Linux General Questions Thread

Ok, thanks Lysander. Will program settings and such be automatically saved in the home partition or will I ahve to direct them there, no biggie, just wondering.

p.s. I was worried about that KDE reboot, phew

 

all personal program settings are stored in your home directory. that's what half the point of the directory is, actually. because linux (or any unix) was designed for multiple users from the beginning, all settings (except for encrypted password stuff) for each user are stored with that user's files in hidden directories. you can still access the text configuration files if you like, though... directories that start with a period (ie. ".themes" or ".gnome2") are hidden from normal view

 

First of all, as a fellow DV6000t user, I would recommend using a distro that has a 2.6.20 kernel. The problem,is that in the earlier kernels (2.6.18), using nvidia drivers shuts down an IRQ port on a wireless card supported by ndiswrapper (essentially all of them, I believe). Its a pretty common problem, and while it has been fixed in 2.6.20, I would make sure your distro uses a newer kernel. For distro choices, I would like to go against the grain and say PCLinuxOS 2007 Final, when it comes out. It is a very user-friendly distro with an easy format to use and a friendly community of people willing to help out. Their server has crashed recently however, so you'll have to wait a little bit to check things out. As someone who was in your position a month ago, I wish you the best of luck in your linux experience.

 

Ok, thanks. So the newer kernel will prevent driver problems from messing up the wireless? Sounds good to me. Will Feisty Fawn have the 2.6.20 kernel? I have been recommended quite a few distros, I would like to test each out a bit. If I make a /home partitions, can I intstall different distros onto my linux partition and not lose all of my settings and such from the /home partition? I think I will start with Ubuntu but I would like to try other flavors once I get the hang of things such as PCLinuxOS 2007, Pardus, Linux Mint, Sabayon, Fedora, who knows.

Anyway I am not sure that will work so I will most likely have to use a single flavor, which is fine with me. I should keep it simple for now anyway. I will be ordering my lappy in the next few days, I will let you guys know what I get and then I am sure I will be back when it comes time to partition and get rolling

 

Yeah, Feisty comes with the 2.6.20 kernel. It's a good idea to set your /home directory to a different partition whether or not you use several different distros so that way you can keep all your information in case you decide to upgrade your distro and do a clean install (sometimes upgrades don't go smoothly with Ubuntu and it's easier to just clean install). I've never personally done this, opting instead to just have a large FAT32 partition for all data between Linux and Windows.

 

I've actually been using NTFS with ntfs-3g for my shared partitions (100GB USB drive and 20GB on the hard disk), and it's been working great. The only thing you have to remember is to safely remove the drive from Windows, and shut down Windows entirely, rather than just hibernating it. Other than that, it's awesome, and really easy.

 

Sounds like just what I need, thanks Pita. And congrats on the mod nomination

 

What are our options if we play games from time to time?
Install Vista, then install ubuntu, and use vista for the games?

 

that's generally the best option if you want full performance for the least amount of headaches.

 

That's what I used to do, but with FAT32, you don't have to worry about unmounting the drive all the time. I like to just hibernate all my OS' because it cuts boot time down a lot, and FAT32 allows me to do that. As you said, with NTFS, you have to always unmount the drive and shut down Windows. FAT32 just works out better for me, not to mention it's readable by default in Linux. The only downside that I see is that FAT32 can't handle files larger than 4GB, but I haven't had to worry about that yet. Besides, ntfs-3g is integrated into Ubuntu 7.04 (though not Kubuntu strangely), so I can still mount and r/w my NTFS drive if I ever do run into that situation. That personally just works better for me.

 

How do I go about mounting and unmounting the NTFS Drive? I am thinking of doing a clean Vista install and just have one big Vista partition of like 100 gigs total. Will logging off of Vista completely do the unmounting of the NTFS drive that you are talking about? So then if I logged into Ubuntu I could read and write to that partition right away? Or would I then have to mount it in Ubuntu. My Ubuntu install will use the remaining 60 gigs of the HDD. I wanted to manually partition (even though I have never done this before ) and set up a 45 gig /home partition, a 14 gig / partition, and a 1 gig swap.

