Sphere Desktop Cube

I was reading the Ubuntu-id's planet when I found this post which caught my attention. I would like to share with other Ubuntu User who visits my blog with this Earth Desktop made by One of the Indonesian Ubuntu Members.

Well It use compiz as the engine and yes, I found out that it is easy to install. What nice is, he even have a snapshot of the Earth Desktop. Here is the snapshot:


And you could always download the compiz-fusion ccsm at the owners blog. Nice one huh. A good one from Indonesian members.

Install msttcorefonts on Hardy

Have you ever wondering why every webpage that you surf by using browser on Linux operating system seem lack in fonts presentation? Tired and bored with all the fonts on the linux system? Then you should be looking for something like msttcorefonts package for linux. What is msttcorefonts? Basically msttcorefonts is a package for linux user to install windows fonts. Well this definition taken from linux.about.com:

Definition: msttcorefonts: Installer for Microsoft TrueType core fonts This package allows for easy installation of the Microsoft True Type Core Fonts for the Web including: Andale Mono Arial Black Arial (Bold, Italic, Bold Italic) Comic Sans MS (Bold) Courier New (Bold, Italic, Bold Italic) Georgia (Bold, Italic, Bold Italic) Impact Times New Roman (Bold, Italic, Bold Italic) Trebuchet (Bold, Italic, Bold Italic) Verdana (Bold, Italic, Bold Italic) Webdings You will need an Internet connection to download these modules from Microsoft's Web site.

It's mostly the best package for linux user to have Microsoft Fonts installed on their linux Operating System. Here is some simple steps on how to install msttcorefonts on Ubuntu Linux Operating system:

• sudo apt-get install msttcorefonts

This command is enough to install all the basic fonts based on Microsoft fonts to make your font presentation better than before. Here is some example of before and after using 'msttcorefonts'

Before using msttcorefonts

After Using msttcorefonts

Nice improvement right? isnt that font look smoother than the original one? yeah it will make your web fonts better than before. Happy surfing~

Make a startup script on Fluxbox

Well, Fluxbox a light weight window manager. Wondering on how to make a startup script for Fluxbox WM on Ubuntu? Well there is a script/file called Xsession for GNOME WM as a startup script. So with Fluxbox, the file is called xinitrc.

How can you do this? It's simple to start an application on Ubuntu Fluxbox start up. Here is some steps using terminal as a start:

• Open up terminal and touch a file name ".xinitrc"

touch ~/.xinitrc

• Then make some script to run the application you like such as nm-applet, pidgin, xchat and etc.

nano ~/.xinitrc

• When the editor open up, just type the command you would like to run. Here is my xinitrc:

#!/bin/sh
session.screen0.rootCommand: fbsetbg -l
export SHELL=/bin/zsh
export LC=C
export LC_ALL=C
fluxbox &
WMPID=$!
sleep 4 &&
wait $WMPID
xset +fp /home/gunblade/.fonts
nm-applet

So you can add what ever application that you would like to run on startup, but if there is any root privileges type of application, then you need to do some tricks to make it work.

Hardy Heron - B43 Broadcom Driver Setup on fresh install

Well, this is my first time fresh installing Ubuntu 8.04 Hardy Heron on my Laptop. Before this, I used to upgrade my system from Gutsy to Hardy using update-manager. And without any problem, I got the wireless(which in hardy using b43 instead of bcm43xx) working without any need to do anything. Which mean, Upgrade --> Reboot --> And wireless is there and it's B43~!

But in another situation, I just do a Hardy Heron fresh install yesterday, not much problem in the installation process, which I manage to boot into the new system in about 20-30 minutes of installation process. All working fine without any major issue but then i realized that my Broadcom Wireless(b43) didnt light up. So I assume that my broadcom didnt working on fresh install.

Here is simple step I make to make this things work:

sudo apt-get install b43-fwcutter

This command will install the fwcutter for latest b43 driver and load the firmware in installation process. Basically, Hardy suppose to include this things on installation, but somehow the b43-fwcutter sometimes doesnt work will all cards, so you really need to remove the default one and reinstall it back using above command. Hope this will help.

Wireless go into Monitor with Injection Support

I've been experimenting to use aircrack to test out Access Point(AP) security for about a month and a half now, and i used to do it with 3 wireless card that I own which is Broadcom(Built-in on my laptop), rt73usb(which is a USB wireless Device) and ZD1211rw(also a USB device).

