Make Tech Easier » Linux

Mobile Media Converter: A Cross-platform No-Brainer Media Converter

Damien — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 13:39:29 +0000

Fancy a media converter that works in all Operating Systems and supports most of the widely used multimedia format? Look no further, Mobile Media Converter could just be the one for you.

The Mobile Media Converter (MMC) is a free video and audio converter for converting between popular desktop media formats like MP3, Windows Media Audio (wma), Ogg Vorbis Audio (ogg), Wave Audio (wav), MPEG video, AVI, Windows Media Video (wmv), Flash Video (flv), QuickTime Video (mov) and commonly used mobile devices/phones formats like AMR audio (amr) and 3GP video. iPod/iPhone and PSP compatible MP4 video are also supported.

Simple UI, great functionality

One thing that I like about MMC is that it is simple in design and does not contain any extra stuffs to misled its users. Regardless you are using Windows, Linux or Mac, you will get the same interface throughout. There is a +/- button for you to add/remove file(s), a button to select the output destination, a dropdown bar to select the output format and a Convert button to start the conversion. That’s it.

Its simple design is by no mean an indication of a lack of functionality. On the contrast, it is packed with plenty of features that you will find it useful.

Supports a variety of media formats

Be it video or audio formats, MMC has covered it all. It is able to convert between the commonly used formats, such as OGG, MP3, WMA, WMV, MP4 WAV, AVI etc. Unless you are using a device that required a special codec, MMC should have you covered.

Batch conversion

MMC supports batch conversion of videos/audios. Simply add a bunch of videos/songs to the application and it will batch convert them and save them all in the same folder.

Advance setting

Most of the time, you won’t have need for this, but if you are keen to change the output bitrate, codec, channel, size etc, then this is the place to go to.

Youtube downloader

We have previously covered several Youtube downloader desktop apps. Here’s another one to add to your collection.

The best part about this is that after downloading the Youtube video, you can convert it to the format that you want, or just to extract the mp3 track in the video. This is great if you just want to get the music out of the video.

Trim/crop

If you think that is all, then you are wrong. MMC also allows you to trim/crop your video before converting. One thing though, this functionality is hidden on its interface and you have to perform extra steps to edit the video.

On the Video entry, right click your mouse. You should now see the options to Trim/Crop. The Trim function is for you to determine the start and end length of the converted video while the Crop feature allows you to change the aspect ratio of the video.

Suggestions for Improvement

One thing that I found lacking is the ability to stop the operation once the conversion start. While testing this out, I accidentally clicked the Convert button and the conversion starts without showing a prompt. Neither does it provide a Cancel button for me to stop the operation. I have two choices: wait for 30 minutes for the conversion to complete or to kill the application completely. I choose the latter. It will be great if it stop the operation in mid-way.

Another thing that is lacking is the support for subtitle files. For converting movie to iPhone format, until it supports adding of subtitle files to the video, I will still stick with my XviD4PSP . Other than that, this is one of the best media converter that I have come across so far.

What do you think?

Image credit: Houkwing

Mobile Media Converter

Mobile Media Converter: A Cross-platform No-Brainer Media Converter originally published on Make Tech Easier (RSS)

Mastering Grub 2 The Easy Way

Joshua Price — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 13:38:33 +0000

If you’re running Linux, there’s a good chance your distro of choice uses Grub as the default bootloader. Grub has served well for many years, but it’s beginning to show its age. As with all software, it doesn’t take long before the latest-and-greatest becomes old-and-haggard. Features have been piling up in Grub without much thought going into revamping the core program. Eventually, this lead to a messy patchwork that no one really wanted to maintain. At this point, Grub2 was born. It’s a complete rewrite from the ground up using a completely redesigned structure. This new Grub gives us powerful features like conditional statements (if/then, etc), intelligent upgrades, and some greatly improved graphics.

Getting Grub2

Currently, if you want to use Grub2, your best bet is to run Ubuntu 9.10 (Karmic Koala). If you just want to toy around and see what it can do without risking your system, I’d suggest running it inside a virtual machine as described here, but of course with Ubuntu 9.10.

menu.lst/grub.cfg

If you’ve messed with the original Grub (now called Grub legacy), you doubtless know all about menu.lst. That was the file where Grub legacy stored pretty much everything. In Grub2, the closest equivalent is grub.cfg, also located in /boot/grub. One of the most important differences, however, is that you should not edit the grub.cfg file directly. Some of you may be thinking “Ha! Warnings like that are for n00bs!”. Well the reason for this rule is not because the developers don’t think you’re l33t enough, it’s because that file is auto-generated by Grub2 and will be overwritten without warning as a result of things like kernel upgrades.

Any time the update-grub command is run, Grub2 will read its various config files and use their contents to generate grub.cfg. These files are dealt with individually below.

/etc/default/grub

Many of Grub’s options that used to be in menu.lst are now here. This includes things like whether or not to display the Grub menu, and how long to wait before timeout. This screenshot is the default config in Ubuntu 9.10, and is set to hide the Grub menu, disable “recovery mode” options, and instruct the kernel to include a splash screen.

By the way, to force Grub 2 to show the menu on boot just hold down the Shift key while Grub is starting.

/etc/grub.d/

This is where things really begin to differ from Grub legacy. Where you’d normally enter all your boot options in the menu.lst file, Grub 2 takes a very different approach. The /etc/grub.d/ directory contains individual files, each representing a option for the boot menu. The following shows the files contained in the default install.

While it’s certainly a lot different than Grub legacy, you may notice something familiar about that folder. It’s set up in a way very similar to the standard Linux startup system, SysV Init. Each of the files shown is a shell script that executes in order. Order is determined by the numbers at the start of each filename, so the script in 00_header will always run before, say, 05_debian_theme.

/etc/grub.d/40_custom

Chances are, if you need to edit your boot menu, this is the file you’re looking for. This is where you add your custom entries to the menu. Since this is the last numbered file in the grub.d directory (as explained in the section above), any entries you place in this file will show up at the end of the boot menu.

By default, the 40_custom file is mostly empty. In this example, I’ve added a new menu entry.

Splash Images

You can easily download the Grub 2 splash pack in Ubuntu with:

sudo apt-get install grub2-splashimages

When it’s done, all the images will be stores as TGA files in /usr/share/images/grub/.

The file that specifies what splash image to use on boot is the 05_debian_theme file we saw earlier. So to set our new custom splash, we want to open /etc/grub.d/05_debian_theme as root in whatever text editor you prefer. Look for a line similar to the highlighted one in the example below,

And change the filename to whichever splash image you prefer. Make certain the path points to the /usr/share/images/grub/ directory. Some older versions default to /usr/share/images/desktop-base/ and that’s not what we want.

Applying changes

As you may remember from the beginning of this guide, the grub.cfg file is auto-generated from the other config files we’ve covered. When you’ve made changes to those files, you’ve got to tell Grub to read them and pull together a new config file. To do that, simply run the following command as root:

update-grub

Once it’s complete, reboot your computer (or virtual machine) to see the results. Don’t forget to hold Shift while booting, if your menu is still set to Hidden.

Mastering Grub 2 The Easy Way originally published on Make Tech Easier (RSS)

Tablet Note-taking Made Easy with Xournal

Tavis J. Hampton — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 13:15:48 +0000

Every tablet needs a good writing application –something to take notes, make annotations, and maybe even scribble a quick sketch. Xournal is a GTK-based program that does just that. It works with Linux-compatible desktop graphics tablets, tablet PCs, and maemo-based handheld devices (such as the soon-to-be released Nokia N900). Xournal is available in many distribution repositories, or you can download the source code from their website.

Features

By default, Xournal presents you with a notebook background. You can change that to a blank page, a a plain ruled page, or a graphing grid. To do this, click the “Journal” menu, then “Paper Style”, and then choose the one you like. To change the paper color, click “Journal” and then “Paper Color”.

There are several input styles:

1. Pen – basic handwriting tool.
2. Eraser – to remove writing.
3. Highlighter – for highlighting text.
4. Text – to type in regular print.
5. Ruler – to draw straight lines.

Xournal also has support for graphics tablet features, such as pressure sensitivity and automatic eraser detection. All of these features can be configured under the “Options” menu. To scroll through multiple pages, click “View” and “Continuous”, and to create a new page, click the up arrow in the bottom left corner, next to the page number.

