Topic: Ubuntu

[Party Phil]

I'd imagine there is a torrent client, doubt the others will mind you.

indeed there is. no idea about sopcast or FM.

[The_Last_Don]

You can install ubuntu on the PS3 with a dual boot, used it for a while but nothing like having it on your laptop.

[Ben S]

There is a linux sopcast client. Oddly enough, available from the sopcast website.

[iSmiff]

i like the look of this linux variant, it's basically just a nicely set up version of one of the popular builds

http://www.jolicloud.com/

[buzzing]

I'd imagine there is a torrent client, doubt the others will mind you.

Why would yuo want it then lol

[crackerbox]

Hey all you guys, I have a huge problem, I just found out I can only click with the right and left mouse /touchpadkey when I press Ctrl

Do you know how to change it???

Would be great, ta

[wacko]

Very difficult to say without knowing which version of Ubuntu and which touchpad your notebook has.

Usually, touchpad/mouse issues are handled in /etc/X11/xorg.conf and with the synaptics touchpad driver.

A good starting point it googling for "ubuntu 10.x.x touchpad not working", using the correct version number for Ubuntu, natch.

[redbyrdz]

try using synclient

[crackerbox]

Hey thanks, I just found out that it was a setting in the gconf editor under Apps/metacity/general/ and then under Mouse_button_modifier
or something like that. It is set to <Alt> so you have to change it to <Control>

Simpleesh

 

[Bullet500]

Linux = hard work.

Sooner or later, you're going to have to get your hands dirty. If you want to learn how an OS
works at a lower level, Linux is great, and Ubuntu has a huge community and tons of documentation. If you don't give a fuck about the OS and just want to run your apps and hardware, and get online with minimum fuss, it's probably going to get on your tits big time at some point.

I'd have agreed with this a few years ago, but I really think that distributions like Ubuntu, Mint and Sabayon have come a long way. Infact, I tend to find Ubuntu easier than Windows now. An opinion shared by most of my friends who have recently switched over to Ubuntu. Pretty much everything works out of the box.

Will it run Itunes, torrents, sopcast and football manager

For iPod you have Rythmbox (comes by default with Ubuntu) and Banshee. Both are good.
For Torrents you get Transmission by default in Ubuntu. Although I prefer Deluge.
Sopcast has a Linux client on their website.
Football Manager will not work.

Real Men run Debian. Or LFS.

Gentoo.

[wacko]

I'd have agreed with this a few years ago, but I really think that distributions like Ubuntu, Mint and Sabayon have come a long way. Infact, I tend to find Ubuntu easier than Windows now. An opinion shared by most of my friends who have recently switched over to Ubuntu. Pretty much everything works out of the box.
For iPod you have Rythmbox (comes by default with Ubuntu) and Banshee. Both are good.
For Torrents you get Transmission by default in Ubuntu. Although I prefer Deluge.
Sopcast has a Linux client on their website.
Football Manager will not work.
Gentoo.

I'm afraid I have to disagree there. I've been using Linux since about 2000, exclusively from 2001 to 2004, and it just isn't improving that quickly. Not in terms of user experience. Currently, I have 2 Ubuntu computers (server and netbook) and a Mac desktop.

Now, I have had more software problems with each of these computers since I bought them in January than I've had with 4 Macs since 2004. It seems every month or so, an update breaks my perfectly working system. Ubuntu don't seem to be able to decide how they want to do things, and change it with every major version. Updates have broken my wireless networking (so far irreparably), my Xserver/GUI interface, VLC, the mail server, the web server, several desktop programs...

Every time I update the server, I have to set aside a few hours for troubleshooting, because as often as not stuff breaks. And it takes me several hours of googling, editing config files, pinning libraries, loading and unloading kernel modules, and rebooting to get it working again.

Back when XP came out, I thought Linux would catch up within a few years, and when I bought the iBook, I figured I could go back to Linux in 3 years when I came to replace it. But if anything, the gap to OS X (and Windows) is widening.