Formerly, I have to patch my modules in order to make the cards to go into monitor mode so that it could be used with aircrack suite. All the hard work will paid out if you successfully patch your cards. But to find the right patch is the most hard part as not every patch is suitable with your chipset.

But, i notice somthing different on the latest linux kernel(maybe it might be working too on BSD's kernel), you dont have to patch your card to change your wireless mode into monitor-mode. But this is only tested on Mac80211 cards only. As far as I'm concern, b43(latest driver for broadcom), rt73usb and zd1211rw - all of this card happened to be mac80211 cards on kernel 2.6.24 and higher.

So al you need to do is install the iw application. So how to install 'iw'? It took a few steps to install 'iw'. But even a new linux user could install this without any problems. First all you have to do is install all the requirements needed by 'iw' in order to function.

sudo apt-get update && sudp apt-get install libnl-dev libnl1 libnl1-pre6

Then when all the requirements has been installed, we may proceed to gathering the 'iw' source:

mkdir iw && cd iw
wget http://gunblade.fakap.net/tool/wireless/iw.tar.bz2 && tar xvjf iw.tar.bz2

And now proceed to the final step:

make && sudo ln -s iw /usr/sbin/iw

And we are done. So now you may try to install the aircrack from SVN by using subversion. There is a simpe tutorial on how to install this latest version of aircrack from by using subversion. But first you need to install subversion first by apt. More tutorial on how to install aircrack is on my previous post.

Download Helper for Firefox 3 has been release

I've been waiting for this plugin called "Video DownloadHelper" for a few weeks. Formerly, this plugin work out of the box on Firefox 2.0 where this plugin help me a lot on downloading videos from Youtube, TV3 website and many more which I would reveal on this post.

The main purpose for this plugin is to make it possible for Firefox user to download the Flash Videos (.flv) files by a point-and-click procedure. It's rich in features where else, it could make a download queue and download one by one your queued files until it finish eventhough you have close the Firefox.

And about couple of days ago, the new version of Video Downloadhelper has been release especially to support Firefox 3. The plugin working fine without any problem as far as I'm using it. So now I can download youtube files on point click.

For those who interested to try this plugin, you must have firefox installed on your system(luckily, all ubuntu OS used firefox as default browser). All you got to do is click on the link here, and the installation popup will appear, just click install and you are done!

Ubuntu: Play Your Favourites Movie Using SopCast

SopCast is a streaming player for all ubuntu user who is interested to watch a show online/streaming. It contain a lot of channel such as HBO, EuroSports and many more. Plus this SopCast also have online movie to entertain the viewer.

For thos interested to have this application running on your Ubuntu Box, please follow this site on how to install QSopCast on Ubuntu. I follow this tutorial and it's working out of the box. No need to have TV Card to watch TV. All I need is a SopCast and I can get a lot of channels.

Did I mention it's a streaming media? Yes, you need to have internet access in order to play the TV online. Surely you will need at least a broadband connection to play a streaming television to have a good quality of video. For me, 1MB of streamyx line is good enough to watch HBO and Sports Channels.

Ubuntu: Hardy and Active Directory easy step

On previous ubuntu release, to get connected to Active Directory need a lot of work to do. But in Hardy release, all this step has been simple as a new package name "likewise-open" is being uploaded into Hardy's repository. Likewine Open is an application to make Linux to Active Directory easier to setup. Only a few clicks needed in order to make your linux ubuntu to get connected to Active Directory.

Likewise Open enables Linux, Unix and Mac authentication on a Microsoft network using Active Directory. A user can now interactively log in to the Linux, Unix or Mac machine using Active Directory credentials, and can access any kerberized services that the non-Windows machine hosts.

taken from likewise-open website

I was really pleased with the action taken by ubuntu to include this package into official repository as this is an important application being used by a lot of ubuntu user in order to access Active Directory which previously need to be setup my intermediate linux user.

You can download the package name 'likewise-open' by using your apt-get service by using this command:

sudo apt-get install likewise-open

As now, everyone could do the setup easily. And no more worries to get the files needed from your Office Active Directory server. But if you have encounter some problem using the new package of 'likewise-open' feel free to launch a bug report in launchpad.

Ubuntu: Firefox-2 on hardy

I notice that the firefox 3 is still have some bugs. So here is the simple to this solution right now, "WAIT UNTIL THE FIREFOX HES BEEN OFFICIALLY RELEASE" . Why do you have to use the beta version? So mean while, please use the old Firefox 2.0. This step below will install you the previous version of firefox:

sudo apt-get install firefox-2

If somehow you still wanted to be a tester user to help firefox to improve and report the bugs in firefox 3, you can always use it by selecting at the "Application > Internet > Firefox 3" menu. So it's your choice.