Not to sounds lazy but if I have to mount and unmount and stuff maybe a FAT32 partition would work better for me. I could suck it up and deal with keeping my larger files on either my /home partition or my Vista partition if necessary. Does Vista read and write well to FAT32? Anyone tried this?

 

Vista will read and write well to FAT32. Windows ran on FAT32 until Win2k when it switched to NTFS (NT File System). You will have to completely shut down Vista in order to mount your NTFS drive in Ubuntu safely. When you log in to Ubuntu, if you have ntfs-3g installed, you will need to navigate to your Computer directory (Places>Computer). You should see the NTFS partition there, and you will need to right click it, then click "Mount Volume." You'll enter your password, and that should take care of it. But again, FAT32 is much easier to use, as you can keep it mounted in both OS' at any time and still be accessed by both easily. FAT32 is what most USB flash drives are formatted to btw. But if you have files larger than 4GB, then FAT32 is not feasible for you.

 

The only files I would ever have larger than 4 gigs would be some occasionaly videos or DVDs. So I can just house those in my NTFS or /home partition until I dont need them anymore right.

Is it hard to manually set up a hard drive like this for someone who has never partitioned before. I have done my reading but still have never done it. I am in a toss up right now between just using NTFS-3G or using a FAT32 shared partition. I think I would give like 50 gigs to each OS and then 60 gigs to the FAT32 if I did it that way. Should that work?

 

Well, I've personally never set up my /home partition by itself to be honest with you. Every time I tried, it would never work, and Ubuntu would tell me that I hadn't assigned enough partitions or something. So I usually just end up installing Ubuntu into a large free space and let it take care of itself. So maybe I just missed something, and it will be easier for you. But those are just my experiences. That's why I keep all my information on a FAT32 partition. That way, in case my Linux install gets hosed, I can still access my important files via Windows as necessary. If I just had a separate /home partition (in the ext2 or ext3 format), Windows wouldn't be able to natively r/w to that partition. If you were just running Linux, I would say that it would be a good idea to make a separate /home partition. But if you're going to be running Linux and Windows (especially if you're going to be using each of them often), then it's a good idea to have a FAT32 partition to share files cause both OS' can easily r/w to that partition. As for size, that's generally up to you. But I have a feeling that you'll be using Windows more than Linux (at least initially), so I would advise you to assign ~80GB to Windows, 50 to Linux, and 30 to the shared partition, especially if you're going to be ripping DVDs to the NTFS partition.

Also keep in mind that while I use FAT32 and find it to be good for me, one benefit of having a spare NTFS partition would be that you could install all your Windows programs to that partition in case your Windows install ever gets hosed (which is likely to happen). I don't use Windows at all anymore, and it's just sitting there for school programs, so this doesn't mean much to me. But it is a definite advantage to having a second NTFS partition in addition to the main Windows partition.

 

Wow, thanks FTW for such a detailed response. I think my best bet for now is a FAT32 shared partition. I could still store my Vista apps on this if I wanted to, correct, so I would still have the benefit of the extra NTFS partition but wouldn't have to deal with mounting/unmounting.

You are probably right that I will use Vista more in the beginning, but as I progress into linux, I should be able to resize my partitions if necessary, correct?

So now I am looking at a clean install of Vista taking up 80GB and leaving the rest unallocated space. Then popping in the GParted Live CD, creating a shared FAT32 partition of about 30GB, leaving the rest unallocated, then popping in the Ubuntu Live CD and allowing it to install on the largest continuous free space (about 50GB) and take care of itself. How much swap will this give me? I don't want more than 1GB. What is the default swap when you allow Ubuntu to take care of itself so to speak.

Thanks so much for your responses. I'm starting to get very excited about my journey into Linux, I enjoy learning more about it every day.

