State of optimus/asus keyboards/trackpad on ubuntu.

Pretty random tale follows:

So my favourite linux distro project, Fuduntu, sadly ended lately, with Andrew Wyatt declaring the updates would dry out. Some of the people from the pro starting up a new OpenSUSE based distro. Which might possibly end up working well. But in the meantime, I thought this was a good opportunity to check on the compatibility progress for ubuntu on my n56.

Generally, any sandy bridge, ivy bridge and optimus enabled laptop, with asus' wm-based keyboard shortcut setup will work in the same way.

Note that, for whatever insane reason, the actual bootloader version right now is chosen based on the way you booted the initial install-media. So if you booted a live-usb (for example created in unetbootin), in EFI-mode, the bootloader will be an efi boot. If you wanted an mbr-based boot, you would have to boot into the legacy mode, and pick the grub entry via the unetbootin loader..).

The proper way to install that kind of boot in the ubuntu install is to pick the primary disk as the target for the bootloader (typically hda or sda - the other partitions will be named sda1, sda2, and so on), and configure a partition mounted as /boot on the system. On an efi-boot, you could opt to place the bootloader on any of the devices, and let the default efi-boot loader pick the bootloader for the linux boot. Or simply use grub (which is what it's called), and launch other efi-boots from that.

Ideally, you would have a gpt-partition, where the first boot is an efi-boot loader such as rEFInd, launching the different OSes present on the system.

On my system, which is an old mbr style setup, this looks something like this, with windows on the first two primary partitions, and linux on the next two. You will see something similar at the start of an ubuntu install - it's not actually as criminally complicated as it looks (but do beware nice options such as "let Ubuntu decide to erase your disk and replace everything with Ubuntu". What you want are the "advanced" options, or the "other" option at the bottom of the page):
sda (the main identifier for the first sdd on the system. If you have a disk-drive on the first sata slot, it'll say hda)
-->sda1 (windows system, bootloader)
-->sda2 (windows main partition, "c:")
-->sda3 (linux, ext4, 500mb, mount point /boot)
-->sda4 (linux, ext4, rest of the disk, mount point /)

..the slash just means "root". Base of the system. Because I have no organisation on anything I do, I don't have a bunch of logical partitions following that primary boot-partition, with for example a /home mount point (for all document folders, etc.) that you would retain between upgrades, etc.

There is also no need to install a swap partition on a computer with more than 4Gb ram. But if you want the linux spins - all of them do this - to support hibernation, you will need a swap-partition slightly larger than the amount of physical ram on the system. It is possible to configure a hibernation file-stream, but there are usually a hilarious amount of roadblocks in place to stop that from working perfectly, so avoid that.

So to summarize - a perfectly good partition setup for any linux spin is a boot partition (this will hold the kernel images and the boot-loader, and can be separated from the rest of the system for all kinds of good reasons). On an mbr-style setup, this partition needs to be a "primary partition". On a gpt-setup/efi boot, this is not an issue. The next few partitions can be "logical", or extended partitions - a root partition, and a home-partition might make sense. The root-partition with all the programs and binaries on - 20Gb usually is generous. A home partition could be for all kinds of things, but lazy people will of course just mount their windows partition and make a shortcut to the old documents.. Lastly, add swap if you want - has to be slightly larger than the amount of physical ram (though the system won't complain during shutdowns until you have less than the amount currently in use).

At the time of writing, the latest release is 13.04. And the standard install with or without the updates actually break before the first boot. Congrats. Probably owing to some nvidia driver precedence, or some module added at the first run (laptops with only internal graphics won't have this issue).

Not to worry, though, installing the latest nvidia drivers and optimus support (or the unofficial tool to simulate the power-switching/saving functions offered in windows, bumblebee) is fairly simple, provided that you had connected to the internet at the time of the install (and still are near the same access point, etc.) since you then will have access to the internets...

Otherwise - gods help you. Good luck figuring out how to get the wifi up with ifup and iwconfig. Seriously, no one does that any more..

Hit ctrl+f2, or something to get a viewport with a terminal up (there are several active at any point - the graphical user interface typically resides in one of them, such as number 7 in ubuntu.. I think).
Log in with your username. And run
$ sudo add-apt-repository ppa:bumblebee/stable
..to add the bumblebee repository to the ubuntu repository list. Sudo is preconfigured to work with your user and your user's password.. *cough* Almost, but not quite, as ridiculous as hitting "continue" with admin rights, I guess..
$ sudo apt-get update
..to update the database of package names/references. You can search these with "apt-cache search [package name]".
Then run
$ sudo apt-get bumblebee primus
..this will draw in the bumblebee package with all the recommended dependencies, and "primus", an alternative rendering method that likely will be implemented as default soon.

Now wait for the new kernel to be created, and for the right modules to be reticulated in some sort of cyber-voodoo. Then reboot:
$ sudo reboot

And the login screen should welcome you soon enough.

This is also the same procedure you would use if you boot straight into ubuntu, and want the power-saving features that disable the nvidia card when it's not active. Without bumblebee/bbswitch, the nvidia card is actually turned on even if it's not used. Not a very good idea..

So what do we have, then. What can i say. Ubuntu is, at the moment, a bit of a mess. On the front is the "Unity" dock. This is really a module running on top of a composite manager called compiz fusion. Except it's been fused into the desktop environment, and will not actually disappear. You also are instantly invited to make use of Ubuntu cloud, one, amazon links. And all your searches in the search bar, which you are insisted on that you should use for documents or programs you wish to find -- are accompanied with hits on music and.. things at Canonical's partners.

Ah, commercialism in linux. How quick they grow up.

