects Settings.
GNOME Panel Settings.
Nautilus Settings.
Advanced Power Management Settings.
System Security Settings.

Install Ubuntu Tweak

First you need to download ubuntu tweak from the following options

for i386 users download from here

For AMD64 users download from here

Download ubuntu tweak using the following command

wget http://ubuntu-tweak.googlecode.com/files/ubuntu-tweak_0.2.0-1_i386.deb

Now you have .deb package install this package using the following command

sudo dpkg -i ubuntu-tweak_0.2.0-1_i386.deb

This will complete the installation

Using Ubuntu Tweak

If you want to open Ubuntu Tweak go to Applications--->System Tools--->Ubuntu Tweak

Once it opens you should see similar to the following screen

Now we will see one by one option

Startup Configuration

Here you can set session settings,change the splash screen

Desktop Configuration

Here you can change the desktop icons and other options relationg to the desktop

Desktop Icons

Compiz Fusion

GNOME

Nautilus

System Configuration

Here you can configure power management and other hardware settings

Security Configuration

Here you can configure the system security options

Applications configuration

Here you can configure commonly used applications

Ubuntu Tweak Version Details

Project home page check here

Install Mplayer and Multimedia Codecs (libdvdcss2,w32codecs) in Ubuntu 7.10 (Gutsy Gibbon)

2007-11-18T08:02:00.000-08:00

Install Mplayer in Ubuntu Gutsy Gibbon Feisty Fawn

You need to add the following lines to /etc/apt/sources.list file or you need to make sure you have enabled Universe and multiverse repositories in /etc/apt/sources.list file

gedit /etc/apt/sources.list

enter these two lines and save your file

deb http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu gutsy universe multiverse
deb-src http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu gutsy universe multiverse

Now you need to run the following command to update the source list

sudo apt-get update

Install mplayer using the following command

sudo apt-get install mplayer

if you want to open mplayer just type

gmplayer

You can Open from Applications—>Sound&Video—> Mplayer Movie Player

Once it opens you should see the following screen

Installing libdvdcss2 and w32 video codecs in Ubuntu Gutsy Gibbon

Support for WMV, RealMedia and other formats has been bundled into the w32codecs package. This package is not available from the Ubuntu repositories due to licensing and legal restrictions.

For Ubuntu Gutsy Gibbon Users run the following command

sudo wget http://www.medibuntu.org/sources.list.d/gutsy.list -O /etc/apt/sources.list.d/medibuntu.list

Now you need to copy the key using the following command

wget -q http://packages.medibuntu.org/medibuntu-key.gpg -O-¦ sudo apt-key add -

Update the source list using the following command

sudo apt-get update

Install Codecs using the following command

sudo apt-get install w32codecs libdvdcss2

Using above download locations you can install most of the mutimedia codecs for ubuntu.

sudo apt-get update

Mplayer Plugin for Firefox

If you want to install Mplayer with plug-in for Mozilla Firefox run the following command

sudo apt-get install mozilla-mplayer

Hotwire - A New graphical terminal

2007-11-04T07:17:00.000-08:00

Hotwire is a graphical shell intended to replace the interactive command execution portion of a typical Unix shell. It includes much of the functionality found in the combination of a terminal emulator, a shell, and core utilities like ls and grep.

Install Hotwire in Ubuntu Gutsy

Download Hotwire .deb package from here

Now you should be having hotwire_0.599-1~getdeb1_all.deb package

Install this package using the following command

sudo dpkg -i hotwire_0.599-1~getdeb1_all.deb

This will complete the installation.

If you want to open hotwire Go to Applications--->System Tools--->Hotwire Shell

Once it opens you should see the following screen

Hotwire Examples

1)When you type ls command it give the available commands list

2)ls -al output shows in the window

Hotwire Version Details

Ubuntu 7.10 (Gutsy Gibbon) LAMP Server Setup

2007-10-24T05:45:00.000-07:00

In around 15 minutes, the time it takes to install Ubuntu Server Edition, you can have a LAMP (Linux, Apache, MySQL and PHP) server up and ready to go. This feature, exclusive to Ubuntu Server Edition, is available at the time of installation.

The LAMP option means you don't have to install and integrate each of the four separate LAMP components, a process which can take hours and requires someone who is skilled in the installation and configuration of the individual applications. Instead, you get increased security, reduced time-to-install, and reduced risk of misconfiguration, all of which results in a lower cost of ownership.New pre-configured installation options have been added to the Ubuntu Server. Mail Server, File Server, Print Server, and Database Server options join existing LAMP and DNS options for pre-configured installations, easing the deployment of common server configurations.

Ubuntu LAMP server Install the following Versions

Ubuntu Gutsy Gibbon 7.10
Apache 2.2.4
Mysql 5.0.45
PHP 5.2.3

First you need to download server version of Ubuntu version from here after that you create a CD and start booting with the CD Once it starts booting you should see the following screen in this you need to select second option "Install to the Hard disk Option" and press enter

Choose you language and press enter you can see we have selected english in the follwoing screen

Choose your location and press enter you can see we have have selected United Kingdom in the follwoing screen

If you want to try to have your keyboard layout detected by pressing a series of keys you need to select yes option and if you don't want that and you want to choose from a list click no in this example we have selected no and press enter

Select Origin of keyboard and press enter

Select keyboard layout and press enter

Detecting hardware to find CD-ROM Drivers in progress

Scanning CD-ROM in Progress

Loading additional components progress bar

Configures the network with DHCP if there is a DHCP server in the network

Enter the Hostname of the system so in this example i enter here as ubuntulamp

Detecting Disks and Hardware in progress

Startingup the partitioner in progress

you have to partition your hard disk in this example i have selected use entire disk option if you want to edit manually you can choose manual and press enter

Warning message about data lost on your hard disk

Creating partitions in your harddisk

Write the changes to disk option here you need to select yes and press enter

Creating ext3 filesystem in progress

Configuring the clock option here if you want to leave UTC Select yes otherwise no and press enter

You need enter the Full name of the user you want to create for your server in this example i have created administrator user select continue and press enter

username for your account in this i have entered test select continue and press enter

Entered the password for test user select continue and press enter

Confirm the password for test user select continue and press enter

Installing the base system in progress

Configuring package mirror this will be related to your country option

Now it will start Installing software and here you need to select the server options here i have selected as LAMP for our LAMP server installation

Software Installation in Progress

At the time of software installation it will prompt for mysql server root password enter root password of your choice and select continue

Installing GRUB Boot loader in progress

Installation complete message here you need to remove your CD select continue and press enter it will reboot your server

After rebooting you can see the following screen prompt for username

This will complete the Ubuntu LAMP Server Installation and your server is ready for installing applications which supports apache,mysql and php.

Configuring Static ip address in Ubuntu server

Ubuntu installer has configured our system to get its network settings via DHCP, Now we will change that to a static IP address for this you need to edit Edit /etc/network/interfaces and enter your ip address details (in this example setup I will use the IP address 172.19.0.10):

sudo vi /etc/network/interfaces

and enter the following save the file and exit

# The primary network interface

auto eth0
iface eth0 inet static
address 172.19.0.10
netmask 255.255.255.0
network 172.19.0.0
broadcast 172.19.0.255
gateway 172.19.0.1

Now you need to restart your network services using the following command

sudo /etc/init.d/networking restart

You need to setup manually DNS servers in resolv.conf file when you are not using DHCP.

sudo vi /etc/resolv.conf

You need to add look something like this

search domain.com

nameserver xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx

Install SSH Server

If you want to access your server remotely through SSH you need to install SSH server for this you need to run the following command

sudo apt-get install ssh openssh-server

You will be prompted to insert the installation CD again and this will complete SSH server in your Gutsy lamp server.This is really simple and easy server installation for new users and who wants a quick server.

GUI Installation for Ubuntu LAMP Server

Option1

If you are a new user and not familiar with command prompt you can install GUI for your ubuntu LAMP server for this you need to make sure you have enabled Universe and multiverse repositories in /etc/apt/sources.list file once you have enable you need to use the following command to install GUI

sudo apt-get update

sudo apt-get install ubuntu-desktop

The above command will install GNOME desktop if you want to install KDE desktop use the following command

sudo apt-get install kubuntu-desktop

Optio2

Installing Webmin in Ubuntu Gutsy Gibbon

Webmin is a web-based interface for system administration for Unix. Using any modern web browser, you can setup user accounts, Apache, DNS, file sharing and much more. Webmin removes the need to manually edit Unix configuration files like /etc/passwd, and lets you manage a system from the console or remotely.

You can install webmin for your server web interface to configure apache,mysql servers.Now we will see how to install webmin in Ubuntu 7.10

Preparing your system

First you need to install the following packages

sudo apt-get install perl libnet-ssleay-perl openssl libauthen-pam-perl libpam-runtime libio-pty-perl libmd5-perl

Now download the latest webmin using the following command

wget http://prdownloads.sourceforge.net/webadmin/webmin_1.370_all.deb

Now we have webmin_1.370_all.deb package install this package using the following command

sudo dpkg -i webmin_1.370_all.deb

This will complete the installation.

Ubuntu in particular don't allow logins by the root user by default. However, the user created at system installation time can use sudo to switch to root. Webmin will allow any user who has this sudo capability to login with full root privileges.

Now you need to open your web browser and enter the following

https://your-server-ip:10000/

Now you should see similar to the following Screen

Once you enter into the webmin you should see similar to the following screen

If you want to configure Apache,Mysql server you need to click on Servers on your lefthand side you should many servers are ready to configure

This is very Easy to configure most of the servers and Enjoy your new Ubuntu Gutsy Gibbon LAMP Server

Upgrade Ubuntu 7.04 (Feisty Fawn) to Ubuntu 7.10 (Gutsy Gibbon)

2007-09-30T07:09:00.000-07:00

The Ubuntu team is proud to announce the version 7.10 of Ubuntu, Kubuntu, Edubuntu, Gobuntu, and Xubuntu codenamed "Gutsy Gibbon". This includes installable live Desktop CDs, server images, alternate text-mode installation CDs, and an upgrade wizard for users of the current stable release.

Before Upgrading You need to remember the following Important point

Take complete backup of your system before upgrading .Now you need to upgraded Ubuntu Feisty Machine to Ubuntu Gutsy.

If you want to upgrade using GUI use the following procedure

Use the Alt+F2 key combination to bring up the Run Application dialog, where you'll want to enter the following command

update-manager -c

“-c” switch tells it to look for upgrades at all.

You should see the following screen here Now you can see 7.10 is available for upgrade click on upgrade

Now you should see the release notes as follows here you need to click on upgrade

Preparing for the upgrade in Progress

You can see similar to the following screen about end of support for some applications click on close

Now you should see the following screen to start upgrade click on start upgrade

Fetching the upgrades are in progress

Installing the upgrades are in progress

Cleaning Up is in Progress

You need to restart the system to complete the Upgrade by clicking “Restart Now”

Testing Your Upgrade

You can check the ubuntu version installed using the following command

sudo lsb_release -a

Output Looks like below

Ubuntu 8.04 (Hardy Heron) Release Dates

2007-09-16T06:41:00.000-07:00

In addition to Ubuntu 6-months stable releases and the next version of ubuntu is 8.04 with Code Name “Hardy Heron” but this release will proudly wear the badge of Long Term Support (LTS) and be supported with security updates for five years on the server and three years on the desktop.

Hardy Heron was announced on Wednesday(29th August 2007) on the blog of Jono Bacon, the Ubuntu community manager for Canonical, the operating system's commercial sponsor.

Jono Bacon about Ubuntu 8.04 (Hardy Heron)

Each new release gives us all an opportunity to shine, irrespective of which bricks in the project we are laying, and this is at the heart of our belief — working together to produce an operating system that will empower its users and shape the IT industry, putting free software at the cornerstone of our direction," wrote Bacon. "Thousands of us get out of bed every day, united behind Ubuntu, ready to make a difference, working together to make our vision happen. Importantly, our ethos of collaboration and freedom extends to the development process as well as the end product."

Important Dates

October 2007

October 25th - Toolchain Uploaded

November 2007

November 1st - Development Summit

November 8th - Canonical AllHands

November 22nd - Specifications must be finalized, Translations exported from LP

November 29th - Alpha 1

December 2007

December 13th - DebianImportFreeze ,Remaining upstream merges completed, Rebuild Test

December 20th - Alpha 2

January 2008

January 10th - Alpha 3

January 24th - Developer Sprint

January 31st - Alpha 4

Feburary 2008

February 14th - FeatureFreeze,UpstreamVersionFreeze ,ArtworkDeadlineOne,UVF Universe,Rebuild Test, Upgrade Testing begins

February 21st - Alpha 5

February 28th - ArtworkDeadlineTwo,NewPackagesFreezeUniverse

March 2008

March 13th - StringFreeze

March 20th - BetaFreeze,FeistyArtworkFinalDeadline

March 27th - BetaRelease

April 2008

April 10th - NonLanguagePackTranslationDeadline,KernelFreeze, Rebuild Test

April 17th - ReleaseCandidate,LanguagePackTranslationDeadline

April 24th - FinalRelease

Details about Each Release

Feature Freeze

The point at which we cease creating and modifying internal features and packages. This means we’re pretty much locked down for bugfixes only.

Exceptions requiring confirmation

Packages in or relating to high-priority ReleasenameFeatureGoals

Major/minor fixes, within reason

Exceptional circumstances

Upstream Version Freeze

The point at which we cease accepting new upstream versions of packages, whether they are sourced from debian or not. Selected Debian releases of the same upstream versions may still be pulled in for bug-fixes, but this would be a manual process.

Exceptions requiring confirmation

Packages in or relating to FeatureGoals

Minor fixes, if the upstream change is a micro-increment (or equivalent)

Major fixes, particularly blockers, if the upstream change is a minor-increment (or equivalent)

Exceptional circumstances

String Freeze

A string freeze is initiated in the project when all the human readable portions of code are no longer allowed to change. This gives the translation teams a chance to complete their translations without having to redo changed text. It also allows documentation to mention the actual UI names and messages.

Beta Freeze

Anal-retentive, high-caution period until the Beta Release goes out. Release and relevant section team confirmed fixes only! Once the BetaRelease is shipped, we roll back to FeatureFreeze status.

Exceptions requiring confirmation

ReleaseCriticalBug

SecurityCriticalBug

Exceptional circumstances

Beta Release

The BetaRelease is a testing oriented pre-release, usually one month before the Final Release.

Non Language Pack Translation Deadline

Some translation data cannot currently be updated via the language pack mechanism. Because these items require more disruptive integration work, they are subject to an earlier deadline. Translations which fall into this category are:

The Ubuntu installer

Translations which don’t use gettext, including:

Firefox

debconf templates

desktop notifications via notification-daemon

Strings visible in the default desktop (live CDs don’t get language pack updates)

Default menu items

Panel strings

All menu entries in KDE applications, which does not support translation via language packs

Kernel Freeze

The kernel freeze is a deadline for kernel updates, since they require several lockstep actions which must be folded into the CD building process. As with other freeze dates, exceptional circumstances may justify exemptions to the freeze, at the exception of the release managers.

Release Candidate (RC)

The release candidate is a production-quality pre-release one week before the final release.

Language Pack Translation Deadline

Translation data using the Language Pack mechanism is due at this deadline.

See NonLanguagePackTranslationDeadline for non Language Pack data.

Final Release

The final release is the finished product which is distributed with an official Ubuntu release number.

