Archive for the 'Linux' Category
Why Use Linux?
The other day I got into a somewhat heated discussion about why Linux is a viable alternative desktop OS. Despite my best efforts, I was unable to move the other side past the rhetoric and myths that seem to surround Linux. It is because of this discussion that I am writing this…as a way to give accurate information.
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How to create a EeePCLinuxOS LiveUSB with VirtualBox
Filed under: Asus Eee, eeePCLinuxOS | Tags: pclinuxos, usb, virtualbox
Comments(1) I was having all types of trouble trying to create a bootable CD from the eeePCLinuxOS iso file, so I decided to try installing from the iso directly to a USB flash drive. I am running a Windows Vista PC and decided I would try using VirtualBox to boot the iso and attach the USB drive. This also helps everyone by not creating an additional CD that will shortly end in the trash.
What you will need.
Once you have installed VirtualBox, you are ready to create a new virtual machine.
How to use USB727 with Pendrive Linux
Filed under: Linux, Pendrive Linux | Tags: evdo, Pendrive Linux, usb727, verizon
Comments(2) I was extremely surprised with how easy it was to configure my Verizon EVDO connection on the USB727 from Pendrive Linux. You will want to start with the USB727 unconnected to your PC.
I am not positive that you have to do this but with Ubuntu you have to use the sudo command when entering all of the following commands, so I went ahead and switched to root.
$ su
You should be prompted to enter the root password, which on the default install is root.
Unload the usbserial serial driver.
# modprobe -r usbserial
Insert your USB727 and load the driver for the device. I am using the USB727, therefore my command looked like below. If you are using a different device, see the Sprint Mobile Broadband document to find your vendor and product id. Simply select the Linux option from the dropdown box and you can then use the PDF.
# modprobe usbserial vendor=0x1410 product=0x4100
# dmesg|grep -i ttyUSB
Should give you something similar to below.
[ 1863.832000] usb 2-1: generic converter now attached to ttyUSB0
[ 1863.836000] usb 2-1: generic converter now attached to ttyUSB1
[ 1863.836000] usb 2-1: generic converter now attached to ttyUSB2
[ 1863.840000] usb 2-1: generic converter now attached to ttyUSB3
Now you are ready to setup the dialup connection. Navigate to the `Configure Your Computer` menu option as seen in the screenshot below.
Some thoughts on Puppy Linux
Recently many of the Linux magazines have been doing articles on Puppy Linux. If you have been reading this blog on a regular basis, you already know that I own an ASUS eeePC. One of the main reasons I bought it was so that I could use it when I travel. There was one big flaw with my plans, I still need to carry my Dell 830 to use for work. The more I work with Windows, the more I despise it but I have to use it for work. Normally I would have just partitioned the drive and installed a Linux distro and Windows, but we are not allowed to do that any longer. A friend recommended buying a second drive and just carrying that along. I was preparing to do that when I read all the hype about PL (Puppy Linux). The first thing I did was download it and install it on a USB flash drive from my home PC. It seemed to work great and on that PC I have a standard connection. Then I decided to carry it with me to visit my family. That is when I had my first problem with it, which seems to be related to using WPA on the wireless router. But it wasn’t very important to me at the time, so I just showed off how cool PL was. Now I am on my first trip with PL and am going to share my thoughts.
- Not sure why this is happening, but I can’t get Xorg to work with my laptop. I ended up using Xvesa instead, which for me seems to be fine.
- Pup packages are fast and easy to download and install, but sometimes they don’t show up in the menu. No a problem if you are comfortable with the command line, but for those people coming from a Windows environment it would very discouraging.
- The touchpad is too sensitive. I never use a mouse when I travel and have often had people comment on how efficient I am with the touchpad. But with Puppy, and maybe this is something with all distros, it is very difficult. As a result, I had to go buy a mouse.
- Connecting to the hotel wireless network took a little bit of time to nail down, but once I did it worked great.
- Changing WMs (Window Managers) was very easy. I opted to use IceWM, which has a ton of themes that are fairly easy to apply. Several of the ones available on the pup package site appear to be corrupted, but I was still able to find one I liked.
- Gaim worked great for several days but then after a reboot, it would show the login process and disappear where I could not locate it.
- The UI fairly plain, but completely acceptable as PL was designed to run on very old hardware. See hardware requirements.
Overall PL is very nice and has many uses. I could see value in carrying it around on a small USB flash drive or on a CD in order to recover files from a corrupted OS. If you had an old PC that wasn’t really up to par for running some of the newer OSs that are on the market, it would be a great way to get some use out of it, especially if you wanted to give that PC to someone who couldn’t afford to buy a new PC.
Linux Mint 5 - Carbon
As you can see it looks far more professional (shall I say boring?) than the theme we’re currently using. It’s all grey and squary looking but it has too huge advantages:
- It looks pro.
- A lot of space is gained on the screen (the widgets take much less and that leaves more space for content). In particular the difference is impressive in mintMenu and in Firefox.
