Ubuntu
So you plug in your iPod, and Rhythmbox automatically starts up. But maybe you want GTKPod to start up, or maybe you don’t want any application to automatically launch when you attach your music player. Here’s how to control this:
Open nautilus (file browser).
Click Edit -> Preferences -> Media tab. Click the button next to “Music Player”.
This is the setting that controls what happens when you attach your MP3 player. You can choose another program from the list, choose a program that is not listed, tell it to ask you each time, or choose “Do Nothing”.
This is a Gnome feature, so it should work on any Linux distribution that is running Gnome (Fedora, Suse, Arch, Debian, etc).
I like to set up my Ubuntu workstation to automatically log into my account and then immediately lock the screen. This allows all my processes to start up and also allows me to VNC into the main console session via the Remote Desktop (vino) server. There are a few ways to set this up:
First, set up auto-login:
System > Administration > Login Window > Security tab
Check ‘Enable Automatic Login’ and choose your username. Click ‘Close’.
As for locking the screen after login, you can try adding the following command to System > Preferences > Sessions:
gnome-screensaver-command --lock
or
xdg-screensaver lock
I found that these commands worked for me when logging in and out of the box. However, I found that they did not work for me when I rebooted my workstation. If any of the other commands listed Sessions utilize gnome-keyring, such as ‘mail-notification’, the gnome-keyring password prompt seems to keep the screen from being locked. To work around this, I created a script called ‘lockstartup’. This script does the following:
1. Pauses for 10 seconds (a step I found necessary in order to get the script to work correctly)
2. Locks the screen
3. Pauses for another 10 seconds (again, a step I found necessary)
4. Starts any applications that use gnome-keyring
Here is what my script looks like:
#!/bin/sh
sleep 10
xdg-screensaver lock
sleep 10
mail-notification$ chmod +x lockstartup
And then add it to System > Preferences > Sessions. If you reboot, you should be automatically logged in and then see the screen lock. Once you unlock the screen you should be presented with the gnome-keyring password prompt.
I am using this on Ubuntu 8.10 Intrepid Ibex. I have not tested this on any other releases.
I had an mp3 file that I wanted to convert to an SWF Flash file so that I could share a link to it in a project I was working on. Here’s how I did it:
First, install ffmpeg and swftools
$ sudo apt-get install ffmpeg swftools
Convert the mp3 file to wav format
$ ffmpeg -i in.mp3 out.wav
Convert the wav file to an SWF Flash file
$ wav2swf -o filename.swf out.wav -s 44100 -l 100 -d
Here is how to install and use PulseAudio on Xubuntu 8.10 Intrepid Ibex.
1. Install packages for PulseAudio
$ sudo apt-get install libasound2-plugins pulseaudio pulseaudio-esound-compat pulseaudio-module-gconf pulseaudio-module-hal pulseaudio-module-lirc pulseaudio-module-x11 pulseaudio-module-zeroconf pulseaudio-utils paman padevchooser paprefs pavucontrol pavumeter libao-pulse
2. Configure Alsa
Edit the file
pcm.pulse {
type pulse
}
ctl.pulse {
type pulse
}
pcm.!default {
type pulse
}
ctl.!default {
type pulse
}$ sudo gpasswd -a YOURUSERNAME pulse
$ sudo gpasswd -a YOURUSERNAME pulse-access
$ sudo gpasswd -a YOURUSERNAME pulse-rtClick Applications > Settings > PulseAudio Preferences
On the Network Access tab, check:
– Enable network access to local sound devices
– Allow other machines on the LAN to discover local sound devices
– Don’t require authentication
On the Multicast/RTP tab, check:
– Enable Multicast/RTP receiver
– Enable Multicast/RTP sender
Configure PulseAudio to run as a daemon and allow users to load modules. Edit the file
Change PULSEAUDIO_SYSTEM_START=
Change DISALLOW_MODULE_LOADING=
Edit the file
default_driver=pulse
Restart your session or reboot to have changes go into effect.