Saving Power on Intel Hardware Using Powertop

2007-09-02T06:29:00.000-07:00

PowerTOP is a Linux tool that finds the software component(s) that make your laptop use more power than necessary while it is idle. As of Linux kernel version 2.6.21, the kernel no longer has a fixed 1000Hz timer tick. This will (in theory) give a huge power savings because the CPU stays in low power mode for longer periods of time during system idle.

However... there are many things that can ruin the party, both inside the kernel and in userspace. PowerTOP combines various sources of information from the kernel into one convenient screen so that you can see how well your system is doing, and which components are the biggest problem.

Requirements

For PowerTOP to work best, use a Linux kernel with the tickless idle (NO_HZ) feature enabled (version 2.6.21 or later). Currently, only 32-bit kernels have support for tickless idle; 64-bit kernels are expected to gain this feature in version 2.6.23.

This only applies to Feisty. Also note that you need kernel 2.6.21 or above.

Install the following prerequisites

sudo apt-get install build-essential libncurses5-dev libncursesw5-dev

Download the latest powertop source from here

Put the source in /usr/src and unpack using

sudo tar -xvf powertop-1.8.tar.gz

Compile using the following command

cd powertop-1.8

sudo make

sudo make install

You can also use "checkinstall" instead of "make install" to create a simple .deb for easier removal.

Run powertop using the following command

sudo powertop

Powertop Output shown as follows

IPBlock - Graphical IP Blocker

2007-08-26T02:45:00.000-07:00

iplist allows users with no or basic knowledge of iptables to filter (e.g. to block) network traffic based on (automatically updated) lists. These lists have various formats and are sorted by different categories (e.g. countries, adware, corporations).

IPBlock Features

to protect your privacy while sharing with others
to ban unwanted clients from servers
to block whole countries or networks
to block spam- and ad-servers

ipblock is part of the iplist package which can be downloaded from here

Download ipblock using the following command

wget http://puzzle.dl.sourceforge.net/sourceforge/iplist/iplist_0.14-0feisty1_i386.deb

Prerequisites

iplist requires a 2.6.14 kernel or later with the option CONFIG_NETFILTER_XT_TARGET_NFQUEUE enabled (module or build-in). On a standard Debian installation (Etch) the additional packages libnetfilter-queue1 and libnfnetlink1 are needed.

sudo aptitude libnetfilter-queue1 libnfnetlink1 sun-java6-jre

If you are installing gusty install this package libnfnetlink0 (gutsy) instead of libnfnetlink1

Now we have .deb package we need to install this using the following comamnd

sudo dpkg -i iplist_0.14-0feisty1_i386.deb

This will install all the required packages for ipblock.

After the installation if you want to open ipblock go to Applications -> Internet -> ipblock.Once it opens you should see similar to the following screen

Lists Tab

The default choice for lists is similar to peerguardian.

level1.gz - Anti-P2P organizations and known government addresses
ads-trackers-and-bad-pr0n.gz - Advertising and data tracker servers
spyware.gz - Malicious spyware and adware servers
edu.gz - Educational institutions and universities
bogon.gz - Spoofed IP-addresses

Custom p2p or dat lists can easily be added. Note that lists can optionally be compressed with gzip.These lists are maintained here

Settings Tab

All options can be configured in this tab. Auto-updating lists is important and the default choice of 2 days is reasonable. Using out-of-date lists is not recommended.

To ignore specific network traffic like HTTP or EMAIL (pop3) use the ignored ports section.

How to connect Motorola V3X to ubuntu 7.04 trough USB

2007-08-12T11:41:00.001-07:00

In this tutorial we will learn how connect your Motorola V3X to ubuntu 7.04 trough USB

First of all, we will download the moto4lin utility from the repositories.

sudo aptitude update

sudo aptitude install moto4lin

Once installed, we need to change the configuration file of moto4lin.

cd $HOME/.qt

gedit moto4linrc

We change the old values to this ones. The most important values are, the device, product and vendor values. Those values are for the motorola V3X. Other motorola have different values. I'm sure you may look in web for those values or you may get them inside the moto4lin using inside preferences the update list button. You can activate the auto connect option too.

[device]
cfgACMdevice=/dev/ttyACM0
cfgATproduct=3002
cfgATvendor=22b8
cfgAutoConnect=1
cfgDetachDriver=0
cfgP2Kproduct=3001
cfgP2Kvendor=22b8

[filemanager]
cfgAutoExpandDirTree=0
cfgAutoUpdateFileList=1
cfgGoLastFolder=0
cfgLoadList=0

Now we are going to make a little script in our home directory to load the module and launch moto4lin.

moto4lin you need access from root login to work, so we make a sudo launch.

cd $HOME

gedit motorola

This will be the script:

sudo modprobe cdc_acm

sudo moto4lin

now we only need to allow execution for the script with chmod and we have our script.

chmod 700 motorola

./motorola

If all has gone right we will be able to connect our Motorola V3X by USB.

How to connect Motorola V3X to ubuntu 7.04 trough USB

2007-08-12T11:41:00.000-07:00

In this tutorial we will learn how connect your Motorola V3X to ubuntu 7.04 trough USB

First of all, we will download the moto4lin utility from the repositories.

sudo aptitude update

sudo aptitude install moto4lin

Once installed, we need to change the configuration file of moto4lin.

cd $HOME/.qt

gedit moto4linrc

[device]
cfgACMdevice=/dev/ttyACM0
cfgATproduct=3002
cfgATvendor=22b8
cfgAutoConnect=1
cfgDetachDriver=0
cfgP2Kproduct=3001
cfgP2Kvendor=22b8

[filemanager]
cfgAutoExpandDirTree=0
cfgAutoUpdateFileList=1
cfgGoLastFolder=0
cfgLoadList=0

Now we are going to make a little script in our home directory to load the module and launch moto4lin.

moto4lin you need access from root login to work, so we make a sudo launch.

cd $HOME

gedit motorola

This will be the script:

sudo modprobe cdc_acm

sudo moto4lin

now we only need to allow execution for the script with chmod and we have our script.

chmod 700 motorola

./motorola

If all has gone right we will be able to connect our Motorola V3X by USB.

How to Install the Eternity Screensaver in Ubuntu

2007-08-07T12:00:00.000-07:00

The Eternity Screensaver plays animations of ray-traced scenes which took days or even weeks to generate. The reasoning is that these clips should look more impressive than anything which can be generated on-the-fly.

Eternity consists of a main package called eternity-screensaver and a number of plugins which add more animations.

Install Eternity Screensaver

Install the key using the following commands

gpg --keyserver subkeys.pgp.net --recv-keys 9B1DB022

gpg --export --armor 9B1DB022 sudo apt-key add -

Edit your APT sources file

sudo vi /etc/apt/sources.list

Add the following lines

# Eternity Screensaver

deb http://parker1.co.uk/apt feisty main
deb-src http://parker1.co.uk/apt feisty main

Save and Exit the file

To install the screensavers use the following command

sudo apt-get update

sudo apt-get install eternal-ubuntu

For Ubuntu Satanic Edition Users

If you are using Ubuntu Satanic Edition use the following command to install screen savers

sudo apt-get install eternal-damnation

Run the Screensaver selection tool

For GNOME Users

* go to: System->Preferences->Screensaver

For KDE Users

* Right-click the desktop and select "Configure Desktop..."

The screensavers are called Eternity, Eternal Ubuntu, Eternal Damnation.

If you want to check the video for this check here

Sample Screen Savers

If you want to know more details check here

Howto Turn Off Auto-Play of CDs,DVDs and iPods in Ubuntu

2007-08-05T07:37:00.000-07:00

Ubuntu automatically starts playing audio or video discs when you insert them into CD/DVD drive.If you want to turnoff this use the following tip.

Go to System--->Preferences--->Removable Drives and Media

Once it Opens You should see the following screen

Now you need to click on Multimedia tab you can just uncheck the box for the disc type you don't want to autoplay

Once you unselect all the options you should see similar to the following screen now you need to click on close

If you are using Feisty by default this is unchecked.

Monitoring Ubuntu Desktops and Servers Using Monit

2007-07-17T06:01:00.000-07:00

monit is a utility for managing and monitoring, processes, files, directories and devices on a UNIX system. Monit conducts automatic maintenance and repair and can execute meaningful causal actions in error situations.

Monit Features

* Daemon mode - poll programs at a specified interval
* Monitoring modes - active, passive or manual
* Start, stop and restart of programs
* Group and manage groups of programs
* Process dependency definition
* Logging to syslog or own logfile
* Configuration - comprehensive controlfile
* Runtime and TCP/IP port checking (tcp and udp)
* SSL support for port checking
* Unix domain socket checking
* Process status and process timeout
* Process cpu usage
* Process memory usage
* Process zombie check
* Check the systems load average
* Check a file or directory timestamp
* Alert, stop or restart a process based on its characteristics
* MD5 checksum for programs started and stopped by monit
* Alert notification for program timeout, restart, checksum, stop resource and timestamp error
* Flexible and customizable email alert messages
* Protocol verification. HTTP, FTP, SMTP, POP, IMAP, NNTP, SSH, DWP,LDAPv2 and LDAPv3
* An http interface with optional SSL support to make monit accessible from a webbrowser

Install Monit in Ubuntu

sudo apt-get install monit

This will complete the installation.

Configuring Monit

Default configuration file located at /etc/monit/monitrc you need to edit this file to configure your options

sudo vi /etc/monit/monitrc

Sample Configuration file as follows and uncomment all the following options

## Start monit in background (run as daemon) and check the services at 2-minute
## intervals.
#
set daemon 120

## Set syslog logging with the 'daemon' facility. If the FACILITY option is
## omited, monit will use 'user' facility by default. You can specify the
## path to the file for monit native logging.
#
set logfile syslog facility log_daemon

## Set list of mailservers for alert delivery. Multiple servers may be
## specified using comma separator. By default monit uses port 25 - it is
## possible to override it with the PORT option.
#
set mailserver localhost # primary mailserver

## Monit by default uses the following alert mail format:

From: monit@$HOST # sender
Subject: monit alert -- $EVENT $SERVICE # subject

$EVENT Service $SERVICE

Date: $DATE
Action: $ACTION
Host: $HOST # body
Description: $DESCRIPTION

Your faithful,
monit

## You can override the alert message format or its parts such as subject
## or sender using the MAIL-FORMAT statement. Macros such as $DATE, etc.
## are expanded on runtime. For example to override the sender:
#
set mail-format { from: monit@monitorserver.com }

## Monit has an embedded webserver, which can be used to view the
## configuration, actual services parameters or manage the services using the
## web interface.
#
set httpd port 2812 and
use address localhost # only accept connection from localhost
allow localhost # allow localhost to connect to the server and
allow 172.29.5.0/255.255.255.0
allow admin:monit # require user 'admin' with password 'monit'

===> Change 172.29.5.0/255.255.255.0 to your network ip range

# Monitoring the apache2 web services.
# It will check process apache2 with given pid file.
# If process name or pidfile path is wrong then monit will
# give the error of failed. tough apache2 is running.
check process apache2 with pidfile /var/run/apache2.pid

#Below is actions taken by monit when service got stuck.
start program = "/etc/init.d/apache2 start"
stop program = "/etc/init.d/apache2 stop"
# Admin will notify by mail if below of the condition satisfied.
if cpu is greater than 60% for 2 cycles then alert
if cpu > 80% for 5 cycles then restart
if totalmem > 200.0 MB for 5 cycles then restart
if children > 250 then restart
if loadavg(5min) greater than 10 for 8 cycles then stop
if 3 restarts within 5 cycles then timeout
group server

#Monitoring Mysql Service

check process mysql with pidfile /var/run/mysqld/mysqld.pid
group database
start program = "/etc/init.d/mysql start"
stop program = "/etc/init.d/mysql stop"
if failed host 127.0.0.1 port 3306 then restart
if 5 restarts within 5 cycles then timeout

#Monitoring ssh Service

check process sshd with pidfile /var/run/sshd.pid
start program "/etc/init.d/ssh start"
stop program "/etc/init.d/ssh stop"
if failed port 22 protocol ssh then restart
if 5 restarts within 5 cycles then timeout

You can also include other configuration files via include directives:

include /etc/monit/default.monitrc
include /etc/monit/mysql.monitrc

This is only sample configuration file. The configuration file is pretty self-explaining; if you are unsure about an option, take a look at the monit documentation

After configuring your monit file you can check the configuration file syntax using the following command

sudo monit -t

Once you don't have any syntax errors you need to enable this service by changing the file /etc/default/monit

sudo vi /etc/default/monit

# You must set this variable to for monit to start
startup=0

# You must set this variable to for monit to start
startup=1

Now you need to start the service using the following command

sudo /etc/init.d/monit start

Monit Web interface

Monit Web interface will run on the port number 2812.If you have any firewall in your network setup you need to enable this port.

Now point your browser to http://yourserverip:2812/ (make sure port 2812 isn't blocked by your firewall), log in with admin and monit.If you want a secure login you can use https check here

Once it opens you should see the following screen

Here you need to enter the username and password

Once it opens you should see the following screen with all the services we are monitoring

Apache web server process details

You can start,stop,restart and disable this service from web interface you can see this in the following screen

Howto Set Flickr images as Ubuntu desktop wallpaper

2007-06-10T04:21:00.000-07:00

Webilder delivers stunning wallpapers to your Linux desktop, directly from Flickr and Webshots. You choose what keywords (tags) to watch for, and photos are automatically downloaded to your computer. Webilder can also change the wallpaper every few minutes.

Webilder Features

download flickr photos that match tags (for example: beach,party)

download photos from flickr users of your choice.

download most interesting photos from flickr.

download amazing daily proshots from Webshots (requires Webshots account).

automatically download new photos for you.

change your wallpaper every few minutes.

import webshots collections (wbz or wbc formats).

Install Webilder in Ubuntu

First you need to edit the /etc/apt/sources.list file

sudo gedit /etc/apt/sources.list

and add the following source list which is suitable for you save the file and exit

For Ubuntu Feisty (i386, amd64, powerpc of sparc) Users

deb http://debian.websterwood.com/ feisty main
deb-src http://debian.websterwood.com/ feisty main

For Ubuntu Edgy (i386, amd64, powerpc of sparc) Users

deb http://debian.websterwood.com/ edgy main
deb-src http://debian.websterwood.com/ edgy main

For Ubuntu Dapper (i386, amd64, powerpc or sparc) Users

deb http://debian.websterwood.com/ dapper main
deb-src http://debian.websterwood.com/ dapper main

Now you need to update the source list using the following command

sudo apt-get update

Install Webilder using the following command

If you are using GNOME Desktop use the following command

sudo apt-get install webilder webilder-gnome

If you are using KDE Desktop use the following command

sudo apt-get install webilder webilder-kde

This will complete the installation process

Adding Webilder to your Desktop Panel

For GNOME Users

Right-click on the GNOME panel you should see the following screen here you need to choose "Add to Panel"

Once you choose Add to Panel option you should see the following screen here under utility you need select "Webilder Webshots Applet" and click on add

Now you should see one small camera icon marked with Red added to your desktop panel

For KDE Users

From the graphics menu, start KWebilder. Go to the preferences Window, to the Advanced Tab, and select KDE wallpapers settings

Now you need to download photos from flicker for this right click on Webilder on your desktop panel and select "Download Photos" option you can see this in the following screen

Downloading Photos are in progress

Once dowload finished your desktop will start refreshing wallpapers by default 5 min if you want to change this option you need to right click on Webilder on your desktop panel and select "Preferences"

You should see the following option here you can select what time your wallpaper need to be refresh or photos download option

Some of the Flicker Wallpapers from my Ubuntu Desktop

Mount and Unmount ISO,MDF,NRG Images Using AcetoneISO (GUI Tool)

2007-06-03T08:52:00.000-07:00

AcetoneISO is CD/DVD image manipulator for Linux.Using this tool it is very easy to Mount and Unmount ISO,MDF,NRG Images

AcetoneISO Features

Mount and Unmount ISO, MDF, NRG (if iso-9660 standard)

Convert / Extract / Browse to ISO : *.bin *.mdf *.nrg *.img *.daa *.cdi *.xbx *.b5i *.bwi *.pdi

Play a DVD Movie ISO with most used media players

Generate an ISO from a Folder or CD/DVD

Generate MD5 file of an image

Encrypt an image

Split image in X megabyte

Compress with High Ratio an image

Rip a PSX cd to *.bin to make it work with epsxe/psx emulators

Service-Menu support for Konqueror

Restore a lost CUE file of *.bin *.img

Preparing Your System

You need to install kommander ( it consists of an editor and a program executor that produce dialogs that you can execute), which is required by AcetoneISO. You also need p7zip (a file archiver with highest compression ratio) to compress and extract ISO images.

sudo apt-get install kommander p7zip

Install AcetoneISO in Ubuntu

First you need to download latest AcetoneISO .deb package from here

Now you should be having acetoneiso2_2.0.1_x86.deb file you need to install this file using the follwoing command

sudo dpkg -i acetoneiso2_2.0.1_x86.deb

This will complete the installation

Now you need to go to Application > Accessories > AcetoneISO

Once it opens you should see similar to the following screen

Speed up dynamic linking Using Prelink

2007-05-20T10:43:00.000-07:00

ELF prelinking utility to speed up dynamic linking.The prelink package contains a utility which modifies ELF shared libraries and executables, so that far fewer relocations need to be resolved at runtime and thus programs come up faster.