 

Depends on how big it is, too. A large partition on FAT32 is very inefficient, and you'll lose some storage space. The cluster sizes are just too big. 30GB should be ok though. For swap space, especially on a 1GB-2GB RAM machine, I recommend between 512 and 1GB of swap space. You really don't need any more than that.

 

Yeah, I think I made a 25GB FAT32 partition for my data, and it only shows up as 23.1. It's not the greatest file system in the world, but a least it's not a proprietary Microsoft thing. It's more of a standard, which is one thing that I like too.

 

You sure FAT32 isn't proprietary?

 

So what does that mean for me? I can still use it right? GRRR I dislike Microsoft.

 

you can use either.

 

I know that, just hoping Microsoft will not make problems down the road for people using FAT32. Anyway, good news. I just ordered my rig. Very Exciting.

Intel(R) Core(TM) 2 Duo T7200 (2.0GHz/4MB L2Cache)
15.4" WXGA BrightView Widescreen (1280x800)
256MB NVIDIA(R) GeForce(R) Go 7400
HP Imprint Finish + Microphone + Webcam
2GB DDR2 System Memory (2 Dimm)
160GB 5400RPM SATA Hard Drive
FREE Upgrade: 8X DVD+/-R/RW w/Double Layer Support
Intel(R) PRO/Wireless 3945ABG Network w/Bluetooth
No TV Tuner w/remote control
High Capacity 6 Cell Lithium Ion Battery

 

Well, that about figures. Microsoft owns everything else, so why not this? Of course, I should've known as much considering that Windows used it and still r/w natively. If it wasn't Microsoft, they wouldn't have used it.

I guess I should say that it at least can be natively r/w by both systems. NTFS can only be natively used by Windows, and ext- can only be natively used by Linux. Still, the FAT news makes me sad. I was hoping that at least one standard wasn't being dominated by Microsoft.

 

well, with Linux the FAT32 "driver" is just a modular part of the kernel. you theoretically could have no FAT32 support. it's not really a standard, either, it's just de facto a standard because of all the bazillions of Windows computers that were running it exclusively up until XP, and even then many people were still using it.

 

Hey guys, with the new version of ubuntu being released i guess i couldnt have picked a better time to make the switch. But, before i wipe out this HDD, i would like to clear up some questions... a little bit about everyhting. If you can help with any it would be great. Thanks!

1. Going to format my HDD when i install this, but i also intent to dual boot with XP exclusively for games. Should i install Ubuntu or XP first? or does it matter?

1.5. Or do i reall need XP for games. What is compatible. HL2, Stalker, Fear, Deus Ex?

2. With dual booting do you guys make seperate partitions? If so what size do you recommend for each OS?

3. OK, so LINUX is SOOOOO much more secure.... but do i really not need an Antivirus or Firewall at all!? If not what do you recommend? I really like Nod32 AV and Outpost firewall in windows, anyone use em in Linux?

4. Nvidia Drivers. Ive got a GO 7400, I dont like using official forceware drivers, and i prefer hacked drivers like LaptopVideo2Go. Any suggestions?

5. Registry. With windows i am a clean freak, Cleaning registry and junk files constantly with utilities such as CrapCleaner. Can/Do i need to do this with Ubuntu?

6. aDSL broadband. Internet explorer has a nifty connection wizard so that i can connect my login required broadband without installing the software. Will it be just as easy in Ubutnu. I hate installing pointless software.

7. Video and Codecs. I love Media Player Classic, i also install CCCP (combined community codec pack) to be able to play just about everything and anything. Are these compatible with Ubuntu. Is there another open source alternative to playing just about any file type in linux? Also, anyone use VLC?

8. Finding compatible software... Any good rescources guys. I dont really know what to look for or how to tell. When i goto the sites of programs i like to use looking for a linux version, some have it and some have a source file download that says i need to use with another program... i dont get it?

