gksu gedit /etc/hostname

You should see a line stating your current hostname. For eg. damien-desktop

2. Change the hostname to something you desired. Save and close the file.

3. Back in your terminal, type:

gksu gedit /etc/hosts

4. Change the line:

127.0.1.1	damien-desktop

to

127.0.1.1	your-new-hostname

Save and close the file.

Restart the computer. Your new hostname should appear in the terminal now.

At CES, Canonical announced its latest major project that it is calling Ubuntu TV “TV for human beings”. Much of the Ubuntu TV interface will be based on the groundwork that has already been established with the development of Unity, Canonical’s revolutionary, and sometimes polarizing, desktop environment.

In keeping with tradition, Ubuntu TV is free and open source. Therefore, you can install it now, while keeping in mind that it is still under heavy development. If you have the time and wherewithal, you can try installing it from source. If not, there is also a PPA available with binary packages.

PPA Install

Before proceeding, I want to reiterate that this is not a fully-functional version of Ubuntu TV. It is a development build and should be viewed as such. It will, however, give you an idea of how the interface looks and functions on a basic level. This install will essentially take over your Unity 2D install, so if you do not want to risk contamination, you should try using a virtual machine instead.

1. If you have the YouTube video lens for Unity installed, you will need to remove it to avoid conflicts:

sudo apt-get remove lens-video

2 Install Ubuntu TV using the PPA provided by Alin Andrei of WebUpd8:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:nilarimogard/test3
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get dist-upgrade
sudo apt-get install unity-lens-video

Make sure you do not skip the “dist-upgrade” step, as it will likely not function properly without it.

3. In this step, you will tell Ubuntu TV to generate thumbnails of your current videos. You can safely assume that this task will be automated in later versions. You will need to copy your videos to /home/username/Videos/unity/local/featured before proceeding.

/usr/lib/unity-lens-video/create_tmb.sh ~/Videos/

Note: I was not able to get video thumbnails to work correctly. Hopefully, you will have better success.

4. If you are not already logged in to your normal desktop (either Unity or Gnome), do so, and run this command from a terminal:

gsettings set com.canonical.Unity2d form-factor tv

5. Kill off your current desktop features.

If you are running Unity 2D:

killall unity-2d-{panel,places,launcher,spread} && killall unity-2d-{panel,places,launcher,spread}

If you are running Unity 3D or Gnome Shell:

metacity --replace &

6. Start Ubuntu TV:

unity-2d-shell -opengl

You will now notice that Ubuntu TV has taken over your entire screen. When you are finished with it, you can end it by Alt-Tabbing back to your terminal and then pressing Ctrl+C. To get your desktop back, type:

unity --replace

or

gnome-shell --replace

Once you are finished getting a taste of Ubuntu TV, run the following commands to get rid of it and get Unity 2D back:

sudo apt-get install ppa-purge
sudo ppa-purge ppa:nilarimogard/test3
sudo apt-get remove unity-lens-video

What Works

From my test of Ubuntu TV, video playback seems to work with multiple codecs (probably any codecs currently installed on my system). It has a very nice pause, skip, and browse feature built into the video player. When you select a video to watch, it will give you the option to view trailer, rent, or buy. Only the “view trailer” button will work for your current videos.

The search feature works as expected and was fast on my aging laptop.

The TV function shows a generic UK broadcast schedule that appears to be just for show. As far as I know, there are no specifics on how the TV integration will work.

The YouTube feature did not work at all on my installation, so it is something that will probably come later. Because Ubuntu TV is extensible, the potential for other “apps” to be added is pretty much limitless.

If you want to compile Ubuntu TV from source, you can find instructions on the Ubuntu Wiki. It does not look terribly complicated and should be easy for intermediate users familiar with compiling programs. For more information about Ubuntu TV in general, see the Ubuntu TV website.

Recently, I re-checked the XDA-Developers forum again and found that someone has created a super-easy way to create a dualboot system. I tried it and it works! Here’s what I did:.

Disclaimer: This tutorial will format your tablet hard disk and wipe out all your data. It could also brick your tablet. It would definitely void your warranty. MakeTechEasier will not be held responsible for any damage, data loss, fire or death of a loved one resulting from using this mod for your device.

Note:
1. This tutorial is based on Linux/Ubuntu. If you are running Windows, this tutorial is not for you.

2. This tutorial only works for Asus Transformer with SBKv1. If your device is running SBKv2. This tutorial is not for you. Here’s how to check if your device is running SBKv1 or SBKv2.

• Download sbkcheck.tar
• Extract the tar file. Open a terminal and cd to the sbkcheck folder
• Put your Asus Transformer to APX mode. To do that, first power off the device. Power on the device again. When you see the Asus EeePad splash screen, press the “Power + Vol up” buttons. When the screen goes black, and remain black, you are in APX mode. Once it is in APX mode, connect the device, via USB to your computer
• Back in the terminal, run the command:

sudo ./sbkcheck

It should return a message whether your device is running SBKv1 or SBKv2. As a general guide, if you bought your Asus Transformer after Aug 2011, most probably it is running SBKv2.

3. The Asus Transformer mentioned in this article is the 1st gen Asus Transformer, not the quad-core Transformer Prime.

Backing up your data

There are a few ways to backup your data. You can either:

1. download a file manager app from market. Use the file manager to transfer important files to the external SD card.

2. Sync your emails, contacts, calendar, files with Google and Dropbox. Even if your device is wiped, your data is still intact in the cloud.

2. For app backup, use Titanium Backup or Titanium Backup Pro if you wish to backup to Dropbox. You will need to root your device first (depending on your firmware, rooting your Asus Transformer is only a 1-click process).

