Ubuntu Tutorials

Flash Player 9 Beta for Linux was released earlier. A release is available for Windows, Mac and Linux platforms. Over the last five minutes I downloaded, installed and setup the Flash Player on my Ubuntu system. It is really simple. Note: This doesn’t qualify as “free software” (free as in freedom) but for those that want their flash goodness here is how its done.

1. Download Installer for Linux (GZ, 2.48M) or visit the Adobe Labs
2. Unpack the archive
3. For Firefox: sudo cp libflashplayer.so /usr/lib/firefox/plugins/
4. Done

If you’re using a different browser simply replace /usr/lib/firefox/ with the folder of your browser. So far, in my quick testing, Flash has worked like a charm.

Also, included in the archive is a readme.txt with more instructions for those that may not have root / sudo access. It can be installed per user or system wide.

technorati tags:linux, flash, player, 9, beta

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I really don’t want to start any flame wars with this post but I wanted to post an honest question to the Linux Desktop user. This stems from my recently installing KDE (since the release of 3.5.5) and desire to learn more about it. I have been a gnome user (Ubuntu) since 5.04 and haven’t used KDE for years. I see it has definitely developed quite a bit since my last use.
Some of the main things that sparked my curiosity about this topic are considering:

1. Linus’ public support for KDE over gnome.
2. Mark Shuttleworth becomes the first Patron of KDE.
3. gnome being chosen as the default (originally) GDM for the Ubuntu Project.

Mainly I would like to hear from gnome and KDE users out there. Why did you chose one over the other? What are some of the real advantages that one has compared to the other? Just since installing it yesterday I have found some real nice features in KDE lacking in gnome, but also find it lacking features I am accustomed to. Granted it could be my lack of knowledge or familiarity about the GDM.

Again, the last thing I want to do is start any kind of KDE vs gnome flame war. Just honest feedback on what you like about one or the other. Mainly I just want to learn about the differences & better educate myself. Thank you.

technorati tags:ubuntu, kubuntu, gnome, kde

This evening I installed KDE to get a feel for what it has to offer since I’ve last used it. I haven’t used KDE since my Red Hat 9.0 days almost four years ago. I’ll say quite a lot has changed! I don’t know that I’ll replace my gnome desktop with KDE but its been a pleasant experience so far.

The Tutorial for the day is how to setup and run Kompose which offers you a very similar experience to OSX “Expose”. The KDE version already offers the upgrade OSX has in store for Leopard, but that’s another story. The main reason I’m including this tutorial is that I spent the last twenty minutes trying to find a similar tutorial and it was not an easy task.

Installing Kompose

sudo aptitude install kompose

Running Kompose

ALT-F2 : kompose

Configuring Kompose Shortcuts

Show Kompose (default): win + tab
Show Kompose (ungrouped): ctrl + shift + j

Show Kompose (grouped by desktop): ctrl + shift + i

Show Kompose (current desktop): ctrl + shift + k

Kompose makes it very easy to view all of the programs you have running on each of your virtual desktops. It does seem to make things very easy to keep organized. It would be nice if something like this were available in gnome.

I spent the afternoon with herlo tinkering & hacking away on our different projects we have. One thing that he has been trying to do is setup Gaim to auto-join the long list of IRC channels that he connects to regularly. I have had this feature setup for quite some time so I thought I would blog the instructions for everyone else wondering. note: I had assumed this information was available elsewhere but he tells me that he has yet been unable to find it.

1. Select “Buddies” and then select “Add Chat”
2. In the “Account” drop-down list select the IRC account you want to use
3. In the “Channel” option enter the channel address (example: #ubuntu-utah)
4. In the “Password” option you can enter a channel password (only if required)
5. In the “Alias” option you can set the Alias of the channel (example: Ubuntu Utah)
6. In the “Group” option you can select your Buddy group to include the new listing

At this point you should have a new buddy listed in the group selected above. Now you need to simply set the “Auto-Join” setting for that user. If you don’t see the user listed double-check that you are connected to the IRC channel.

1. Right-Click the newly added user (example: Ubuntu Utah)
2. Select “Auto-Join” which should highlight the checkbox (should be second option)

At this point you can try to disconnect & reconnect to your IRC server. Any new “Chats” that you’ve added and set to “Auto-Join” should auto-connect at this point.

Have fun, enjoy. If something happens not to work let me know or point out what I’m missing.

technorati tags:gaim, irc, instant, messenger, ubuntu

Blogged with Flock

Below is a quick hack to have your Ubuntu machine automagically update for you at a pre-specified time. This includes the “update”, “upgrade”, “dist-upgrade” and “autoclean” commands. The scheduling is taken care of by cron, our trusty always-on-time friend.

sudo crontab -e

It is important that you use sudo at this point. The command will need super-user priveleges so the cron listing needs to be setup as the root user.

0 0 * * * aptitude -y update && aptitude -y upgrade && aptitude -y dist-upgrade && aptitude -y autoclean

The above line represents the listing put into the crontab file. Here is a quick explanation of the five fields you can specify for the date and time. (The above executes daily at midnight)

minute - hour - day of month - month - day of week

After you have specified the appropriate time and date for your system simply save the file and your system will now automagically upgrade at the time specified. These upgrades include regular updates, kernel updates, security updates, etc. Also, the “autoclean” command removes old packages from your system after they are no longer needed.

Of course, if you prefer not to have cron take care of everything (if you’d still like to be somewhat hands-on) you could simply run the command in a single line:

sudo aptitude -y update && sudo aptitude -y upgrade && sudo aptitude -y dist-upgrade && sudo aptitude autoclean

technorati tags:ubuntu, breezy, dapper, edgy, update, dist-upgrade, security, cron, aptitude

Tonite and into tomorrow this site will be getting a very much needed facelift. If you experience some oddities this is why. Please be patient. I’m trying to update the site to better layout the content to make things easier for me & easier for you to find the information you’re looking for. I hope you find what you’re looking for.
Thank you

A new version of the incredible Flock browser is now available. For those that are running it on an ubuntu system you most likely need to manually update.

Download Flock 0.7.6

Unpack latest version (should be on Desktop): sudo tar -C /opt -xzvf flock-*.linux-i686.tar.gz
Enjoy!

If this is your first installation of Flock on Ubuntu visit my previous post with complete steps.

With the recent release of Ubuntu 6.10 Edgy Eft Beta I wanted to outline how to upgrade easily. I have now updated three of my machines and they are all very reliable.

For those interested in updating you can use the following command (via ALT-F2 or the terminal)

gksu "update-manager -c -d"

This should check your system for available updates, notify you that a distribution upgrade is available & ask you to verify. After verifying that you’d like to upgrade your system the rest of the process is mostly automated. Go thru the steps, finish the upgrade, reboot and done. Note: I have noticed you might need to repeat the process after a reboot simply to verify it is completed or finish any pending packages.