Install Prelink in Ubuntu

First you need to make sure you have enables Universe repositories in /etc/apt/sources.list file and you need to update source list using the following command

sudo apt-get update

Install prelink using the following command

sudo apt-get install prelink

This will complete the installation

Configuring Prelink

You need to edit the /etc/default/prelink file with your favorite editor, as sudo/root

sudo vi /etc/default/prelink

Near the top of the file change the following line

PRELINKING=unknown

PRELINKING=yes

Adjust the other options if you know what the you're doing.Defaults work well Save and exit the file.

To start the first prelink it will take long time using the following command

sudo /etc/cron.daily/prelink

In the future, prelink performs a quick prelink (a less-than-1-minute procedure on most systems) daily, usually at midnight. Every 14 days, or whatever you changed it to be, a full prelink will run.

If you just did a major apt-get upgrade that changed systemwide libraries (i.e. libc6, glibc, major gnome/X libs, etc etc etc) and experience cryptic errors about libs, run the following command again

sudo /etc/cron.daily/prelink

To undo prelink,

You need to edit the /etc/default/prelink file with your favorite editor, as sudo/root

sudo vi /etc/default/prelink

Near the top of the file chnage the following line

PRELINKING=yes

PRELINKING=no

Save and exit the file and rerun the following command

sudo /etc/cron.daily/prelink

How to Install Webmin in Ubuntu

2007-05-15T02:05:00.000-07:00

Webmin is a web-based interface for system administration for Unix. Using any browser that supports tables and forms (and Java for the File Manager module), you can setup user accounts, Apache, DNS, file sharing and so on.

Webmin consists of a simple web server, and a number of CGI programs which directly update system files like /etc/inetd.conf and /etc/passwd. The web server and all CGI programs are written in Perl version 5, and use no non-standard Perl modules.

Preparing Your System

You need to install the following packages

sudo apt-get install perl libnet-ssleay-perl openssl libauthen-pam-perl libpam-runtime libio-pty-perl libmd5-perl

Install Webmin in Ubuntu

You can use the above procedure but if you want to install latest version of .deb package you can download from webmin site under Download Section

Download latest webmin using the following command

wget http://prdownloads.sourceforge.net/webadmin/webmin_1.340_all.deb

Now we have webmin_1.340_all.deb package you need to install using the following command

sudo dpkg -i webmin_1.340_all.deb

If your server complains that there is some library things does not find. Just run the following command

sudo apt- get install -f

You should now be able to login to Webmin at the URL https://localhost:10000/

Webmin User Password Change

If you want to change root password in webmin use this included Perl script:

sudo /usr/share/webmin/changepass.pl /etc/webmin root

Ubuntu 7.04 (Feisty Fawn) LAMP Server Setup

2007-05-13T07:36:00.000-07:00

Automatic LAMP (Linux, Apache, MySQL and PHP) In about 15 minutes, the time it takes to install Ubuntu Feisty Server Edition, you can have a LAMP server up and ready to go. This feature, exclusive to Ubuntu Server Edition, is available at the time of installation.

The LAMP option saves the trouble of installing and integrating each of the four separate LAMP components, a process which can take hours and requires someone who is skilled in the installation and configuration of the individual applications. You get increased security, reduced time to install, and reduced risk of misconfiguration, all of which results in a lower cost of ownership.

Ubuntu LAMP server Install the following Versions

Ubuntu Feisty Fawn 7.04
Apache 2.2.3
Mysql 5.0.38
PHP 5.2.1

Choose you language and press enter you can see we have selected english in the follwoing screen

Choose your location and press enter you can see we have have selected United Kingdom in the follwoing screen

Select Origin of keyboard and press enter

Select keyboard layout and press enter

Detecting hardware to find CD-ROM Drivers in progress

Scanning CD-ROM in Progress

Loading additional components progress bar

Configures the network with DHCP if there is a DHCP server in the network

Enter the Hostname of the system so in this example i enter here as ubuntulamp

Detecting Disks and Hardware in progress

Startingup the partitioner in progress

you have to partition your hard disk in this example i have selected use entire disk option if you want to edit manually you can choose manual and press enter

Warning message about data lost on your hard disk

Creating partitions in your harddisk

Write the changes to disk option here you need to select yes and press enter

Creating ext3 filesystem in progress

Configuring the clock option here if you want to leave UTC Select yes otherwise no and press enter

You need enter the Full name of the user you want to create for your server in this example i have created administrator user select continue and press enter

username for your account in this i have entered test select continue and press enter

Entered the password for test user select continue and press enter

Confirm the password for test user select continue and press enter

Installing the base system in progress

Configuring package mirror this will be related to your country option

Now it will start Installing software and here you need to select the server options if you want DNS or LAMP i have selected as LAMP for our LAMP server installation

Software Installation in Progress

Installing GRUB Boot loader in progress

Installation complete message here you need to remove your CD select continue and press enter it will reboot your server

After rebooting you can see the following screen prompt for username

This will complete the Ubuntu LAMP Server Installation and your server is ready for installing applications which supports apache,mysql and php.

Enable root Account in Ubuntu server (Not Recommended for security Reasons this is just Optional)

After the reboot you can login with your previously created username (test). Now we will enable the root account using the following command

sudo passwd root

and give root a password.

Now onwards we become root by running the following command

Configuring Static ip address in Ubuntu server

sudo vi /etc/network/interfaces

and enter the following save the file and exit

# The primary network interface

auto eth0
iface eth0 inet static
address 172.19.0.10
netmask 255.255.255.0
network 172.19.0.0
broadcast 172.19.0.255
gateway 172.19.0.1

Now you need to restart your network services using the following command

sudo /etc/init.d/networking restart

You need to setup manually DNS servers in resolv.conf file when you are not using DHCP.

sudo vi /etc/resolv.conf

You need to add look something like this

search domain.com

nameserver xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx

Install SSH Server

If you want to access your server remotely through SSH you need to install SSH server for this you need to run the following command

sudo apt-get install ssh openssh-server

You will be prompted to insert the installation CD again and this will complete SSH server in your Feisty lamp server.

This is really simple and easy server installation for new users and who wants a quick server.

One small Observation i have noticed in Feisty LAMP installation and Edgy,dapper LAMP installation was choosing LAMP server option is available in dapper at the time of booting your server CD and in Feisty,edgy you need to select LAMP server option at the time of software installation.

This might be useful for users who might think there is no LAMP server option at the time of start booting their Feisty server CD.

GUI Installation for Ubuntu LAMP Server

sudo apt-get update

sudo apt-get install ubuntu-desktop

The above command will install GNOME desktop if you want to install KDE desktop use the following command

sudo apt-get install kubuntu-desktop

Now you can install webmin for their server web interface to configure apache,mysql servers.

Performance Tweaks for ext3 and ReiserFS filesystems

2007-05-10T04:50:00.000-07:00

If you want to Increase ext3 and ReiserFS filesystems Performance use the following Tweaks

Introduction

ext3 Filesystem

The ext3 or third extended filesystem is a journalled file system that is commonly used by the Linux operating system. It is the default file system for many popular Linux distributions

Features of ext3 File System

The ext3 file system is essentially an enhanced version of the ext2 file system. These improvements provide the following advantages

Availability

After an unexpected power failure or system crash (also called an unclean system shutdown), each mounted ext2 file system on the machine must be checked for consistency by the e2fsck program. This is a time-consuming process that can delay system boot time significantly, especially with large volumes containing a large number of files. During this time, any data on the volumes is unreachable.

The journaling provided by the ext3 file system means that this sort of file system check is no longer necessary after an unclean system shutdown. The only time a consistency check occurs using ext3 is in certain rare hardware failure cases, such as hard drive failures. The time to recover an ext3 file system after an unclean system shutdown does not depend on the size of the file system or the number of files; rather, it depends on the size of the journal used to maintain consistency. The default journal size takes about a second to recover, depending on the speed of the hardware.

Data Integrity

The ext3 file system provides stronger data integrity in the event that an unclean system shutdown occurs. The ext3 file system allows you to choose the type and level of protection that your data receives. By default, Most Linux Distributions configures ext3 volumes to keep a high level of data consistency with regard to the state of the file system.

Speed

Despite writing some data more than once, ext3 has a higher throughput in most cases than ext2 because ext3's journaling optimizes hard drive head motion. You can choose from three journaling modes to optimize speed, but doing so means trade offs in regards to data integrity.

Easy Transition

It is easy to change from ext2 to ext3 and gain the benefits of a robust journaling file system without reformatting. See the Section called Converting to an ext3 File System for more on how to perform this task.

ReiserFS

ReiserFS is a general-purpose, journaled computer file system designed and implemented by a team at Namesys led by Hans Reiser.ReiserFS is currently supported on Linux and may be included in other operating systems in the future. Introduced in version 2.4.1 of the Linux kernel, it was the first journaling file system to be included in the standard kernel.

ReiserFS Features

ReiserFS has fast journaling, which means that you don't spend your life waiting for fsck every time your laptop battery dies, or the UPS for your mission critical server gets its batteries disconnected accidentally by the UPS company's service crew, or your kernel was not as ready for prime time as you hoped, or the silly thing decides you mounted it too many times today.

ReiserFS is based on fast balanced trees. Balanced trees are more robust in their performance, and are a more sophisticated algorithmic foundation for a file system. When we started our project, there was a consensus in the industry that balanced trees were too slow for file system usage patterns. We proved that if you just do them right they are better--take a look at the benchmarks. We have fewer worst case performance scenarios than other file systems and generally better overall performance. If you put 100,000 files in one directory, we think its fine; many other file systems try to tell you that you are wrong to want to do it.

ReiserFS is more space efficient. If you write 100 byte files, we pack many of them into one block. Other file systems put each of them into their own block. We don't have fixed space allocation for inodes. That saves 6% of your disk.

Ext3 & ReiserFS has three kinds of journaling methods

1) Journal Data Writeback
2) Journal Data Ordered
3) Journal Data

By default the the 2nd method is used.To speed things up we will make it use method 1. The price to pay is that it may allow old data to appear in files after a crash and journal recovery.

How to make ext3 or reiserfs use journal data writeback

First you need to take fstab file using the following command

sudo cp /etc/fstab /etc/fstab.orig

Edit the /etc/fstab file using the following command

sudo vi /etc/fstab

Add the thing marked in bold to your fstab root mount line.

/dev/hda1 / ext3 defaults,errors=remount-ro,atime,auto,rw,dev,exec,suid,nouser,data=writeback 0 1

Save that file and exit

You need to take Grubmenu file backup using the following command

sudo cp /boot/grub/menu.lst /boot/grub/menu.lst.orig

Now you need to edit the grub menu list file using the following command

sudo vi /boot/grub/menu.lst

look for the following two lines

# defoptions=quiet splash
# altoptions=(recovery mode) single

change to

# defoptions=quiet splash rootflags=data=writeback
# altoptions=(recovery mode) single rootflags=data=writeback

Save that file and exit

Now you need to update the grub using the following command

sudo update-grub

the added flags will automatically be added to the kernel line and stay there in case of kernel update

Changes to Ext3 FileSystem Only

Note:- tune2fs only works for ext3. Reiserfs can't change the journal method

Before rebooting change the filesystem manually to writeback using the following command

sudo tune2fs -o journal_data_writeback /dev/hda1

Check that it is running or not using the following command

sudo tune2fs -l /dev/hda1

Remove update of access time for files

Having the modified time change you can understand but having the system updating the access time every time a file is accessed is not to my liking. According to the manual the only thing that might happen if you turn this off is that when compiling certain things the make might need that info.

To change this do the following

sudo vi /etc/fstab

add the following marked in bold

/dev/hda1 / ext3 defaults,errors=remount-ro,noatime,auto,rw,dev,exec,suid,nouser,data=writeback 0 1

Now reboot and enjoy a much faster system

Recover Data from a Damaged hard disk using dd_rhelp

2007-05-08T02:05:00.000-07:00

dd_rhelp is a bash script that handles a very usefull program written in C which is called dd_rescue, it roughly act as the dd linux command with the caracteristic to NOT stop when it falls on read/write errors.

This makes dd_rescue the best tool for recovering hard drive having bad sectors.In short, it'll use dd_rescue on your entire disc, but will try to gather the maximum valid data before trying for ages on badsectors. So if you leave dd_rhelp work for infinite time, it'll have the same effect as a simple dd_rescue. But because you might not have this infinite time , dd_rhelp will jump over bad sectors and rescue valid data. In the long run, it'll parse all your device with dd_rescue.

You can Ctrl-C it whenever you want, and rerun-it at will, it'll resume it's job as it depends on the log files dd_rescue creates.In addition, progress will be shown in a ASCII picture of your device beeing rescued.

Why use dd_rhelp and not dd_rescue ?

dd_rhelp uses dd_rescue to compute a recovery path through the device that will focus on valid data recovering. This recovery path will go through all the device, exactly as dd_rescue could do it on its own without any path. This means that dd_rhelp will save you time ONLY IF YOU INTEND TO CANCEL ITS JOB BEFORE THE END of a full recovery.

Because a considerable amount of time is taken to try to rescue badsectors. This amount of time can be mesured in days,month, years, depending on your device capacity and its defectiveness. You might not want to spend this time knowing that 99 percent of this time will be taken to look at badsector and won't lead to any more data recovering.

dd_rhelp shifts this useless waiting time to the end. Using dd_rescue strait throughout your device make your waiting time dependent on the badsector distribution.