Now that you have verify the SBK version and backed up your data, here the exact steps to create a dual-boot system:

1. Download OLiFE Prime.

2. Extract the file (DO NOT extract the files on a windows type filesystem such as NTFS or FAT or you will run into problems. Do it all inside your linux partition).

3. Open a terminal and cd to the OLiFE directory. Run

sh OLiFE.sh

You will see an agreement page. Read it carefully. Once done, type “understood” and press Enter.

4. In the next screen, press ’2′ to select the flash device option

5. Now, it will show you the different option to flash the device. Regardless what your intention is, choose ’1′ to dualboot.

6. Choose ’1′ to select the Android as the default OS. Ubuntu as the default doesn’t work.

7. Put your device in APX mode and connect it to the computer via USB. The script will now format your device, partition the hard drive and copy the ubuntu and Android img over. This will take a long time, so go grab yourself a coffee and relax.

8. Once it is done, your device will restart and boot into your Android OS.

Installing Ubuntu

Now that the Ubuntu.img is copied over to your device, it is time to install it.

1. Power off your device. Press “Power + Volume Down” button until the splash screen comes alive. At the top, you should see a message asking you to press the “Volume Up” button. Release the “Power + Volume Down” button and press “Volume Up” button. This will boot into the Ubuntu installer (this is also the way to boot into Ubuntu in the future).

2. Once you reach the Ubuntu main screen, proceed on to install Ubuntu (make sure your device is connected to the keyboard dock).

If you don’t have the keyboard dock, connect it to the computer via USB again. On your Linux computer, in the terminal, run the command:

sh OLiFE.sh

This time, press ’5′ to select the “Onscreen keyboard”. You should now see the onscreen keyboard appear on your Ubuntu screen.

3. Proceed with the Ubuntu installation. If everything goes well, you should have a dual OS tablet now.

Post install configuration

Everything works out of the box for Ubuntu on Asus Transformer, however, the Unity desktop is taking up a lot of resources, causing the system to run very slowly. What I did is to open the Ubuntu Software Center and install LXDE – a lightweight desktop manager. Once I switched to LXDE, everything runs smoothly and quickly.

Inject bluetooth firmware

The bluetooth firmware is not included in the Ubuntu installer due to licensing issue. Here’s how you can get bluetooth working on Ubuntu.

Connect the device to your computer again and run the OLiFE script. This time, press ’4′ to select “Inject Firmware”.

Press ’1′ to select the Default Install.

When prompted which firmware to inject, select either one will do.

That’s it. Enjoy!

Reference: XDA-Developers Wiki

By default, in Ubuntu, the first user account you created during the installation process is also the administrator of the system. Using this user account, he/she is able to perform administrative tasks with the “sudo” command. If you are not aware, “sudo” refers to Super User Do and all users in this group are geared with administrative rights to manage the system. However, if you accidentally removed yourself from this “sudo” group, you will not be able to do anything. Instead, the only thing you will see is:

damien is not in the sudoers file. This incident will be reported

How I removed myself from the sudo group

For my case, while adding myself to another group, I used the command

usermod -G nogroup damien

without using the ‘-a‘ parameter and this cause myself to be removed from the sudo group. While I still can use the computer (as a standard user), I am no longer able to update the system, nor install/remove applications.

If you are in the same situation like me, here’s the fix:

1. Reboot the computer. If Ubuntu is your primary and the only operating system in your computer, press the “Shift” button when it is booting up. This should make the Grub screen show up on your monitor. On the Grub screen, press the down button to the Recovery mode and press Enter.

2. On the next screen, select “Check all file system (will exit read only mode)”.

When you see the message “Finished, press Enter“, press Enter.

3. Next, select “Drop to root shell prompt”.

4. You will now be at the command line. Type:

usermod -a -G admin username

Replace the username with your own login name.

5. That’s it. Now type “exit” and select “Resume normal boot”.

Follow these steps only if you have messed up the /etc/sudoers file

The above steps assume that your /etc/sudoers file is still intact. If you have mishandled the /etc/sudoers file and cause it to be corrupted. Here is what you need to do:

1. Do the above steps until Step 3.

2. At the command line, type

sudo cp /etc/sudoers /etc/sudoers.backup
sudo nano /etc/sudoers

Enter the following lines to the file

#
# This file MUST be edited with the 'visudo' command as root.
#
# Please consider adding local content in /etc/sudoers.d/ instead of
# directly modifying this file.
#
# See the man page for details on how to write a sudoers file.
#
Defaults        env_reset
 
# Host alias specification
 
# User alias specification
 
# Cmnd alias specification
 
# User privilege specification
root    ALL=(ALL:ALL) ALL
 
# Members of the admin group may gain root privileges
%admin ALL=(ALL) ALL
 
# Allow members of group sudo to execute any command
%sudo   ALL=(ALL:ALL) ALL
 
#includedir /etc/sudoers.d

Press “Ctrl + o” to save the file and “Ctrl + x” to exit.

3. Next, set the file permission of the sudoers file:

chmod 440 /etc/sudoers

4. Lastly, add yourself to the sudo group:

usermod -a -G admin damien

5. exit the shell prompt and resume normal boot.

You should be able to perform administrative task again.

To install:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:nuvola-player-builders/beta
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install nuvolaplayer

This is what you will see on the first run:

Being a Grooveshark fan, the first service that I clicked on is, of course, Grooveshark. This is what you will see. You can perform a search and add songs to your playlist. Everything is just what you see in the browser.

The same goes for Google Music, Hype Machine and 8 Tracks.

Note: Although Google Music is only for US citizens, with a simple US-based VPN connection, you (those who do not reside in US) should be able to activate Google Music service with your Google account. Once the service is activated, you won’t need a VPN to access your music anymore.

