Mar
1
Speed Up and Improve Web Surfing With an Ubuntu Squid Server.
March 1, 2008 | By: UbuntuLinuxHelp | 9 Comments
Posted in Hands On, How To
A year ago, I was able to obtain a used (end-of-lease) skid of 20 IBM ThinkPad T22 notebooks. I was able to sell almost all of them on eBay (after cleaning them up, buying RAM and power adaptor cords), except for two (because the hardware does not work properly). Those two have been laying around (gathering dust) ever since. I'm reluctant to throw the last two out, because some of the parts can be salvaged. I scavenged both units, in order to make one that is somewhat usable. After booting-up, I found the screen starts to flicker and then "go wild" after some time. Needless to say, I'll never be able to use or auction this as a "working" laptop.
The unit has a Read more
Feb
29
Ubuntu – I am what I am because of who we all are.
February 29, 2008 | By: UbuntuLinuxHelp | Leave a Comment
Posted in Editorials
My most recent perception of the Ubuntu Linux community.
Friday's are normally easier days, right? Not my last friday. It was loaded with stress, anger and other emotions. Why? Read here: We've let someone go...
The difficult part for me was was finding out you've misplaced your trust in someone and in turn it makes you feel like an idiot.
After friday's "goodbye" session ended, I was left with a mess to clean up and did not really know the best way to approach the matter. Do I email people, don't I? Do I blog an entry or not? Is this a private matter or a public one? What do I say and to whom? How do I tell people it was not me and in the same breath, not look like a dope?
After much hemming and hawwing (and listening to input from others), I realized it's my blog and I'm taking it back! I resolved to email some individuals and respond to any messages (from others) that I found. Suffice it to say, this post is not about me, rather about my perception of the community at large.
[coolplayer width="340" height="260" autoplay="0" loop="0" charset="utf-8" download="1" mediatype=""]
The meaning of Ubuntu
[/coolplayer]
I sent a message to Philip Newborough of CrunchBang.org and Christer Edwards at Ubuntu-tutorials , but Mr. Edwards has not had the time to respond yet, nor for that matter have others. Those that did respond, with advice were very helpful. In particular, I was surprised with the helpfulness, consideration and candour of those that did respond. I imagined that there would be raving mad beasts, red eyed and waiting, with stomping hooves and snorting steam, but my experience was quite the opposite. Everyone was helpful, and that's when I realized that Linux users, perhaps,supported a more intelligent, understanding community; than I expected.
One representative of the community that I found particularly helpful (in part because of such speedy responses) was Mackenzie Morgan of Ubuntu Linux Tips & Tricks.
She has a nifty blog with lots of Ubuntu goodies, so do check it out when you have a moment, you'll learn a few helpful things from that blog.
If it were not for her input, I would not have realized that a rather large area was being blocked access to my site. I found that a large number of IP address ranges were being blocked because she could not access the site. That was a 2 minute configuration change, but would never have been fixed had someone (Mackenzie) not told me. She even took extra time out of her day to fully let me know what had transpired, sending me any information she had. In my opinion, I think most individuals would get mad and not do anything to help. Ubuntu Linux Tips & Tricks didn't do that, but instead chose to help. This (to me) falls under the definition of Ubuntu found here: http://www.ubuntu.com/products/whatisubuntu
"Ubuntu is an African word meaning 'Humanity to others', or 'I am what I am because of who we all are'."
I was taken aback by the response from Mr. Newborough:
"...No problem, thanks for the email. Sad to hear that someone has been forcefully removed. Was that really necessary, was (re-)educating the individual in the correct use of licensing not an option?
Peace..."
I must be honest and admit that I had not considered this option - Wow!! In retrospect the approach and suggestion came across as a more wiser course of action. I certainly wish I had considered that earlier, I wish I had contacted CrunchBang.org earlier. (Isn't hindsight great?). His input meant to me "Professional relationships are not things to use, but rather things to grow" and "If something goes wrong, then it's up to you to help teach the person what is right". In any event, the response has left me with a lot of valuable insight and food-for-thought. Again, dare I say this is "Ubuntu".
I anticipated this being a lengthy blog post, but realize that I've already expressed my opinion of this community.
I'm impressed, I'm happy that there's a supported online community. Now I can get back to the subject of re-building my blog with a clear mind. As I've mentioned an another post a few days ago...
...I think one positive component of the Ubuntu community is that we are all able to work together despite our differences in religion, politics, language, race… Do I need to go one listing them? I wish the leaders of all our countries could work as well together as this community. We really are “Ubuntu”, “Humanity to others” or “I am what I am because of who we all are.”...
A big thanks to everyone!
Feb
29
We’ve Let Someone Go…
February 29, 2008 | By: UbuntuLinuxHelp | 4 Comments
Posted in Editorials
This is an open post to all visitors. Recently we were contacted by an individual who had some of their content posted on our blog. (Actually, we found out by accident when we saw a message from the poster while he was away from his desktop and left his Yahoo webmail page open; and he finally spilled the beans this morning). The message indicated that it was not licensed to be used. After checking the original site, we were fortunate to be able to easily confirm, as such, we were grateful that this individual brought it to our attention. We were able to fix the issue and the individual ("poster") responsible has left our team. (Unfortunately the individual did not leave voluntarily, rather forcibly removed). As such we are not privy to all communication.