Install dd_rhelp

First you need to download latest version from here

Preparing your system

sudo apt-get install make gcc g++ ddrescue

Download dd_rhelp using the follwoing command

wget http://www.kalysto.org/pkg/dd_rhelp-0.0.6.tar.gz

Now you have dd_rhelp-0.0.6.tar.gz file

Extract this file using the following command

tar xzvf dd_rhelp-0.0.6.tar.gz

cd dd_rhelp-0.0.6

Run the following commands

sudo ./configure

sudo make

sudo make install

This will complete the installation and this will install program under /usr/local/bin/dd_rhelp

dd_rhelp Syntax

dd_rhelp {filenamedevice} {output-file} [{info}]
or dd_rhelp --help
or dd_rhelp --version

Now we will see how to use ddrescue under damaged disk

If you have a damaged hard disk /dev/sda1 and you have an empty space hard disk /dev/sda2 Now if you want to copy data from /dev/sda1 to /dev/sda2 use the following command

sudo dd_rhelp /dev/sda1 /dev/sda2/backup.img

Output looks like below

/usr/bin/tail: Warning: "+number" syntax is deprecated, please use "-n +number"
=== launched via 'dd_rhelp' at 0k, 0 >>> ===
dd_rescue: (info): ipos: 104384.0k, opos: 104384.0k, xferd: 104384.0k
errs: 0, errxfer: 0.0k, succxfer: 104384.0k
+curr.rate: 10178kB/s, avg.rate: 8532kB/s, avg.load: 31.3%
dd_rescue: (info): /dev/sda2 (104391.0k): EOF
Summary for /dev/sda2 -> backup.img:
dd_rescue: (info): ipos: 104391.0k, opos: 104391.0k, xferd: 104391.0k
errs: 0, errxfer: 0.0k, succxfer: 104391.0k
+curr.rate: 355kB/s, avg.rate: 8519kB/s, avg.load: 31.3%
/usr/bin/tail: Warning: "+number" syntax is deprecated, please use "-n +number"

This copies an image of /dev/sda1 to sda2

Now you need to check the backup image consistency this will check for is there any problems with this image.

sudo fsck -y /dev/sda2/backup.img

After finishing this checking you need to mount your disk image in to your other hard disk

sudo mount /dev/sda2/backup.img /mnt/recoverydata

This will mount all the data from the backup.img under /mnt/recoverydata now you can try to access the data it should work without any problem.

Restore image

If you want to restore this image use the following command

sudo dd_rhelp /dev/sda2/backup.img /dev/sda1

Copy Disk Image to remote machine using SSH

If you want to copy your disk image to remote machine over ssh you need to use the following command

sudo dd_rhelp /dev/sda1 - ssh username@machineip ‘cat /datarecovery/backup.img’

This will be prompetd for password of the username you have menctioned in the above command after entering the password

dd_rhelp strats copying obviously it will take some time to copy over the network.

Mount Network File systems (NFS,Samba) in Ubuntu

2007-04-25T12:03:00.000-07:00

NFS

Network File System (NFS), a protocol originally developed by Sun Microsystems in 1984 and defined in RFCs 1094, 1813, and 3530 (obsoletes 3010) as a distributed file system, allows a user on a client computer to access files over a network as easily as if attached to its local disks. NFS, like many other protocols, builds on the Open Network Computing Remote Procedure Call system (ONC RPC).

Samba

Samba is a free software re-implementation of SMB/CIFS networking protocol released under the GNU General Public License. As of version 3, Samba not only provides file and print services for various Microsoft Windows clients but can also integrate with a Windows Server domain, either as a Primary Domain Controller (PDC) or as a Domain Member. It can also be part of an Active Directory domain.

Samba runs on most Unix and Unix-like systems, such as GNU/Linux, Solaris, and the BSD variants, including Apple's Mac OS X Server (it was added to the OS X workstation edition with version 10.2). It is standard on nearly all distributions of Linux and is commonly included as a basic system service on other Unix-based systems as well.

If you want to mount your NFS and samba file systems on ubuntu client machines you need to use the /etc/fstab file (short for filesystem table) keeps track of filesystems that you want to mount in static locations.

fstab file looks like below

#
# /etc/fstab

#

/dev/hdb5 / ext2 defaults 1 1
/dev/hdb2 /home ext2 defaults 1 2
/dev/hdc /mnt/cdrom iso9660 noauto,ro,user 0 0
/dev/hda1 /mnt/dos/c msdos defaults 0 0
/dev/hdb1 /mnt/dos/d msdos defaults 0 0
/dev/fd0 /mnt/floppy ext2 noauto,user 0 0
/dev/hdb4 none ignore defaults 0 0

none /proc proc defaults
/dev/hdb3 none swap sw

Note that this system has two IDE partitions, one which is used as /, and the other used as /home. It also has two DOS partitions which are mounted under /mnt. Note the user option provided for the cdrom, and the floppy drive. This is one of the many default parameters you can specify. In this case it means that any user can mount a cdrom, or floppy disk. Other options will be dealt with later.

Mount NFS and smb File systems

Network filesystems use slightly different syntax than ordinary partitions.Specifically, the syntax you use to describe the filesystem is different.

For this example, we have an NFS share on host server1 at /mnt/apps, and a SMB file share on host server2 called accounts. We want to mount the NFS share at /mnt/software and the SMB share at /mnt/music.

Before mount these file systems we need to create a directory where we are going to mount these shares, In this example i am going to create software and music two shares using the following commands

sudo mount /mnt/software

sudo mount /mnt/music

To mount both of these partitions at boot time you need to add the following lines to your /etc/fstab file

server1:/mnt/apps /mnt/software nfs defaults 0 0
//server2/music /mnt/music smb defaults 0 0

In the above example explained as follows

For NFS shares follow the hostname:/path/to/share syntax,

For SMB shares follow the //hostname/share syntax.

Other than that, the remaining fields are same for this example and If you want to use NFS or SMB options you can use in the options field.

If you don't want a partition to mount at boot time , add the noauto option to the list of options.

If you want to know more available options you can check fstab man page and mount man page

Create backup of installed packages using APTonCD

2007-04-21T08:25:00.000-07:00

APTonCD is a tool with a graphical interface which allows you to create one or more CDs or DVDs (you choose the type of media) with all of the packages you've downloaded via APT-GET or APTITUDE, creating a removable repository that you can use on other computers.One thing you need to remember this will create backup all the packages installed using apt-get,synaptic because these package arcives are stored in /var/cache/apt/archives

APTonCD will also allow you to automatically create media with all of your .deb packages located in one especific repository, so that you can install them into your computers without the need for an internet conection.

APTonCD Features

Create media with all your downloaded packages;

Create media with all packages from an especific repository

Download all official Ubuntu repositories (main,restricted,universe and multiverse) into removable media (CD/DVD);

Perform backup/restore all packages installed via apt;

Install, with the same CD/DVD, the same programs into several different machines;

Upgrade softwares/packages for several different machines, downloading them only one time;

Install APTonCD in Ubuntu

sudo apt-get install aptoncd

or you can download .deb package from here once you have this you can install using the following command

sudo dpkg -i aptoncd_0.1beta-1_all.deb

Backup all your installed Packages

This will complete the installation and if you want to open the application go to System -> Administration -> AptonCD

Once it opens you should see the following screen

In the above screen you can see two tabs called create and restore first one is create tab now if you want to create a backup of your installed packaged you need to click on "Create AptonCD" now you should see the following screen reading all the available packages from /var/cache/apt/archives directory Once it read all the packages and you should see the following screen

Here you can add any other packages you want to add and click ok

Here you can see APTonCD creating the necessary CD/DVD image and saves it in the location you had chosen is in progress

Here you can see the .iso image stored successfully in the location i had chosen and you can use this image you can burn CD/DVD

Restore Packages

If you want to restore your backup you need to click on restore tab now you should see the following screen this is having three options as follows

Restore APTonCD

Restores all packages available from an APTonCD media to your computer

Restore .iso Image

Restores packages from an APTonCD .iso image previously generated and stored locally

Add CD/DVD

Add a CD or DVD created as a repository for apt-get,aptitude or synaptic

You can choose which one is suitable for you and restore all your packages

APTonCD Version Details

This tools is very useful if you want to install same packages in different machine you can save your bandwidth and if you have slow internet connection

How to Install Java Runtime Environment (JRE) in Ubuntu

2007-04-18T09:36:00.000-07:00

Java is an object-oriented programming language developed by Sun Microsystems in the early 1990s. Java applications are compiled to bytecode, which at runtime is either interpreted or compiled to native machine code for execution.

The language itself derives much of its syntax from C and C++ but has a simpler object model and fewer low-levelfacilities. JavaScript, a scripting language, shares a similar name and has similar syntax, but is not directly related to Java.

Currently Ubuntu has the following Java packages

sun-java5-bin - Contains the binaries

sun-java5-demo - Contains demos and examples

sun-java5-doc - Contains the documentation

sun-java5-fonts - Contains the Lucida TrueType fonts from the JRE

sun-java5-jdk - Contains the metapackage for the JDK

sun-java5-jre - Contains the metapackage for the JRE

sun-java5-plugin - Contains the plug-in for Mozilla-based browsers

sun-java5-source - Contains source files for the JDK

Installing the Java Runtime Environment

First you need to check multiverse repository enabled or not after that open a terminal window. Since you are going to be installing the JRE and the web browser plug-in, you'll be using the following command from a terminal

sudo apt-get install sun-java5-jre sun-java5-plugin sun-java5-fonts

Once it downloads the packages and begins the installation, you'll get a screen that contains the Sun Operating System Distributor License for Java and hit Enter to continue. You'll see a dialog that asks you if you agree with the DLJ license terms. Select Yes, and hit Enter; the JRE will finish installing.

Testing Java Runtime Environment

You'll want to confirm that your system is configured properly for Sun's JRE. This is a two-step process.

First, check that the JRE is properly installed by running the following command from a terminal.

java -version

You should get similar output

java version "1.5.0_08"
Java(TM) 2 Runtime Environment, Standard Edition (build 1.5.0_08-b03)
Java HotSpot(TM) Client VM (build 1.5.0_08-b03, mixed mode, sharing)

Testing Java Plugin for Firefox

open Firefox and typing about:plugins in the address bar and check for java plugin

Install Popular Applications in Ubuntu Feisty Fawn Using Automatix2

2007-04-15T05:38:00.000-07:00

Automatix is a graphical interface for automating the installation of the most commonly requested applications in Debian based Linux operating systems.

Install Automatix2 in Ubuntu Feisty Fawn

Open terminal from Applications—>Accessories—>Terminal From terminal do the following enter each line and press enter

echo “deb http://www.getautomatix.com/apt Feisty main”¦sudo tee -a /etc/apt/sources.list

wget http://www.getautomatix.com/apt/key.gpg.asc

gpg --import automatix2.key

gpg --export --armor E23C5FC3 sudo apt-key add -

Now you need to update your source list using the following command

sudo apt-get update

Install Automatix2 Using the following command

sudo apt-get install automatix2

This will complete the installation and now if you want to open the application you need to go to Applications—>System Tools—>Automatix you can see in the following screen

This will prompt for root password and enter your root password and click ok

Multimedia codecs License information just click on yes

Automatix2 is loading

Automatix2 is Updating Source list

Now you should see the following screen this is having different softwares in different categories

“Burning and Ripping” this contains the following applications

Brasero - CD Burning tool for the GNOME Desktop

GnomeBaker - The Best GTK2 CD/DVD Burning Software

Ripper and Tuner - Streamripper and Streamtuner

xDVDshrink - Linux CounterPart of DVDshrink

“Chat Clients” contains the following applications

AMSN 0.97 - MSN Client With Webcam Support

Gaim 2.0 Beta6 and extras - Install Gaim 2.0 Beta6 and extras

Gyachi - Yahoo Messanger With Voice,Webcam and lots of other features

Skype - A free Voice over IP Software

XChat - Install XChat

“Codecs and Plugins” contains the following applications

AUD-DVD Codecs - NON-FREE Audio and DVD codecs

Flash Player - Installs the adobe Flash Player Plugin for firefox

Mplayer and FF Plugin - Mplayer and Firefox 2.0 plugin

Multimedia Codecs - Commonly needed audio and video codecs

SUN Java 1.6 JRE - Sun's Version 1.6 JRE and the firefox plugin

Swiftfox Plugins - Installs commonly used Swiftfox Plugins,MS Fonts

“Commercial Software” contains the following applications

Crossover Office Professional 6.0-1 - Install and Run Windows applications like MS Office and Adobe Photoshop on Ubuntu

Crossover Office Standard 6.0-1 - Install and Run Windows applications like MS Office and Adobe Photoshop on Ubuntu

“Drivers” contains the following applications

Lightscribe for Linux - LaCie LightScribe Labeler for Linux

NDISWrapper - A driver wrapper that allows you to use windows drivers for network cards

Nvidia Driver - Installs nVidia drivers on select nVidia cards

“Email Clients” contains the following applications

Checkgmail - Gmail checker which sits in your system tray

Thunderbird 1.5 - Installs Thunderbird 1.5

“Eyecandy” contains the following applications

Gdesklets - Installs Gdesklets

“File Sharing” contains the following applications

Azures - Installs Azureus bittorrent client

Bittornado - A GTK Bittorent Client for GNOME

DCPP - Linux DC++ client

Frostwire - Install Frostwire P2P client

aMule - Latest version of a P2P file sharing client

“Media Players and Editors” contains the following applications

Audacity - A Versatile audio editor

Avidemux - Video Editing Tool

Beep Media Player - A classic winamp style audio player

DVD Ripper - Installs a GTK based DVD ripper

Easytag - A Versatile mp3 tag editor

Exaile - Amarok like music manager for Gnome

Kino - A Versatile Video editor

Listen Media Manager - Latest Version of a new media manager and player for GNOME

RealPlayer - Installs RealPlayer

Songbird - Music Manager

Totem Xine - A media player

VLC Media Player - Another Versatile media player

iLinux - iLife Alternative and Ipod programs and libraries

“Miscellaneous” contains the following applications

Automatix read/write NTFS and FAT32 Mounter - Automatically mounts all local FAT32 and NTFS Partitions and makes them writable

Ctrl-Alt-Del - This Configures Ctrl-Alt-Del to Open Gnome System Monitor

Debian Menu - Shows all installed applications on your system

Extra Fonts - Additional fonts and msttcorefonts

Nautilus Scripts - Open Nautilus, and any file with gedit with a right click, as root (GNOME ONLY)

Slab - Installs Novell’s “Slab” menu used in SLED 10

“Office” contains the following applications

Acrobat Reader - Adobe Acrobat Reader and plugin for Firefox 2.0

GnuCash - Money management software for GNOME

Google Earth - Satellite Earth imagery application from Google

Google Picasa - Photo editing application from Google

OpenOffice Clipart - clipart in OpenOffice

“Programming Tools” contains the following applications

Anjuta - C/C++ Development enviroment

Bluefish - HTML Editor

Gambas - Gambas is a free development environment based on Basic interpreter like Visual Basic

Monodevelop - C#/Boo/Java/Nemerle/lLasm Development enviroment

Screem - Gnome website development environment

Scribus - Desktop publishing software

Stanis Python Editor - A powerful python IDE

“Utilities” contains the following applications

Archiving Tools - Additional archiving tools (rar, unrar, ace, and 7zip)

Backup and Restore - A graphical backup and restore solution for Ubuntu (GNOME)

Beagle - A Mono-based desktop search program

Boot-up Manager - Easy configuration of startup and shutdown scripts and services

GFTP - FTP client for GNOME with ssh capability

Glipper - Clipboard Manager for Gnome

Gnome Security Suite - ClamAV Antivirus and Firestarter Firewall

GnomePPP - Graphical dialup connection tool

Liferea - A RSS reader for GNOME

Network Manager - A Program and menu applet that allows you to easily change networks

“Virtualization” contains the following applications

VMware Player - Runs virtual operating systems

VirtualBox - Runs virtual operating systems

Wine - Installs wine

“Web Browsers” contains the following applications

Opera Browser - Installs Opera Web Browser

Swiftfox Browser - Installs Swiftfox browser for your specific CPU

Example

Now we will see one example how to install Opera web browser using automatix first you need to check the tick box option available next to opera browser application

Now if you want to start installation you need to click on start button available at the top panel

Opera Web Browser installation in progress

Uninstall applications Using Automatix

If you want to uninstall any application which you installed using automatix you need to click on uninstall tab select the application you want to uninstall and click on start button on top

Automatix2 is having new feature when you can check your automatix activitylog, changelog, Errors and Information and Source list

Sample Activitylog Report

Sample Changelog Report

Automatix2 Version details

How to Set-up a gameport,gamepad or joystick in Ubuntu

2007-04-14T02:28:00.000-07:00

If you want gameport,gamepad or joystick to work in Ubuntu you need to follow this procedure

Basics of Game Port,Gamepad and Joystick

Game Port

The game port is the traditional connector for video game input devices on an x86-based PCs. The game port is usually integrated with a PC I/O or sound card, either ISA or PCI, or as an on-board feature of some motherboards. The game port is no longer supported by Windows Vista and will thus likely largely disappear.