Background Selection

Xournal has another feature which lets you select any background you want, rather than the four it provides. Start with a new document and:

1. Click “File” and “New”.
2. Click the “Journal” menu.
3. Click “Load background”.
4. Select a background (preferably a wallpaper or scanned document that will cover the entire page).

Now, you can write directly on that new background. If you select “background screenshot” instead, it will show your desktop. Click on whatever you want to take a screenshot of, and it will import a picture of it into Xournal.

PDF Annotations

One very useful Xournal tool is its PDF annotation capabilities. To annotate a PDF:

1. Click File
2. Click Annotate PDF
3. Choose a PDF file.
4. Use the pen tool, highlighter, or ruler to make annotations.

With a graphics tablet, annotating becomes just like editing a physical document on your desk. The advantage is the undo feature. A simple Ctrl-Z will take you back to the last time you lifted the pen. When you are finished with it, you can export it back to PDF format.

Selection Rectangle

The selection rectangle gives you the power to move something even after it has been drawn, written, or typed. For example, you might have circled some text but then realized that the circle was not quite where you wanted it. Click the “selection rectangle” button and then draw a rectangle completely around the part you wish to move. You will then be able to drag it to a new location. It will let you select as many objects as you want, as long as they are completely inside the selection rectangle.

Xournal is easy to setup and use, and best of all, it is free software. With Xournal in your computing arsenal, nothing will be safe from your pen.

Tablet Note-taking Made Easy with Xournal originally published on Make Tech Easier (RSS)

How to Play Classic Console Games in Linux

Joshua Price — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 13:07:37 +0000

If you’re reading this, there’s a good chance you grew up with classic video game consoles like the NES and Sega Genesis. For years Windows users have been enjoying high quality game emulation software, but many of the Linux options have been buggy or incomplete. It’s time to take a look at where things stand when it comes to playing console games in Linux. Here at MakeTechEasier, we’ve touched on console game emulation here and there, but never done a guide covering multiple systems. Today, we’ll show you how to run games for NES, SNES, Genesis, original Playstation, and Dreamcast.

Before we begin, it’s important to note one thing right up front – many console manufacturers do not look kindly on emulation, and some emulators require proprietary software (like the game system BIOS) in order to run. Because of the legal grey area occupied by some of this software, there may be some files or programs for which MTE cannot provide links, such as the actual game files (commonly called ROMS).

NES – GFCEU

We’ll begin with the system that brought video games into many of our homes for the first time, the Nintendo Entertainment System. NES emulators are often the easiest to find, install, and run. In my searching for quality NES emulators for Linux, I’ve found GFCEU to be my favorite.

Installation – It’s available in the standard Ubuntu repositories, so it can be installed easily with apt-get/aptitude/Synaptic, or with the command below:

sudo apt-get install gfceu

It is a graphical frontend for the console-based NES emulator FCEU, so if your distro does not have GFCEU in the standard repositories, look for FCEU to get the same capability.

SNES – SNES9Express

We’ve covered the ZSNES emulator before, so this time we’ll check out my personal favorite, SNES9Express. Like GFCEU above, this is a graphical frontend to a console emulator, in this case SNES9X.

Installation - Like the NES emulators above, both the graphical frontend (SNES9Express) and the emulator itself (SNES9X) are available in Ubuntu’s repositories, so they can be installed easily with apt-get/aptitude/Synaptic like most other software.

Genesis – Gens/GS

Gens/GS is a fork of the popular Gens Genesis emulator. Its goal is to combine the various forks of Gens into one clean, functional program. It can support a wide variety of games and runs on both Linux and Windows, but unfortunately does not (yet) fully support 64 bit processors.

Image by SonicRetro

Installation - You can download Gens/GS for Ubuntu (32 bit only) and Windows here.

Playstation – pSX

Since we’ve covered pSX in detail before in this article, I wont go into a lot of detail here. pSX allows you to play many original Playstation games from your Linux PC. It does, however, have the same drawback as Gens/GS in that it does not currently support 64 bit environments.

Installation - covered in detail here.

Dreamcast – LXDream

Running Dreamcast games on PC requires a fairly fast machine. My Core 2 Duo with Intel graphics wasn’t quite up to the task, so LXDream only gets about 20% native speed for me. On the plus side, 64 bit CPUs are fully supported. You will need the Dreamcast system BIOS to run any games, and that’s one of those files you’ll have to find on your own.

The only problem I had with LXDream was that it didn’t have any controls configured by default. Fortunately, setting up the keyboard is as simple as opening Settings > Controllers and choosing Properties on Sega Controller section.

Installation - Source and binaries for Mac OSX and Linux can be found here. The Debian package installed perfectly on my Ubuntu desktop.

If you know any other high quality console game emulators for Linux, let us know in the comments.

How to Play Classic Console Games in Linux originally published on Make Tech Easier (RSS)

Using Kate As a Web Editor

Tavis J. Hampton — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 13:03:59 +0000

There are many applications out there that provide project-based web development tools and very feature-rich interfaces, but sometimes all you really need is a good text editor. For those times, there are few editors that can stand up to the KDE powerhouse called Kate.

Kate is a multi-document interface (MDI) text editor, available for both KDE 3 and 4. It runs on multiple Linux and Unix-like platforms, Mac OS X, and Windows. It also includes a component called KatePart, which runs inside numerous other KDE applications, including Quanta+ (on KDE 3 only), KWrite, Konqueror, and Kdevelop. Kate provides syntax highlighting for over 120 text formats, making it perfect for whatever programming language you choose.

HTML Editing

Kate will highlight HTML markup and underline errors, particularly when you forget to close a tag. It will also group text within tags, so that you can see what content is where. It will display folding markers, small arrows on the side, that you can use to collapse or expand a tag and its contents. To toggle folding markers, press F9. For that reason, if you are coding in XHTML, make sure to use the XML highlighting rather than HTML. It will then appropriately mark single tags that are not closed with arrows.

To enable XML highlighting:

1. Click Tools in the main menu
2. Navigate to “Highlighting”, “Markup”, and finally to “XML”.

You can also do the same for PHP and other web scripting languages. Kate will generally highlight all of these, so you can usually leave the settings at the default.

Kate includes a dynamic word wrap feature, useful for documents with large amounts of text. Toggle it on or off with F10. Press F11 to toggle line numbers, and you will notice that a wrapped line has symbols indicating that it is still part of the previous line.

Multiple Documents

With Kate, you can edit multiple documents at once. The left-hand column will display the list of currently opened files, and you can move through them by clicking on the file you want to edit, by clicking the forward or back buttons, or by holding the Alt key and pressing the left or right arrow. Control+S will save your current document, and Control+L will save all open documents.

Sessions

Kate has a handy feature called “Sessions” that allows you to pick up work right where you left off the last time you were editing. For example, you might have eight documents for a particular project. Rather than having to open each document one at a time every time you want to work on them, you can save a Kate session that will automatically open those documents when activated. To save a session:

1. Click Sessions
2. Click Save As…
3. Give your session a name.

The next time you want to return to that project, just open the session you saved.

Remote Editing

There are times when you need to edit a document quickly right on the server. While you could SSH into the server and use whatever text editor is available from the command line, you will miss some of the many benefits of Kate. Furthermore, if you have a shared hosting account, you might not even have access to SSH. With Kate, you can open a document live on the server via FTP, SFTP, and any other protocol supported by KDE. To accomplish this, do the following:

1. Login to your web server using the normal method. You can use Dolphin or Konqueror.
2. Navigate to the folder containing the file you want to edit.
3. Right click on the file and open it with Kate.
4. Repeat those steps for multiple files if necessary.

Find

Kate’s find feature is very useful with long documents. To activate it, press Control-F. It will open a dialog at the bottom of the window. You can find each instance individually and scroll through the results with the “Next” and “Previous” buttons, or click “Options” and “Highlight all” to see all results highlighted at once.

Click the arrow on the far right to expand the find dialog further, and it will add a “replace” feature. With it you can find a tag or piece of content and replace every instance of it with something else or nothing at all. Kate will also remember your searches so that you can perform them again by pressing the down arrow on the right side of the search box.

I have only touched the surface of the many features available in Kate. The best way to find out exactly what Kate can offer you is to try it out for yourself. I highly recommend it, not only for KDE users, but for anyone. Kate is available through any Linux distribution that offers KDE.