And the dock on the left (and it will be stuck on the left - you can't change the location, even if it is in the way of something else, such as a dock that actually works) will be your companion for as long as you use Ubuntu.

The same will go for the themes - you're stuck with the pre-configured themes, unless you go in and manually change the references to the themes individually, or find some clever way of circumventing this. It is essentially a locked down version of gnome2, and it's no wonder Linus Torvalds had very few nice things to say about this. Frankly, it gives off exactly the same impression as when booting up Windows 8 for the first time -- except it's not quite as insistent. They've even copied the unbelievably annoying behaviour where if you drag a window up to the taskbar, it somehow fills the entire screen automatically. Why? I've no idea. It's about as smart as to lock the toolbar to only show the "file | edit | view" menu bar, and leave the rest open, but unoccupied (and uneditable).

They've even overridden the default behaviour in gnome2 where it remembers the size and position of the launched apps, and instead reverts back to whatever insanity the package-makers thought would look good. For example, everything is plastered on the right if it is a program that comes with the package. Why? Because the dock extends across the screen if, /if/, it is open.

You don't actually have to use this dock-application on the left for anything else than as a launcher, though. And the barebones system is set up very efficiently. And, I'm happy to note, the power-saving functions for iCore processors and intel's weed and branch farm systems are well supported. With bumblebee running, I'm actually dropping a bit below the lowest power-draw in windows. Fan behaviour and battery life follows after. That is a pleasant surprise.

The same goes for the keyboard. The light works, monitor light keys work (after nvidia-drivers have been installed via the bumblebee dependencies), and the volume keys work.

Synaptics multitouch gestures are not implemented at this point, but are proposed standard in the next few releases. I think it's likely they might actually work reasonably well - if you're feeling adventurous, try them out.

Seems that devices powering up and down is also better handled than they were the last time I ditched Ubuntu. Though kernel panics have certainly happened several times when the system would sleep while an optimus session was active -- the general impression of the system (outside the entire "install breaks at the install" thing) so far is actually not bad. The system's backbone has matured proportionally to the way parts of the frontend has devolved into a useless and arrogant presentation that serves to do nothing but confuse the heck out of people.

Let me give you an example: So you know what a terminal is. Or a shell. So you search for a shell, and get a terminal. And this helps you in no real way. It just puts an obstacle between you and what you want.

So next you want to install Steam. This is a fairly well touted feature, let's do a search. So now you get, among other things, Steam. And you get an option to "buy" it from the ubuntu software center. And if you click around here, you've already left the unity shell - so why have it in the first place? You still need to go to the software center to search for installs you don't have included in the "quick-search".

And beyond that, the software center is now even more impenetrable than the standard package browser, which at least let you see what you did when you added a new ppa or a new unofficial package well.

Of course, to run it with optimus, you can't simply pick at the dock, and add a command (it's locked). Or create a launcher prefix for executables in a certain filter (that would have been useful). You would need to either start it from the terminal..
$ optirun steam
or
$ optirun -b primus steam
..to use the "bridge" switch, and use primus as the pass-through, before launching the program, steam.

What this amounts to is that the new system looks friendly on the surface, but is actually only obscuring features that you would like to know about, and which are essential if you want to do something and know what you are actually doing, or undo it later. And you prefer to simply circumvent the frontend to do something quickly. Sound familiar to windows users..?

Beyond that, like mentioned, compiz fusion is pre-installed, the dock is a very quick and small module, and intended to run smoothly on any system with a minimal amount of processing power. It also calls compiz plugins fairly intelligently when you open programs, and these open more instances.

On top, the default integrated themes and so on work very smoothly with the preinstalled software specially, but also with anything supporting the messaging/notification facilities. And there are fewer pre-installed amounts of chat-software and ubuntu one services turning up, which is good.

And if you add a few packages, that follow easily with the packaged project, you can get a fairly functional desktop very quickly.

I.e., $ sudo apt-get install compiz-plugins
And you get a few more plugins and useful extras to play with. Which.. all is completely useless to, no matter how familiar you are with computers, you if you don't also know that the name of the plugin that sweeps for example all active program windows into slightly miniaturized windows on the current viewport is called "Scale". While the swoop-zoom out so you can see all the desktops on the board is called "Expo".

You can configure both of those with a tool called compizconfig-settings-manager. Which.. is actually what it's called in the package well:
$ sudo apt-get install compizconfig-settings-manager

Of course, the actual program is called "ccsm".

Which is what you will need to type in a terminal to get the program to launch.

Simplez!

Generally, though, you can install most programs and packages by simply downloading them, or adding a repository with a click on a web-page. This is also the case for compizconfig-settings-manager, and compiz-fusion-icon, for example. And then install the packages via the automatically launched software tools.

This isn't necessarily very complicated. And once you start the programs (via the crazy launcher), you can sticky them on the dock, or on the desktop afterwards. And simply launch them from there, in a familiar way.

Ups and downs, in other words, for ubuntu so far.

Good news, though, is that it's actually a working OS now. I'm certainly looking forward to the point when the asus-specific fixes for the keyboard, and the Ivy bridge tweaks, will be implemented by default in more distros.. Because then I will ditch Canonical and their streamlining into the garbage bin.

You want to know what streamlining really is? It's a desktop environment that's accessible and actually simplify the tasks you want to perform. If you can do that while removing complicated procedures, you have a success on your hands. This is helpful, this is functional.

If you can only make it /look/ simple, and you do it by removing user-choices that are necessary for performing the task they want -- then you have a disaster. Then you're actually sabotaging the user, making it more difficult to do what you want.

Then you just have "Windows". And we have that one already.

So we're getting there. Getting further ahead, at least