Ubuntu makes it easy to enable automatic login if you're using a login manager such as GDM. I was recently setting up a minimal Ubuntu 9.10 system with an LXDE desktop and no GDM. Here#8217;s how I enabled automatic login.

Note: This was tested on Ubuntu 9.10. Previous versions of Ubuntu require different procedures because of changes to the way Ubuntu boots.

Open /etc/init/tty1.conf as root:

sudo nano /etc/init/tty1.conf

Change the last line of this file to (where USERNAME is the username of the user you want to log in):

exec /bin/login -f USERNAME < /dev/tty1 > /dev/tty1 2>#038;1

Reboot, and the user you chose should be logged in automatically after boot. If something goes wrong, you can switch to a different TTY with CTRL+ALT+F2 and log in normally.

If you want this user to be logged into a graphical environment instead of just a shell, there#8217;s more work to be done. Open your user#8217;s .bashrc file:

nano ~/.bashrc

Add the following to the end of the file:

if [ $(tty) == "/dev/tty1" ]; then
 startx
 fi

This code will start X (the graphical environment) whenever the user logs in on TTY1. You can add more code after startx that will be executed if the user logs out of X.

[via tombuntu]

Today, finally install Ubuntu 9.10. I've only to update the system for several hours, but everything seems to work smoothly.

II used my usual technique to install the new version of Ubuntu. I'm using a separate home and root partition. To use a custom installer Ubuntu partition and converted small partition using the new ext4 file system and use the old boot partition as the new boot partition. Setup has finished in less than nine minutes. Before leaving the live CD, opened a file browser (Alt-F2 and "gksu nautilus") to remove the old configuration files (files and folders from the period in your home directory). With the exception of a few applications I don't want to have to reconfigure, I moved the old config files in the backup location. This allows me to start new applications and application configuration, without having to backup and restore my data.

Ubuntu 9.10 is out for a while now, so surely everyone knows what's new. I'll just mention a few things I've found setting up the new system.

The default theme (and especially the icons) are much improved in Ubuntu 9.10. But I'm not a fan of orange so I installed the elementary theme (just the GTK and icon themes). I'm getting a warning that I don't have the right theme engine installed, but I like how it looks so I just ignored it.

The first thing I noticed after installing the Nvidia drivers and getting Compiz running was how moving windows around looked jerky. I reapplied my settings from Make Compiz Run Smoothly and Without Tearing to fix Compiz's refresh frequency and now it's back to being smooth.

I'm using Chrome for web browsing now. Before the upgrade I was using the daily builds of Chromium. I used Google's bookmark sync to save my bookmarks, but couldn't restore them because the official release of Chrome lacks the sync feature. I couldn't find a way to get at the bookmarks online (why isn't this integrated with Google Bookmarks?)(update: A commenter points out that bookmarks are available in Google Docs), so I copied .config/chromium/Default/Bookmarks from my backed up configuration folder to the new Chrome configuration at ~/.config/google-chrome/Default/Bookmarks.

I installed Ubuntu Restricted Extras as usual to install Flash, Java, web fonts, and media codecs. For some reason this didn't install the Java plugin. I installed 'sun-java6-plugin' separately to fix this.

After installing the latest version of GNOME Do I was pleased to find that it can now open my home folder. This bug (I think it was actually in Nautilus) has been annoying me for ages.

I added the new Wine PPA to get the latest versions of Wine. Trying to install the 'wine' package failed with a "unresolvable dependencies" error. Installing wine1.2 instead worked (all 'wine' should do is install wine1.2 anyways). There's a forum thread about this issue.

Ubuntu 9.10 has a little mail icon near the notification area called Indicator Applet. I'm using web-based mail and instant messaging, so the Evolution and Empathy integration aren't useful for me. I am using a utility called Gmail Notifier which integrates with Indicator Applet and Ubuntu's notification system. When I get a new email it pops up one of Ubuntu's fancy notifications and lights up the mail icon.

[via tombuntu]

The last few days I have been testing backup software to automatically backup my desktop Ubuntu system. I’ve only just got it set up, but rdiff-backup is exactly what I was looking for and seems to be working very well.

rdiff-backup tries to “combine the best features of a mirror and an incremental backup”. It’s a command line utility that not only gives you a plain mirror of your files, but also allows you to retrieve previous versions of your files using the extra difference data it keeps. This means you can quickly copy and paste to restore a file from your most recent backup, or retrieve the contents of files as they were at the time of any previous backup. rdiff-backup has built in support for network backups over SSH and is network-efficient and fast thanks to its incremental nature. It’s also possible to run rdiff-backup on Windows, soon I’ll be investigating whether it will work as a backup solution for the Windows systems on my network.

If you’re looking for an simpler graphical backup tool, check out A Guide to System Backup and Restore in Ubuntu. The rest of this post will go though how I’ve set up rdiff-backup to backup my home directory to a hard drive connected to another Ubuntu system on my network.