9. SVideo out. Will it be easy?

10. For a laptop. How are power managment settings? Should i expect any change in battery life from windows?

11. Wine... Can i really use this to install windows programs? how compatible is it?

12. Uninstalling programs. Is it the same procedure as Windows, always leaving a bunch of crap behind?

13. Bit-torrent. I use it. A lot. Any suggestions? I like bittornado in windows, but again, this is an example of them giving a source file for use in Linux...... ? http://bittornado.com/download.html

14. Browser. It sounds like ubuntu is installed with Firefox 2... but im still not so convinced its the best. Anyone use Opera?

15. Do you recommend any alternatives to software that ubuntu is already installed with. Photo viewers, dvd player, media player, etc?

16. Chinese language pack. I have to be able to write in Chinese. Can anyone confirm?

17. I am in another country. Internet is really slow so its a pain to search forums and internet. Know of any excellent linux newb sites?

Thanks everyone. Any Q you can answer would be great. And possibly more to come from me

 

Congratulations, welcome aboard.

If you want hassle free, partition your hard drive, then install Windows first, followed by Linux. Window's bootloader doesn't play nice with anything but Windows.

Generally, yes.

Yup.

Not very well.

Nope.

Sort of.

For a dual boot, you must have atleast three partitions. One for Windows, one for Linux, and one for Linux Swap. Swap size should be about the same size as the physical memory in the machine. About 10 gigs is enough for basic Ubuntu stuff.

I don't use Anti-Virus or firewalls. I'm still clean.

The official drivers from nVidia are really the best way to go. Look here.

I suppose you could clean out uninstalled package files, but no clean up is neccessary on my machine.

I believe Firefox has similar suppoprt, Linux supports PPPoE.

Look here for codec information. I also have VLC player installed on my machine, because of the higher volume.

Depends on the program. Tell us what you're looking for and we'll help you out.

Can't honestly say, never tried it.

Linux supports the same sort of power saving features windows does, so you shouldn't see much of a difference either way.

This site will tell you.

No crap left behind. Just the installer file if you want it again, and sometimes it leaves the config files behind.

Code:

sudo apt-get install bittornado-gui

Done.

Look here, the 6.10 package should work.

I use amarok for music files.

See here for all your asian keyboard needs.

http://ubuntuforums.org works wonders.

No worries, let us know how you get on.

 

Yeah, you pretty much wanna follow everything Lysander said. Your biggest hassles will likely be media codecs, but if you want a really easy way out, you can use Automatix2. It makes installing codecs and common applications (such as media players like VLC and the Opera browser) incredibly easy. But it comes with its consequences; it's not actually supported by the folks at Ubuntu, and thus will most likely leave you with the inability to upgrade to a new version when it comes out (currently scheduled to be Gutsy Gibbon 7.10 in October), and could even screw up some updates down the line. On top of that, it's not really a good way to learn Linux. But for n00bs just getting started, it could be a valuable tool. Eventually, as you become more comfortable with Linux, you'll probably just want to leave it alone though, and thus I really don't recommend it (though I used it myself at one point).

 

Wow. Thats fantastic!

OK, so... 3 partitions. What is a linux swap?

I have a 120 GB HDD, so ill want 10 GB for linux, and what do you recommend for XP and for Swap. Could the swap just be the remainder of my HDD space to store files?

So first I install XP. Then i am assuming i will boot the computer from the Ubuntu disk to install Linux. Is it at that point that it will install whatever i need in order to dual boot the system?

Can i make it always just automatically boot Ubuntu and only choose to boot XP if i press a specified key while the system is starting?

Also, im a little confused by this Automatix. By the way you described it... it makes it sound as if the normal installation of linux programs is much more difficult than just double clicking an .exe files.

If you say it will make updates difficult or impossible in the future than i will probably opt out of using it. But i do need to learn the typical procedure of installing common applications then.

Thanks guys

 

It's really much easier to just make two partitions. You'll want to install Windows XP to the first partition, and then leave the second partition empty. Ubuntu will automatically make all the necessary preparations, including setting up your swap partition. Alternatively, you could make a Windows XP partition, a FAT32 or NTFS partition for sharing data between Windows and Ubuntu, and then leave the rest unallocated for Ubuntu to install to (again, it will make all necessary adjustments).