Though it is all grey and square looking, I quite fancy it. I have always preferred the clean professional look myself. With the nice crisp clean corners, it is very easy on the eyes. Then you add that look to a the best distro available and you have something to brag about.
eeePC webcam w/ UCView on Linux Mint
Filed under: Asus Eee, Linux, Linux Mint | Tags: asus, eeepc, Linux Mint
Comments(1) It was very simple to get the webcam working. If anyone knows a better way, please respond.
- Go here to find details on adding the repository. You can should use the Ubuntu 7.10 repository and add it in the Package Manager in Mint.
- At the bottom of the same page, make sure to save the GPG public key. Remember where you saved the public key to.
- Open a terminal and run the following command to add the key.
# sudo apt-key add public.key
# sudo apt-get update - After the update is complete, you are ready to install ucview.
# sudo apt-get install ucview - To run ucview..
# /usr/bin/ucview
Install Linux Mint on ASUS eeePc with USB
Filed under: Asus Eee, Linux, Linux Mint | Tags: asus, eeepc, Linux Mint
Comments(18) Required Files
fixmint
Linux Mint
I started by following the directions here until I got to step 7. At this point I was never able to get the USB drive bootable. Below are the steps that I followed and successfully install Linux Mint on my eee.
* (Updated 6.23.2008) I later discovered that the reason I was never able to be the USB drive to be bootable was because of the order in which I inserted the USB drive. In order to have fixmint recognize the USB flash drive, you should have it plugged in before running fixmint. Fixmint adds all the current drives to the makeboot.bat file when it is run. If you run fixmint without the USB drive connected, it will not recognize the USB drive. So either you need to insert the USB drive first or modify the makeboot.bat file afterwards to include the appropriate drive.
- Format my USB drive with FAT32.
- Created a directory on my local PC.`C:\Temp\LinuxM`.
- Download the Linux Mint iso image. I keep mine in a directory on a secondary drive. After the download was complete, I copied it over to the `C:\Temp\LinuxM` directory.
- Download fixmint.exe to the `C:\Temp\LinuxM` directory. Then I ran the fixmint.exe executable.
- Run the fixmint.bat batch file. You can just double-click on it from Windows explorer if you choose.
- Open the command prompt. Change to the directory where you created the LinuxM directory. Change directories to the mint\syslinux\win32 directory. Mine is `C:\Temp\LinuxM\mint\syslinux\win32`. In this win32 directory is a file called syslinux.exe. For some reason none of my Windows machines recognized any of my USB drives as removable (Probably why the makeboot.bat didn’t work). In order to get around this I ran the following command, K is the drive letter of my USB drive.
# syslinux.exe -fma K: // Change K: to the drive letter of your USB drive. - At this point we can copy over the content of the mint directory over to the USB drive.
# xcopy /s *.* K:\ // Change K: to the drive letter of your USB drive.
How to upgrade OpenOffice on Xandros for eeePC
Filed under: Asus Eee, Linux, openoffice | Tags: asus, eee, install from source, Linux, openoffice
Comments(0) For those of you who are new to linux, upgrading to OpenOffice may be a daunting task without using the Synaptic Package Manager, but don’t fret over it. The folks over at eeePC.net have provided details on doing the installation.
There is a problem with OpenOffice 2.0 bundled with Asus EEE PC. This version is not capable to open some extensions, which are important. You might want to upgrade OpenOffice.org to work on those extensions.
Installing Xfce 4.4.2 on the eeePC w/ EeeXubuntu
Filed under: Asus Eee, EeeXubuntu, Xfce | Tags: asus, eee, eeepc, EeeXubuntu, Xcfe, Xfce 4.4.2
Comments(0) After installation of eeeXubuntu on the ASUS eeePc, I wanted to install the latest version of Xfce, which is 4.4.2. I used the graphical installer from the Xfce.org website. For the most part, I followed the documentation. I didn’t have to install gcc and cpp, as I already had the newest releases. And the document doesn’t mention libxml2-dev libvte-dev libstartup-notification0-dev libhal-storage-dev libdbus-glib-1-dev libjpeg62-dev, but when I started the installation, I found I needed to install these as well.
# sudo apt-get install libgtk2.0-dev libice-dev libsm-dev libxpm-dev gcc cpp libxml2-dev libvte-dev libstartup-notification0-dev libhal-storage-dev libdbus-glib-1-dev libjpeg62-dev
Saga of an Asus Eee User - Day 5
Filed under: Asus Eee, EeeXubuntu, Linux | Tags: asus, Asus Eee, eee, EeeXubuntu, Linux, xandroa, Xcfe
Comments(0) I know that earlier in the week, I alluded to the fact that I would be installing EeeDora. This morning I downloaded it and created the LiveUSB. I must say that I was not very impressed with it. So after playing around with it for a few hours, I decided that I would try the EeeXubuntu distro.
Check out this video, not from my own installation…
This was the first time I ever used Xfce, but it is quickly becoming my favorite. I have always been a fan of KDE, but it does require far more resources. So far my overall impression of EeeXubuntu is that it still has a long way to go before I would want to recommend it to anyone who was new to Linux and the eeePc. For anyone getting the eee, I would suggest sticking with the Xandros distro that is installed. If the Easy mode doesn’t provide everything you are looking for, try running in the regular KDE mode. It offers far more flexibility. I think in the next few days I will be back to Xandros myself.