Using Kate As a Web Editor originally published on Make Tech Easier (RSS)

Amaya: A Simple, Yet Useful Alternative to Dreamweaver

Shevonne — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 13:00:10 +0000

While on a project, where money was scarce, we were scrambling around looking for a free or open source HTML editor that can provide us the same functionality as Adobe Dreamweaver. During my analysis of the different HTML editor out there, I came across Amaya. What intrigued me about it was that it was created by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C). As someone who loves Dreamweaver, I thought that I would never find something comparable to it that was free (open source), but I was wrong.

Amaya is an open-source HTML editor created by the W3C. If you don’t already know, W3C is an international community that develops Web standards. It was founded by Tim Berners-Lee, who is credited as inventing the World Wide Web. In 1998, Amaya was invented. Since then, there have been various releases that have given more functionality to Amaya.

Amaya is the most user-friendly HTML editor that I have come across. One of its features that is very similar to Dreamweaver is that you are able to split the screen to view the visual editor and the HTML code. In this way, you are able to code while seeing the changes, or you can do the other way around. It’s a great way to learn HTML, if you don’t know already. On the sidebar, you are able to easily modify the HTML, like in Adobe Dreamweaver. Different profiles can change the way they see the sidebar displayed.

Another great feature is the CSS functionality. With the press of a button, you are able to create a CSS stylesheet. You do not have to know CSS in order to create one, which is great for people trying to learn CSS and/or if you are trying to design a stylesheet quickly. This is a great way to have your site’s formatting and style be in a different file than the HTML code. It provides a way to add flexibilty to your web site/blog. It also has a debugger to check your code for errors.

One good thing about Amaya is that it allows five different user editing profiles, so if someone wants to change the behavior of the Amaya tool, he/she can have his/her own profile that is different from someone else. In addition, Amaya runs on Linux, Mac, and/or PC, so regardless which OS you are using, you will be able to use Amaya for your coding project.

What’s can be improved on?

Amaya is a quick and neat HTMl editor. I couldn’t find any issues, except that it needs to keep up with the new technologies. For instance, it isn’t made to build smartphones apps, which I saw in other free HTML editors. It also doesn’t support Ajax, which is being used more and more.

When it comes to features, Amaya is definitely not on par with Dreamweaver, but if you are looking for a free, simple, and useful HTML editor, then Amaya is a good candidate.

Have you use Amaya before? Tell us what you like/dislike about it.

Amaya: A Simple, Yet Useful Alternative to Dreamweaver originally published on Make Tech Easier (RSS)

TonidoPlug: Your Personal Cloud Server in a Plug

Damien — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 23:47:39 +0000

Putting all your stuffs and confidential data on the cloud may seems like a good idea as it allows you to access to them anytime, anywhere. However, it can become a totally bad decision when the security of the cloud server is compromised or the third party providers wind up their services and all your data gone down with them. When such things happen, you might wonder why you have not heard of Tonido earlier.

Tonido is a free software that turns your desktop into a personal server and allows you to access and share your files, media, calendar and apps from everywhere. Be it Windows, Mac or Linux, you simply install the software and have your own personal cloud server up and running in no time. Forget all the complicated stuffs you have heard about creating your own server. There are no technical skills required to set up and run Tonido. The best thing is – all the data resides in your own computer and there is no need to worry about security or even data loss (unless your own computer crashes).

Introducing TonidoPlug

On the other hand, if all your important data resides on your external backup drive and you wish to have your own cloud server running at all times without having to turn on your computer everytime, then TonidoPlug is the one for you.

TonidoPlug is the hardware version of Tonido. It is a tiny, low power, low cost home server and NAS device powered by Tonido software. It comes with its own RAM and CPU (and preinstalled with Ubuntu). All you need to do is to plug it into the power socket and there you are, a server ready at your beckoning. It integrates nicely with all the features found in the Tonido software and allows you to access your files, music, pictures from anywhere.

Setting up TonidoPlug

Once you have connected up the respective cables (there are only 3 cables that you need to connect: the power cable, LAN cable and the USB cable), power it up. On any computer that are linked to the home network, go to the URL: http://tonidoplug.com/ip. This will detect your Tonido Plug. In some cases where it doesn’t detect, you can enter the MAC address (at the back of the plug) to get it identified by the network.

Once the plug is detected, you will have to create a new profile for the Tonido. Those who already have an existing profile can use this method to import them into the Plug.

In the dashboard, you will find the exact same interface as the Tonido. The software available in TonidoPlug is as follow:

Many of these apps should be familiar to already Tonido users, (Jukebox, Photos, Search, Thots, Workspace). The newer apps are WebsharePro, Torrent, Explorer and Plug Admin.

Here’s a quick summary of these applications.

WebsharePro: All the power of Tonido Webshare, plus the ability to upload, setting upload quotas for users, zip downloads, viewing currently downloading lists, change thumbnail and photo slide show image size
Torrent: Download Torrent files to your plug and control torrents via your web browser from anywhere
Explorer: Web based File manager and browser that allows common file operations like rename, delete, copy files and folders and even uploads
Plug Admin: Manage your TonidoPlug hardware, recover Tonido Profile passwords, Manage attached USB drives, Share USB drives over the network for access, Monitor CPU loads etc

If you are not in your own home networks, you can also connect to your TonidoPlug via the public URL: http://yourprofilename.tonido.com:10001.

In addition, TonidoPlug is also a DLNA device, which means you are able to connect to your PS3, Xbox, or even XBMC software and stream music over the cloud.

The Tonido software is free to download and use, but the TonidoPlug comes at a price of $99.

Considering that most Web servers with the same hardware spec as the TonidoPlug can easily cost you up to $40-50 per month, at a mere price of $99, TonidoPlug is really a great bargain; not to mention the unlimited amount of storage device you can attach to it and the security issue that you never have to worry about. This is really a no-brainer deal.

Note 1: Thanks to Venkat for sending in a test unit for review and providing a prompt support for all my doubts.
Note 2: MakeTechEasier is not affiliated in any way to CodeLathe, the company behind TonidoPlug, nor do we benefit from any sale of TonidoPlug generated from this article.

TonidoPlug: Your Personal Cloud Server in a Plug originally published on Make Tech Easier (RSS)

5 System Administration Tools for KDE

Tavis J. Hampton — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 12:54:12 +0000

Keeping any computer system running can be some work. It would be nice if we never had to do any type of maintenance or troubleshooting, but no operating system has reached that point. Many desktop Linux users have server administration experience and are quite comfortable dropping to the command line and tinkering with their system. Not only do they know how to do this, it is the method that makes them comfortable.

For those users who use a desktop operating system and expect a graphical experience, opening a terminal window is not a normal thing to do. That does not mean they are incapable of learning it. They are just more comfortable with a visual interface.

There are many control panel tools and settings dialogs in KDE that make it easier for graphical-minded users to get things done. Here are five stand-alone applications that will help you stay informed about your computer’s status and health.

1. KInfoCenter

It is just what it says. It provides users with information about their systems. There are categories for graphics cards, PCI devices, memory, CPU, and many others. If you are ever unsure about what devices you have or what system settings you currently have, KInfoCenter is a good place to start.

2. KDiskFree

This is a very useful tool for those of us who manage to fill up our hard drives rather quickly. You can monitor disk usage on both fixed drives and currently connected removable ones.

3. KDE Partition Manager

Need to format a drive, resize a partition, or create a swap partition? KDE Partition Manager can do it all. It depends on the trusted disk “Parted” libraries, so users can know they are getting reliable results

4. KSystemLog

Linux documents every major occurrence on your system. You just have to know where to look for that documentation. For convenience, KSystemLog will collect that information for you and display it in a window, all with the click of a button. KSystemLog monitors your log files, updating them periodically. It currently supports system log, kernel log, authentication log, daemons’ logs, CUPS (printer) log, X.org log, and others.

5. Ksysguard

KDE 4 includes a handy little task manager that you can access by pressing Control+Escape or by clicking the button on Krunner. For those of us who used KDE 3, however, we need something a little more robust. Ksysguard monitors processes, provides stats, and includes graphs, updated in real time. Processes and programs can be monitored, filtered, and killed, when necessary. As with previous versions, users can add new tabs, placing customized sensors on each tab. Sensors include CPU cores, uptime, partition usage, log files, memory, and much more.

There are many others tools that can make your Linux experience easier. If you have a favorite, feel free to post it in the comments. For me, after having worked as a Linux system admin for many years, I still occasionally love to open up Konsole and hack away the command line.