Noooo.... the swap does not need to be the remainder of your HDD. The swap isn't really what you think it is; it's actually just an area on your drive that Ubuntu uses as a cache, like Virtual Memory in Windows. The swap needs to be no larger than 1GB usually, assuming you have 1GB+ of RAM. If you have 2GB, you could really get away with less space.

Yes, you will first install XP, then you will boot from the Ubuntu CD, and select Install from the Desktop. The Ubuntu disk is a LiveCD, which means you can actually use the OS as it's installing, or use the OS without choosing to install at all. It will simply run from your RAM, and doesn't touch the hard drive.

During the install, Ubuntu will install the GRUB bootloader, which will allow you to select between Ubuntu and Windows XP at startup. If you don't press any boot, you will boot into Ubuntu by default. Otherwise, you can select from Ubuntu or Windows XP.

Well, installing files in Linux isn't usually as simple as clicking a .exe file, although it can be. The problem is that most devs just put out the source code in the interest of having open source available. Binaries tend to hide the source code, which is against the GPL, but is allowed as long is source code is available. So for devs, it just makes sense to just release the source code since you can compile a program from source.

The good part is that Ubuntu has what are called repositories where applications are stored, and to install those, all you need is an Internet connection. You simply navigate to the proper utility in Ubuntu, search for your program, click the check box, then click apply. It will install it and configure it for you. But the thing is that many of your more obscure or less-Linux friendly apps aren't in the repositories.

 

Automatix is your friend, get it and use it to get many essential apps. I believe it has Opera, Azureus, codecs, etc.

 

I really don't see a huge use for Automatrix as the Ubuntu's repositories already have all of that. The only thing I seen in Automatrix that I didn't see in repositories are Abode reader & the commercial software Crossover.

And I will advise anyone to manually download Azureus. There is a problem with Azureus not working when downloaded from the repositories. Google it for more details. I had to install myself to have it run properly.

 

With codecs becoming so easy to install on Feisty, the need for Automatix is diminishing. Plus, there is always the risk that Automatix may break a future update due to adding unusual repos.

I just don't believe it is worth it, at the current stage.

 

If you want predominantly work on Ubuntu, 30~50G out of 120G might be a good choice. You don't need to worry about XP has too little space since:
1. You don't want much except Games
2. XP can always write to Linux partition using free IFS driver.

In Linux, you won't get hacked driver from laptopvideo2go. Nvidia official linux driver is good.

Don't worry about the install sequence, you can do whatever you want. A easy step is to install Ubuntu after you install XP. Before reinstall XP(it happens all the time), you can save the boot sector as "linux", then go ahead to install XP stuff. After you finish XP, just copy this "linux" to "c:\" and add "c:\linux" into boot.ini. By this way you will see grub again but the booting sequence is to start XP bootloader first and then looking for multiple boot option.

Ubuntu handle multiple language pretty good. SCIM gives you both simplified and traditional characters. That's a lot better than XP. Ubuntu's cn99 repository is in China.

For media player, all DVD can be played in Totem player, however LinDVD looks much familiar(It is from Intervideo)

 

Yea yea thats what people say. It works and thats what matters to me.

 

Commercial DVDs can only be played via Totem if you have the libdvdcss2, which is not as easy to install as the other codecs (which are VERY easy in Feisty). You'll have to add the medibuntu repos, wget the key, and then install it. It's a workaround that most new guys will not be accustomed to. And LinDVD is not available for Ubuntu; it's available only to manufacturers to distribute (in Commercial distributions), and currently the only distribution that I know of with LinDVD is Mandriva 2007.

 

HMMM... ok. SOOO, how does this sound?