System tray icon with Player Control

Nuvola Player also comes with an app-indicator (or system tray icon) with the ability to control your music. You can Pause/Play the current song and go Next/Previous song in the playlist. There is even a Thumb Up/Thumb Down button.

Conlcusion

Nuvola Player is basically a browser wrapper that contains links to various cloud services. There is nothing new that you can’t do on your normal browser, but the convenience of having several cloud music services at your fingertips and the ability to run separately as a native app make it a winner.

What do you think? Is this kind of music player suitable for you? Or you prefer the good old Rhythmbox and Amarok?

Nuvola Player

MyUnity is a tweaking tool for the Unity desktop that allows you to tweak and customize your Unity desktop to your liking. While it doesn’t cover every possible tweaks under the sun, it does make the Unity desktop more customizable and easier to use.

To install:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:myunity/ppa
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install myunity

Once you have installed it, go to your Dash, type “myunity” and run the “My Unity” app.

There are few sections that you can customize, namely the Launcher, Dash, Panel, Desktop and Font.

In the Launcher section, you can configure the size of the app icon, the display of the launcher (whether to autohide or fade) and whether to show devices icon on the launcher.

In the Dash section, you can set the display of Dash to blur, smart or off and change the display size to suit desktop or netbook.

For the Desktop configuration, you can select whether to show the Home, Networking, Device and Trash icon on the desktop.

Lastly, at the Font section, you can customize the font for each part of the system.

Conclusion

What MyUnity has done right is to put all the various configuration options together in one interface so the end-users don’t have to hunt high and low to change that particular setting. MyUnity will be integrated into the Ubuntu 12.04 repository, so you can easily install it without adding a PPA. My guess is that this will become one of the “must-install” app when Ubuntu 12.04 releases. What do you think?

For security sake, it is best to set a password so others can’t access your desktop easily.

That’s all you need to do for your Ubuntu.

Configuring remote access in Android tablet

There are several apps in the market that allow you to connect to a remote device, but the one that I found to be working best is Wyse PocketCloud RDP/VNC. It is free, fast and easily configurable.

In your Android tablet,

1. Download and install Wyse PocketCloud RDP/VNC (market link)

2. Run the app. Select the “Add Connection” link at the top right corner.

3. Select the Manual Connection, follow by “VNC”.

4. At the configuration window, choose “Windows” under the Operating System dropdown (it will work for Mac as well). Give the connection a nickname. The most important part is the Host address. This is where you enter the IP address of your Ubuntu machine. If your Android tablet is on the same WiFi network as your Ubuntu machine, all you have to do is to enter the local IP (192.168.x.x) of your Ubuntu machine. However, if both are not connected in the same network and your Ubuntu machine is using a dynamic IP, you may want to configure it with a dynamic DNS. Lastly, tap “Save”.

5. Back to the main screen, tap the big “Connect” button. If everything is set up properly, you should be connected to your remote machine in less than a minute.

Wyse PocketCloud even comes with a mouse icon that you can use to simulate left and right click of the mouse and also the keyboard so you can type on the screen.

To exit, simply press the Back button and it will prompt you if you want to exit the session.

Conclusion

As can be seen, it is very easy to connect remotely to your Ubuntu machine. There is no need to install additional software on your Ubuntu. In addition, even on a slow network, the remote connection on the Android tablet works well too.

What other apps do you use to connect remote to your desktop?

Nautilus Action Extra is an action script for Nautilus that adds plenty of useful options to the context menu (the window that pop up when you right-click your mouse). Once installed, you will get feature like “Open file in terminal”, “open file as administrator”, “repair filename”, “check sum” and many other advanced options easily accessible from the context menu.

To install, open a terminal and type the following:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:dr3mro/nautilus-actions-extra
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install nautilus-actions-extra
nautilus -q

Now, right click on any file/folder and you will see the following:

Some of the options are different, depending on whether you righ-click on a file or folder. For a folder, the “Open in Terminal” option will be visible and when selected, a terminal will open with the file path pointing to the folder location. For a file, you will see “Gedit” instead. When expanded, you have a choice to select whether to edit the file as normal user or with root permission.

For image files, you will also see the option to “Resize image” and “Rotate image”. This is particularly handy when you are managing your photo gallery. What is even better is the Multimedia section that allows you to “upload to ImageShack.us”, “convert to GIF”, “JPG”, “PNG” or “optimize it for web use”.

Some other built-in features include PyRenamer, a script that allows you to mass rename files.

That is not all about Nautilus Action Extra. If you are a control freak who love to customize every single bit of an application, you can also run the following command to access the backend configuration menu of Nautilus Action Extra.

gksu nautilus-actions-config-tool

Here is what you will see:

From here, you can configure what show up in the context menu and/or change the commands or behavior associated with each action.

Conclusion

Nautilus Action Extra is definitely a powerful and useful addon for Nautilus. While you may not have use for most of the actions, having a few useful features at your fingertips is enough to improve your productivity and make your life better. What do you think?

Error 1: E:Encountered a section with no Package: header, E: Problem with MergeList

Sometimes running the updates in the Update Manger results in the following error:

Could not initialize the package information.
An unresolvable problem occurred while initializing the package information.
Please report this bug against the ‘update-manager’ package and include the following error message:
‘E:Encountered a section with no Package: header, E: Problem with MergeList /var/lib/apt/lists/archive.ubuntu.com_ubuntu_dists_natty_main_binary-amd64_Packages, E:The package lists or status file could not be parsed or opened.’

A similar error occurs while running the apt-get update command in terminal:

Reading package lists… Error!
E: Encountered a section with no Package: header
E: Problem with MergeList /var/lib/apt/lists/archive.ubuntu.com_ubuntu_dists_natty_main_binary-amd64_Packages
E: The package lists or status file could not be parsed or opened.