Sources: Ubuntu Wiki, ivotron on Ubuntu Forums, pulseaudio.org
Gnome on Ubuntu comes with an included “Remote Desktop” feature (vino) that allows you to VNC into your existing desktop session (usually on the :0 display). However, XFCE does not have a native VNC package built in. The best option I have found is to use vino, the same VNC app that Gnome uses. Here’s how:
Install vino:
$ sudo apt-get install vino
Configure vino:
$ vino-preferences
Then enter this command in your Autostarted Apps to start vino server:
/usr/lib/vino/vino-server
This works well for me, the only feature I have found that doesn’t work is the “disable wallpaper on remote login” setting.
There are two versions of Virtual Box:
- OSE (Open Source Edition) which is in the repos
- Closed Source Edition, or Standard, or just plain “Virtual Box”
OSE does not have USB support. There are a few other features from the closed source version that aren’t included in OSE, you can see the list here. So, if you want to have USB support in VirtualBox, you need to install closed source edition and make a change to /etc/fstab. Here are the steps:
1. Remove OSE
$ sudo apt-get autoremove virtualbox-ose
2. Add the VirtualBox repo for Intrepid Ibex. Click System > Administration > Software Sources. Click the ‘Third Party Software’ tab. Click ‘Add’ and enter:
deb http://download.virtualbox.org/virtualbox/debian intrepid non-free
Save the VirtualBox GPG key from here, then import it into Synaptic by clicking the ‘Authentication’ tab and then ‘Import Key File’.
Click the ‘Reload’ button in Synaptic to reload the repositories.
3. Install the latest virtualbox package (as of this writing it is virtualbox-2.2) by selecting it in Synaptic, or running this command from a terminal:
$ sudo apt-get install virtualbox-2.2
4. Add yourself to the vboxusers group:
$ sudo gpasswd -a YOURUSERNAME vboxusers
5. Find the devgid for ‘vboxusers’:
$ grep vboxusers /etc/group
It will return something like:
vboxusers:x:125:username
Add this line to the bottom of /etc/fstab, replace the devgid number with your devgid:
none /proc/bus/usb usbfs devgid=125,devmode=664 0 0
After you reboot you should now have USB support in VirtualBox.
Last tested on Ubuntu 9.04 Jaunty Jackalope.
The command
Screen 0: minimum 320 x 240, current 1440 x 900, maximum 1440 x 900
default connected 1440x900+0+0 0mm x 0mm
1440x900 50.0*
1360x768 51.0 52.0
1152x864 53.0
1024x768 54.0
960x600 55.0
960x540 56.0
840x525 57.0 58.0
800x600 59.0 60.0
800x512 61.0
720x450 62.0
700x525 63.0
680x384 64.0 65.0
640x512 66.0
640x480 67.0 68.0
576x432 69.0
512x384 70.0
400x300 71.0
320x240 72.0xrandr -s 1024x768
sudo dpkg-reconfigure fontconfig-config
Select “Autohinter”, “Always” and “No” when prompted.
sudo dpkg-reconfigure fontconfig
Add the following to ~/.Xdefaults (create the file if it doesn’t exist):
Xft.antialias: true
Xft.hinting: true
Xft.hintstyle: hintfull
Xft.rgba: rgb
Xft.dpi: 96xrdb -merge ~/.Xdefaults
Restart X.
****EDIT****
These instructions are no longer needed for me. I don’t need to install Gsynaptics to disable my touchpad. I can now simply click System > Preferences > Mouse, click the “Touchpad” tab and uncheck “Enable Touchpad. The touchpad stays disabled, even through reboots. I’m leaving the original post here in case this doesn’t work on your system.
**** Original Post ****
In order to disable your Synaptics touchpad on previous releases of Ubuntu, you would set “SHMConfig” to “true” in xorg.conf and then install the program gsynaptics to disable/enable the touchpad.