Ubuntu: Kernel 2.6.25 on Hardy

Well, I've been playing and trying a new kernel stable release of 2.6.25 which is known to be compatible and will work on Ubuntu Hardy or any release. But as i'm using Hardy right now, so this tutorial will be on Hardy Heron environment. Well I strictly not recommend a beginner user to try this because this is not an official kernel for Hardy, so if anything goes wrong, you are the one who cause this(and me cuz writing this tutorial).

So I look on the www.kernel.org for a new stable release of 2.6.25 kernel and wonder if it can work with my new hardy heron. Here is the changes made in the new 2.6.25 kernel:

1. There are deeply invasive performance/scalability/latency fixes for CFS regressions (vs. 2.6.24) in the 2.6.25 tree. These fixes are too invasive to be ported to the 2.6.24 kernel without significant risk.

2. Many of the driver updates/new drivers in the kernel-ubuntu package are merged into upstream as of 2.6.25. (This is always true, but the smaller the delta against upstream the better on release day).

3. Fedora 9 is based on 2.6.25 which means that key RH kernel developers are aggressively working to get the feature and performance/scalability regressions vs. 2.6.18 & 22 fixed.

4. The kgdb patch will probably be merged at the start of the 2.6.26 cycle which means the delta vs. 2.6.25 kernel should be pretty manageable. This would be really valuable from an LTS ongoing perspective.

5. The RT patch will be better maintained (and smaller) against 2.6.25. (see #3)

6. Better virtualization and SELinux support (see #3).

Given the life-cycle of an LTS release (especially this one which will finally have a meaningful chance to enter the data center) these considerations are especially important.

Obviously 2.6.25 would have to be in addition to 2.6.24 for the Hardy 8.04 LTS release time-frame, but it does allow the aforementioned benefits to be propagated forward.

Taken from Ubuntu Brainstorm

So, if you are interested to try this new kernel on your ubuntu, please take note that if anything goes wrong, dont blame me or anyone as this is your decision to try this. By the way, take precautious step by not removing the standard hardy kernel which is 2.6.24 version to turn back if anything goes wrong.

Here we go~

• First of all, make sure your system has everything that a system need in order to compile a kernel. Please sudo apt-get the dependencies:

sudo apt-get install build-essential bin86 kernel-package libqt3-headers libqt3-mt-dev wget libncurses5 libncurses5-dev

• Then go into /usr/src directory

cd /usr/src

• Make yourself a root:

sudo -s

• Download the kernel from kernel.org and extract:

wget -c http://kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/v2.6/linux-2.6.25.tar.bz2 && tar -xvjf linux-2.6.25.tar.bz2

• Remove the link to linux directory, and make a new link to the new kernel:

rm -rf linux && ln -s /usr/src/linux-2.6.25 linux && cd /usr/src/linux

• NOTE: If you need to patch your kernel, please patch it now before we proceed to the next step.
• Now import the current kernel config:

cp /boot/config-`uname -r` .config && make oldconfig

• Configure the kernel (I will only cover my way of compiling, there is several ways to do this, but this is how i do it)

make menuconfig

• Now it's time for us to build our kernel.
  

make-kpkg clean

• And continue with:

make-kpkg --initrd --revision=386 kernel_image kernel_headers modules_image

• Note that you can chage *386 with any name you like such as "k7" or "686"... Now It will take about 2-3 hours to compile the kernel, and maybe longer time for a slow cpu. Meanwhile waiting for the kernel to compile, you can enjoy watching movie or anything else.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

• Now we need to install the .deb package to our Ubuntu:

cd .. && dpkg -i linux*2.6.25*.deb

• And after installed, you need to reboot (if you are using nvidia, you will probably need to reinstall the driver again in order to make it work)

You can always revert back to the old kernel if you think the 2.6.25 is buggy by selecting your old kernel from the GRUB after POST. Now we will have a faster system after reboot. Hopefully you wont get any trouble when compiling the kernel. So enjoy using a new 2.6.25 kernel on Ubuntu Hardy Heron.

PS:- Some people will have trouble with no soud when first booting the kernel. You have to enable alsa on the 'make menuconfig' step and also enable Intel HDA Sound even if your card isnt Intel. This will make your sound work.