Gamepad

A gamepad, also called joypad or control pad, is a type of game controller held in the hand, where the digits (especially thumbs) are used to provide input. Gamepads generally feature a set of action buttons handled with the right thumb and a direction controller handled with the left. The direction controller has traditionally been a four-way digital cross (D-pad), but most modern controllers additionally (or as a substitute) feature an analog stick. The analog stick was introduced with the Atari 5200 controller, but did not reach popularity until the Nintendo 64, Sony PlayStation, and Sega Saturn.

Joystick

A joystick is a personal computer peripheral or general control device consisting of a handheld stick that pivots about one end and transmits its angle in two or three dimensions to a computer. Most joysticks are two-dimensional, having two axes of movement (similar to a mouse), but three-dimensional joysticks do exist. A joystick is generally configured so that moving the stick left or right signals movement along the X axis, and moving it forward (up) or back (down) signals movement along the Y axis. In joysticks that are configured for three-dimensional movement, twisting the stick left (counter-clockwise) or right (clockwise) signals movement along the Z axis. These three axes - X Y and Z - are, in relation to an aircraft, roll, pitch, and yaw.

Now we will see how to configure some Game Port,Gamepad,Joystick modules in Ubuntu

First, we need to check if the gameport module is already loaded.

In a terminal, type the following command

lsmod

It should display a list of the currently loaded modules.

One of the lines should begin with 'gamepad'

gameport 17160 2 snd_es1938

If you didn't find any similar line, look for the way to enable the gameport for your specific sound card in the list below.

Now, we need to setup the gamepad/joystick.Again in a terminal, type the following

sudo modprobe joydev

Testing and calibrating the gamepad/joystick

If you want to check if everything's working correctly or/and you want to callibrate your device, you can try out jscalibrator.

What is jscalibrator ?

GTK Joystick Calibrator With jscalibrator you can calibrate your joystick for Linux games. The Joystick Wrapper library (libjsw) is designed to provide a uniform API and user configuration for joysticks and other game controllers on all platforms.

It features an integrated library level calibration system using jscalibrator to provide a one time calibration for any program that uses libjsw. libjsw also features several levels of advanced joystick input error correction.

Install jscalibrator in Ubuntu

sudo apt-get install jscalibrator

If you want to use this program run the following command from your terminal

jscalibrator

A new window should appear which should allow you to test and calibrate your device.

List of gameports, gamepads/joysticks and their corresponding commands

Gameports

Classic ISA/PnP gameports

sudo modprobe ns558

Crystal SoundFusion gameports

sudo modprobe cs461x

Aureal Vortex and Trident 4DWave gameports

sudo modprobe pcigame

SoundBlaster Live! gameports

sudo modprobe emu10k1-gp

Any other gameports(If your sound card isn't one of the above and you couldn't find it in lsmod, try this command)

sudo modprobe gameport

Gamepads and joysticks

Analog joysticks and gamepads (Most gamepads and joysticks, especially generic ones, work well with this one)

sudo modprobe analog

Assassin 3D and MadCatz Panther devices

sudo modprobe a3d

Logitech ADI digital joysticks and gamepads

sudo modprobe adi

Creative Labs Blaster Cobra gamepad

sudo modprobe cobra

Genius Flight2000 Digital joysticks and gamepads

sudo modprobe gf2k

Gravis GrIP joysticks and gamepads

sudo modprobe grip

InterAct digital joysticks and gamepads

sudo modprobe interact

ThrustMaster DirectConnect joysticks and gamepads

sudo modprobe tmdc

Microsoft SideWinder digital joysticks and gamepads

sudo modprobe sidewinder

Microsoft xbox controller then the command is

sudo modprobe xpad

then do jscalibrator

Some parts of this procedure from here

Fix for SSH slow to ask for password in Ubuntu Feisty Fawn

2007-04-13T11:31:00.000-07:00

When you try to login using ssh some users might find asking for ssh password is slow here is the solution how to fix this problem.

Solution 1

Edit the /etc/ssh/ssh_config file using the following command

sudo vi /etc/ssh/ssh_config

Commentout the following lines

GSSAPIAuthentication yes
GSSAPIDelegateCredentials no

save the file and exit

Solution 2

If you got to System>Administration>Network

Now you should see similar to following screen here click the "General" tab

You need to Uncheck the option that says "Scan for available services and advertise . . ." and close

Now you can try to login using ssh you should see it will prompt for password immediately

Ubuntu 7.10 (Gutsy Gibbon) Release Dates

2007-04-12T02:16:00.000-07:00

In addition to Ubuntu 6-months stable releases and the next version of ubuntu is 7.10 with Code Name “Gutsy Gibbon”.

Mark Shuttleworth about Ubuntu 7.10 (Gutsy Gibbon)

On a personal note, the monkey on my back has been composite-by-default,which I had hoped would happen in Edgy, then Feisty. I'm nervous to predict it now for Gutsy, for fear of a third strike, but I'm told that great work is being done in the Compiz/Beryl community and upstream in X. There's a reasonable chance that Gutsy will deliver where those

others have not. I remain convinced that malleable, transparent and extra-dimensional GUI's are a real opportunity for the free software community to take a lead in the field of desktop innovation, and am keen to see the underlying technologies land in Ubuntu, but we have to balance that enthusiasm with the Technical Board's judgement of the stability and maturity of those fundamental layers.

Now you can make a note of ubuntu 7.10 (Gutsy Gibbon) release dates in you calender

Important Dates

April 2007

April 26th - Toolchain Uploaded

May 2007

May 10th - Development Summit

May 31st - Specifications must be finalized

June 2007

June 7th - Tribe CD 1

June 21th - DebianImportFreeze ,Remaining upstream merges completed, Rebuild Test

June 28st - Tribe CD 2

July 2007

July 12th - Developer Sprint

July 19th - Tribe CD 3

August 2007

August 16th - FeatureFreeze,UpstreamVersionFreeze ,ArtworkDeadlineOne,UVF Universe

August 23rd - Tribe CD 5

August 30th - ArtworkDeadlineTwo,NewPackagesFreezeUniverse

September 2007

September 6th - Tribe CD 6

September 13th - StringFreeze

September 20th - BetaFreeze,FeistyArtworkFinalDeadline

September 27th - BetaRelease

October 2007

October 4th - NonLanguagePackTranslationDeadline,KernelFreeze

October 11th - ReleaseCandidate,LanguagePackTranslationDeadline

October 18th - FinalRelease

Details about Each Release

Feature Freeze

The point at which we cease creating and modifying internal features and packages. This means we’re pretty much locked down for bugfixes only.

Exceptions requiring confirmation

Packages in or relating to high-priority ReleasenameFeatureGoals

Major/minor fixes, within reason

Exceptional circumstances

Upstream Version Freeze

The point at which we cease accepting new upstream versions of packages, whether they are sourced from Debian or not. Selected Debian releases of the same upstream versions may still be pulled in for bug-fixes, but this would be a manual process.

Exceptions requiring confirmation

Packages in or relating to FeatureGoals

Minor fixes, if the upstream change is a micro-increment (or equivalent)

Major fixes, particularly blockers, if the upstream change is a minor-increment (or equivalent)

Exceptional circumstances

String Freeze

Beta Freeze

Anal-retentive, high-caution period until the Beta Release goes out. Release and relevant section team confirmed fixes only! Once the BetaRelease is shipped, we roll back to FeatureFreeze status.

Exceptions requiring confirmation

ReleaseCriticalBug

SecurityCriticalBug

Exceptional circumstances

Beta Release

The BetaRelease is a testing oriented pre-release, usually one month before the Final Release.

Non Language Pack Translation Deadline

The Ubuntu installer

Translations which don’t use gettext, including:

Firefox

debconf templates

desktop notifications via notification-daemon

Strings visible in the default desktop (live CDs don’t get language pack updates)

Default menu items

Panel strings

All menu entries in KDE applications, which does not support translation via language packs

Kernel Freeze

Release Candidate (RC)

The release candidate is a production-quality pre-release one week before the final release.

Language Pack Translation Deadline

Translation data using the Language Pack mechanism is due at this deadline.

See NonLanguagePackTranslationDeadline for non Language Pack data.

Final Release

The final release is the finished product which is distributed with an official Ubuntu release number.

Desktop Data Manager(DDM) for Ubuntu Desktop

2007-04-10T02:09:00.000-07:00

Desktop Data Manager is a Clipboard Manager for GNOME similar to Klipper for KDE. With DDM it is possible to display different types of content like text or images.Additional DDM includes a screenshot taking application which is able to take screenshots from a single window/subwindow, rectangle of the screen or the whole desktop.

Desktop Data Manager Features

Clipboard history for a customized number of entries

Separate list for CLIPBOARD (Ctrl+C/Ctrl+V) and PRIMARY (Middle Mouse Button)

Displays text and images inline

Converts HTML/FTP/... links (in fact any link that is supported through GnomeVFS) to images which can be pasted into any application

Images can be pasted as a new file by simply using Ctrl+V

Customizable keyboard shortcuts

Extensible through plugins

Install Desktop Data Manager in Ubuntu

First you need to download the latest .deb package from here using the following command

wget http://downloads.sourceforge.net/data-manager/desktop-data-manager_0.8.10_i386.deb

Now you have desktop-data-manager_0.8.10_i386.deb package you need to install this using the following command

sudo dpkg -i desktop-data-manager_0.8.10_i386.deb

This will complete the installation.Now you need to open Desktop Data Manager go to Applications--->Accessories--->Desktop Data Manager

Now you should see the following icon marked with red in your system tray

If you want to see the available options right click on the above icon

If you want to take a screenshot right click you can select Take A Screenshot option

You should see the following screen with the available options

Once it finishes the screenshot you should see the following screen

If you want to see the preferences right click you can select Preferences

Once it opens the preferences window you should see the following screen

One more important feature is DDM collects both text and graphics when you perform copy or cut functions, and displays them when you click the icon.To insert a clipboard item, you select it from the DDM icon, then use a program's normal paste function.

View Hidden Files and Folders in Ubuntu File Browser

2007-04-08T16:53:00.000-07:00

The Ubuntu file browser does not show hidden files or folders by default, only the files that your user has access to.Here is the small tip how to view Hidden Files and Folders in Ubuntu File Browser.

Here’s what file browser looks like when browsing the root file system normally

As you can see, all of the hidden/system folders are not shown. If you hit Ctrl+H at this screen, you will immediately see all the hidden files.

If you would just prefer to make this be the default setting when using file browser, go to the Edit menu and select Preferences

Check the “Show hidden and backup files” checkbox, and you should now see the hidden files all of the time.

How To Import mails from Evolution to Thunderbird

2007-04-06T00:33:00.000-07:00

If you want to Import your mails from Evolution to Thunderbird there is very nice utility called MboxImport .

Thunderbird, like many other email clients, uses the mbox format to archive the emails.It's curious that Thundebird has not a function that let you import or export files in this format and this lack is sometimes a problem when you want to move the accounts from a pc to another one or when you want to migrate (for example) from Mozilla to Thunderbird.Anyway this kind of import can be made very easily copying the mbox file into the directory "Local Folders" (it is inside the profile directory) with Thunderbird close; restarting the program, the mbox file will be visible as sub folder of Local Folders.To export, you must just copy the email files that are inside the account's folder.This method can give some troubles, above all for people not very expert with Thunderbird, because the profile's files are into a hidden directory, whose path changes with the operative systems or also with personal needs.

First you need to download MboxImport from here

Install MboxImport in Thunderbird

In Thunderbird, go in "Tools" --> "Extensions" and click on "Install";

pick the xpi file you downloaded and follow the instructions;

restart Thunderbird.

To export, it's sufficient a right-click on the folder or on the account and to choose the voice you want from the menu "Import/export".

Once you have saved all the folders/files into the Mbox format, just go into Evolution and select "Import" and follow the wizard using "a single file import" and select your xxxx.mbox file and then select which folder in Evolution you want to import into.

For importing the address book from Thunderbird to Evolution, use T-birds address book export function and save the address book as a .csv file.After finishing address book check everything is fine or not.

Streaming Media Server in Ubuntu GNU/Linux

2007-04-04T06:51:00.000-07:00

The GNU MP3/Media Streamer is a simple application which makes it possible to navigate through your audio and video collection via a browser, and stream playlists across a network.GNUMP3d is a streaming server for MP3s, OGG vorbis files, movies and other media formats.The software supports browsing, searching, and streaming all via your browser with support for MP3, OGG Vorbis, WMA and many other types of audio files.

If you have a large music collection then streaming it across a LAN, or the internet, is a logical thing to do with it.Now we will have a look at gnump3d.

Gnump3d features

Small, stable, portable, self-contained, and secure.
Simple to install, configure, and use.

Portable across different varieties of Unix, the GNU Operating System, and Microsoft Windows platforms.

Install Gnump3d in Ubuntu

sudo apt-get install gnump3d

This will install all the required packages for gnump3d

When the software is installed it will have the following options configured

The directory containing all your media, /var/music by default.

The port number the server should listen upon, 8888 by default.

The user the daemon should run as, gnump3d by default.

Now you need to access go to http://youripaddress:8888 you should see similar to the following screen

To change the theme you wish to use simply click upon the "Preferences" link and you should see the following screen here you can change theme

Default Configuration file located at /etc/gnump3d/gnump3d.conf you can change this for your needs most common things users change is The default theme,The security options,The downsampling support.

Change the default directory containing multimedia files for GNUMP3d

By default multimedia files location is /var/music.If you want to change this to /home/music using the following steps

Backup existing config file

sudo cp /etc/gnump3d/gnump3d.conf /etc/gnump3d/gnump3d.conf_backup

Edit the configfile

gksudo gedit /etc/gnump3d/gnump3d.conf

Search for the following line

root = /var/music

Replace with the following line

root = /home/music

Find this line

user = gnump3d

Replace with the following line

user = root

Save and exit file

Restart gnump3d service using the following command

sudo /etc/init.d/gnump3d restart

Change the default port number for GNUMP3d

By Default gnump3d server port will listen port number 8888.If you want to change to 7878 use the following steps

Backup existing config file

sudo cp /etc/gnump3d/gnump3d.conf /etc/gnump3d/gnump3d.conf_backup

Edit the configfile

gksudo gedit /etc/gnump3d/gnump3d.conf

Find this line

port = 8888

Replace with the following line

port = 7878

Save and exit the edited file

Restart gnump3d service using the following command

sudo /etc/init.d/gnump3d restart

Now you can access at http://youripaddress:7878

Adding files to gnump3d

Now, you'll probably want to add some files to gnump3d. The default directory is /var/music.

