5 posts tagged “xubuntu”

With the headaches of the network manager and producing five icons... I am a bit annoyed from Xubuntu. The tips and tricks from the great folks at the Ubuntu Forums, the instructions keep producing additional icons to my dismay. It's driven me to a bit of insanity, but after some calm thought and lack of solutions... I just thought it may just be time to give up. What also upset me was the fact that on installing Rhythmbox for downloads of my favorite weekly podcast by the folks of Maximum PC... I found that I could not even download a single one due to an odd error message saying that the link is invalid and to check the link. The link works fine in Amarok in Linux Mint and Rhythmbox in Ubuntu, I just can't figure why it's not working in Xubuntu.

It shouldn't be bad to return to Ubuntu, I think I am attuned to the Gnome environment so much that I am used to it's behavior. I hold no bitter feelings towards Xubuntu and I like Kubuntu very much... but I think that Ubuntu is the environment I have grown familiar to and I like the look it has for a mobile machine (Suzaku just looks sleek in Ubuntu with Beryl running).

I know that when I get into making my gigabit server... I will definitely install Kubuntu on it and sit down to learn the fun stuff Kubuntu can do... I just need a good processor, motherboard, a Cooler Master case, a Geforce card, 2GB of RAM, 1 terabyte of hard disk space, DVD burner, a great mouse, and a Das Keyboard II. Until money flows that nicely... Suzaku will be "Old Faithful" to me.

I thought Xubuntu was going to play nice... but apparently not the case...

Lots of custom configuration had to happen to make the machine play nice with the OS and after all the perfection... I run into a bug that just annoys me.

On installing network manager, for some reason it produced two instances of it... but on trying to use some instructions to minimize it to just one instance, I some how have three instances! I almost want to give up and try my luck tomorrow... but well, if this bloody mess doesn't get resolved... I may just suck it up and see Kubuntu extensively on my system to run it down the paces or return to Ubuntu.

Don't get me wrong... Xubuntu is great for old machine, even better if they are linked up in a traditional LAN. But to configure it to use a wireless manager that's Gnome based and iffy integration is almost a pain in the neck! I really do wish the Xubuntu team integrated a light-weight wifi network manager, instead of the hoops and ladders just to get one.

It's a late night... I should have been out about 2 hours ago... Let's hope I can get everything correct and increase my tolerance in XFCE.

I decided as I don't keep much on my machine and have web-resources to back up my stuff... (like del.icio.us for my bookmarks) I figured that I would try out Linux Mint just to have some fun and try it for a bit just to see how I like it. For having it installed for almost 5 days, it's quite an experience. The art is pleasant and all, but my reason for trying it was based on the mindset of the following:

If it's based on Ubuntu, then it should be just as great, right? I mean the basis of the software and core are essentially Ubuntu, it should provide a more fulfilling out-of-the-box experience.

With that mindset, I backed up my few downloads and files to my external hard drive, prepped the drive for Linux Mint, and just let it do its work. After about 30 minutes, the system was installed and I would begin use. True, Linux Mint has earned it's praise with me, but that is not to say that it has some things that I want to gripe about. Especially the fact that these things were not noticeable when the operating system ran as a LiveCD.

For some reason, the Window's style lay-out of the MintMenu irritated me and I had to configure it in the standard Gnome dual bar set-up. This was a personal preference, so it holds no bearing... I just would have expected that Mint would keep to a traditional Gnome configuration or that they use a set-up similar to DreamLinux. The Novell Gnome SLAB doesn't appear over all of the applications which is more of a bother to me... I would expect it to be on top, but sometimes, you have to click twice to make it appear over everything. That and when you click on something on the SLAB, the menu doesn't disappear... You have to click the MintMenu to close the SLAB.

Apparently the integration of the Mint icons wasn't very well thought out... as the other Gnome icon themes and any others that are used from Gnome-Look cause the sleek Linux Mint leaf logo to change to the Ubuntu circle logo. In a sense, the customization is a little limited from this set-back.