There is a one shot solution to the above errors. Open the terminal and run the following commands in the given order:

sudo rm -rf /var/lib/apt/lists/* 
sudo apt-get clean 
sudo apt-get update

Hope that solves the above mentioned problems. Now lets move on to another type of error.

Error 2:E: Could not get lock /var/lib/dpkg/lock – open (11: Resource temporarily unavailable)

A very common error while installing an application or updating a package is following:

E: Could not get lock /var/lib/dpkg/lock – open (11: Resource temporarily unavailable)
E: Unable to lock the administration directory (/var/lib/dpkg/), is another process using it?

The reason is quite obvious from the error itself “another process using it”. Which means another process is already using the mentioned directory (necessary for the application to be installed) through Synaptic Package Manager, Update Manger, terminal or Ubuntu Software Center.

The idea would be to look for another application which is being installed or update it. Wait for it to finish the installation or cancel it. If you cannot see the application then try running this command in the terminal to solve this error:

sudo rm /var/lib/apt/lists/lock

Error 3: The action would require the installation of packages from not authenticated sources

I faced a strange situation today when I ran the Update Manager in Ubuntu. It showed me a number of updates to be installed and when I clicked on Install Updates it showed me the following error:

The action would require the installation of packages from not authenticated sources

There could be several reason for this error:

• Software is restricted by copyright or legal issues
• The Software is from Canonical Partner and has not been added to Source List
• The application has been installed form its source code
• Missing public key of the application

If you do not know which is the root cause of error, then follow the instructions for each of them and then you can find it out. Lets see how to tackle these problem one by one:

(i) Software is restricted by copyright or legal issues

Run the Update Manager. And go to Settings as shown in the pic below:

Now here, go to the Ubuntu Software tab and make sure that Software is restricted by copyright or legal issues field is checked. Close the settings and install updates now.

(ii) The Software is from Canonical Partner and has not been added to Source List

In the Update Manager Settings, go to Ubuntu Software tab and include the Source Code for updates like in the pic below:

(iii) The application has been installed form its source code

In the Update Manger Settings, go to Ubuntu Software tab and check the Source Code option:

(iv) Missing public key of the application

Open the terminal (Ctrl+Alt+T) and run the following command:

sudo apt-get update

Now wait till it finishes and see if you see something like this:

W: GPG error: http:/something.something Release: The following signatures couldn’t be verified because the public key is not available: NO_PUBKEY XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Note down the numbers you see after NO_PUBKEY. This error is because the application’s public key has not been added. To solve the error use the following command in the terminal:

sudo apt-key adv --recv-key --keyserver keyserver.ubuntu.com XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

After adding the missing public key run the following command (again):

sudo apt-get update

I hope it helps solve your problem. Do provide us your feedback and if you are facing errors other than this do let us know. Comments section is all yours. Enjoy :)

Let’s say that you are using a household computer and you love to watch late night movie (aka. porn) on it, the last thing you want your family members to see is the name of the movie showing up on the “Recent Files” list every time they open the Nautilus file manager.

Activity Log Manager Comes to the Rescue

The Activity Log Manager is one useful app that controls the behavior of Zeitgeist. You can use it to delete all your file logging history and configure it to log only certain applications or files.

To install:

sudo apt-get install activity-log-manager

This is what you see on first run:

There are three tabs: History, Applications and Files. In the History tab, you can delete file log for the past 15 minutes, or up to past week, or if you want, define your own time range.

The Application tab is where you can blacklist Application and prevent logging of any activity on these applications. So if you are using VLC to watch movie, you can add VLC into this tab.

To make it even better, you can blacklist specific file types and folders. In this case, you probably want to select the video format and videos directory in order to keep your “track” clean.

Turning it off

For those who prefer to turn the file logging off completely rather than configuring each individual item, you can simply click the “Tick” button at the right bottom corner. The default is “Logging Active”. Give it a click and you will see the “Logging Stopped” text.

Conclusion

(Recent) File logging is definitely a useful way to help you retrieve your files faster and improve your productivity. However, extensive file logging can also be an intrusion of your privacy, especially if you are using a shared computer. Being able to control what to log and what not to log is definitely a good way to protect your privacy without compromising your productivity.

What do you think?

Installation

There is a PPA for crebs, but it is only available for Ubuntu Natty and below.

In Ubuntu Natty,

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:crebs/ppa
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install crebs

For Ubuntu Oneiric 11.10, the PPA will still work, but you will need to add it manually to the sources.list.

sudo nano /etc/apt/sources.list

Add the following two lines to the end of the file

deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/crebs/ppa/ubuntu natty main 
deb-src http://ppa.launchpad.net/crebs/ppa/ubuntu natty main

Save (Ctrl + O) and exit (Ctrl + X) the file. Next, in your terminal,

sudo apt-key adv --keyserver keyserver.ubuntu.com --recv-keys EF0A4C44
 sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install crebs

Creating custom slideshow

Run the crebs (Create Background Slideshow) app.

Click the “+” button to add wallpapers. You can select multiple wallpapers.

Rearrange (using the < and > buttons) the wallpapers to the order you want them to display.

Once you are done with the images, you can click on the Slideshow tab to configure the length of the slideshow.

Lastly, enter a name for your slideshow and click the “Tick” button to save.

Activating the slideshow

Even after you have saved the file, it won’t appear in the Appearance section. We have to configure the setting manually.

In your terminal, type

GSETTINGS_BACKEND=dconf gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.background picture-uri "file://$HOME/.crebs/my-wonderful-slideshow.xml"

Replace “my-wonderful-slideshow” with the name of the slideshow that you have saved earlier.

Done.

Note:
1. The custom slideshow xml file is saved in the /home/username/.crebs folder.