There are many different ways to copy files into your server from another Ubuntu machine,More secure way is using openssh. On the Ubuntu box that you want to copy the files from, open a terminal and type

sudo apt-get install openssh

Assuming that the path of a folder to copy is /home/username/music and the local IP of the remote Ubuntu computer is xxx.xxx.x.xxx, and the directory where the copied files will go is /var/music, go you your server and type

cd /var/music sudo su scp -r username@xxx.xxx.x.xxx:/home/username/music

Once you copied some files you should see similar to the following screen

Step By Step Ubuntu 6.10 (Edgy Eft) GNU/Linux LAMP Server Setup

2007-04-03T03:50:00.000-07:00

Automatic LAMP (Linux, Apache, MySQL and PHP) In about 20 minutes, the time it takes to install Ubuntu Edgy Server Edition, you can have a LAMP server up and ready to go. This feature, exclusive to Ubuntu Server Edition, is available at the time of installation.

Ubuntu LAMP server Install the following Versions

Ubuntu Edgy Eft 6.10
Apache 2.0.55
Mysql 5.0.24a
PHP 5.1.6

Choose you language and press enter you can see we have selected english in the follwoing screen

Choose your location and press enter you can see we have have selected United Kingdom in the follwoing screen

Select Origin of keyboard and press enter

Select keyboard layout and press enter

Detecting hardware to find CD-ROM Drivers in progress

Scanning CD-ROM in Progress

Loading additional components progress bar

Configures the network with DHCP if there is a DHCP server in the network

Enter the Hostname of the system so in this example i enter here as ubuntulamp

Detecting Disks and Hardware in progress

Startingup the partitioner in progress

you have to partition your hard disk in this i have selected manually edit the partition table and press enter

It will show you the hard disk space and press enter here i am using vmware with 10.7GB of space

Create a New partition table on the device select yes and press enter

Now you can see the freespace and press enter

How to use this freespace select create a new partition and press enter

Enter the new patition size and press continue i have entered 100mb in this example

Select the type of the partition and press enter in this example i have selected primary

Location for the new partition as begining and press enter

Now you need to select the mount point with the following screen and press enter to change mount point

Now you can see the available mount points and here i have selected /boot mount point and press enter

Now you should see the following screen and here you need to select "Done Setting Up the Partition" option and press enter This will create the /boot mount point with 100mb of space and you can create the / mount point in the same way with the existing space.

you can see this in the following screen here you need to select "Finish partitioning and write changes to disk" option and press enter

Write the changes to disk option here you need to select yes and press enter

Creating ext3 filesystem in progress

Configuring the clock option here if you want to leave UTC Select yes otherwise no and press enter

You need enter the Full name of the user you want to create for your server in this example i have created administrator user select continue and press enter

username for your account in this i have entered test select continue and press enter

Entered the password for test user select continue and press enter

Confirm the password for test user select continue and press enter

Installing the base system in progress

Configuring package mirror this will be related to your country option

Now it will start Installing software and here you need to select the server options if you want DNS or LAMP i have selected as LAMP for our LAMP server installation

Software Installation in Progress

Installing GRUB Boot loader in progress

Installation complete message here you need to remove your CD select continue and press enter it will reboot your server

After rebooting you can see the following screen prompt for username

This will complete the Ubuntu LAMP Server Installation and your server is ready for installing applications which supports apache,mysql and php.

Configuring Static ip address in Ubuntu server

sudo vi /etc/network/interfaces

and enter the following save the file and exit

# The primary network interface

auto eth0
iface eth0 inet static
address 172.19.0.10
netmask 255.255.255.0
network 172.19.0.0
broadcast 172.19.0.255
gateway 172.19.0.1

Now you need to restart your network services using the following command

sudo /etc/init.d/networking restart

You need to setup manually DNS servers in resolv.conf file when you are not using DHCP.

sudo vi /etc/resolv.conf

You need to add look something like this

search domain.com

nameserver xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx

Install SSH Server

If you want to access your server remotely through SSH you need to install SSH server for this you need to run the following command

sudo apt-get install ssh openssh-server

You will be prompted to insert the installation CD again and this will complete SSH server in your edgy lamp server.

This is really simple and easy server installation for new users and who wants a quick server.

One small Observation i have noticed in edgy LAMP installation and dapper LAMP installation was choosing LAMP server option is available in dapper at the time of booting your server CD and in edgy you need to select LAMP server option at the time of software installation.

This might be useful for users who might think there is no LAMP server option at the time of start booting their Edgy server CD.

After completing your Edgy LAMP Server Installation some of users may not be comfortable with command prompt for those users they can install webmin for their server web interface to configure apache,mysql servers.

Bash Shell Keyboard Shortcuts For Linux Users

2007-03-31T16:53:00.000-07:00

The default shell on most Linux operating systems is called Bash. There are a couple of important hotkeys that you should get familiar with if you plan to spend a lot of time at the command line. These shortcuts will save you a ton of time if you learn them.

Here is the List of Bash Shell Keyboard Shortcuts For Linux Users

Ctrl + A - Go to the beginning of the line you are currently typing on

Ctrl + E - Go to the end of the line you are currently typing on

Ctrl + L - Clears the Screen, similar to the clear command

Ctrl + U - Clears the line before the cursor position. If you are at the end of the line, clears the entire line.

Ctrl + H - Same as backspace

Ctrl + R - Let’s you search through previously used commands

Ctrl + C - Kill whatever you are running

Ctrl + D - Exit the current shell

Ctrl + Z - Puts whatever you are running into a suspended background process. fg restores it.

Ctrl + W - Delete the word before the cursor

Ctrl + K - Clear the line after the cursor

Ctrl + T - Swap the last two characters before the cursor

Esc + T - Swap the last two words before the cursor

Alt + F - Move cursor forward one word on the current line

Alt + B - Move cursor backward one word on the current line

Tab - Auto-complete files and folder names

Ctrl + W - erase word before cursor

Ctrl + Y - to paste it (as in delete and copy) all text in front of the cursor

Esc + . (or Esc + Underscore) - Insert Last Argument

Ctrl + b - Move back a character

Ctrl + f - Move forward a character

Ctrl + r - Search the history backwards

Ctrl + xx - Move between EOL and current cursor position

Ctrl + x @ - Show possible hostname completions

Alt + < - Move to the first line in the history

Alt + > - Move to the last line in the history

Alt + ? - Show current completion list

Alt + * - Insert all possible completions

Alt + / - Attempt to complete filename

Alt + . - Yank last argument to previous command

Alt + c - Capitalize the word

Alt + d - Delete word

Alt + l - Make word lowercase

Alt + n - Search the history forwards non-incremental

Alt + p - Search the history backwards non-incremental

Alt + r - Recall command

Alt + t - Move words around

Alt + u - Make word uppercase

Alt + back-space - Delete backward from cursor

Here "2T" means Press TAB twice

$ 2T - All available commands(common)

$ (string) 2T - All available commands starting with (string)

$ /2T - Entire directory structure including Hidden one

$ 2T - Only Sub Dirs inside including Hidden one

$ *2T - Only Sub Dirs inside without Hidden one

$ ~2T - All Present Users on system from "/etc/passwd"

$ $2T - All Sys variables

$ @2T - Entries from "/etc/hosts"

$ =2T - Output like ls or dir

Useful Note that some of these commands may not work if you are accessing bash through a telnet ,ssh session, or depending on how you have your keys mapped.

Install Mplayer and Multimedia Codecs (libdvdcss2,w32codecs) in Ubuntu Dapper Drake,Edgy Eft,Feisty Fawn

2007-03-30T00:43:00.000-07:00

MPlayer is a movie and animation player that supports a wide range of codecs and file formats, including MPEG 1/2/4,DivX 3/4/5, Windows Media 7/8/9, RealAudio/Video up to 9, Quicktime 5/6, and Vivo 1/2. It has many MX/SSE (2)/3Dnow(Ex) optimized native audio and video codecs, but allows using XAnim’s and RealPlayer’s binary codec plugins, and Win32 codec DLLs. It has basic VCD/DVD playback functionality, including DVD subtitles, but supports many text-
based subtitle formats too. For video output, nearly every existing interface is supported. It’s also able to convert any supported files to raw/divx/mpeg4 AVI (pcm/mp3 audio), and even video grabbing from V4L devices.

Install Mplayer in Ubuntu Dapper Drake

You need to add the following lines to /etc/apt/sources.list file

gedit /etc/apt/sources.list

enter these two lines and save your file

deb http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu dapper universe multiverse
deb-src http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu dapper universe multiverse

Install Mplayer in Ubuntu Edgy eft

You need to add the following lines to /etc/apt/sources.list file

gedit /etc/apt/sources.list

enter these two lines and save your file

deb http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu edgy universe multiverse
deb-src http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu edgy universe multiverse

Install Mplayer in Ubuntu Feisty Fawn

You need to add the following lines to /etc/apt/sources.list file

gedit /etc/apt/sources.list

enter these two lines and save your file

deb http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu feisty universe multiverse
deb-src http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu feisty universe multiverse

Now you need to run the following command to update the source list

sudo apt-get update

Install mplayer using the following command

sudo apt-get install mplayer

if you want to open mplayer just type

gmplayer

or

You can Open from Applications—>Sound&Video—> Mplayer Movie Player

Once it opens you should see the following screen

Installing libdvdcss2 and w32 video codecs in Ubuntu

Support for WMV, RealMedia and other formats has been bundled into the w32codecs package. This package is not available from the Ubuntu repositories due to licensing and legal restrictions.
Edit /etc/apt/sources.list file and enter the following repositories

sudo gedit /etc/apt/sources.list

You can install this DVD playback and w32codecs using Seveas Repository

For Ubuntu Dapper Drake Users

deb http://mirror.ubuntulinux.nl dapper-seveas all
deb-src http://mirror.ubuntulinux.nl dapper-seveas all

For Ubuntu Edgy Eft Users

deb http://mirror.ubuntulinux.nl edgy-seveas all
deb-src http://mirror.ubuntulinux.nl edgy-seveas all

Now you need to copy the key using the following command

wget http://mirror.ubuntulinux.nl/1135D466.gpg -O- ¦ sudo apt-key add -

For Ubuntu Feisty Fawn Users

deb http://medibuntu.sos-sts.com/repo/ feisty free non-free
deb-src http://medibuntu.sos-sts.com/repo/ feisty free non-free

Now you need to copy the key using the following command

wget -q http://packages.medibuntu.org/medibuntu-key.gpg -O- ¦ sudo apt-key add -

Update the source list using the following command

sudo apt-get update

Install Codecs using the following command

sudo apt-get install w32codecs libdvdcss2

Using above download locations you can install most of the mutimedia codecs for ubuntu.

sudo apt-get update

Mplayer Plugin for Firefox

If you want to install Mplayer with plug-in for Mozilla Firefox run the following command

sudo apt-get install mozilla-mplayer

How to Set-up a gameport,gamepad or joystick in Ubuntu

2007-03-27T12:06:00.000-07:00

If you want gameport,gamepad or joystick to work in Ubuntu you need to follow this procedure

Basics of Game Port,Gamepad and Joystick

Game Port

Gamepad

Joystick

Now we will see how to configure some Game Port,Gamepad,Joystick modules in Ubuntu

First, we need to check if the gameport module is already loaded.

In a terminal, type the following command

lsmod

It should display a list of the currently loaded modules.

One of the lines should begin with 'gamepad'

gameport 17160 2 snd_es1938

If you didn't find any similar line, look for the way to enable the gameport for your specific sound card in the list below.

Now, we need to setup the gamepad/joystick.Again in a terminal, type the following

sudo modprobe joydev

Testing and calibrating the gamepad/joystick

If you want to check if everything's working correctly or/and you want to callibrate your device, you can try out jscalibrator.

What is jscalibrator ?

Install jscalibrator in Ubuntu

sudo apt-get install jscalibrator

If you want to use this program run the following command from your terminal

jscalibrator

A new window should appear which should allow you to test and calibrate your device.

List of gameports, gamepads/joysticks and their corresponding commands

Gameports

Classic ISA/PnP gameports

sudo modprobe ns558

Crystal SoundFusion gameports

sudo modprobe cs461x

Aureal Vortex and Trident 4DWave gameports

sudo modprobe pcigame

SoundBlaster Live! gameports

sudo modprobe emu10k1-gp

Any other gameports(If your sound card isn't one of the above and you couldn't find it in lsmod, try this command)

sudo modprobe gameport

Gamepads and Joysticks

Analog joysticks and gamepads: (Most gamepads and joysticks, especially generic ones, work well with this one)

sudo modprobe analog

Assassin 3D and MadCatz Panther devices

sudo modprobe a3d

Logitech ADI digital joysticks and gamepads

sudo modprobe adi

Creative Labs Blaster Cobra gamepad

sudo modprobe cobra

Genius Flight2000 Digital joysticks and gamepads

sudo modprobe gf2k

Gravis GrIP joysticks and gamepads

sudo modprobe grip

InterAct digital joysticks and gamepads

sudo modprobe interact

ThrustMaster DirectConnect joysticks and gamepads

sudo modprobe tmdc

Microsoft SideWinder digital joysticks and gamepads

sudo modprobe sidewinder

Microsoft xbox controller then the command is

sudo modprobe xpad

then do jscalibrator

Some parts of this procedure from here

How to Fix broken Ubuntu Feisty Fawn

2007-03-26T08:59:00.000-07:00

Ubuntu Development team released ubuntu feisty fawn beta on 23rd March 2007 some of them started upgrading their edgy to feisty .If your feisty broken here is the procedure to fix that.

Boot up with a live cd, or ubuntu CD from a different partition.

Mount your feisty drive somewhere in this example i am mounting on /media/feisty

Create a directiory when do you want to mount

sudo mkdir /media/feisty

Mount your drive using the following command

sudo mount /dev/sda2 /media/feisty

(replace /dev/sda2 with name of drive, e.g. hda1 etc.)

chroot into your feisty drive.

sudo chroot /media/feisty su

Update your system via apt as normal. (sudo is not required)

apt-get update

apt-get upgrade

apt-get dist-upgrade

ctrl+d or type "exit" to exit the chroot, then reboot the computer and you should be able to get back into feisty.

Sometimes there will be no Internet connection in the chroot environment.

To correct this, we have to enter the following command

sudo cp /etc/resolv.conf /media/feisty/etc/resolv.conf

Ubuntu 7.04 (Feisty Fawn) Beta Preview

2007-03-25T03:25:00.000-07:00

The Ubuntu developers are moving very quickly to bring you the absolute latest and greatest software the Open Source Community has to offer. This is the Ubuntu 7.04 Beta and it comes packed with a whole host of excellent new features including the released GNOME 2.18, the 2.6.20 kernel and much more.

Ubuntu 7.04 is the most user-friendly Ubuntu to date and includes a ground-breaking Windows migration assistant, excellent wireless networking support and improved multimedia support.

Final Release Date

This is still an beta release. Do not install it on production machines. The final stable version will be released in 19th April 2007.

New features in Feisty Fawn

Migration assistant: The new migration tool recognises Internet Explorer bookmarks, Firefox favourites, desktop wallpaper, AOL IM contacts, and Yahoo IM contacts, and imports them into Ubuntu during installation. This offers easier and faster migration for new users of Ubuntu and individuals wanting to run a dual-boot system.

Easy-to-install codec wizards: A new guided wizard for installing codecs not shipped with Ubuntu gives users a safe way of installing codecs they can legally use to view multimedia content.