As a desktop OS for surfing, watching videos, listening to music, and looking at pics, it's great. The superior security to Windows is a huuuuge bonus, particularly for less sophisticated users. But the power management is so bad on Linux that you may get less than half the runtime off a notebook's battery compared to Windows 7.

I couldn't bring myself to recommend Linux to any non-geek. I may be projecting the problems I've had in admin-space into user-space, but I find Linux a pretty high-maintenance OS.

I suppose a caveat is that my only frame of reference is OS X, as I haven't used or worked with Windows in anger since 2003, and I dread to think how much £££ it has cost me over those years to have a machine that runs OS X

[Bullet500]

well, regarding updates, my experience has been good. I don't generally tend to upgrade Ubuntu as I prefer a reinstall, but somehow an old machine was left with Ubuntu 9.04 and I felt the need of starting it up after 16 months or so. I agree that I wasn't expecting a smooth upgrade to Ubuntu 10.10, but to my surprise everything went smooth and nothing was broken. My LAMP server on the machine was running beautifully still.

If you're facing battery issues with Ubuntu, then you might prefer to use this tiny panel on GNOME:
I've a 5 year old Acer laptop with poor battery life (hardly gives 1 hour) and it actually lasts longer on Ubuntu than Windows 7.

I really believe that Ubuntu has caught up to Windows. I mean, to use my printer on Windows, I'll have to manually install the driver from the CD or get the driver from the hardware vendor's website. In Ubuntu, I get a prompt that a proprietary driver needs to be downloaded, and voila I get my printer working within 15 seconds of plugging it in. Same was the case while using my mobile as a modem for using Internet in Ubuntu.

I also own a Mac mini and I agree on the fact that Mac OS X is the best Operating System around. (I don't consider gaming a flaw of any platform)

[wacko]

I have all the CPU scaling turned on (and voltage manipulation, too), but I'm getting 4-5 hours on my Eeepc vs about 8 under Win 7. That might be because I have Win 7 Starter, though, which is a lot kinder on the hardware than the full-on version.

to be honest, I would never reinstall a Debian-based Linux system (like Ubuntu) unless it were really, really screwed (someone did 'chmod -R 0700 /' or similar). Apt is far and away the best software management system ever, and it can literally upgrade a running system without missing a beat. You only need to reboot if you upgrade the kernel.

I agree 100% about driver/software installation under Ubuntu. If it's in the repositories, it's incredibly simple to get something installed. If your hardware or software isn't supported, though, you're probably in for a world of pain.

[Bullet500]

Just thought of dropping a link here: http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1609505

It is for installing Sopcast in Ubuntu 10.10. Might be of help for many.

[Butcher Knife Roberto]

Thought I'd give this a bump as I'm looking to dual boot my laptop with a Linux OS but I'm unsure which one to try out. I've got Ubuntu dual-booting on my desktop but I thought it would be nice to try a different distro on the laptop.

Been thinking about some of the usual suspects such as OpenSUSE, Debian and Mint, but spotted Ubuntu Studio the other day as I'm wanting to do some multimedia work and I'm led to believe its pretty decent for this. Anyone got any good / bad / indifferent experiences with any of these, or any other distros that might be worthwhile trying out? Been trawling some Linux forums but frankly they are full of nerds who don't seem to be able to communicate using plain English. Any help would be much appreciated

[wacko]

I'll admit I haven't tried any of the other distros apart from Debian for a few years, but Ubuntu is always a very good choice because it's based on Debian. Debian (and by extension, Ubuntu) have the best software management system of any operating system, Linux or not, in apt.

Ubuntu strikes a great balance between the conservativeness of Debian stable and the up-to-date-ness of Debian unstable, and it has the best support of any distro. They also take great pains to make the distro accessible to anyone. Unless you have very specific needs for which there is a custom distro, you're almost certainly best of with Ubuntu, especially if you're not too familiar with Linux.

If you don't like the dumbed-down Gnome environment, you can easily install KDE instead, or something really lightweight for a netbook.

That said, most distros offer live CDs, so there's no reason why you can't try out a few. Indeed, because Linux keeps user stuff separate from the system, if you put /home on its own partition, you can install multiple distros on different partitions and switch between them with very little difficulty.