2. An alternative is to use third-party wallpaper changing app, like Drape, Wallch etc.

1. You already have SSH access to your remote host. For security sake, you might want to setup a public/private SSH key to secure your SSH connection.

2. The remote host is in a fresh state. No additional software have been installed or any other user has been created.

Get Started

1. Open a terminal (if you are using Windows, use Putty) and SSH to your remote host.

2. The first thing to do is to update your remote host so that it is running the latest version of all software.

sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get upgrade

3. If you are logging in as the root user, it is best to change the default password for the root user and also create a new user account. It is not a good practice to log in as the root user. Once the new user account is created, you will administer the remote host with this account.

Change the password for the root user.

passwd

Create new user account.

adduser username   #replace "username" with your own your user name.

It will prompt you to enter your user password and info.

Add the new user to the “sudo” group.

adduser username sudo

Once this is done, you will need to exit the current SSH session and re-login with the new user account.

4. Install LAMP Server. There is no Synaptic or Ubuntu Software Center here, so we have to install everything via the terminal. While you can install a whole bunch of files here, an easier way is to use the tasksel package.

sudo apt-get install tasksel
sudo tasksel install lamp-server

During the installation, it will prompt you a few questions.

Once the installation is done, go to your web browser and type in the domain name (or IP address) associated with the remote host. If you see the “It Works” screen, you are on track.

9. Secure MySQL

mysql_secure_installation

It will prompt you a few questions:

• Change the root password? – If you have set a secure password previously, you can safely type ‘n’.
• Remove anonymous users? – Type ‘y’.
• Disallow root login remotely? – Type ‘y’.
• Remove test database and access to it? – Type ‘y’.
• Reload privilege table now? – Type ‘y’.

That’s it. You have successfully setup a web server in the remote host.

Optional Stuff

Here are some optional stuff you can install/do:

1. phpMyAdmin

PhpMyAdmin is a frontend GUI that allows you to configure and setup database easily. Since it is accessible via web interface, many people feel that it is unsecured and could be the loophole for hackers to brute-force into your database.

Here’s how to install:

sudo apt-get install phpmyadmin

Open a browser and go to http://your-ip-address/phpmyadmin. If you see the phpMyAdmin page, your installation is successfully. If not, you will have to add an extra line to the Apache conf file.

sudo nano /etc/apache2/apache2.conf

Add the following line to the end of the file.

Include /etc/phpmyadmin/apache.conf

Save (Ctrl + O) and exit (Ctrl + X).

Restart Apache

sudo /etc/init.d/apache2 restart

2. Configure Apache

There are tons of things that you can do with Apache. I won’t discuss the detail here. Check out this Apache tutorial for the instruction.

3. Install FTP server

If you need to access your remote host via FTP, you will need to install a FTP server. There are several FTP software that you can use. Here, we will be using vsftp.

sudo apt-get install vsftpd

Don’t forget to add the current user to ftp group.

sudo adduser username ftp

4. Install Webmin

Webmin is a free web-based control panel for administrators to manage their servers without having to go into the command line.

sudo nano /etc/apt/sources.list

Add the following to the end of the file:

deb http://download.webmin.com/download/repository sarge contrib
deb http://webmin.mirror.somersettechsolutions.co.uk/repository sarge contrib

Import the GPG key:

wget http://www.webmin.com/jcameron-key.asc
sudo apt-key add jcameron-key.asc

Install webmin:

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install webmin

Once installed, you can access webmin in your browser at the URL https://your-ip-address:10000/.

I have spoken to many people who dislike KDE solely based on its default appearance, the Air/Oyxgen set of styles and themes. Some have even argued that it looks too much like Windows (although evidence strongly suggests that Windows 7 mimicked KDE, rather than the other way around). What those people may not realize is that you can make KDE look as much like Gnome or any other desktop environment as you want.

The customizations in this guide are just examples. They will not give an exact Unity or Gnome appearance, as most people change those defaults anyway. Instead, this example will use some of the common customizations that Ubuntu and Gnome users often apply.

The Desktop Theme

KDE-Look has a plethora of desktop themes you can use. To change your theme, do the following:

1. Open “System Settings” from the kickoff menu (or press Alt+F2 and type it)
2. Click “Workspace Appearance”
3. Click “Desktop Theme” on the left-hand pane
4. Click “Get New Themes” at the bottom
5. Choose whatever theme you want and click “Install”. For this example, I have chosen the “Ambiance” theme.
6. Click “Apply”

The Window Decoration

Since you are already in Workspace settings, now is a good time to change the window decoration.

1. Click “Window Decorations” from the left-hand pane.
2. Click “Get New Decorations”
3. Following the same example, search for Ambiance Aurorae and click “Install”
4. Choose the decoration theme and click “Apply”.

If you want to really be like Ubuntu/Mac OS X, you can move the window buttons to the left side:

1. Click “Configure Buttons”
2. Check the box labeled “Use custom title bar button positions”
3. Simply drag each button type to the left in the order that you want them.

Application Appearance

Getting the application appearance you want is a little more tricky. That is because KDE does not currently offer users the ability to install new styles from within System Settings. Therefore, before you choose a style, you will need to make sure the one you want is installed. You have two options: 1. You can install the actual GTK style that you want and use it, or 2. Find an actual KDE or Qtcurve style that matches the one you want.

If you decide to go with the Qtcurve option, you can download something like Ambiance-like. Download it and extract it to the folder of your choice. To install it, do the following:

1. Open “System Settings”
2. Click “Application Appearance”
3. Choose Qtcurve and click “Configure” (If you do not have Qtcurve installed, it is probably in your distribution’s software repository)
4. In the “Presets” section, choose “Import”
5. Find the Ambiance-like theme (Ambiance-like.qtcurve) and then click “OK”
6. Click “Apply”
7. Click the “Colors” button in the left-hand panel
8. Choose “Import Scheme”
9. Locate the Ambiance colors (Ambiance-like.colors) and click “OK”
10. Click “Apply”

Alternatively, you can use the Ambiance color scheme from KDE-Look.