5 System Administration Tools for KDE originally published on Make Tech Easier (RSS)

Lancelot: An Alternative KDE Menu

Tavis J. Hampton — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 12:06:40 +0000

Many KDE 3 users swear by the K menu and would dare anyone to challenge it with something better. Fortunately for those people, KDE 4 retained that menu version as an option. For the rest of us, there are a couple of more robust menus that offer a variety of features. Lancelot is a third-party menu that has now entered into the KDE fold. It is the one I use, and many others have found it pretty useful. In this post, I will present to you some of Lancelot’s features so that you can decide if it is right for you.

Setup

Lancelot is now part of KDE and should be available for installation in any KDE-based distribution (or distributions with the option for full KDE installation). To enable it:

1. Right click on the desktop or panel and click “Unlock Widgets”.
2. Right click on your current menu and click “Remove…”
3. Right click on the desktop and click “Add Widgets”.
4. Drag the Lancelot widget onto the panel.

You will see another widget called “Lancelot Part”, but leave that one alone for now. Like most panel widgets, you can configure it by right-clicking on the icon and clicking “Lancelot Launcher Settings”. “Show categories…” will display a button for each Lancelot category. “Show only menu launcher icon” does just what it says.

One unique feature of Lancelot is the “No-click activation”, which allows you to navigate through the menu without clicking the mouse button. It is in the settings under “Menu” and the “General” tab. To activate an item, move your mouse pointer over the little arrow that appears when you highlight it. In my case, there is apparently something about clicking that feels more manly, so I disabled the “No-click”.

Lancelot Part

I had a very good reason for telling you to leave the Lancelot Part alone. If you were to drag it from the “Add Widgets” dialog, you would find that it does nothing. Any section within a Lancelot category can become a widget, utilizing Lancelot Part. For example, make sure that your widgets are unlocked, and then try dragging the “Places” section from the “Computer” category onto an open area of your desktop. You will now have a handy shortcut menu for all of your bookmarked places.

You can do the same with any of the Lancelot categories. You can also add multiple sections to one Lancelot Part. Just drag a second section onto the current one you just made. It is resizeable and has some configuration settings. In addition, any folder can be made into a Lancelot Part simply by dragging it to the desktop.

Lancelot Search

Lancelot is integrated with Krunner. That means anything the user can search for in Krunner can also be found in Lancelot. That includes applications, nepomuk tags, indexed documents, contacts, bookmarks, and file folders. It will also perform numerous Krunner functions such as the calculator and unit convertor.

Lancelot works very well for those users who like a lot of functionality, and it delievers on its promises. If you are the type who prefers simplicity, however, Lancelot is not for you. The myriad of categories and menu columns can be daunting. Furthermore, I have noticed a slight delay in opening the menu on slower machines, so those of you on netbooks and low-powered desktops will probably prefer a more minimal menu. On my desktop, I enjoy Lancelot in its full glory, and it integrates nicely with KDE’s “Air” Plasma theme. I recommend you give it a try.

Lancelot: An Alternative KDE Menu originally published on Make Tech Easier (RSS)

Preview of Kubuntu 9.10 Karmic Koala

Tavis J. Hampton — Mon, 19 Oct 2009 12:01:35 +0000

The release of the newest version of Ubuntu is only 10 days away. Many sites, including MakeTechEasier have covered its pending arrival and given you a glimpse of the Beta version. Today we are going to take a look at Kubuntu, the KDE-based version of Ubuntu.

Installation

As with previous Kubuntu versions, you can install it from the desktop of the running live CD. The interface for the installation now follows KDE 4’s Oxygen Air theme and has new graphical representations of several options.

Booting and Login

Booting is faster than ever, and the new KDE Air theme login window is the default.

KDE 4.3

If you have been following my weekly posts, you already know about many of the features new in KDE 4.3. While it has been available in the 9.04 Jaunty backport repositories for some time, it will now be the default KDE version with 9.10. Just to recap, here are some of the features new with KDE 4.3:

New Krunner features and layout

New desktop effects, including the slide back feature
New KDE games, including an Egyptian mummy theme
New system tray that includes an improved notification system
Several new plasma widgets, including one for Google Calendar

OpenOffice.org Integration

In previous versions, OpenOffice integrated with KDE 3 themes or not at all. Now, with OpenOffice.org 3.1, it is well-integrated with KDE 4 widgets and themes.

K3b

One of KDE’s most universally loved applications was one of the last to be ported to KDE 4. Kubuntu includes an early version of K3b that is fully KDE4-based. K3b is a CD and DVD burning program. It is not clear how stable this version is, and I did not have any CDs to test it.

Amarok and Codecs

Kubuntu has long suffered from the codec discrimination that nearly all Linux distributions have endured. Proprietary codecs that cannot be packaged with a free operating system have often left users disgruntled, sometimes even blaming the distribution developers. It has always been relatively easy to install codecs with Kubuntu, but now, starting Amarok will give you a notice that you may want to install certain additional software packages. Check the ones you want and then click “Install Selected“. This is all processed through the new update notifier, which is integrated with Kpackagekit.

Kpackagekit

This is the application installation and management software for Kubuntu. Like its predecessor Adept and the GTK version Synaptic, Kpackagekit relies on apt-get as a backend and uses the repositories listed in Apt’s sources. In Karmic, installation is even easier, and it is fully integrated with the update system and KDE’s notification system.

USB Startup Disk

Kubuntu provides an easy-to-us KDE-based program to create a Kubuntu startup disk.

Web Browser

Kubuntu has always been about options. In fact, the very existence of Kubuntu could be considered an Ubuntu option for a KDE-based distribution. Konqueror is still the default web browser for the latest Kubuntu, but the developers have added some options. For those that want a slim, lightweight, Webkit-based browser, Arora is now in the official repositories. For those die-hard Firefox fans, Kubuntu now includes a handy installation program. When you click “Firefox installation” in the “Internet” menu, you are presented with an installation screen.

Overall, Karmic Koala looks more polished than any previous Kubuntu version and probably any other KDE-based distribution to date. Nevertheless, it is still in Beta at least for another week, and an honest review will have to wait. With this preview, however, you have a glimpse of what is on the horizon.

Preview of Kubuntu 9.10 Karmic Koala originally published on Make Tech Easier (RSS)

Linux: Access 100+ Games Instantly With DJL

Damien — Sat, 17 Oct 2009 12:13:54 +0000

(Update: The site was up and running when this post was published, but now it seems that it is down for unknown reason.)

(Update: The site is up and running again.)

For those who always feel that gaming is not suitable in Linux OS and it is always an hassle to install and get games to run in Linux platform, then DJL will definitely change the way you think.

Djl is an open-source (GPL licensed) game manager written in Python 2.5 for the GNU/Linux Operating Systems. In short, it is an application that allows you to install/uninstall/manage your games easily. With Djl, you can browse through its repository of 100+ games and install the game you want with a simple click. No longer do you need to worry about game dependencies and all the command lines.

Installation

Download djl installer script. Extract it to your Home folder.

Open a terminal, Install the dependencies

sudo apt-get install python-qt4

Change the file permission

chmod +x ~/djl/djl.sh

Run the scripts

sh ~/djl/djl.sh

Configuration

At the first run, the configuration window will appear. Here is where you can configure the settings such as the installation directory, default browser etc.

Once you are done with the configuration, click Save and it will bring you to the main screen of DJL.

Running DJL

Once you are at the main screen, this is where the fun comes in. In the Repository tab, you can find all the games available in the DJL repository. There are currently about 120 games in the repository and new games are added regularly.

One thing that I like about the interface is that it is well organized. You can even filter the games by the game types and game license.

When you have found the game you like, simply click Install and DJL will take care of the rest.

As soon as the installation is completed, you will find an entry in the Game tab where you can click to start playing.

Plugins

Even though it is a simple game manager, DJL allows its users to install plugins to increase its functionality. While I have no use for most of the plugins, it is good to know that such stuffs exist. Plugins such as the Unreal Tournament 2004 stats could be useful for Unreal fans.

If you are not a gamer, or that you are contented with just playing with Gnometrics, then this is not for you. Other than that, this is really an awesome piece of software.

Linux: Access 100+ Games Instantly With DJL originally published on Make Tech Easier (RSS)

The Many Ways to Copy, Move, Rename, and Archive in KDE 4

Tavis J. Hampton — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 12:36:10 +0000

In my last post, I covered some of the features in Dolphin that I find particularly useful. In this post, you will learn about some very basic features that everyone uses, but you may not know all of the various easy methods of accomplishing them. In KDE, there are several ways to copy, move, rename, and archive files. Let’s take a look at a few them.