Change Vmware Bridge Network Interface

I'm using vmware mostly to do my work with other operating system such as Windows and BSD(learning on how to use it). But I figure out I'm having some troubles on getting the network to work as I cant stick to one method to connect to the Internet. Which is sometime I used a wired connection(eth0) while mostly I'll use wireless(wlan0) to get into the internet.

I will have trouble to set my vmware to bridge to the network if i'm changing interface. As usual, vmware will make eth0 as a default interface to bridge with. And you will encounter trouble to do the bridge if you are connected through wireless. So to change this according to your current internet interface, here is the tips:

• Edit the /etc/vmware/locations

sudo nano /etc/vmware/locations

• Change the interface from eth0 to wlan0 / wlan0 to eth0 (depends on your configuration.

locate the line with "answer VNET_0_INTERFACE eth0"
and change it to "answer VNET_o_INTERFACE wlan0"

• Then run the vmware. Your guest operating system will bridge using the new configuration. And the bridge will took the new interface wet by you to gain connection.

There is another way to solve this problem which is running "vmware-config.pl", and reconfigure your vmware. But this method will not work on certain machine. So my tutorial is the other way to solve the problem.

Ubuntu: Vmware Server On Hardy Heron

I've been looking for vmware on the repository for the whole day but could find it. There are still no vmware on hardy repo for sure. It's still not supported on Hardy. So here is a few tips on how to setup VMWARE:

• Download the source from http://www.vmware.com/download/server/
• Download the patch from Patch
• Now we could start installing the VMware on our new Hardy Heron.
• 1st Step: Extract the .tar file and go to the directory.

tar xvf VMware-server-1.0.4-56528.tar.gz
cd [Directory created when extract]

• 2nd Step: Run the installation.

sudo ./vmware-install.pl

• You will recieve an error like this. But that's normal.

include/asm/bitops_32.h:9:2: error: #error only can be included directly
make[2]: *** [/tmp/vmware-config2/vmmon-only/common/cpuid.o]
make[1]: *** [_module_/tmp/vmware-config2/vmmon-only] Error 2
make[1]: Leaving directory \`/usr/src/linux-headers-2.6.24-4-generic\’
make: *** [vmmon.ko] Error 2
make: Leaving directory \`/tmp/vmware-config2/vmmon-only\’
Unable to build the vmmon module.

• Then here come the patch to save your day.
• 3rd Step: Extract the patch and go to the directory.

tar xvf vmware-any-any-update115.tar
cd [directory created when extracting the patch]

• 4th Step: Run the runme.pl script and this will continue the installation and fix the previous problem.

sudo ./runme.pl

• Final Step: Now, we need to copy some files so that the vmware will run smooth without any problem.

sudo cp /usr/lib/libpng12.so.0 /usr/lib/vmware/lib/libpng12.so.0/
sudo cp /lib/libgcc_s.so.1 /usr/lib/vmware/lib/libgcc_s.so.1/

And now we have just finish installing our VMware Server edition on our brand new Ubuntu Hardy Heron. I hope this tutorial can help you to solve the problem.

Link to refer: aldeby | vmware | ubuntuforums.org

Ubuntu: Hardy Problem with Wireless (b43,iwl3945, madwifi etc)

I have been helping one of my fellow Ubuntu user from my neighbours country - Indonesia regarding his problem with Intel 3945 wireless chipset on Hardy Heron. Well, to be honest Intel chipset doesnt have any problem on the previous version of Ubuntu 7.10(Gutsy Gibbon). But the problem arise as in Hardy, the driver have change from ipw3945 to iwl3945.

Some people will have/encounter problems to setting up the intel chipset in order to make it work properly. Well, from my experience dealing with the problem(on helping my friend), there is a simple solution to this problem. There are several ways to solve this problem. And it will work on other chipset too including b43, madwifi and etc.

So here is the step to configure Intel 3945 Chipset on Ubuntu 8.04 Hardy Heron:

1. Open up terminal
2. Code : sudo gedit /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist
3. Edit : Add at the end of the file "blacklist ipw3945" then save and exit. (You could use any text editor you like. I'm using gedit so that it could be more newbie friendly)
4. Then you need to edit the rules. Type : sudo gedit /etc/udev/rules.d/70-persistent-net.rules
5. Then delete all lines related to wifi interface. Leave only line which define eth0 which refering to your wired interface(ethernet). Then save and exit.
6. Now we need to remove the modules: sudo rmmode iwl3945
7. And add the modules back: sudo modprobe iwl3945
8. Now to check either the wifi is working do: ifconfig
9. If you see a device called 'wlan0' and 'wmaster0' then it means your wireless is working. Please check your network manager applet for access point signal. But please make sure you do have access point nearby if not you wont see any signal in network manager.