SSH public key authentication
If you want to schedule automatic rdiff-backups over the network you will need to use public keys with SSH so rdiff-backup can log into the remote system without a password. This assumes that both the remote and local systems already have SSH servers installed.

On your local system create new key pair with no passphrase for your user:
ssh-keygen -t rsa

Use the ssh-copy-id tool to give the new public key to the remote backup system:
ssh-copy-id -i ~/.ssh/id_rsa.pub '-p 2222 backups@192.168.1.40'

Finally, test logging in to the remote system without a password:
ssh -p 2222 backups@192

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The Eee PC 901 is an Intel Atom-based laptop, with 1 GB of RAM, a 20 GB SSD, a 9 inch display, and ships with Asus’ own Linux distribution. Since I bought mine, I’ve installed and used Ubuntu 8.10 and 8.04. The new Ubuntu 9.04 finally has full support for the Eee PC 901.

With previous releases it has been necessary to install a customized Linux kernel to add support for wireless networking, Ethernet, and more. In Ubuntu 9.04, everything is supported by default with the exception of some of the keyboard function keys.

The system feels much more responsive than it was with Ubuntu 8.04. Booting from bootloader to the login screen takes 20 seconds (35 seconds in 8.10). Battery life is approximately 4.5 hours (same as 8.10).

Installation is pretty straightforward, but here’s how I installed Ubuntu 9.04 on my Eee PC 901:

Unless you have an external CD drive, you will have to run the Ubuntu installer from a USB drive (or SD card). The easiest way to create a live USB system is using Ubuntu’s USB Startup Disk Creator tool. If you don’t have another Ubuntu system, or the tool doesn’t work for you, UNetbootin is another option. To boot from a USB drive, press escape after starting your Eee PC to open the boot menu. Select the USB option and press enter. You can run Ubuntu’s installer normally, but pay attention to the partitioning step. The Eee PC has two solid states drives: a faster 4 GB drive, and a slightly slower 16 GB drive. Select the manual partitioning option and put your root (/) on the smaller drive and home (/home) on the larger. I also chose the Ext4 filesystem to get more performance out of the SSDs. You’ll be warned if you don’t create a swap partition, but I’d recommend not using swap to avoid shortening the life of the SSDs. Boot into the newly installed system and everything should be working

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For a long time it has bothered me that Compiz does not seem to run as smoothly as Metacity on my desktop system. With desktop effects switched off, moving windows around the screen would seem smoother. With desktop effects switched on, I’d also notice tearing in areas of the screen with fast motion including in videos. I was fiddling with Compiz settings recently and managed to fix the problem entirely. Now, if your graphics card struggles to run Compiz this will probably not help you. But if you have a decent graphics card (mine is a nVidia GeForce 8600 GT) give this a try if you have noticed this problem.

If you haven’t already, you’ll need to install the advanced Compiz configuration utility. Install CompizConfig Settings Manager from the package compizconfig-settings-manager (click the link to install), or by running the command below in your terminal:
sudo apt-get install compizconfig-settings-manager

Start CCSM from System->Preferences->CompizConfig Settings Manager. Under the category General, select General Options. Select the Display Settings tab. De-select the Detect Refresh Rate option. Set the Refresh Rate option to match the vertical refresh rate of your display. (I checked my monitor’s on-screen display to verify that it was running 60 Hz.) Finally, select the Sync To VBlank option.

These settings should take effect immediately. If Compiz is still not completely smooth, it won’t hurt to turn the refresh rate up higher.

[via tombuntu]

I’ve been using a small utility called eee-control on my Asus Eee PC 901 netbook with Ubuntu. eee-control lets you take control of the hardware on Eee PCs. Some of these controls, like the performance modes, were easily accessible in the default Asus Linux distribution but not from Ubuntu. It includes:

• on/off toggles for the wifi and bluetooth radios, the camera, and the SD card reader
• front-side bus performance modes including over and under clocking
• sensor readings for temperature, fan level, and fan RPM
• hotkey setup for extra buttons
• smarter fan control

I would absolutely recommend eee-control to anyone using Linux on an Eee PC. Be sure to turn on the smart fan control feature because with it my system is much quieter and even silent at times. By turning off the wireless radios and using powersave mode I can now push my Eee PC 901 to six hours of battery life.

Installing eee-control on Ubuntu is easy. Download and install the latest deb package provided by the author of eee-control. Reboot so that the eee-control daemon can be started. When you log in you should have a new Eee icon in your desktop’s notification area.

[via tombuntu]

The feature freeze for Ubuntu 9.10 has been in effect for a while now, so it’s time for the next Ubuntu release to be announced. Mark Shuttleworth has done this speaking to UbuCon at the Atlanta Linux Fest. The video of the announcement is from YouTube is embedded below.