Plug and play network sharing with Avahi: This new feature allows users to automatically discover and join a wireless network and share music, find printers and more.

Kernel Virtual Machine: On x86 systems with the Intel VT or AMD-V extensions, Kernel-based Virtual Machine support (KVM) allows users to run multiple virtual machines running unmodified Linux. Each virtual machine has private virtualised hardware: a network card, disk, graphics adapter, and so on. We have also added VMI support, which provides optimised performance under VMWare.

Faster searching with Tracker: Tracker is a search tool much like Beagle. Both programs will be available in the repositories.

Networking Improvements: New in Feisty is Network Manager, a simple way to find and connect to wireless and wired networks.New Zeroconf support makes it easy to network desktop computers without needing servers to assign IP addresses or names.

Artwork:For Feisty all new artwork is trickling in, including a new background image, and a usplash image that has more 'bling'.

Help Center:In order to make Help more accessible, a brand new Help Center with a easier to use interface that is more stylish.

Print and sound support: Jetpipe, a new printing architecture for thin clients, greatly improves on previous technologies.Sound support in applications is also dramatically improved with the PulseAudio sound server.

Thin client management: Administrators can now manage thin client connections to a server more easily.

VPN: Easy VPN access with NetworkManager.

New Gnome control center

Desktop Effects: Graphical Desktop Effects will be made extremely accessible, with one click activation in the system menu.

Current versions available in Festy Fawn

On the Desktop: GNOME 2.18, OpenOffice.org 2.2.0rc3, X.org 7.2

On the Server: Apache 2.2, PostgreSQL 8.2, PHP 5.2.1, LTSP 5.0

Under the hood: GCC 4.1.2, glibc 2.5, Linux 2.6.20, Python 2.5

Installation

First You need to Download Feisty Beta .iso file from here and burn a cd with this now you need to boot from this cd to start the your festy cd once it booted from this cd you can see am icon called install to start installation.

the Ubuntu graphical installer now no longer uses the GParted program for partitioning. Starting with Ubuntu 7.04, Ubiquity has it’s own partitioning tool.

Here are some screenshots of the new partitioning tool

Final Festy installer Improvement

One of the minor tweaks to the installer is an advanced option at the last screen of the installer. In the window that is displayed you can pick the device for the boot loader installation and select if you want to join in the package usage survey.

Ubuntu Migration assistant

The new migration tool recognises Internet Explorer bookmarks, Firefox favourites, desktop wallpaper, AOL IM contacts, and Yahoo IM contacts, and imports them into Ubuntu during installation. This offers easier and faster migration for new users of

Ubuntu and individuals wanting to run a dual-boot system.Currently i am not using dual boot so i am showing sample screenshot for this.

Ubuntu Help Center

I knew kde had a help center with some stuff like how to change your wallpaper, etc. But This was very nice. A simple and useful help center has been included in ubuntu. This has loads of useful articles on how to install multimedia codecs, help for server systems, and almost everything you may need. To top it all off, a very useful search that found articles on nvidia drivers, mp3 codec installation, and an entire section dedicated towards ubuntu propaganda like “the desktop”, “The difference” etc. But real good stuff indeed.

Gnome Control Center

utilities to configure the GNOME desktop this contains configuration applets for the GNOME desktop, allowing to set accessibility configuration, desktop fonts, keyboard and mouse properties, sound setup, desktop theme and background, user interface properties, screen resolution, and other GNOME parameters.It also contains a front end to these applets, which can also be accessed with the GNOME panel or the Nautilus file manager.

First made it’s debut in the Novell and SuSe distributions, this nice piece of software is now ported to Ubuntu to make our lives easier but it entirely depends on user.

Easy-to-install codec wizards

A new guided wizard for installing codecs not shipped with Ubuntu gives users a safe way of installing codecs they can legally use to view multimedia content.Ubuntu will try to install the necessary codecs automatically, and start playing the desired file.

New Games: Sudoku and Chess

Currently Ubuntu Feisty is including these two new games.Gnome Sudoku is a logic game with a Japanese name that has recently exploded in popularity. Originally developed by Thomas Hinkle, now included in gnome-games. Gnome Sudoku is written in Python. glChess is a 2D/3D chess game, where games can be played between a combination of human and computer players. If you want to open these games go to Applications--- > Games--- > Chess or Sudoku

Chess, GNOME style

Sudoku, GNOME style

Your disk in ring view

One of the new tools that came with Ubuntu 6.10 was the Disk Usage Analyzer. With this new version, you can easily view your disk usage stastics in a more intuitive manner.

Disk analyzer

Mount Windows Partitions Made Easy

Using ntfs-config program allow you to easily configure all of your NTFS devices to allow write support via a friendly gui. For that use, it will configure them to use the open source ntfs-3g driver. You'll also be able to easily disable this feature.You can see simple screenshot to enable write support for internal/external device

Some more Interesting applications

Tomboy

Tomboy is a desktop note-taking application for Linux and Unix. Simple and easy to use, but with potential to help you organize the ideas and information you deal with every day.

Sticky Notes

This will allows you to create computer sticky notes to keep all information you have to remember on your PC desktop.

Weather Map

If you want to set-up local weather map on your ubuntu desktop it is very easy in ubuntu feisty.Sample screenshot as follows

Desktop Search Tool

Beagle is a search tool that ransacks your personal information space to find whatever you're looking for.A desktop search util for indexing and searching user's data. At the moment, it can index filesystems, Gaim logs, Evolution mail and data, RSS and other. We have one more tools for this is called tracker you can use this one also.

Desktop Effects

Graphical Desktop Effects will be made extremely accessible, with one click activation in the system menu.Compiz will be installed by default in Ubuntu Feisty Fawn.If you want to enable Go to System->Preferences->Desktop Effects, click the 'Enable Desktop Effects' button.

Ubuntu Studio

Ubuntu Studio aims to be a multimedia editing/creation flavor of Ubuntu for the Linux audio, video, and graphic enthusiast or professional who is already familiar with the Ubuntu-Gnome environment. Ubuntu Studio is currently in planning. This page is the starting point for these plans.Now UbuntuStudio Packages available in feisty fawn you can see this in the following screen

You can see the available tools for UbuntuStudio

Plug and play network sharing with Avahi

This new feature allows users to automatically discover and join a wireless network and share music, find printers and more.Avahi is a system which facilitates service discovery on a local network. This means that you can plug your laptop or computer into a network and instantly be able to view other people who you can chat with, find printers to print to or find files being shared.

Artwork

For Feisty all new artwork is trickling in, including a new background image, and a usplash image that has more 'bling'. Now we will see some of screen shots

Better bug reporting

Since this is an alpha release not all system applications are stable, and to help testers file bug reports the latest release of apport is included.

Upgrade Ubuntu Edgy Eft to Ubuntu Feisty Fawn (Beta)

If you want to upgrade Ubuntu Edgy Eft to Ubuntu Feisty Fawn you need to remember the following points

1) Before upgrde take backup of your complete data and then start upgrade

2) This is still in beta version so be carefull before doing upgrade in production machines

Now you need to follow step by step upgrade guide

Conclusion

I really Like Ubuntu festy Fawn and this will be the best release ever from ubuntu development team.This includes lots of desktop features includes network manager, Easy-to-install codec wizards,migration assistant,Kernel Virtual Machine,desktop effects like Beryl or Compiz get a more prominent place and and many more in this wonderful operating system.

Sharing Ubuntu Desktop Using Remote Desktop

2007-03-24T09:23:00.000-07:00

vino is VNC server for GNOME.VNC is a protocol that allows remote display of a user's desktop. This package provides a VNC server that integrates with GNOME, allowing you to export your running desktop to another computer for remote use or diagnosis.

By default ubuntu will come with vino-server so it is very easy to configure to enable remote desktop sharing in your ubuntu machine.If you want to access ubuntu machine remotely you need to login in to your ubuntu system.

Important note :-

Remote Desktop will only work if there's a GNOME login session.Leaving your computer with an unattended GNOME login session is not secure and not recommended.

Some Useful Tips

1) You can lock your screen using System--->Quit

Once you click on quit you should see the following screen here you need to select lockscreen

2) switch off your monitor when computer is left unattended

Configuring Remote Desktop

First you need to go to System -> Preferences -> Remote Desktop

Once it opens you should see the following screen

In the above screen you need to configure remote desktop preferences for sharing and security

For Sharing

you need to tick the box next to the following two options

Allow other users to view your desktop
Allow other users to control your desktop

For Security

you need to tick the box next to the following two options

Ask you for confirmation (If you tick this option some one need to click on allow from remote desktop once it connected if you don't want you can untick this option)

Require the user to enter this password:
Password: Specify the password

Connecting from Ubuntu Machine

Open your terminal from Applications--->Accessories--->Terminal and enter the following command

vncviewer -fullscreen 192.168.2.23:0

now you should see the following message asking for password enter the password after complete success you can see VNC authentication succeeded message and starting remote desktop

VNC viewer version 3.3.7 - built Jul 4 2006 10:04:48
Copyright (C) 2002-2003 RealVNC Ltd.
Copyright (C) 1994-2000 AT&T Laboratories Cambridge.
See http://www.realvnc.com for information on VNC.
VNC server supports protocol version 3.7 (viewer 3.3)
Password:
VNC authentication succeeded

If you want to quit vncviewer

Press 'F8' and select Quit viewer

Connecting from Windows machine

If you are trying to connect from your windows machine you need to install vncviewer of your choice i have installed from here http://www.realvnc.com/download.html.Install this program once you install this you can opem from start--->All programs--->RealVNC--->VNC Viewer 4--->Run VNC Viewer once it opens you should see the following screen here enter the remotemachine ipaddress:0 format and click ok

Now it will prompt for password enter your password and click ok

Now on the remote machine you should see the following screen asking for permission to allow this connection you need to click on allow this will comeup only if you tick "Ask you for confirmation" option under sharing

Once it connected you should see the remote machine desktop like the following screen

Enable DVD playback and w32codecs in Ubuntu System

2007-03-23T07:55:00.000-07:00

w32codecs this is a package of codecs needed to play multiple formats, notably DivX. (disponible. Maintainer: MirSPCM)

libdvdcss is a highly portable library for accessing and unscrambling DVDs encrypted with the CSS system. It is part of the VideoLAN project and is used by VLC and all other open source DVD players such as Ogle, xine-based players and MPlayer.

DVD playback and w32codecs are not a feature that is installed by default due to license restrictions.

Note: In some parts of the world using DVD playback is not legal.

Installing libdvdcss2 and w32 video codecs in Ubuntu

Support for WMV, RealMedia and other formats has been bundled into the w32codecs package. This package is not available from the Ubuntu repositories due to licensing and legal restrictions.

Edit /etc/apt/sources.list file and enter the following repositories

sudo gedit /etc/apt/sources.list

You can install this DVD playback and w32codecs using Seveas Repository

For Ubuntu Dapper Users

deb http://mirror.ubuntulinux.nl dapper-seveas all

deb-src http://mirror.ubuntulinux.nl dapper-seveas all

For Ubuntu Edgy Users

deb http://mirror.ubuntulinux.nl edgy-seveas all

deb-src http://mirror.ubuntulinux.nl edgy-seveas all

Now you need to copy the key using the following command

wget http://mirror.ubuntulinux.nl/1135D466.gpg -O- ¦ sudo apt-key add -

Update the source list using the following command

sudo apt-get update

Install Codecs using the following command

sudo apt-get install w32codecs libdvdcss2

Using above download locations you can install most of the mutimedia codecs for ubuntu.

Windows NTFS Partitions Read/write support made easy in Ubuntu Feisty

2007-03-22T02:46:00.000-07:00

This program allow you to easily configure all of your NTFS devices to allow write support via a friendly gui. For that use, it will configure them to use the open source ntfs-3g driver. You'll also be able to easily disable this feature.

Current Stable 0.5.5

Project Home page :- http://flomertens.free.fr/ntfs-config/

Requirements

windows with Feisty dual-boot installation and external hard drive (Optional)

Install NTFS-config in Ubuntu Feisty

Now You can install NTFS-config from Ubuntu Feisty repositories (Make sure you have enabled Universe Repositories)

sudo apt-get install ntfs-config

This will install all the required packages for ntfs-config including ntfs-3g

Using Ntfs-Config

If you want to open this application go to Applications--->System Tools--->NTFS Configuration Tool

Now it will prompt for root password enter root password and click ok

It will show the available NTFS partition as follows in this example /dev/sda1 in NTFS partition

You need to select the partitions you want to configure,add the name of the mount point and click on apply.In this example i have ticked the check box next to /dev/sda1 and click under mount enter the name you want to use i have entered as windows now the mount point showing as /media/windows and click on apply.

Select the NTFS Write support which is suitable for you i.e internal or external

In this example i have tick the check box next to Enable write support for internal device because i am using dualboot with windows.If you are using external hard drive select external option and click on ok

Once it finished you should see the mount point on your desktop as follows

You can see the windows mount point files as follows

If you want to unmount you should be root to unmount and then right click on mount point select Unmount Volume

Performance tip for Ubuntu Edgy and Feisty users

2007-03-21T05:31:00.000-07:00

I have checked this in ubuntu Feisty forums .One user suggested the following tip to improve the applications launch performance.

Edit your “/etc/hosts” file

sudo gedit /etc/hosts

You should see something like this

127.0.0.1 localhost

127.0.1.1 onlyubuntu

(and if your in Feisty, some lines about IPV6 also)

Now, You need to Replace with the following lines

127.0.0.1 localhost onlyubuntu

127.0.1.1 onlyubuntu

(Replace “onlyubuntu” with your hostname)

Save and exit the file.

Now your applications launch should improve.

Currently There are two bugs filed against this you can check here and here

Bandwidth Monitoring Tools For Linux

2007-03-20T10:03:00.000-07:00

Bandwidth in computer networking refers to the data rate supported by a network connection or interface. One most commonly expresses bandwidth in terms of bits per second (bps). The term comes from the field of electrical engineering, where bandwidth represents the total distance or range between the highest and lowest signals on the communication channel (band).

Bandwidth represents the capacity of the connection. The greater the capacity, the more likely that greater performance will follow, though overall performance also depends on other factors, such as latency.

Here is the huge list of bandwidth monitoring tools with current stable version and project home page.

Autofocus

AutoFocus is a traffic analysis and visualization tool that describes the traffic mix of a link through textual reports and time series plots.

Current Stable Version :- 0.3.6

Project Home Page :- http://ial.ucsd.edu/AutoFocus/

Bandwidthd

BandwidthD tracks usage of TCP/IP network subnets and builds html files with graphs to display utilization. Charts are built by individual IPs, and by default display utilization over 2 day, 8 day, 40 day, and 400 day periods. Furthermore, each ip address's utilization can be logged out at intervals of 3.3 minutes, 10 minutes, 1 hour or 12 hours in cdf format, or to a backend database server. HTTP, TCP, UDP, ICMP, VPN, and P2P traffic are color coded.

Current Stable Version :- 2.0.1

Project Home Page :- http://bandwidthd.sourceforge.net/

Bmon

bmon is a portable bandwidth monitor and rate estimator running on various operating systems. It supports various input methods for different architectures. Various output modes exist including an interactive curses interface,lightweight HTML output but also formatable ASCII output.

Current Stable Version :- 2.1.0

Project Home Page :- http://people.suug.ch/~tgr/bmon/

Bwbar

bwbar is a small C-based program for Linux-based machines which produces bandwidth usage statistics for a network interface. It was originally written by H. Peter Anvin, and I (Brian Towne) modified it somewhat to better suit my needs. The original program was released under the GPL. A number of people have asked for the modified program and its source, so I have created this page.