The xorg.conf file is different in Intrepid Ibex, there is no section for the touchpad anymore. Now to enable SHMConfig you have to do it via HAL:
Edit this file:
/usr/share/hal/fdi/policy/20thirdparty/11-x11-synaptics.fdi
Find the section that starts with:
<match key="info.product" contains="Synaptics TouchPad">
And add this line to that section before :
<merge key="input.x11_options.SHMConfig" type="string">On</merge>
The file should end up looking something like this:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="ISO-8859-1"?>
<deviceinfo version="0.2">
<device>
<match key="info.capabilities" contains="input.touchpad">
<match key="info.product" contains="Synaptics TouchPad">
<merge key="input.x11_driver" type="string">synaptics</merge>
<!-- Arbitrary options can be passed to the driver using
the input.x11_options property since xorg-server-1.5. -->
<!-- EXAMPLE:
<merge key="input.x11_options.LeftEdge" type="string">120</merge>
-->
<merge key="input.x11_options.SHMConfig" type="string">On</merge>
</match>
<match key="info.product" contains="AlpsPS/2 ALPS">
<merge key="input.x11_driver" type="string">synaptics</merge>
</match>
<match key="info.product" contains="appletouch">
<merge key="input.x11_driver" type="string">synaptics</merge>
</match>
<match key="info.product" contains="bcm5974">
<merge key="input.x11_driver" type="string">synaptics</merge>
<merge key="input.x11_options.LeftEdge" type="string">0</merge>
<merge key="input.x11_options.RightEdge" type="string">1280</merge>
<merge key="input.x11_options.TopEdge" type="string">0</merge>
<merge key="input.x11_options.BottomEdge" type="string">800</merge>
<merge key="input.x11_options.ClickFinger1" type="string">1</merge>
<merge key="input.x11_options.ClickFinger2" type="string">3</merge>
<merge key="input.x11_options.ClickFinger3" type="string">2</merge>
<merge key="input.x11_options.HorizEdgeScroll" type="string">0</merge>
<merge key="input.x11_options.VertEdgeScroll" type="string">0</merge>
<merge key="input.x11_options.VertTwoFingerScroll" type="string">1</merge>
<merge key="input.x11_options.HorizTwoFingerScroll" type="string">1</merge>
<merge key="input.x11_options.HorizScrollDelta" type="string">0</merge>
<merge key="input.x11_options.VertScrollDelta" type="string">40</merge>
<merge key="input.x11_options.PressureMotionMinZ" type="string">10</merge>
<merge key="input.x11_options.FingerLow" type="string">16</merge>
<merge key="input.x11_options.FingerHigh" type="string">80</merge>
<merge key="input.x11_options.FingerPress" type="string">256</merge>
<merge key="input.x11_options.PalmDetect" type="string">0</merge>
<merge key="input.x11_options.PalmMinWidth" type="string">10</merge>
<merge key="input.x11_options.PalmMinZ" type="string">200</merge>
<merge key="input.x11_options.MinSpeed" type="string">0.8</merge>
<merge key="input.x11_options.MaxSpeed" type="string">1.2</merge>
<merge key="input.x11_options.AccelFactor" type="string">0.10</merge>
<merge key="input.x11_options.MaxTapMove" type="string">25</merge>
<merge key="input.x11_options.MaxTapTime" type="string">223</merge>
<merge key="input.x11_options.MaxDoubleTapTime" type="string">200</merge>
<merge key="input.x11_options.TapButton1" type="string">0</merge>
<merge key="input.x11_options.TapButton2" type="string">0</merge>
<merge key="input.x11_options.TapButton3" type="string">0</merge>
<merge key="input.x11_options.RTCornerButton" type="string">0</merge>
<merge key="input.x11_options.RBCornerButton" type="string">0</merge>
<merge key="input.x11_options.LTCornerButton" type="string">0</merge>
<merge key="input.x11_options.LBCornerButton" type="string">0</merge>
</match>
</match>
</device>
</deviceinfo>Reboot, and you should now be able to disable the touchpad with gsynaptics.
Note, System > Preferences > Mouse also has a section for touchpad, so disable it there as well.
To see what repository a package was installed via in Ubuntu using apt, use this command:
$ apt-cache policy packagename
Example:
$ apt-cache policy firefox
firefox:
Installed: 3.0.3+build1+nobinonly-0ubuntu0.8.04.1
Candidate: 3.0.3+build1+nobinonly-0ubuntu0.8.04.1
Version table:
*** 3.0.3+build1+nobinonly-0ubuntu0.8.04.1 0
500 http://security.ubuntu.com hardy-security/main Packages
100 /var/lib/dpkg/status
3.0.2+build6+nobinonly-0ubuntu0.8.04.1 0
500 http://archive.ubuntu.com hardy-updates/main Packages
3.0~b5+nobinonly-0ubuntu3 0
500 http://archive.ubuntu.com hardy/main Packages