Copy/Move

KDE is a typical graphical interface, and lends itself to dragging and dropping. If you want to copy or move a file quickly, just drag it from one folder to another. With Dolphin, press F3 to bring up a split window, Control-N to open a whole new window, or Control-T to open a new tab. You can also drag files to any point in Dolphin’s breadcrumbs, to a folder on the Places panel, or to a Folderview on your desktop.You can also drag images from your web browser to a folder, if your browser supports it (both Konqueror and the latest Firefox do).

When you let go of the button after dragging, KDE gives you an options window: Move here, Copy here, Link here, Cancel. You will also notice shortcut keys listed beside each. If you hold the shortcut key while dragging a file, it will automatically choose the corresponding action. “Link here” creates a symbollic link to your file, rather than copying or moving it.

Another way to copy or move is to use shortcut keys. Simply select the files you want to copy and press Control-C, or select the files you want to move and press Control-X. Then, paste them in the new location, just like pasting text in a word processor, by pressing Control-V.

Another feature that many found useful in KDE 3 is the “Copy to…” context menu. To enable this:

1. Click “Settings” and “Configure Dolphin”
2. Click “General”
3. Click “Context Menu”
4. Check “Show ‘Copy To’ and ‘Move To’ commands.

Now, when you right click on a file, you will notice the “Copy To” option in the menu. Navigate through the menu to the place where you want to copy the file and click “copy here”. The same method will work for “Move To”.

Rename

There are three easy ways to rename a file:

1. Select the file and then click “File” and “Rename…”.
2. Right click on the file and click “Rename…”
3. Selet the file and press F2.

Batch Rename

There are times when you might need to rename multiple files at once. KDE makes it easy.

1. Select all the files you want to rename.
2. Press F2.
3. It will ask for a new name: “New name # (# will be replaced by ascending numbers).
4. Leave the “#” and enter the prefix you want for each filename.

Screenshots Tour of Ubuntu Karmic Koala 9.10 Beta

Damien — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 12:14:54 +0000

Yes, after six months down the road, it’s time to gear up for the newly born Ubuntu baby again. This time, Ubuntu 9.10, codenamed Karmic Koala, will be officially released on 29th Oct 2009. We, at MakeTechEasier have not been slacking around. With the release of the 9.10 beta, we have grabbed the LiveCD image, wipe our machines clean and installed the full version onto it. Now, let us present you the screenshots tour (and new features) review of Ubuntu Karmic Koala 9.10 beta.

New boot screen

The first thing that you will notice is the new splash screen. Unlike all previous splash screens that are in black, it comes with a brown gradient and white font color. It definitely looks much polished and refined than all all its previous reincarnations.

New login screen

No fancy stuff here. The login architecture was rewritten to provide a better integration with the system. Despite the simple design, one good thing here is that you don’t to type in your username anymore. Simply click on the respective user entry and type in the password.

New wallpaper

The default wallpaper is a plain mix of brown and orange color. Nothing fanciful here, but I do feel that it looks much more livelier than its previous iteration.

The best part is at the backend (Preferences -> Appearance) where you can choose from a great selection of newly added wallpapers.

One interesting wallpaper is the Cosmos, that is in fact a series of wallpapers packed into one. Once set, it will automatically change itself every 30 minutes, so you won’t be bored with the same old wallpaper.

There is even a link that brings you to the Gnome art to download more wallpapers.

For those who can’t wait for the release, you can also grab the wallpaper here (5.2MB).

New icon themes

A new icon theme – humanity was introduced in Karmic beta.

Existing user who wanted to install this icon theme can do so via the command:

sudo apt-get install humanity-icon-theme

Addition in the System tray

Long time Ubuntu users will notice the new addition in the System tray. The envelope icon now allows you to access your Empathy and all IM chat in real time. It also acts as a non-obstructive notification center for new incoming mails.

On your Profile button where you click to shut down your computer, you can also use it to update your IM status now.

New software – Ubuntu Software Center

There have been a lot of hearsay about the launching of the iPhone style AppStore for Ubuntu. Now, it is finally here – Ubuntu Software Center.

The Software Center is not a replacement of the Add/Remove app and Synaptic Package Manger as both of them are still available in Ubuntu Karmic. It is more of an alternative (a much better one) to those who wanted to install applications the easy way. In my opinion, this is by far the easiest and most informative way to source for a free software and get it running in your system.

When you open the Software Center, you don’t see all the apps. Instead, you will find various categories that the apps are grouped into.

Clicking on any of the category will display a list of apps in that category.

Once you found the app that you are interested in, click on it to go to the info page. Here is where you can find the description of the app and its screenshot. At the bottom is the Install button where you can click and get it install on your system.

Does this make you think of iPhone AppStore?

Empathy

For those who are crazy about Pidgin, you are going to be disappointed here. Pidgin will no longer be included in Ubuntu Karmic. Instead, it was replaced by Empathy.

Like Pidgin, Empathy supports various network protocols and allows you to login to various IM networks with one interface. Empathy supports text, voice, video, and file transfers over many different protocols, so you can transfer files over XMPP and local networks and also place voice/video call using SIP, XMPP, Google Talk and MSN.

The GUI is similar to Pidgin, so there is little to get used to.

Ubuntu One

We have previously discussed Ubuntu One and how it could possibly become a dominant force in the online storage arena. In Ubuntu Karmic, Ubuntu One is well-integrated into the system so you can skip the installation and use it straight away.

Signing up is almost instant and the Nautilus integration means you can easily access your files/folders from your Nautilus.

Backend

Enough about the front end, let take a look at the backend.

New bootloader – GRUB 2

You probably won’t notice this at all, but the software that is used to boot up the OS has been upgraded to version 2. This means better scripting support, command-line rescue mode, graphical boot as well as boot from ISO files.

GRUB 2 will only be installed for new installation. Existing users who upgrade their system via the Update Manager will continue to use the legacy GRUB bootloader.

Default Ext4 Filesystem

Ext4 filesystem was introduced in Jaunty. In Karmic, it has graduated to become the default filesystem. Like the GRUB 2 bootloader, the ext4 filsystem will only be applied for new installation. Existing users who are still on Ext3 will remain as Ext3 unless you choose to upgrade to Ext 4 manually.

That’s about all to the new features in Ubuntu Karmic beta. The official release will be on 29th Oct 2009. Are you looking forward to it?

Screenshots Tour of Ubuntu Karmic Koala 9.10 Beta originally published on Make Tech Easier (RSS)

Master Dolphin in KDE 4

Tavis J. Hampton — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 12:42:49 +0000

Dolphin is KDE 4’s default file manager, and is a departure from KDE 3, which relied on Konqueror for file management. Unlike Konqueror, which functions as a web browser and many other things, Dolphin is specifically used for file management. If you prefer to use Konqueror or any other file manager, you can change the KDE settings to use it by default.

Dolphin is intended to be a simplified file manager, stripping away some of the common Konqueror file management features. Many of the features can be re-enabled, and some new features are unique to Dolphin. Here is a basic guide to all things Dolphin.

Breadcrumbs vs. Location Bar

Konqueror has a web-browser-style location bar that allows you to type in the file path you want to reach. Dolphin introduced a feature to KDE called breadcrumbs. Each folder in a path hierarchy is a button that you can use to navigate back any number of steps. If you prefer the location bar method or ever need to type a path in directly, move your mouse to the end of the path until the mouse pointer turns into a cursor selection. Then, just click. To revert back, click the check. You can also turn the location bar on by default in the settings. To toggle back and forth, you can also use Ctrl+L.

View Modes

There are three view modes in Dolphin, just like Konqueror: icons, details, and columns. Use shortcuts to switch between them: Ctrl+1, Ctrl+2, and Ctrl+3, or click “View” and choose the view mode you want.

Panels

A new feature introduced in Dolphin is the panel. There are four possible panels: Places, Folders, Information, and Terminal. There are three settings, and you can display all three, two, one, or even none of them. You can also drag the panel to either side of the window or stack two on top of each other. To add all three to the same panel, right click and check the ones you want to appear. Tabs will appear allowing you to cycle through them.

The Places panel gives you clickable links to the folders you specify. To add a folder, just drag it over to the Places panel. Once it is there, you can edit it or remove it. Alternatively, to add a folder, right click on it and click “Add to Places“. Dolphin is integrated with other KDE applications, and the “places” you set in Dolphin will be available in file open and save dialogs in other applications.