Panel and Launcher

In most distributions, the KDE panel is at the bottom and is rather large. To move it to the top:

1. Right click on the panel and click “Unlock widgets”
2. Click the cashew button on the far right
3. Click and hold the “Screen Edge” button and drag the panel to the top.
4. Click and hold the “Height” button to make it the size you want

KDE can use a global menu that works for KDE, Qt, and GTK apps. To use it:

1. Click the cashew again and click “Add widgets”
2. Choose “Window Menubar” and drag it to the panel

You have a couple of options for launchers. You can either use a KDE-native launcher like Daisy or Fancy Tasks, or you can use a separate launcher program like Docky (mono-based but very reliable), Plank (fast, light-weight next-gen Docky), AWN (robust and powerful), or Cairo Dock (all about options).

Icons

KDE uses a slightly different icon theme system from Gnome and Ubuntu. Therefore, it may not be the best idea to use those themes directly, but they will still work. The alternative is that you can find one specifically modified for KDE. Faenza-Cupertino is a very popular iconset for Ubuntu users, and KFaenza is an excellent KDE version.

To install it:

1. Open “System Settings”
2. Click “Application Appearance”
3. Choose “Icons” from the left-hand pane
4. Click “Get New Themes”
5. Search for “KFaenza”
6. Click “Install”
7. Select the icon theme and click “Apply”

Mixing and Matching

You are certainly not limited to the examples I have shown. You can mix and match whatever you like to get your KDE desktop looking exactly the way you want.

1. Gnome 3 with Gnome Shell

Let’s get the most obvious choice out of the way first. Historically, Ubuntu has always run the Gnome desktop environment. Gnome was one of the first DEs for Linux, and is still going strong. When they recently released version 3, it was a complete overhaul of both the desktop interface and much of the software behind it. Currently, Ubuntu uses Gnome 3′s backend software with the Unity desktop, but if you want the full Gnome 3 experience you need Gnome Shell.

As regular readers may know, we’ve covered Gnome Shell in detail several times before.

Gnome shell can be installed through the Ubuntu Software Center, or from the command line with

sudo apt-get install gnome-shell

2. KDE

The other big kid on the block is KDE. It and Gnome have been battling for the Linux desktop for years, each with their own group of avid supporters. As one of the heavyweight contenders, KDE packs a full suite of mature and capable software, a beautiful desktop, and decades of Linux desktop design experience.

All of KDE’s power and flexibility does not come cheap. A full KDE installation is a pretty hefty thing, and for all its fine points, KDE might not be a great option for low end or mobile computers.

KDE can be installed through the Ubuntu Software Center or from the command line with

sudo apt-get install kde-standard

or if you want, download Kubuntu, which comes with KDE as the default DE.

3. XFCE

For a long time, XFCE was jokingly known as “Gnome Lite”. It uses similar backend software (such as GTK) and has an overall look and feel similar to the Gnome 2.x series. It’s generally regarded as lighter and faster than Gnome, however most of those comparisons were made prior to Gnome 3. Now the two desktops take such vastly different approaches, and such comparisons would have less meaning.

Still, its resemblance to Gnome 2 is much of the reason why many people (including Linus Torvalds himself) have migrated to XFCE due to dissatisfaction with Gnome 3.

XFCE can be installed through the Ubuntu Software Center or from the command line with

sudo apt-get install xfce4

or download Xubuntu which comes with XFCE.

4. LXDE

A lightweight option that’s been growing in popularity lately is LXDE. It’s a desktop environment built around the OpenBox window manager. It includes several small apps and utilities like the PCManFM file manager and a custom panel and terminal.

LXDE is a fairly nice setup, particularly on lower-end machines, but it’s been this author’s experience that LXDE and its related apps always seem to have the feel of being almost done. If you’re the type of user who likes everything to be smoothly polished, feature-complete, and rock-solid – LXDE might not be great for you. If, however, you need something light, fast, and simple – I highly recommend you try it out. It may not be your dream desktop, but it’s almost there.

LXDE can be installed through the Ubuntu Software Center or from the command line with

sudo apt-get install lxde

5. Enlightenment (E17)

Once considered a thing of myth and legend, E17 is now a part of Ubuntu 11.10′s online repositories. Many years of development have gone in to this release, and it’s got loads of features. This is a desktop that aims to do it all – high performance, high productivity, extreme flexibility, and loads of eye candy. Chances are it does not much resemble any desktop environment you’ve used before, so if you decide to take the plunge, be prepared for a little bit of a learning curve.

Once you’ve learned to do things the “enlightened” way, it may be tough to switch back. E17 can be installed through the Ubuntu Software Center or from the command line with

sudo apt-get install e17

Conclusion

Each of these has its own pros and cons. Some people love Gnome 3, some think it’s garbage. Some people use KDE every day, others won’t go near it. The beauty of Linux is that whatever you like, you can have it – for free. If it doesn’t exist, make it. That’s what open source is all about: choice. Hopefully this guide has helped you make yours.

In Ubuntu Oneiric, the default desktop session is the Unity Desktop (or Unity 2D depend on your hardware capabilities). If you have set the computer to auto-login to your desktop whenever you boot up, it will always login to the Unity desktop, even though you have installed Gnome-shell or classic Gnome. It doesn’t matter which desktop session (Gnome shell, classic gnome or Unity) you are using before you shut down, because on the next boot up, it will automatically login to the Unity desktop again. If you have Gnome shell installed, here’s how you can change the auto-login to Gnome shell instead of the Unity desktop.