The oddest thing (to me, at least) was that the Metacity window theme was called "Cassandra Green", yet the windows were themed in blue. The irony was when you change to "Cassandra Blue", there's no difference in the window theming. I can only assume that someone who was in charge of the artwork portion had forgotten to change over the colors. I would have loved to see the windows match the great wallpaper with the operating system by default.

A pet peeve of mine and even a few other users is the old references from Ubuntu not thoughtfully changed over to the defaults of Linux Mint. The e-mail editor installed on Linux Mint is Mozilla Thunderbird, yet there was still a default reference to Evolution. Lucky for many, you can change that, by going into Preferences > Preferred Applications and change that. The second instance of this annoyed me because I could not get it to work... The default music player refers to Rhythmbox, but the installed media player is Amarok! I have the great and convenient multimedia keys on Suzaku that are a nice thing to have when you want to just flip through music and tunes. On Ubuntu, I had my "MediaDirect" button launch Rhythmbox and it was perfect! On Mint, the reference defaulted to Rhythmbox and with multiple attempts to try to correct it in gconf and MintConfig, the system would not change its binding to Amarok.

The final thing that disappointed me in Linux Mint was the fact of the "Install Software" command in the MintMenu does not bring up a nice choose and click software repository interface... It brings up Synaptic instead! Synaptic is by no means fun or easy to novice Linux users. Sure, they do have a software repository where applications are packed in .MINT files, but the list is by no means even comparable to the folks over at the Ubuntu GetDeb.net site! I am fortunate to have learned that Linux Mint is compatible with Ubuntu .DEB files or even installing from source... This came to me as a shock as I figured that a new user would definitely have no problems getting acquainted with Linux if they use Linux Mint... If the folks of Mint could give the users the ability to have a click and install/remove software menu, then it will have a great polish to the operating system that's very user friendly to those just diving into Linux.

I won't let Mint go away with bad praise... I do like the multimedia integration as it really is top notch. It takes the brainwork out of using the Terminal to enable extra repositories, apt-get all the media packages, then install. That being great for getting a PC ready to enjoy instantly, rather than 10 - 20 minutes depending on your processor speed and internet connection. The inclusion of Beryl, the NTFS writing tool, Envy, NDISwrapper are all great! Beryl is great, as you can play with eye candy without having to bother with doing the install and download for instant gratification. The MintConfig menu provides easy access to the system intensive parts of modifications, including a graphical editor for the xorg.conf file for display configuration...

I am just going to return to Canonical's work and just play with a different flavor just to learn more about Linux. Sure, Mint was an Ubuntu derivative, but it needs more polish to make it really shine. Tomorrow, after work... I will either install Kubuntu or Xubuntu after I deem whichever package is suitable for my laptop Suzaku. If either of those just doesn't fit... I'll gladly do a fresh install of Ubuntu 7.04 and return Suzaku to it's former set-up. I do hope to learn more from my experiences to come tomorrow.

Edit: I am adding my "final" screenshots of my Mint Desktop as a final respect to my experiences.

zeroMint.png

zeroMint2.png

Last night... Boy, that was fun! I was at my cousin Sol's home and we were being geeks as usual. My sister, Alice had finished using my aunt's old Sony Vaio to browse the web and well, she had wanted to use MSN. There was an implication that made things painful... The system isn't strong enough to run a lot of programs. She got a message that the Vaio couldn't connect with the last copy of MSN Messenger (that was officially called Messenger, not Live! Messenger). Let's break here and I'll introduce you to my 2 closest family members...

Sol is a dear cousin to me. He is a power user, so he's no slouch on computer bugs, viruses, worms and the like. He's officially ripped the family PC gamer title from me, by being a World of Warcraft player (Elune server). He has learned a lot of his basic computer security knowledge from me teaching him, in addition to observing me jury-rig things to work. He takes a lot of my values and thoughts to heart as my family says I seem to be a positive influence to him. His machines of choice are a slick HP laptop powered by Altec Lansing built-in speakers with an AMD Turion 64-bit processor and an ATi Mobility Radeon for his graphics and a Sony Vaio media PC loaded Pentium 4 Hyper Threading system with a Geforce 5200 series card (aftermaket upgrade) and dual DVD burner drives.