When i format the HDD and create partitions to reinstall XP i should do this...
50 GB for a Linux partition
25 GB XP for a XP Partition
And the rest of the space for a storage Partition

THEN when i get to installing ubuntu, it will create its own ~1gb partition for the swap from one of those.

OR should i make the XP partition smaller?

Sorry guys, ive never dual booted, and though i know how to create seperate partitions.... i always only just make one out the the HDD for XP.

I think the reason a lot of people stick OS's on one partition is to make formatting and reinstalling easier without loosing all of there files. Right?

 

Put in your XP cd, wipe out your drive, create a partition for XP leave rest as free space, install XP. Then go back and pop in Ubuntu cd and create 2 partitions, one for root and one swap. Make swap as big as your total ram + a bit more, make your root the rest. You're done.

 

It worked for me too. But that doesn't change the fact that it's messy, and can cause troubles down the line.

Sounds good, but if you want Ubuntu to make its own swap partition, you'd be best to leave that 50 GB as raw, or unpartitioned space, as during setup, it looks for free space.

Well, partitioning can help secure those files too. If you have all your data on a non-system partition, if say, XP went bananas and wouldn't load up, you still have all that important data safely tucked away.

People stick it all on one partition because they don't want (or can't) learn how to set up partitions. However, it is a valuable skill to learn, and is, in the end, a very simple skill.

 

About swap, why does there need to be a swap partition if nearly everybody has sufficient RAM to run these distributions? I have never used any of my swap to my knowledge based on looking at the System Monitor.

 

Well, you don't want your OS freezing up when some program decides to go rogue, do you?

 

My personal opinion - don't even create swap
I have 896MB of RAM and my Ubuntu never have the need to use swap. Also if there's no swap you force linux to use RAM which is also faster than using swap.

 

My personal opinion is to make a small swap partition as a logical partition extended from your root partition. If you have more than 2GB of RAM or more, make the swap 512MB or smaller. But if you're dealing with 1GB or less, there are plenty of programs that, when combined with other running programs, will send you over 1GB. I've been higher than 700MB of running application before in Ubuntu, and those that decide to do things like add desklets, docks, widgets, and run Beryl before they even open any applications like Firefox, OpenOffice, Gaim (sorrry... ahem... Pidgin ) will probably have that happen to them too. And that's not even counting if you run games (whether natively or via Wine/Cedega), where newer games consistently complain about having less than 1.5GB of RAM. Just because you guys don't use it, doesn't mean that nobody does.

 

Linux uses the available ram before resorting to swap, anyways. Besides, if you want things like hibernation to work, you need a decent sized swap partition.

 

Here is the link of LinDVD in .deb package. But it only come with i386, not x86_64.

 

Your link needs to be removed. From the Intervideo website:

LinDVD is a commercial pay-for program available only to manufacturers or users of Mandriva 2007. By linking to a free (as in beer), non-original binary of the software, you are guilty of software piracy. The only way to legally obtain LinDVD (as I've said SEVERAL times now) is to either be a manufacturer or a user of Mandriva 2007.

 

When I installed, Ubuntu 6.1 it made me create at least 256 MB of swap. Does Feisty Fawn require swap?

 

As far as I know it does. But I don't think every distribution does. Some of the more advanced ones where you can compile your own kernel (like Gentoo) probably don't require it. But you'll need a swap to go into hibernate either way, so it's a good idea to give yourself 1GB because anything lower, and there might not be enough space to dump all the active memory to the drive.

 

Does the swap need to be a certain size in order to make hibernation work? If I have 2GB RAM, do I need 2GB of swap?

 

Exactly. Swap space is also the hibernation file under Linux. So swap needs to be as large as RAM to hibernate correctly, from my understanding.

 

I guess I'll be repartitioning my computer then. Thanks.

 

I don't think it has to be the same size. I think my swap file is only ~1GB, but I have 1.5GB of memory. Ideally, you would want the two values to be equal in case you did have all of your available RAM being used. However, with more than 1GB of memory, this usually isn't a problem, and if it is, you'll just need to close some programs before you go into hibernate.