Open a terminal and type:

sudo /usr/lib/lightdm/lightdm-set-defaults -s gnome-shell

That’s it. Simple fix. Big differences. Less annoyance.

1. Ask Ubuntu

Are you an active user of AskUbuntu? Or that you have plenty of questions about Ubuntu and is always looking to AskUbuntu for answer? Good news for you, the AskUbuntu lens allows you to search the AskUbuntu site right in your desktop (Dash).

Installation:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:askubuntu-tools/ppa
sudo apt-get update 
sudo apt-get install unity-askubuntu-lens
sudo apt-get upgrade

Log out and log in again.

2. Bookmarks lens

Bookmarks Lens allows you to search your web bookmarks directly from the desktop.

Installation

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:nilarimogard/webupd8
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install bookmarks-lens

Log out and log in again.

3. Gwibber lens

If you have connected your various Twitter, Facebook and identi.ca accounts, you can now search your tweets, status update or message directly from Dash. There are also ways for you to filter results to show only messages, replies, link, images, videos etc.

Installation

Click here to install, or in the terminal, type:

sudo apt-get install unity-lens-gwibber

Log out and log in again.

4. Google Books Lens

For those books lovers, you can now use the Google Books lens to look for ebooks in Google Books.

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:davidc3/books-lens
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install unity-lens-books

Log out and log in again.

5. Gdocs Unity Lens

Do you always use Google Docs to manage your documents? You can now use the Google Docs lens to search your documents from the desktop.

Installation

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:nilarimogard/webupd8
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install unity-lens-gdocs

Next, open up the unity-gdocs-lens.py file and scroll down to line 124.

gksu gedit /usr/bin/unity-lens-gdocs.py

Replace GDOC_USERNAME with your Google username and GDOC_PASSWORD with your Google password. Save and close the file.

Lastly, run Unity Gdocs lens:

unity-lens-gdocs.py
setsid unity

Sources: WebUpd8

6. Web Sources Place

Would you like to be able to search the web without having to open a browser? This is what Web Sources Place is about. It allows you to perform a web search and returns a list of sources instead of pages (e.g. a search for a band name might list MySpace, Wikipedia, Amazon and Last.fm as results, but not individual pages thereon).

Installation

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:cscarney/unity-web-place
sudo apt-get update 
sudo apt-get install unity-place-websearch

Note: The PPA has stated that it is working with Oneiric, but I have not been able to get it to install.

Conclusion

The lens feature was introduced in Ubuntu Natty and has only become more mature in Oneiric. As of now, the number of lens for Ubuntu Oneiric is still very limited. Hopefully, more developers will come out with more useful and handy lenses for the platform. As for the lenses mentioned above, you don’t have to install all of them. Just grab the ones that you need will do.

What other lenses do you use in your Oneiric?

1. Go to System Settings and click the “Keyboard” icon.

2. Click on the “Shortcuts” tab. On the left panel, select “System”. On the right, select the first entry “Show the run command prompt” and click on “Disabled” to activate it. You should now see “New shortcut…”

3. Now, press “Alt + F2″. It should show on the screen.

That’s it. Close the window and restart the computer. Your “ALt + F2″ shortcut key to activate the RUN prompt should work in the next boot up.

32-bit vs 64-bit. What’s the difference?

In short, a 32-bit and 64-bit computer are different in architecture. The main difference lie in the length of data supported by each architecture. A 32-bit machine can only understand data that is 32-bit long. Anything more than that would not be able to read by the machine. Similarly, a 64-bit machine can read data up to 64 bit long. Even though 64 is twice of 32, a 64-bit data can hold much more than double the information of a 32-bit data. This also explains why a 64-bit machine can process and run faster and effectively than a 32-bit machine.

Another difference between 32-bit and 64-bit machine is the amount of memory RAM each can support. For a 32-bit machine, the maximum it can support is only 4GB, whereas for a 64-bit machine, there is theoretically no memory limit cap (or up to 17.2 BILLION gigabytes of system memory). However, most OSes limit to only 16GB (or 32GB) of RAM, which is considered very powerful for today’s desktop computing standard.

What is AMD64?

Instead of using 32-bit and 64-bit, people give them names. A 32-bit architecture is often referred to as i386 or x86 while a 64-bit architecture is widely known as any of the following: AMD64/EM64T/x86-64/x64, depending on the products and the manufacturers.

Why AMD64, you might ask? According to Wikipedia, AMD was the first to come up with the specification of a 64-bit processor. They initially named it x86-64, but later renamed it to AMD64 when they released their first 64-bit processor: AMD-K8 series. Ever since then, AMD64 has become the term for 64-bit processor.

Intel (a competitor of AMD) obviously won’t use AMD64 name for its 64-bit CPU, that why they came up with EM64T, and later renamed it to Intel 64. In some Intel mainboard, during the BIOS bootup, you still can see the word “EM64T” appears in your monitor.

In short, in today technology, AMD64 is now referring to the 64-bit architecture and is not tied with the AMD CPU.

Does AMD64 Ubuntu only works with AMD processor?

Back to the Ubuntu ISO download issue, if you are using a 32-bit computer, you will download the i386 version. If you are using a 64-bit computer, you will download the amd64 version, regardless what brand of CPU you are using.

If you are wondering, a 64-bit computer can run the i386 (32-bit) version of Ubuntu as well. It is just that you are not utilizing your computer to the maximum.

Lastly, don’t bother to run AMD64 Ubuntu on your 32-bit computer. Your system might crash.

Can I run 32-bit applications on 64-bit Ubuntu, and vice-versa?