Press F4 to bring up a terminal panel at the bottom of the window. It will automatically be set at the point where you currently are in Dolphin. Anytime you navigate to a different location within dolphin, the terminal will change to that directory. This is very useful if you have navigated through several folders and need to do some terminal work there. Instead of having to type in the full path, it will take you there.

File Associations

When you click on a file, does it open the application you want? In a previous post, I explained how to change file associations in KDE, but Dolphin also allows you to do this on the fly. For example, suppose you have three video players installed, and VLC is set to default. But when you click on Quicktime files, you want SMplayer to open instead. Simply right click on the file, click properties, and then click the wrench icon to the far right of the current file type description. This will open up the normal file associations dialog that you would get through the longer process of going through System Settings, but the changes will still be applied to all files of that type.

Ultimately Dolphin is a preference, and some will still prefer the more powerful Konqueror. Others will appreciate have a file manager separate from their browser. There are many other features to try with Dolphin. Experiment and try new things. You might be pleasantly surprised.

Master Dolphin in KDE 4 originally published on Make Tech Easier (RSS)

Linux: Improve Your Battery Life With PowerTOP

Damien — Fri, 02 Oct 2009 03:10:58 +0000

There are plenty of things that I love about Linux, but when it comes to maximizing battery life performance, there is very little to desire. On the frontend, you might be running very few applications, but unknown to you, there are actually plenty of applications running in the backend that are quietly draining away your battery. Compiz, workspace, dock are few such examples. As a result, a battery that used to last 3 hours can only last for 2 hours (or less) now.

So what can you do about it?

PowerTOP is an application that allows you to view information about programs that are misbehaving while your computer is idle. With this information, you can then make changes and optimize your computer to squeeze more juice out of your laptop battery.

Installation

For Ubuntu and Debian based system

sudo apt-get install powertop

or simply click here to install

Running PowerTOP

In the terminal, type

sudo powertop

PowerTOP runs itself inside the terminal, so don’t expect a fanciful GUI here.

On the top of the screen, you can see the two columns showing the C-states and P-states.

The C-state refers to the idle state where your CPU is not doing anything. The higher C-state the CPU is running at, the better it is.

On the other hand, the P-state shows the operational state, or the frequency the CPU is running at most of the time. The lower frequency the CPU runs, the lesser power it will require. From the screenshot above, you can see that my laptop is running at C3 and 800MHz most of the time. (More info on the C-states and P-states can be found here)

At the bottom half is where you can see the applications that are actively running in the background. The number of wakeup refers to the number of time the application refreshes itself to check for instruction. The fewer wakeup an application makes, the better it is.

PowerTOP Suggestions

It is pretty useless if you know the cause of the problem, but not the solution to it. One thing that impresses me in PowerTOP is that it provides improvement suggestions as well as the instruction to implement the solution. It even comes with a shortcut key for those who are not familiar with the command line.

For example, in my laptop, PowerTOP detects that the USB drive is taking up plenty of resources and it suggested me to enable the USB auto-suspend mode. Even though I have completely no idea on how to do that in the terminal, I can simply press U on my keyboard and get PowerTOP to do the job for me.

Isn’t that cool!

Once you have resolved one issue, PowerTOP will continue to prompt you for the next issue, until it resolves all the issues that it can find.

Conclusion

If you are already power-managing your laptop, PowerTOP might not be able to improve your battery life to a great extent, but for those casual users who have paid no attention to such detail in the past, I am sure PowerTOP will be able to help you to get the most out of your battery; provided your battery is still functional.

Linux: Improve Your Battery Life With PowerTOP originally published on Make Tech Easier (RSS)

How to Easily Mount Your iPhone As An External Drive in Ubuntu

Damien — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 12:27:35 +0000

For those who own an iPhone/iPod Touch and at the same time is an Ubuntu (or Linux) users, here’s is a good news. You can now easily mount your iPhone in your Ubuntu without having to jailbreak your phone.

In the past, the dirty but effective way to access the iPhone from your Linux system is via SSH. This requires you to jailbreak your phone and it voids the warranty. With iFuse, you can now mount your iPhone/iPod Touch under Linux with just a USB cable. You can also view/edit/cut/copy/paste the file just like any USB disk drive.

Installation

Open up your terminal, type the following to open up your APT sources file

gksu gedit /etc/apt/sources.list

Insert the following lines to the end of the file

deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/jonabeck/ppa/ubuntu jaunty main
deb-src http://ppa.launchpad.net/jonabeck/ppa/ubuntu jaunty main

The above is assuming that you are using Ubuntu 9.04 (Jaunty). For any other version, simply replace the jaunty by the respective version name (hardy, intrepid, karmic etc)

Save and close the file.

Back in the terminal:

sudo apt-key adv --recv-keys --keyserver keyserver.ubuntu.com F0876AC9
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install ifuse

Once the installation is done, connect your iPhone to your computer via the USB cable.

Open up your Nautilus. You should see the iPhone/iPod entry at the side pane. This show that it is already mounted in your system.

Click on the entry to view the filesystem.

Things that you can do

1. View/copy/download photos.

You can now manage the photos that you have taken with your iPhone without iTunes.

2. Create folders, upload/download files

You can now use your iPhone as a USB drive and use it for file storage. To allow confusion/conflict with the other system files, it is best to create a custom folder (and name it My Folder) and store all your files there.

3. Managing address book/calendar (upcoming)

Work is underway to sync the contact data with Conduit.

What you cannot do now

Manage your music database

Apple uses a cryptographic signing algorithm to encrypt all the music files. While you can access the music folder, there is no way that you can transfer your music over and get it to work in your iPhone.

Note:
1. iFuse is not Ubuntu-specific app. It works for most Linux distro as well.

2. Mac users can also use iPhoneDisk to achieve similar functionality.

How to Easily Mount Your iPhone As An External Drive in Ubuntu originally published on Make Tech Easier (RSS)

How to Create Your Own USB Linux Distro with LiLi

Joshua Price — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 12:00:59 +0000

Linux Live CDs have long been well known as a handy tool in PC repair. Personally I’ve used Linux CDs dozens of times to repair Windows problems, from virus scans to file retrieval to partition adjustments. As great as Live CDs are, they still have a few drawbacks, like an inability to save any new files or changes. Bootable USB sticks solve most of the problems with Live CDs. You can write to them, change the software or the whole system without burning a new CD, and carry them easily wherever you go.

There’s a new (Windows only, strangely enough) software tool out called LiLi USB Creator. LiLi makes it incredibly easy to create your own customized bootable Linux system on a USB stick, and even run it from within Windows using an portable copy of Virtualbox that’s included on the installation. Impressed? I am.

I ran LiLi on Windows XP Pro with Service Pack 3 and a 2GB Kingston USB drive. You can download the installer here. It’s a ZIP file and there’s no installer so you can just run it directly from wherever it was extracted. Once loaded you’ll get the main LiLi screen where all your choices are made.

Step 1: Choose a USB Key

If your USB drive isn’t already connected, connect it now and wait a few seconds before hitting the blue refresh button. When you click the drop-down list, you should see your flash drive in the list. Make sure you’re choosing the correct flash drive, as the program also lists your hard drives, and we certainly wouldn’t want to go wiping any of them. Which reminds me – in case this isn’t yet clear, this flash drive will be wiped clean so make sure there’s nothing important on there before we proceed.

Step 2: Choose a Source

LiLi needs to know what you plan to use as the base of your system. This is one of LiLi’s big strengths in my opinion. You can choose to use a Live CD ISO file you already have, a Live CD in your CD-ROM, or to have LiLi download an ISO for you. This last option is particularly impressive, as LiLi provides a list of some of the compatible distros and will automatically fetch and check the files it needs.

As for me, I went with Fedora because… well… pretty much just because I haven’t used it in a while. If you chose to let LiLi download a compatible ISO for you, then you’ve got a little time to wait while it downloads. Now might be a good time to make a snack, read a book, or better yet – browse articles on MakeTechEasier.

Step 3: Persistence

At this point, we can take advantage of the fact that we’re using a USB drive and not a Live CD. By setting some space for persistence, we can now save file and settings changes directly on to the USB drive. This is also the cause of some confusion when creating these live systems.