Alice is the average, haphazardly average computer user who lives dangerously with regards to computer use. She's also the same one that got Beast V2 hit by a load of viruses and reduced to rubble... She's the trend jumper as she will jump on technology trends as friends mention them to her, this includes security related issues as well. She was never one to heed my advice until it's too late and that doesn't seem to be changing any time soon. Thankfully she's been pleased with Apple's OS X, although she wants Windows Vista... (ugh... Her Windows XP problems are bad enough.) Her machines of choice are an old school G4 iBook laptop and a Sony Vaio media PC with a similar build to Sol's machine, but with a Geforce 4 MX440 64mb RAM.

February was a revolution with me converting my reliable as bolts PC to Linux. Sure there was lots of fear and uncertainty with being in an operating system completely foreign to me... but at the same time, there was another chance for me to relearn how to enjoy computing again. Being a person who owned both a Windows PC and a Mac had shown me realms that are almost polar opposites, but Linux was completely something unique. The previous 2 realms had shown one major point though: IF you want GOOD software, then you need to PAY for it. Every once in a while there's a challenger with a good piece of free software, but the more common place practice is to give a basic edition for free (although hindered) but ask you to front up the money for "enhanced" functionality.

To be "dead in the water" with Linux alone and no Windows XP partition was interesting as there were no commercial applications with prices tagged onto them... Everything was open source. It was in the same mindset of "for the buyers, written by the buyers". Functionality was as robust as a commercial application, yet it was not hindered like a "freeware" application. The irony is that some commercial companies have dived into the foray of open source with regard that programming is like a science. What good is research and science when you don't share your data with your peers? Worse yet... Forcing your "investors" to pay for your research, only to have their returns go towards minuscule changes that have little impact on future developments and lock out end users from assisting with bug reporting or furthering the evolution of the program's life. One of the greatest examples of progress made by open source is Corel/Novell's OpenOffice.org suite. A robust office suite providing a basic frame for a wide range of basic word processing and spreadsheet work for free! Sure, it's not as polished as nicely as Microsoft Office, but at least the licensing cost is not nearly as bad as $139.99 for "Student and Teacher" edition while Open Office is a complete suite and free to boot.

I'm not one to say that I have fervent zeal in spreading the joy of Ubuntu Linux to others. I do, however, end up introducing Ubuntu (or any other packages) to friends or family who have been utterly frustrated with Windows and could use an alternative to love their PC's again. Computers are nothing to fear really, well until the common place plagues of viruses, malware, and even root-kit trojan keyloggers land in full force. I have shown some people the joy I get from my computer and they are impressed. No more needless maintenance that has to be run overnight... More time enjoying computer time. Recently, my ex-girlfriend had asked about conversion, as she is starting to feel the burn of Windows related frustrations. I enlightened her today and even let her try out all the flavors of Canonical Linux: Ubuntu, Kubuntu, and Xubuntu. She definitely liked Ubuntu the most as it seemed foreign to her, but yet so natural. Kubuntu was not her thing, due to the fact that the layout by default is similar to Windows XP (being that she wants to get away from the offending memories of Windows XP). Xubuntu was a bit much on her as the learning curve is a bit higher due to its minimalistic nature. She too had the same view that Ubuntu Studio should have been packed as a Live DVD as the Alternate CD format only takes up 836mb and a single layer DVD is about 4.7GB! For now, she awaits conversion, as she's not sure about making the dive just yet.

Giving people a choice of absolute freedom for computing is a gift of knowledge. You're giving frustrated users a chance to stand-up against the "locked-in" to software companies trying to exploit problem fixes as new frontiers for profit. Ever since becoming an assistant leader to Ubuntu Dallas, I have felt like the gift of choice and the promise of open source are wonderful. I know from stumbling on my own into a world of freedom, it was overwhelming. To be a guide in my city and give others the hand to break free is a joy on its own.