So that's it. If you are using bcm43xx formerly on Gutsy, then change the iwl3945 to b43. And you'll see what i mean. I hope this will be helpful. If any problem occur, please leave me a message either by comments or emails. Thanks

Ubuntu: Epiphany For Ubuntu Hardy

I've upgraded from Gutsy to Hardy two days ago with not much problem occurs during the installation process. One of the main features in Hardy is Firefox 3 beta 5 which is the default Internet Browser in Hardy Release. Unfortunately, the Firefox 3 Beta 2 isn't in stable release yet which we could tell from it's version - 'BETA'

So from now until the Official/Stable release of Firefox 3, I would encourage Ubuntu users to use an alternatif lightweight browser which has been in Ubuntu Repositories for such a long time - Epiphany Browser. How to install Epiphany Browser? Just two steps:

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install epiphany-browser epiphany-extensions

This command will install Ephiphany Browser with an extension for gnome. Adds extra features to GNOME’s Epiphany web browser, including action, adblocking, auto-reload, auto-scroller, console, extensions manager, find, greasemonkey, javaconsole, mouse gestures, move tabs between windows, python-console, pushscroller, rss extension, error viewer and validator, certificate viewer, sidebar, smart bookmarks, page info, CSS Stylesheet, favicon.ico, tab states and a GNOME Dashboard interface.

Epiphany Web Browser

How to install Flash Plugin?

Simple, Flash plugin can be setup the same way as Firefox setup. If you would like to manual install the flash plugin, then you could download the flash installer at flash website and have it installed. But for a newbie, I will advise them to learn and use 'apt' service as much as they can.

Here is some tips on Epiphany Browser:

• Quick search if your home page is not a search engine page : CTRL-L, enter keywords in the URL area, and ‘Search the Web’. By default, epiphany performs a Google search. If you wish to change the search engine, change the keyword.url in about:config
• To open a link or a bookmark in a new tab, click with the mouse middle button after enabling /apps/epiphany/general/middle_click_open_url in gconf-editor
• 
  
To enable the spell checker, set layout.spellcheckDefault to 1 in about:config
• Language for spell checking is set in spellchecker.dictionary in about:config. “en_US” for US English, and “fr” for French. Sorry, I have not checked other languages
• My favorite extensions : Ad Blocker, News Feed Subscription, Smart Bookmarks, Tab GroupsEnter about:epiphany in the URL area, and enjoy ;-)
• To enable smooth scrolling, go to about:config and set general.smoothScroll to true

I hope You will enjoy using epiphany as I do right now, i'll wait for the Firefox 3 release to have another try with firefox. Till then, epiphany will be my default browser :)

Ubuntu: '.3gp' Files Won't Output Sound on Hardy Heron

I upgraded from Gutsy to Hardy couple of days ago, and it started good except for some minor problem which I always had from the previos version. Thank god my wireless got no problem at all to load on startup using b43 firmware driver which is still in experimental version during Hardy first boot.

But unluckily, I found out that VLC do not output any sound on .3gp files on hardy. I wonder what's the problem causing VLC to stop output the video's sound. So I open up terminal and try running the video by using terminal to look at the error message. Here is the error I got:

VLC media player 0.8.6e Janus
[00000366] pulse audio output error: Failed to connect to server: Connection refused
[00000366] pulse audio output error: Pulse initialization failed

So, obviously the problem is with the Pulse audio plugin which is being introduce into hardy release. I cannot find a better way to solve this problem at the moment.

For, all Hardy user who having the same problem may try to play your 3gp files by using realplayer 11 which can be download here. Realplayer 11 is the latest release from Realplayer.

How to install? First you need to "chmod +x RealPlayer11GOLD.bin" and then just run it with "./RealPlayer11GOLD.bin". And it will install on the default folder in /opt/real/realplayer/ . I hope this will solve your problem.

Ubuntu: ATI crash on hardy upgrade.

I just upgraded from gusty to hardy heron about 3 minutes ago. And I reboot my machine and hoping that my new hardy heron will load smoothly without any errors. And suddenly, my boot time took forever to load the login screen :(