In the video the code name for Ubuntu 10.04 is revealed: “Lucid Lynx”. As this release fits into the two year long term support schedule, it will receive the LTS designation. A few details about what this version will entail are given in the video. Ubuntu 10.04 “Lucid Lynx” will focus on GNOME 2 rather than GNOME 3, which will be adopted in subsequent releases. The server edition will focus on cloud computing and support for large scale web infrastructure.

Ubuntu 10.04 should be released in April 2010.

[update] Mark Shuttleworth has formally introduced Lucid Lynx in written form.

[via tombuntu]

This guest article was written by Vivek Kumar from LinuxHub.net, a blog focused on Linux tutorials (how-to’s), technology and news.

One great advantage of using Linux (Ubuntu) is the fact that you don’t really have to worry about security and hence viruses. However, this does not mean that you should not use an anti-virus on your Ubuntu machine. Especially when you can get a good anit-virus for free. BitDefender for Unices is one such anti-virus solution for Linux and you can get it for free. Let’s see how to get a free license of BitDefender anti-virus for your Ubuntu machine and how to install it on your Ubuntu machine.

BitDefender Antivirus Scanner for Unices is a versatile on-demand scanner built for Linux and FreeBSD systems. It provides antivirus and antispyware scanning for both UNIX-based and Windows-based partitions.

BitDefender Antivirus Scanner for Unices is highly customizable and capable of script and extension-based integration with various applications such as file managers and mail clients.

Get a free home license for BitDefender
Before we download and install BitDefender on Ubuntu, let’s first get a free license copy of BitDefender. Please remember that the free copy of BitDefender is only for non-commercial home usage. In case you want to use it for business purpose please get a valid license. In order to request a free license go to the following page:
http://www.bitdefender.com/site/Products/ScannerLicense/

Fill in the information and accept the license agreement to get the license key to your email.

Download Free BitDefender Antivirus for Linux

1. On the following page, click download, enter your details to download the free BitDefender antivirus:
   http://www.bitdefender.com/PRODUCT-80-en–BitDefender-Antivirus-Scanner-for-Unices.html
2. Once you have filled the information the download link will be sent to your email address.
3. Click the download link that you received in your email and click BitDefender Antivirus scanner for Unices (Linux, FreeBSD).
4. On the next page click Download.
5. Click EN_FR_BR_RO/ and click Linux on the following page.
6. You’ll see many links on the page. Depending on the version of Linux and your OS (32 or 64 bit), you can download the files. In our case we’ll download the following file:
   BitDefender-Antivirus-Scanner-7.6-4.linux-gcc4x.i586.deb.run

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This article was written by Blair Mathis. Blair works with Laptoplogic.com where she is responsible for all Linux/Ubuntu related articles. At Laptoplogic.com you can find all the information you need on the best gaming laptops and go through the latest Acer laptop reviews.

As always, the latest version of Ubuntu, 9.04, was released on time. It offers faster boot time, ext4 support, and many other minor updates and tweaks that makes the system better. Unfortunately, in addition to the updates, there’s a fairly serious (aka, annoying) bug in Ubuntu 9.04 that causes a certain combination of buttons–most commonly, the Fn+UP/DOWN and volume buttons—to render the keyboard completely dead, as well as the system menus and the right-click menu that appears when using the mouse. This bug appears in many different ways, as evidenced by the varying bug reports, but it always has the same symptoms.

While there’s no reported cause for the bug—only acknowledgement that it exists—users are forced to hard reset their system to correct the problem; restarting the X server is impossible, due to the lack of keyboard, and the system menus disappear, preventing a simple log in/log out fix.

Because a hard rest is not a viable option when using the system for work (or at all, for that matter), it would seem those plagued with this bug are forced to install 8.04 or temporarily abandon their system for a different one. Luckily, if you’re willing to stick it out for awhile until the coveted bug fix is released, there is a simple solution to unlocking the keyboard that does not involve a hard reset:

CTRL + ALT + F3

Or any other key F1-F12. The screen will temporarily turn black, and a system beep might occur, and then the keyboard and menus will continue working as normal. The buttons that trigger the bug will continue to act poorly, however.

If you’re experiencing their bug with your system, be sure to report it so that a solution can be found as quickly as possible.

[via tombuntu.com]

Sun has just released the major 2.2 update to their VirtualBox virtualization software. The most exciting new feature in this release is 3D acceleration for Linux guest operating systems! See the changelog for all the new features and fixes.

Install VirtualBox
VirtualBox offers Ubuntu package downloads as well as a software repository from their Linux downloads page. Neither of these options have been updated for Ubuntu 9.04 yet, so I just downloaded and installed the 8.10 package for now.

Start VirtualBox from Applications->System Tools->Sun VirtualBox.

Install Guest Additions
Here’s how I installed the VirtualBox guest additions in an Ubuntu 9.04 guest. Start up your Ubuntu guest OS. In VirtualBox, click Devices->Install Guest Additions.

Click Run when the autorun prompt opens in the guest. The installation could take a minute while kernel modules are being built. When it’s finished, the installer should prompt you to reboot the guest.

( Read more... )