For clarity, we’ll use my 2GB Kingston flash drive as an example of how this all works. It’s actually about 1.9GB, and the files from the ISO will be using up about 700MB, so according to LiLi that leaves about 1.1 GB for persistent files to be saved. The math doesn’t quite add up, but I would guess that LiLi is using up a little more space than just the ISO contents for things like VirtualBox (discussed below). The slider bar in the screenshot above lets me choose how much of that space I really want to use. Unless you’ve got other plans for that space, you probably want to slide the bar all the way up.

If your USB drive is larger than 1GB and LiLi doesn’t let you move the slider past 0MB, just reformat the entire USB drive, reload LiLi and try again.

Step 4: Options

The first item in the Options section is whether or not you want to hide the system files on the USB drive. The only relevance this has is whether or not Windows will show the Linux system files on the flash drive. The benefit is that you won’t have to worry about a convoluted mess of files and directories on the drive if you just want to run VirtualBox (which we’ll cover in a moment). The down side is that it would be more difficult to access or edit those files from Windows, should you want to. Neither choice will have any significant effect on how your Linux system runs.

The second option is whether or not to format the USB drive in Fat32. Unless you have a specific reason not to, I’d recommend you allow the format to be certain that the drive is being wiped clean and installed correctly.

The last option is one of the really unique and interesting things about LiLi. As I hinted in the opening paragraph, LiLi is capable of adding a portable copy of VirtualBox to your USB drive. For anyone not familiar with VirtualBox, it’s a high quality free virtualization program. With VirtualBox on the drive, you’ll be able to run your new Linux USB system from within Windows, without rebooting. I’d recommend checking this option, so that your flash drive can be as versatile and useful as it can be.

Step 5: Create

Before clicking the lightning bolt to begin, there are a few things to check to make sure we’re not about to cause a disaster. First, make totally certain that the device you chose in Step 1 is the USB drive, and that you don’t mind wiping its contents. Next do a quick glance at the traffic light icons in the bottom right corner of each step. Each light should be green, indicating it’s got everything it needs in order to proceed. When ready, hit the lightning bolt icon, and go make yourself another snack.

Running your new USB Linux System

If you’ve followed this guide closely, then you now have two ways to start your new system. The first is from within Windows, using VirtualBox. Open My Computer to your flash drive, and you’ll see a Virtualbox folder. Open that and run Virtualize This Key. That will launch the portable VirtualBox to your Linux image and you can use your shiny new Linux system from a contained environment within Windows. Keep in mind, this method does give the benefit of being able to use both OSes simultaneously, but Linux will most likely be MUCH slower here than if it had been booted on its own.

The other method is to boot the USB key as intended, as its own OS. To do that, you insert the USB drive into whatever computer you’d like to boot, and restart the computer. Some computers may require you to open the BIOS settings to include USB in the boot devices. Others may give you an option when starting up like Hit F12 for Boot Menu, or something along those lines. Any fairly modern PC should be capable of booting from a USB drive.

Presuming all went well, you should now have a portable, self-contained, customizable USB Linux system installed on your USB drive that can be taken anywhere. This can be useful in repairs, file recovery, virus scanning, or just showing off. Files saved to the USB drive will persist across multiple reboots.

Other than a booting glitch when I tried LiLi with Crunchbang (which may or may not have been LiLi’s fault), everything seems to work smoothly. I was very impressed by LiLi’s simple yet powerful user interface, and the developers have clearly put a lot of thought and effort into making LiLi a quality piece of software. I’m a little surprised it only runs in Windows, but everything it does, it does well. Kudos to the development team.

How to Create Your Own USB Linux Distro with LiLi originally published on Make Tech Easier (RSS)

How to Configure Custom Shortcuts in KDE

Tavis J. Hampton — Mon, 28 Sep 2009 12:00:29 +0000

Perhaps Mac users know this better than anyone else. Shortcut keys do exactly what they say, give you shortcuts, saving you time. On my previous computer, my “C” key had worn off the keyboard because I spent so much time copying with “Ctrl-C” rather than going to the menu each time to select “copy”. Whether you are starting an application or cycling through virtual desktops, Linux users tend to love shortcut keys just as much.

In KDE, shortcut keys are customizable for each and every application, and you can also customize global shortcuts that affect the desktop, window manager, command interface, and other features. What follows is a brief guide to using KDE shortcuts, but first I am going to press “Ctrl-S” to save my work.

Global Shortcuts

1. To start the KDE shortcut configuration, find System Settings in the menu, or press “Alt-F2″, type “systemsettings“, and press enter.

2. Click “Keyboard & Mouse” in the Computer Administration section.

3. Click “Global Keyboard Shortcuts“.

4. Select the KDE component you wish to edit. For example, select “Run Command Interface” to edit Krunner settings.

5. Click on an action, and it will expand a section showing you the default shortcut and the option to make a custom one.

6. Select “Custom” and then click the button next to it.

7. It will then wait for you to press a key or keystroke combination. If the shortcut is already assigned, it will warn you about that. Otherwise, it will assign the new shortcut key.

8. Click Apply.

Application Shortcuts

Another handy shortcut feature of KDE is that you can assign shortcuts to an application or command. The example I am going to demonstrate solved a problem for me. I have a Mac Pro, but I Linux on it as my main OS. The CD-ROM/DVD drive has no button to open it. That is controlled by the keyboard, which worked fine when I used an Apple keyboard. When I got tired of the Apple keyboard and bought one I liked better, I needed to assign a key for opening the CD tray.

1. Right click on the K-Menu icon on the panel.

2. Click “Menu Editor”

3. Find the application you want to edit or click the “new” button to add a new command (For new commands, follow the normal procedures for adding a command to the menu).

4. Click the “Advanced” tab.

5. Where it says “Current shortcut key”, click the button next to it.

6. Enter the key combination you want. For my eject command, I used “Fn-F10″.

7. Click “Save”.

Finally, whenever you are in a KDE application, you can assign shortcuts by doing the following:

1. In the application’s menu, click “Settings”.

2. Click “Configure Shortcuts”.

With application shortcuts, you have the option of assigning alternates so that two different shortcuts can execute an action. You can also assign a global shortcut to an application that will work even when another application has focus. For example, you can set media controls, such as volume, to be controlled even when you are not in KMix. You can export any of your shortcut settings and import them on another computer, giving you the ultimate flexibility. Now press the shortcut to bookmark MakeTechEasier.com, and enjoy.

How to Configure Custom Shortcuts in KDE originally published on Make Tech Easier (RSS)

How to Install and Use Ubuntu Netbook Remix

Joshua Price — Tue, 22 Sep 2009 12:06:47 +0000

As time goes on, netbooks are getting more and more popular. These small, cheap, portable computers are gaining popularity in situations where you want the flexibility of a laptop, but don’t need the raw power or price tag of a high-end machine. Some come with Windows, some come with Linux. Unfortunately, the pre-installed Linux on some netbooks can be lacking in quality and features. For those who aren’t satisfied with the default OS on their netbook, Ubuntu has created Ubuntu Netbook Remix.

As the name implies, it’s Ubuntu with some tweaks to make the size and speed of the OS more appropriate to the hardware you’ll find in your average netbook. The most noticable difference is that they’ve completely re-skinned the standard Gnome desktop into something more closely resembling Gnome Shell than the Gnome you’re used to.

Preparing USB Media

Since many netbooks have no CD/DVD drives, you’ll need a USB thumb drive (1GB minimum) to perform the installation. The second thing you’ll need is the image file that we’ll be putting on the thumb drive, which can be downloaded here. The requirements for UNR list an Intel Atom processor for CPU, however I am writing this from UNR running on a Core 2 Duo so it seems the Atom is the “minimum” CPU, not necessarily the only supported type.

Installation will proceed in 2 steps. First, we put the live image on the USB stick (using Linux, Windows, or Mac) then we insert the USB stick into the netbook and install to the netbook’s hard drive. The USB stick is the temporary storage, replacing the CDROM in a typical Linux install.

Linux – Ubuntu

If you’re copying the image file to the USB drive from an Ubuntu system, you need the usb-imagewriter package. Ubuntu users can install it from the repositories with apt-get/aptitude/synaptic like any other package. With apt-get, it would look like:

sudo apt-get install usb-imagewriter

or simply click here to install it in your computer.

Once installed run the program from Applications -> Accessories -> Image Writer.

