Ubuntu Linux Help

Ever want to boot up your Ubuntu Linux system really quick to look something up? Sure, I think we all do that from time to time. Hate it when you get the forced file system check because you’ve booted up 30 times? I do.

Imagine how I felt in front of a room full of young students, who were attending a small business seminar when this “lengthy” check kept us waiting, while listening to them snigger and giggle. (”Windows doesn’t do this”, “…that’s a cheap OS…”, “Get a real OS”, “…hurry up man…”, “…slooooowwwww…”, “…Linux sucks…”, and so on).

Despite the bad manners of some attendees… The topic I was presenting showed many of the ways that opensource software (including Ubuntu Linux) could help cash strapped business startups save money. Everything was ready to go, but the switch on the power bar had switched off. No big deal, it would be nice to show Ubuntu boot up anyway, that it’s really not some difficult system to use and they can quickly migrate to Linux. I didn’t expect it to do the forced check! I remember thinking the luck that it would have to be at this time, I didn’t really think is was 30 times, oh well… After explaining the benefit of such a check and how it helps to safeguard our PC’s, I finished the successful seminar presentation. But it left me with the reminder that I might want to turn that feature off or better, find an improved solution.

For users who never check their systems manually, I’d suggest not turning the feature off by configuring longer time periods between a check, rather leave your systems running the way they are. But for those of us who are a bit more Linux savvy or who like playing and tweaking with our systems, sure, let’s do the following…

Improving forced file system check:

To accomplish this, I decided to use AutoFsck. Why? Because it does not prevent the forced check from running if the file system is flagged as unclean during boot. Otherwise, the forced check will not continue. I also found it interesting to have a solution that would ask first, instead of going ahead and performing the check. I found a post on Ubuntu’s wiki that explained a little bit more:

“It’s really quite simple, every time you shut down, AutoFsck finds information on your disks. Every linux partition has two important number associated with it, one is the number of times it has been mounted, the other is the number of times it is allowed to before being checked. AutoFsck looks at these, and if your drives are due for checking it asks if you want to check them. If you say yes, your drives are checked before your computer shuts down. If you say no, AutoFsck will ensure that the check will not run next time your computer boots. You will then be prompted again the next time you shut down.” You can read the wiki entry here: AutoFsck ensures that the automatic disk check will no longer inconvenience you by making your boot times very long.

Installation was very simple, I downloaded AutoFsck v3.2 and double clicked the package to begin the installation.

The installation of the.deb file is automatic.

If you need to configure AutoFsck, it’s very simple. Just select System > Administration > Periodic Disk Checking

You can learn more about the configuration here: AutoFsck/Doc

A simple tweak that allows much greater control! As usual, I hope this post helps some of you.

And finally, to the individual who suggested, “Get a real OS”? I did, it’s called Linux… Smarty pants!