[Bullet500]

Thought I'd give this a bump as I'm looking to dual boot my laptop with a Linux OS but I'm unsure which one to try out. I've got Ubuntu dual-booting on my desktop but I thought it would be nice to try a different distro on the laptop.

Been thinking about some of the usual suspects such as OpenSUSE, Debian and Mint, but spotted Ubuntu Studio the other day as I'm wanting to do some multimedia work and I'm led to believe its pretty decent for this. Anyone got any good / bad / indifferent experiences with any of these, or any other distros that might be worthwhile trying out? Been trawling some Linux forums but frankly they are full of nerds who don't seem to be able to communicate using plain English. Any help would be much appreciated

Ubuntu Studio is basically Ubuntu + Multimedia Apps. Mint is an excellent distribution too and it is based on Ubuntu.

openSUSE is crap and bloated imho. You can try out Sabayon. http://www.sabayon.org/

[Kashinoda]

I went with Ubuntu just before Christmas, I'm programming for it for my degree so it was more or less essential... I do rather love it! I did go with Debian first, and although I'm quite savvy with this stuff I found it a bit excessively non-user friendly... although if you've used Ubuntu a lot on your desktop you might be more familiar with the environment and it won't be such a bitch.

Echoing what Bullet500 said I have a lot of mates who quite like Mint also.

[redbyrdz]

I'm still using Debian, have been for a good number of years now! Works fine for me, otherwise I'd probably migrate to Ubuntu too. Usually you can work out what to do if there's a problem in Debian, and you can find a Ubuntu solution. That being said, you hardly need to do anything these days, as nearly everything works straight away.

Have used Suse ages ago, didn't like it, too windows-like in making decisions for you and not telling you whats going on. Might have changed now though.

[rako]

Installing Ubuntu ATM via VMware. Gonna have a look at it

[conman]

gonna buy a new laptop in a few days, selling off the 2 i have for something better..
Will dual boot with Linux. Ill do all my work on it, and everything else on Winda's...
but then again, Google... hmmm, i wonder what their OS will be like

[crackerbox]

indeed there is. no idea about sopcast or FM.

Install opcast player in Ubuntu 9.10

Use the following command to add the sopcast player PPA

    sudo add-apt-repository ppa:jason-scheunemann/ppa

Update the source list using the following command

    sudo apt-get update

First you need to install sp-auth .deb package so download from here

wget http://sopcast-player.googlecode.com/files/sp-auth_3.0.1_i386.deb

Install .deb package

sudo dpkg -i sp-auth_3.0.1_i386.deb

Install sopcast player using the following command

    sudo apt-get install sopcast-player

working on 10.10

[Lusty]

Tried getting Ubuntu to work on my main PC and an old laptop, had an absolute ballache getting it to work on both.  The support is really good though and eventually we got it working.  I've left it on the old laptop and it's working fine, does everything I want that machine to do, which is basically surfing and watching the game on sopcast.

Gave up on using it on the main PC though.  Much as I hate iTunes, I've not yet found a decent alternative that handles cover flow, compilations etc.  Also I have years worth of emails backed up in psts that only work with Outlook, and it's a real pain trying to import them into Thunderbird.  And wine doesn't work on amd64, so that was the real showstopper because it ruled out a ton of apps straight away. 

It's getting there though; it's a really good OS to get some life out of older machines and I reckon in a couple of years it might be a serious contender.  But not yet.

[NatD]

Hey.

Are people still using this (is it version 11.07?).....?  I've just had to reset my Netbook, which we only use for Torrents, Browsing and Skype, so was wondering if it would be better than XP?

[lachesis]

Unity is shite. Hate it.

Are people still using this (is it version 11.07?).....?  I've just had to reset my Netbook, which we only use for Torrents, Browsing and Skype, so was wondering if it would be better than XP?

If that's all you're using it for yeah, will be a piece of cake to set up. You might not like the new interface and sidebar because I hate it myself, but you can just select gnome to log into.