Choose the image file downloaded earlier, and the device it’ll write to (your USB drive). THIS WILL WIPE ANY DATA CURRENTLY ON THE USB DRIVE. Click Write when ready. Once it’s done, you’re ready to plug the thumb drive into the netbook and proceed to the Installation section.

Details for writing the image from other operating systems can be found at the Ubuntu Netbook Remix website.

Booting UNR

Once the image file has been written to the drive, it’s time to take it to your netbook. Shut down the netbook, plug in our newly formatted drive, and turn it back on. On some netbooks, you may need to manually specify that you want to boot from the USB drive instead of the netbook’s internal storage. If this is the case, you can normally set the boot order in the netbook’s BIOS settings. Some even have a option when first started, that says something like “Press F12 for boot menu”.

Running UNR

Here’s what we’ve all been waiting for. Once booted, you won’t see the normal Gnome desktop. Instead, you’ll get a custom desktop menu system devised specifically for UNR. Regular MakeTechEasier readers will immediately notice the resemblance between UNR’s menu system and that of Gnome Shell.

Your normal panel on top has been replaced by a black bar containing some of the items normally seen in Gnome’s panel, such as the Network Manager, clock, and power management applet.

When you run any app from the new menu system, it will automatically be maximized to fill the entire screen. Instead of having a box for each running application filling up the panel, UNR gives each app an icon next to the menu button, and the rest of the screen space is used for the title bar of the currently active (maximized) window. Here, for example, is my top bar while running Firefox, Rhythmbox, and The Gimp.

Some whitespace in the titlebar was removed to avoid shrinking the image and losing clarity.

You may also notice in the full screenshot that all my storage devices were detected and are listed along with Home, Music, Documents, etc on the right hand section of the menu screen. This is roughly the equivalent of the Places menu on a normal Gnome installation. At the bottom of that last is the Quit/Shutdown button which is normally found in the top-right corner of a typical Ubuntu system.

A nice feature of UNR is the very first menu section, Favorites. As the name implies, this holds your most frequently used applications. As someone who despises the traditional hierarchical menu system, I appreciate anything that speeds up and simplifies the act of finding and running my favorite apps. The only thing I found lacking in the left pane’s menu setup is a Run box, allowing me to type in the name of my preferred command instead of hunting through menus.

Installing UNR to Netbook Hard Drive

UNR uses the standard Ubuntu installer, which can be found in the Favorites menu. The process for installing from USB to hard drive should be no different than any other Ubuntu installation, which we’ve covered here before. You do not need to install UNR to the hard drive in order to use it, you can simply boot from the USB stick any time you like if you want to run UNR, however there are a few drawbacks to this. For one, any changes you make are not persistent. Next time you reboot, any changes made the the files on the USB drive will be reverted back to their original state. This means no (useful) software upgrades, and no persistent settings and preferences. Each boot on to your USB drive will be like the first.

Caveats

I had a few complaints about the UNR menu-driven interface. For starters is the auto-maximization of pretty much any application. I can see how, in theory, the small screen on your average netbook would mean you’d only want one app on screen at a time, however that’s not always the case in practice. You still have the option of right-clicking the titlebar and choosing “Unmaximize” to drop a window into normal mode, but then you have a semi-transparent version of the menu sitting behind all your apps, giving it a cluttered look.

The biggest drawback, to me, was the lack of multiple workspaces. I use these “virtual desktops” extensively, and so far I haven’t found a way to enable them on UNR. I suppose the idea behind UNR’s interface is that people will generally only be running a few full screen apps like web browser and email, due to the low power of your average netbook. That’s another thing that sounds fine in theory, but has caused me frustrations when attempting to use UNR as a desktop system.

Finally, there’s the issue with multi-windowed apps, such as The Gimp. I briefly mentioned above that whenever an app is NOT maximized, you can see a semi-transparent menu floating on your desktop. While not a real problem, I find this very annoying as it makes my workspace feel cluttered and disorganized.

Conclusion

As far as the real guts of the system, UNR is roughly the same as any Ubuntu installation, with approximately the same set of software and whatever pros and cons they provide. Regarding the interface, I wasn’t particularly impressed. Some of the design choices seem good at first, but over time have caused me some frustrations. I suppose, though, that if you’re using UNR exactly as intended (light use, small amount of full-screen apps) it could provide a cozy, simple setup that sure beats some of the pre-installed operating systems many manufacturers provide (I’m looking at you, Xandros). Perhaps in the next iteration of UNR, some kinks will be better worked out and the UNR interface will more closely match the clever design we’ve seen in projects like Gnome Shell.

How to Install and Use Ubuntu Netbook Remix originally published on Make Tech Easier (RSS)

Jolicloud – The Innovative OS For The Web-Centric Crowd

Damien — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 12:56:32 +0000

For those who are sick of using Windows XP on their netbook and wanted to try out a netbook-efficient and more user friendly OS, then Jolicloud could well be the one heading to your netbook.

Jolicloud is a new Linux distro based on the Ubuntu Netbook Remix, but specifically optimized for netbook devices. What make it stands out from the rest is its Web services that delivers a whole new Web-centric experience to its users (we will discuss more on that later).

Jolicloud is currently at closed alpha testing stage and only offer download on an invitation basis. The download is a LiveCD installer of around 600MB, distributed in iso format. You will have to use a USB creator software to mount the iso file on a USB drive before you can use it to install on a netbook.

When you first boot up the OS, you will see a Ubuntu-like grub splash screen.

Similarly, on the home screen, you will find the familiar UNR user interface.

On further exploration, you will also find that many of the standard software suite found in UNR (like Open Office, GIMP, Rhythmbox) are no longer available. Even Ubuntu signature app installer: Synaptic Package Manger, is missing. There is a good reason for that. Jolicloud stripped out all the heavy-duty and redundant applications in the system and allows you to customize fully what applications you want in your computer.

This is also where Jolicloud Web Services plays its part.

Click on the My Jolicloud icon (or the Get Started icon in Favorites tab) to launch Jolicloud Web Services. This is basically a Mozilla Prism application that connects you to the Jolicloud server.

Jolicloud Dashboard

This is essentially the starting point of your Jolicloud Web-centric experience. The dashboard contains news information and notification of the software update for your netbook.

Jolicloud Application

The application panel functions just like the iPhone App Store where you can choose the applications you want and install it in your netbook, easily and quickly. You are not restricted to install only desktop based application. Most of the popular web-based apps such as Google docs, Zoho office, YouTube can also be installed in your system (basically they are just customized build of Prism). Who says you need to know command line to install applications in Linux?

Jolicloud Settings – the social media stuff

The Settings panel is where you can follow other Jolicloud’s members (in Twitter style) and get update on what they are installing in their system. One thing though, for those who are concerned with their privacy, (unfortunately) I have not found a way to prevent others from following you. I strongly hope that Jolicloud can fix this up and allow more privacy control to the users.

Conclusion

For an OS that is still in alpha testing, Jolicloud is impressive. Surely there are plenty of bugs still need to be sorted out, but for the simple, yet user-friendly and easy to use interface, it really worth the praise.

Things that I hope to see improvement in future release:

1) Privacy control for the end-users
2) Support for a wider range of netbooks (currently it only works on certain models)
3) Better hardware support

Have you tried out Jolicloud? If not, apply for the invitation code here.

Jolicloud – The Innovative OS For The Web-Centric Crowd originally published on Make Tech Easier (RSS)

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Mobile Media Converter: A Cross-platform No-Brainer Media Converter

Simple UI, great functionality

Supports a variety of media formats

Batch conversion

Advance setting

Youtube downloader

Trim/crop

Suggestions for Improvement

Mastering Grub 2 The Easy Way

Getting Grub2

menu.lst/grub.cfg

/etc/default/grub

/etc/grub.d/

/etc/grub.d/40_custom

Splash Images

Applying changes

Tablet Note-taking Made Easy with Xournal

Features

Background Selection

PDF Annotations

Selection Rectangle

How to Play Classic Console Games in Linux

NES – GFCEU

SNES – SNES9Express

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HTML Editing

Multiple Documents

Sessions

Remote Editing

Find

Amaya: A Simple, Yet Useful Alternative to Dreamweaver

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TonidoPlug: Your Personal Cloud Server in a Plug

Introducing TonidoPlug

Setting up TonidoPlug

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2. KDiskFree

3. KDE Partition Manager

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Lancelot: An Alternative KDE Menu

Setup

Categories

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Preview of Kubuntu 9.10 Karmic Koala

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New software – Ubuntu Software Center

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