Since then, we have reviewed the content left behind by this poster and have been able to ensure that attribution links and licensing posts were attached to each entry written by other individuals. For any of you that do have posts, please kindly review them and if you find anything please contact us so that we can further fix any issues left behind by the outgoing poster. This individual uses a yahoo.com email address to communicate (which is beyond our control), so please do contact us direct via the above link.
Unfortunately, we had to remove this poster (as he also had access to manage our server), it's embarrassing, but sometimes things happen when you're not looking and need to be fixed. Therefore we fixed it, he's gone. Permanently!
Again, thanks for reading and hopefully all of you will have a great Friday.
Update: This was quite the learning experience! Final follow-up here: /ubuntu-i-am-what-i-am-because-of-who-we-all-are/
Feb
28
Top 100 of the Best (Useful) OpenSource Applications
February 28, 2008 | By: UbuntuLinuxHelp | 172 Comments
Posted in Applications, Editorials
The following is a list of about 100 of the best OpenSource Applications, that actually help make Linux more usable for people. It is my hope that this list shows potential Linux users that there really is a large, effective, productive and usable range of free,
OpenSource applications. For existing Linux users (like myself), I think this will provide a great resource in finding applications that may better suit your needs, or just for fun! Needless to say, this is just some of the thousands of applications available! I develop web sites, so this list tends to focus on applications which support that type of work.
The majority of these applications can be installed by either apt-get or synaptic, however I've included the web site addresses of these applications so that you can obtain more information. I've tried many of these applications myself - and they are pretty good!
This list took a long time to put together and I tried to keep it in alphabetical order for you. - You might want to bookmark this and Read more
Feb
26
Linux Driver for Quickcam USB cameras – Logitech Quickcam Fusion
February 26, 2008 | By: UbuntuLinuxHelp | 9 Comments
Posted in How To
I just inherited a Logitech Quickcam Fusion, but where the heck are the drivers? I took a look at the Logitech site... and asked the same question. (Sidenote: Logitech, you need to get your act together. Where are your Linux drivers?).
Needless to say Ekiga could not use the cam. After much hair pulling, nashing of teeth and grumbling, I was able to Google enough information to put a solution together. If someone is looking for a solution on Feisty, read on...
First, I needed to install the linux headers for my kernel (so I could properly compile the drivers). To compile, I needed tools (GCC, etc.):
(Unplug the cam!!)
sudo apt-get install build-essential
sudo apt-get install linux-headers-386
* If you use i686 the make sure your command is: sudo apt-get install linux-headers-686 instead
To get a driver go here: http://svn.berlios.de/svnroot/repos/linux-uvc/linux-uvc/trunk/ and save each file to your sources folder. (Mine is .../root/sources/linux-uvc). The following should be saved:
Makefile
dynctrl.txt
svn-version.sh
uvc_compat.h
uvc_ctrl.c
uvc_driver.c
uvc_isight.c
uvc_queue.c
uvc_status.c
uvc_v4l2.c
uvc_video.c
uvcvideo.h
** I don't know what the rules are about distribution, but if they disappear or someone cannot get them, just say so in the comments section and I will have them.
Update Feb. 24, 2010: I just found out that the Berlios site requires logins to download the actual files. I have no idea when they changes this. In my opinion the registration is harder to find, so here's the link to that: http://developer.berlios.de/account/register.php I notice they now support Git as well as SVN, etc. Also an IMPORTANT thing to keep in mind is that Ubuntu 8.04.x and 9.x support this camera out-of-the-box
Now that I had the drivers, run the following command in the same directory you saved them to:
sudo make && sudo make install
This installs those drivers and you can type "dmesg" in the same terminal (after plugging in the cam) to see the "xxxx class device" message. That means the drivers work.
I started Ekiga, but no-go... no video... :(
So:
sudo modprobe uvcvideo
Seems the problem was with Ekiga preferences? I tried Tried v4l2 on the video devices, and the set the 'USB video class device' to auto
(I'm going from memory in this last part as I didn't write it down... but I'm sure I saw that in a post in one of the links below). Either way... Wheeee!!! It works!
Only in Ekiga.
I don't remember every single page I looked at, but most of them are here. There is no way I could have figured all this out myself, so big kudos to all the contributors on those sites!:
http://forum.skype.com/index.php?showtopic=10858
http://www.theinquirer.net/en/inquirer/news/2007/04/30/one-man-writes-linux-drivers-for-235-usb-webcams
http://mxhaard.free.fr/spca5xx.html
http://linux-uvc.berlios.de/
http://svn.berlios.de/svnroot/repos/linux-uvc/
http://qce-ga.sourceforge.net/
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=321862
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=194793
Update: If you're looking for more information, I've found another resource that, among other things, has:
"...a script to install your webcam on ubuntu. The author has now one application for all the scripts. It does detect which driver is needed and installs the correct driver..."
You can find this (script) via http://ralph.n3rds.net/index.php?/archives/128-ubuntu-webcam.html
Additionally, there's information about Logitech QuickCam Express Plus and Ubuntu community webcam help.