Current Stable Version :- 1.2.3

Project Home Page :- http://www.mythica.org/bwbar/

bwm

This is a very tiny bandwidth monitor (not X11). Can monitor up to 16 interfaces in the in the same time, and shows totals too.

Current Stable Version :- 1.1.0

bwm-ng

small and simple console-based bandwidth monitor.Bandwidth Monitor NG is a small and simple console-based live bandwidth monitor.

Current Stable Version :- 0.5

Cacti

Cacti is a complete network graphing solution designed to harness the power of RRDTool's data storage and graphing functionality. Cacti provides a fast poller, advanced graph templating, multiple data acquisition methods, and user management features out of the box. All of this is wrapped in an intuitive, easy to use interface that makes sense for LAN-sized installations up to complex networks with hundreds of devices.

Current Stable Version :- 0.8.6j

Project Home Page :- http://cacti.net/

cbm

cbm — the color bandwidth meter — is a small program to display the traffic currently flowing through your network devices.

Current Stable Version :- 0.1

Project Home Page :- http://www.isotton.com/utils/cbm/

dstat

Dstat is a versatile replacement for vmstat, iostat, netstat, nfsstat and ifstat. Dstat overcomes some of their limitations and adds some extra features, more counters and flexibility. Dstat is handy for monitoring systems during performance tuning tests, benchmarks or troubleshooting.

Current Stable Version :- 0.6.4

Project Home Page :- http://dag.wieers.com/home-made/dstat/

EtherApe

EtherApe is a graphical network monitor for Unix modeled after etherman. Featuring link layer, ip and TCP modes, it displays network activity graphically. Hosts and links change in size with traffic. Color coded protocols display.

Current Stable Version :- 0.9.7

Project Home Page :- http://etherape.sourceforge.net/

gdesklets

gDesklets is a system for bringing mini programs (desklets), such as weather forecasts, news tickers, system information displays, or music player controls, onto your desktop, where they are sitting there in a symbiotic relationship of eye candy and usefulness. The possibilities are really endless and they are always there to serve you whenever you need them, just one key-press away. The system is not restricted to one desktop environment, but currently works on most of the modern Unix desktops (including GNOME, KDE, Xfce).

Project Home Page :- http://www.gdesklets.de/

GKrellM

GKrellM is a single process stack of system monitors which supports applying themes to match its appearance to your window manager, Gtk, or any other theme.

Current Stable Version :- 2.2.10

Project Home Page :- http://members.dslextreme.com/users/billw/gkrellm/gkrellm.html

ipband

ipband is a pcap based IP traffic monitor. It tallies per-subnet traffic and bandwidth usage and starts detailed logging if specified threshold for the specific subnet is exceeded. If traffic has been high for a certain period of time, the report for that subnet is generated which can be appended to a file or e-mailed. When bandwidth usage drops below the threshold, detailed logging for the subnet is stopped and memory is freed.

Current Stable Version :- 0.8

Project Home Page :- http://ipband.sourceforge.net/

iftop

iftop does for network usage what top does for CPU usage. It listens to network traffic on a named interface and displays a table of current bandwidth usage by pairs of hosts. Handy for answering the question "why is our ADSL link so slow".

Current Stable Version :- 0.17

Project Home Page :- http://www.ex-parrot.com/pdw/iftop/

iperf

Iperf is a tool to measure maximum TCP bandwidth, allowing the tuning of various parameters and UDP characteristics. Iperf reports bandwidth, delay jitter, datagram loss.

Current Stable Version :- 2.0.2

Project Home Page :- http://dast.nlanr.net/Projects/Iperf/

ipfm

IP Flow Meter (IPFM) is a bandwidth analysis tool, that measures how much bandwidth specified hosts use on their Internet link.

Current Stable Version :- 0.11.5

Project Home Page :- http://robert.cheramy.net/ipfm/

ifstat

ifstat is a tool to report network interfaces bandwith just like vmstat/iostat do for other system counters.

Current Stable Version :- 1.1

Project Home Page :- http://gael.roualland.free.fr/ifstat/

ibmonitor

ibmonitor is an interactive linux console application which shows bandwidth consumed and total data transferred on all interfaces.

Current Stable Version :- 1.4

Project Home Page :- http://ibmonitor.sourceforge.net/

ipaudit

IPAudit monitors network activity on a network by host, protocol and port.IPAudit listens to a network device in promiscuous mode, and records every connection between two ip addresses. A unique connection is determined by the ip addresses of the two machines, the protocol used between them, and the port numbers (if they are communicating via udp or tcp).

Current Stable Version :- 3.0.0

Project Home Page :- http://ipaudit.sourceforge.net/

IPTraf

IPTraf is a console-based network statistics utility for Linux. It gathers a variety of figures such as TCP connection packet and byte counts, interface statistics and activity indicators, TCP/UDP traffic breakdowns, and LAN station packet and byte counts.

Current Stable Version :- 0.95

Project Home Page :- http://iptraf.seul.org/

IFStatus

IFStatus was developed for Linux users that are usually in console mode. It is a simple, easy to use program for displaying commonly needed / wanted statistics in real time about ingoing and outgoing traffic of multiple network interfaces that is usually hard to find, with a simple and effecient view. It is the substitute for PPPStatus and EthStatus projects.

Current Stable Version :- 1.1.0

Project Home Page :- http://ifstatus.sourceforge.net/graphic/index.html

jnettop

Jnettop is a traffic visualiser, which captures traffic going through the host it is running from and displays streams sorted by bandwidth they use.

Current Stable Version :- 0.13.0

Project Home Page :- http://jnettop.kubs.info/wiki/

MRTG

The Multi Router Traffic Grapher (MRTG) is a tool to monitor the traffic load on network links. MRTG generates HTML pages containing PNG images which provide a LIVE visual epresentation of this traffic.

Current Stable Version :- 2.15.1

Project Home Page :- http://oss.oetiker.ch/mrtg/

moodss

moodss is a graphical monitoring application. It is modular so that the code accessing the monitored objects is completely separate from the application core. The core takes care of managing modules (loading and unloading),displaying modules data through sortable tables and diverse graphical viewers, handling user set threshold conditions with email alerts, recording and browsing data history from a database.moodss can even predict the future, using sophisticated statistical methods and artificial neural networks, and therefore be used for capacity planning.

Current Stable Version :- 21.5

Project Home Page :- http://moodss.sourceforge.net/

monitord

A lightweight (distributed?) network security monitor for TCP/IP+Ethernet LANs. It will capture certain network events and record them in a relational database. The recorded data will be available for analysis through a CGI based interface.

Current Stable Version :- 4.0

Project Home Page :- http://sourceforge.net/projects/monitord/

Netmrg

NetMRG is a tool for network monitoring, reporting, and graphing. Based on RRDTOOL, the best of open source graphing systems, NetMRG is capable of creating graphs of any parameter of your network.

Current Stable Version :- 0.18.2

Project Home Page :- http://www.netmrg.net

nload

nload is a console application which monitors network traffic and bandwidth usage in real time. It visualizes the in-and outgoing traffic using two graphs and provides additional info like total amount of transfered data and min/max network usage.

Current Stable Version :- 0.6.0

Project Home Page :- http://www.roland-riegel.de/nload/index.html

ntop

ntop shows the current network usage. It displays a list of hosts that are currently using the network and reports information concerning the IP (Internet Protocol) and Fibre Channel (FC) traffic generated by each host. The traffic is sorted according to host and protocol. Default protocol list (this is user configurable).

Current Stable Version :- 3.2

Project Home Page :- http://www.ntop.org

netspeed

Netspeed is just a little GNOME-applet that shows how much traffic occurs on a specified network device (for example eth0). You get the best impression of it, if you look at the screenshots below.

Current Stable Version :- 0.14

Project Home Page :- http://www.wh-hms.uni-ulm.de/~mfcn/netspeed/

Netwatch

Netwatch is a Linux program created to aid in monitoring Network Connections. It is based on a program called "statnet" but has been substantially modified for its Ethernet emphasis. It is a dynamic program which displays the Ethernet status based each the connection's activity. It has the capability of monitoring hundreds of site statistics simultaneously. The connection's port number (Well Known Service) and destination address are available as well. There are options which allow router statistics to be measured on simple networks (with one router). External network communication is counted and transfer rates are displayed.

Current Stable Version :- 1.0c

Project Home Page :- http://www.slctech.org/~mackay/netwatch.html

NOCOL

NOCOL is a popular system and network monitoring (network management) software that runs on Unix systems and can monitor network and system devices. It uses a very simple architecture and is very flexible for adding new network management modules

Current Stable Version :- 4.3.1

Project Home Page :- http://www.netplex-tech.com/nocol/

NeTraMet

NeTraMet is an open-source (GPL) implementation of the RTFM architecture for Network Traffic Flow Measurement,developed and supported by Nevil Brownlee at the University of Auckland. Nevil also developed a version of NeTraMet which uses the CoralReef library to read packet headers. This 'CoralReef NeTraMet meter' can work with any CoralReef data source; it has been tested on both CAIDA and NLANR trace files, and on DAG and Apptel ATM interface cards.

Current Stable Version :- 43

Project Home Page :- http://freshmeat.net/projects/netramet/

NetPIPE

NetPIPE is a protocol independent performance tool that visually represents the network performance under a variety of conditions. It performs simple ping-pong tests, bouncing messages of increasing size between two processes, whether across a network or within an SMP system. Message sizes are chosen at regular intervals, and with slight perturbations, to provide a complete test of the communication system. Each data point involves many ping-pong tests to provide an accurate timing. Latencies are calculated by dividing the round trip time in half for small messages ( <64>

Current Stable Version :- 3.6.2

Project Home Page :- http://www.scl.ameslab.gov/netpipe/

netperf

Netperf is a benchmark that can be use to measure various aspect of networking performance. The primary foci are bulk (aka unidirectional) data transfer and request/response performance using either TCP or UDP and the Berkeley Sockets interface. As of this writing, the tests available either unconditionally or conditionally

Current Stable Version :- 2.4.3

Project Home Page :- http://www.netperf.org/netperf/

potion

This is a console utility which will listen on an interface using libpcap, aggregate the traffic into flows and display the top (as many as can fit on your screen) flows with their average throughput. A flow is identified ip protocol, source ip, source port, destination ip, destination port, and type of service flag.

Current Stable Version :- 0.0.4

pktstat

Display a real-time list of active connections seen on a network interface, and how much bandwidth is being used by what. Partially decodes HTTP and FTP protocols to show what filename is being transferred. X11 application names are also shown. Entries hang around on the screen for a few seconds so you can see what just happened. Also accepts filter expressions á la tcpdump.

Current Stable Version :- 1.8.3

Project Home Page :- http://www.adaptive-enterprises.com.au/~d/software/pktstat/

RTG

RTG is a flexible, scalable, high-performance SNMP statistics monitoring system. It is designed for enterprises and service providers who need to collect time-series SNMP data from a large number of targets quickly. All collected data is inserted into a relational database that provides a common interface for applications to generate complex queries and reports. RTG includes utilities that generate configuration and target files, traffic reports, 95th percentile reports and graphical data plots. These utilities may be used to produce a web-based interface to the data.

Current Stable Version :- 0.7.4

Project Home Page :- http://rtg.sourceforge.net/

speedometer

Monitor network traffic or speed/progress of a file transfer. The program can be used for cases like: how long it will take for my 38MB transfer to finish, how quickly is another transfer going, How fast is the upstream on this ADSL line and how fast can I write data to my filesystem.

Current Stable Version :- 2.4

Project Home Page :- http://excess.org/speedometer/

Spong

Spong is a simple system-monitoring package written in Perl. It features client based monitoring, monitoring of network services, results displayed via the Web or console, history of problems, and flexible messaging when problems occur.

Current Stable Version :- 2.7.6

Project Home Page :- http://spong.sourceforge.net/

slurm

slurm started as a pppstatus port to FreeBSD. As I ripped off several functions

Current Stable Version :- 0.3.3

Project Home Page :- http://www.wormulon.net/projects/slurm

SNIPS

SNIPS (System & Network Integrated Polling Software) is a system and network monitoring software that runs on Unix systems and can monitor network and system devices. It is capable of monitoring DNS, NTP, TCP or web ports, host performance, syslogs, radius servers, BGP peers, etc. New monitors can be added easily (via a C or Perl API).

Current Stable Version :- 1.1

Project Home Page :- http://www.navya.com/software/snips/

tcpflow

tcpflow is a program that captures data transmitted as part of TCP connections (flows), and stores the data in a way that is convenient for protocol analysis or debugging. A program like tcpdump shows a summary of packets seen on the wire, but usually doesn't store the data that's actually being transmitted. In contrast, tcpflow reconstructs the actual data streams and stores each flow in a separate file for later analysis. tcpflow understands TCP sequence numbers and will correctly reconstruct data streams regardless of retransmissions or out-of-order delivery.

Current Stable Version :- 0.21

Project Home Page :- http://www.circlemud.org/~jelson/software/tcpflow/

vnstat

vnStat is a network traffic monitor for Linux that keeps a log of daily network traffic for the selected interface(s).vnStat isn't a packet sniffer. The traffic information is analyzed from the /proc -filesystem, so vnStat can be used without root permissions. However at least a 2.2.x kernel is required.

Current Stable Version :- 1.4

Project Home Page :- http://humdi.net/vnstat/

WMND

Shows a graph of incoming/outgoing traffic, activity indicators for rx/tx and current/maximum rate for rx/tx in bytes or packets.Tailored for use with WindowMaker, it will as well work with any other window manager though.

Current Stable Version :- 0.4.6

Project Home Page :- http://dockapps.org/file.php/id/178

How to Install Beryl with latest nvidia drivers in Ubuntu Feisty Fawn

2007-03-19T04:47:00.000-07:00

Beryl is an OpenGL accelerated desktop that seeks to provide a free, open source desktop experience to the community that reflects the wishes of the users. Above all else, the project seeks to listen to and respond to the requests of the user base.

Beryl is a combined window manager and composite manager written in C using OpenGL to provide acceleration. It is designed to be highly flexible, extensible, and portable, all the while keeping in mind that the users know how they want their desktops to act better than we do. With Beryl the rather esoteric concept of the computer desktop is brought down to a more human level, allowing for a more native and intuitive understanding of your workspace.
Nvidia have released their 9xxx series drivers.Tis allows compiz/beryl to now run directly on an x server (xorg7.1) without separate aiglx or xgl.

Note:- First you need to remove all existing xgl/aiglx from your system

Preparing Your system

You need to make sure you system is up-to-date using the following

sudo apt-get update

sudo apt-get upgrade

sudo apt-get dist-upgrade

Adding Source list

you need to edit /etc/apt/sources.list file

sudo vi /etc/apt/sources.list

Add the following line for the latest beryl (Both i386&64 bit)

deb http://ubuntu.beryl-project.org feisty main

Save file and exit

Copy the key file using the following command

wget http://ubuntu.beryl-project.org/root@lupine.me.uk.gpg -O- sudo apt-key add -

Now you need to update the source list using the following command

sudo apt-get update

Install nvidia drivers in Ubuntu Feisty

sudo apt-get install nvidia-glx

sudo nvidia-xconfig --add-argb-glx-visuals --composite

Now you need to restart your X by logging out and in or by pressing ctrl+alt+backspace

Install Beryl in Ubuntu Feisty

sudo apt-get install beryl emerald-themes

Now you need to type the following command in terminal or run application box by pressing alt+f2

beryl-manager