Transmission comes installed already for torrents. Browsing you have firefox already installed. Skype is here. I still dual boot windows 7 on a 20GB partition for things like photoshop because I don't really like using wine.

[wacko]

Tried getting Ubuntu to work on my main PC and an old laptop, had an absolute ballache getting it to work on both.  The support is really good though and eventually we got it working.  I've left it on the old laptop and it's working fine, does everything I want that machine to do, which is basically surfing and watching the game on sopcast.

Gave up on using it on the main PC though.

That's unusual: normally Linux works well enough on desktops, but notebooks are a pain in the arse. That said, older hardware is always better for Linux support.

Much as I hate iTunes, I've not yet found a decent alternative that handles cover flow, compilations etc. 

Linux media managers aren't up to much. As is usual, resources are spread across half a dozen alternatives that are consequently relatively lacking in features. Media Monkey for Windows is the only media manager I've ever heard anyone actually rave about. Never used it myself, though.

Also I have years worth of emails backed up in psts that only work with Outlook, and it's a real pain trying to import them into Thunderbird.  And wine doesn't work on amd64, so that was the real showstopper because it ruled out a ton of apps straight away.

Never tried it myself, but you could try setting up an IMAP server on your Linux laptop, then set up the account on your Outlook and copy the mails to the IMAP server.

It's quite a lot of faffing around, but on Linux I always use an IMAP server with fetchmail and procmail (or similar), and keep the mail in the server. Then you can use any email client you like, even your smartphone if you have dyndns, and it stays in sync.

Regarding wine, you could try virtualbox instead if your processor supports that. It'll run Windows software *far* better than wine, anyhow.

It's getting there though; it's a really good OS to get some life out of older machines and I reckon in a couple of years it might be a serious contender.  But not yet.

You see, that's what I though about 7 years ago when I bought my first notebook. I knew Linux would be a pain in the dick to get running, and didn't want Windows, so I bought an iBook. At the time, I figured it'd be at most 2-3 years before Linux was plenty ready to replace OS X. Today, I'd say it's even further behind than it was then. Perhaps I'm just spoilt from having an OS that pretty much "just works", but Linux seems to be just as much work as it ever was to get and keep stuff running, and KDE and Gnome have been busy taking giant strides backwards the whole time, bloating up and dumbing down respectively.

[Ken-Obi]

Hated the new Unity interface - as laggy if not more than the KDE desktop on a three year old machine. Good thing there's an option to go back to Gnome ie 'classic'.

Whilst it's understandable that the new GUI was created in anticipation of more touch screen services but it made no sense to replace a perfectly good working desktop environment on the general distribution version when the majority of the users would still be using it on large non-interactive monitors where screen estate is not a problem.

The new media player Banshee has problems with unicode tags compared to Rhythmbox that just works out of the box.

[Andy @ Allerton!]

Ubuntu won't install on my old laptop.

Does the install. All looks OK, does a reboot to start the first time and then comes up with a load of IO errors and Hangs.

[_tomd]

Ubuntu won't install on my old laptop.

Does the install. All looks OK, does a reboot to start the first time and then comes up with a load of IO errors and Hangs.

Exact same things happens on an old tower of mine, really frustrating.

[Andy @ Allerton!]

Exact same things happens on an old tower of mine, really frustrating.

Is there a workaround for it mate?

[_tomd]

Is there a workaround for it mate?

I've not managed to get it working, was hoping someone on here would be able to help! I can get it to run off the disc itself, but when I try to boot off the hard drive it just hangs. Should've mentioned that in my previous post, sorry!

[Ken-Obi]

Did you run the live cd and install from within the live session?

[_tomd]

Did you run the live cd and install from within the live session?

No, should I try that? I originally changed the boot order to boot from the CD drive, then installed Ubuntu that way. After that didn't work, I tried running the live CD to see if it worked at all.

[Ken-Obi]

From what I've read, the live cd will do a hardware detection and load the most suitable drivers et al to bring you a workable live session. Installing from the live session will use the same detected settings meaning that it would most likely be the most compatible.