In usual cases, you can run 32-bit applications on 64-bit Ubuntu, but you won’t be fully utilizing your system. However, the vice versa is not true. You won’t be able to run 64-bit applications on a 32-bit machine (just imagine, you can place a small container into a big container, but you can’t do that the other way round). When installing applications in Synaptic, you might notice that some software comes with the 32-bit and 64 bit version (only shows up when you are using the 64-bit Ubuntu). You can just pick the one you want. Additionally, not all 32-bit applications will work in 64-bit machine, particularly for applications that require access to system hardware settings.

For those who wish to remove the appmenu, simply remove the appmenu app with the following command:

sudo apt-get autoremove appmenu-gtk appmenu-gtk3 appmenu-qt

Restart the PC. Your menu bar should stick to the top of your application window now.

Firefox

If you are using Firefox, you will notice the above method will not work. This is because Oneiric is using a Firefox extension to enable the global menu effect.

1. In your Firefox, go to “Tools -> Add-ons -> Extensions”. Disable the “Global Menu Bar Integration” extension (You can’t un-install it).

2. Restart Firefox. The Firefox menu bar should stick to the application window now.

Re-enable Appmenu

To re-enable the appmenu, all you have to do is to re-install the appmenu packages.

sudo apt-get install appmenu-gtk appmenu-gtk3 appmenu-qt

and restart your computer.

That’s it.

1. How to Add/Remove Applications to/from the Launcher Bar

The launcher bar comes with a set of default launchers that you may not have use for. To remove application from the launcher bar, simply right-click on its icon and uncheck “Keep in launcher”.

To add application to the launcher bar, first open the application, then right-click on its icon and select “Keep in launcher”. You can drag and rearrange the icons to the order of your preferences.

2. How to open an application in Unity desktop

Unlike the old Gnome desktop, there is no Applications menu at the top panel where you can click to launch the application you want. To open an application in Unity desktop, you have to search for it.

The default method:

Click on the first icon on the launcher bar (or press “Super” button) to access the Dash. Search for your application by typing its name in the search field. Select the application and Press Enter.

Alternatively, you can click on the Application icon at the bottom of the Dash (second from left) and scroll through the list of application until you found the app you want.

Alternative method 1: Install Classicmenu indicator

The ClassicMenu Indicator is a third-party appindicator that brings the classic Gnome menu back. To install:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:diesch/testing
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install classicmenu-indicator

Run ClassicMenu indicator from Dash. You should be able to access your applications from the system tray now.

Alternative method 2: use quick launcher app like Gnome Do or Synapse

Quick Launcher app like Gnome Do or Synapse allows you to open your application very quickly. You just have to press a hotkey (Ctrl + Space) to activate the search box and you can quickly search for the app you want.

3. How to Add Quicklist to the Launcher in the Launcher Bar

Quicklists are the list of options when you right-click on an icon in the Launcher Bar. For example, when you right-click on the folder icon, you can quickly access your Home, Documents, Music and various folders that you have added to bookmarks.

Follow the instructions here to add quicklist to the launcher.

4. How to Configure the Unity Desktop

The default installation of Ubuntu Oneiric doesn’t come with any option to configure the Unity desktop. You can, however, install CompizConfig Settings Manager to access the configuration menu.

sudo apt-get install compizconfig-settings-manager

Once installed, run the app and scroll down the list till you see the Ubuntu Unity Plugin. Click on it. From here, you can configure the behaviour of the launcher, the shortcut key, the switcher and some experimental features.

If you are using an old computer that doesn’t support Compiz, most probably you are running Unity 2D instead of the usual Unity desktop. To configure Unity 2D, you have to install dconf-tools by clicking here or use the following command in the terminal:

sudo apt-get install dconf-tools

Next, in the terminal, type:

dconf-editor

Navigate to Desktop -> Unity. You can find several configuration options here.

5. How to Restore Synaptic package Manager

The useful and popular Synaptic Package Manager was removed from Ubuntu Oneiric in favour of Ubuntu Software Center. Luckily you can easily restore it by installing the Synaptic application. Click here to install Synaptic Package Manager or type the following command in the terminal:

sudo apt-get install synaptic

6. How to install .deb File Without Using Ubuntu Software Center

Ubuntu Natty and Oneiric open the Ubuntu Software Center when you double-click to install any .deb file. As USC is quite resource-intensive, the whole installation process is often very slow. A faster and quicker way is to use the gdebi package to manage your deb file. Click here to install or type the following command in the terminal:

sudo apt-get install gdebi

Once installed, right-click on any deb file and select Properties. Go to the “Open With” tab and select gdebi as the default application. That’s it. Whenever you double-click to install a deb file, the gdebi package installer will open up instead of Ubuntu Software Center.

7. How to Change Login Screen Background

To change the background of the login screen (LightDM), open a terminal and type:

sudo nano /etc/lightdm/unity-greeter.conf

At the field starting with “background=…“, change the background path to your favourite wallpaper. Leave everything else untouched.

Once done, press “Ctrl + O” follow by Enter. Lastly, press “Ctrl + X” to exit.

Log out. You should see your new login background in action.

8. How to Restart Ubuntu Oneiric

If you have noticed, there is no “Restart” option at the Power menu. You can only Logout, Shut Down, Suspend or Hibernate. What if you need to Restart your PC? Fret not, the “Restart” option is integrated with the Shut Down option. Click the Shut Down option and you will be able to select between Restart or Shut Down in the popup window.

9. How to Restore Gnome Classic

If you don’t like the Unity desktop, you can switch back to the classic Gnome desktop.

sudo apt-get install gnome-session-fallback

Log out and choose “Gnome Classic” in the login screen.

Note: The Gnome Classic is running on the Gnome 3 platform, so don’t expect everything to be the same as the old Gnom