Try clicking around and do things such as looking at the hard disk contents to ascertain that everything works more or less properly.

[_tomd]

From what I've read, the live cd will do a hardware detection and load the most suitable drivers et al to bring you a workable live session. Installing from the live session will use the same detected settings meaning that it would most likely be the most compatible.

Try clicking around and do things such as looking at the hard disk contents to ascertain that everything works more or less properly.

Cool, I'll give that a go. Thanks a lot.

EDIT: Installation failed twice from within live session, re-burning the install disc at 8x instead of 24x.

EDIT 2: Still not installing from disc - must be an issue with the disc/drive? Going to try from a USB stick instead...

[wacko]

Cool, I'll give that a go. Thanks a lot.

EDIT: Installation failed twice from within live session, re-burning the install disc at 8x instead of 24x.

EDIT 2: Still not installing from disc - must be an issue with the disc/drive? Going to try from a USB stick instead...

Such problems are often differences in the modules included in the Live CD kernel and the installation kernel. Bad disc/drive would do it, too.

If the USB stick doesn't work, I'd try a different distro if I were you. If that works, you know it's an Ubuntu thing and not a general Linux problem with your system. In that case, make at least 3 partitions: one for /home, one for your distro and another, empty one where you can try Ubuntu again when the next version comes out. If you have a separate /home partition, all your personal settings and data will still be there when you install a new system, though you might have to tinker with user IDs in one of the systems.

[Andy @ Allerton!]

Cool, I'll give that a go. Thanks a lot.

EDIT: Installation failed twice from within live session, re-burning the install disc at 8x instead of 24x.

EDIT 2: Still not installing from disc - must be an issue with the disc/drive? Going to try from a USB stick instead...

Found what the problem is...


Thanks guys.

To all who have this question here is another set of codes you can put in terminal to make the 'noapic' permanent.

In terminal type:

sudo gedit /boot/grub/menu.lst

Once you see the text file that comes up, you should look carefully about halfway down the file and find the section that says '#defoptions'

In that section you should see the words 'quiet splash' at the end. Type 'noapic' after the 'quiet splash'. Remember to leave a space between the added text.

Once done type this code in the terminal:

sudo update-grub

You should see the list of text saying 'done' at the end.

There it is now official. Restart your computer and you should not have an IO-APIC error.


http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=704873

[Wish Matrix]

Does Ubuntu comes with drivers for mainboards, graphic cards etc? I have an old system and consider about installing it. As I'm relatively lazy to hunt them on the intrawebz.

EDIT: NVM. Found this in the FAQ;

Will it work with my hardware?
Ubuntu 11.04 is built to take advantage of the very latest technologies, but it should work on a most desktops, laptops and netbooks too. If you don’t have the required hardware, Ubuntu will automatically start the classic desktop experience so you won’t have to worry about a thing.

Will give this a go then.

[wacko]

Does Ubuntu comes with drivers for mainboards, graphic cards etc? I have an old system and consider about installing it. As I'm relatively lazy to hunt them on the intrawebz.

EDIT: NVM. Found this in the FAQ;

Will give this a go then.

Generally with older hardware (unless it's an obscure notebook), you're golden. Just don't try running KDE.

[_tomd]

Such problems are often differences in the modules included in the Live CD kernel and the installation kernel. Bad disc/drive would do it, too.

If the USB stick doesn't work, I'd try a different distro if I were you. If that works, you know it's an Ubuntu thing and not a general Linux problem with your system. In that case, make at least 3 partitions: one for /home, one for your distro and another, empty one where you can try Ubuntu again when the next version comes out. If you have a separate /home partition, all your personal settings and data will still be there when you install a new system, though you might have to tinker with user IDs in one of the systems.

It's a pretty old system, doesn't appear to be any options in BIOS to boot from USB so I scrapped that. I did however try a different disc drive, no issues launching the installer/live CD session but still issues actually booting from the hard drive once it's installed. I'll try Andy@Allerton's solution, since it sounds like our issues were almost identical. If that doesn't work then I'll try a different distro on another partition as you suggested. Thanks a lot both of you for your help!