Ubuntu 7.04 "Feisty Fawn" on an Asus Z92J notebook (check here for other installations)
Changelog (you can always find an up-to-date version here)
* April 24, 2006
- First official release of this document
Usage
I use this notebook for work (system/network administration and web/database development) and for fun (music, movies and sometimes games).
Partitions
I use to install linux using only / and /home partitions.
I also reserve a 10 GB partition for the preinstalled Windows XP Home and another one to test other distributions or BSD flavours.
The partition table is set as follows:
$ sudo fdisk -l /dev/sda
Disk /dev/sda: 100.0 GB, 100030242816 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 12161 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes
Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System Size Mount point
/dev/sda1 1 243 1951866 1b Hidden W95 FAT32 2 GB
/dev/sda2 * 244 1548 10482412+ c W95 FAT32 (LBA) 10 GB /windows
/dev/sda3 1549 2201 5245222+ 83 Linux 5 GB /
/dev/sda4 2202 12161 80003700 5 Extended
/dev/sda5 2202 2854 5245191 83 Linux 5 GB /mnt/test
/dev/sda6 2855 3115 2096451 82 Linux swap
/dev/sda7 3116 12161 72661963+ 83 Linux 70 GB /home
Installation
The installation is very straightforward: it's as simple as booting from the "desktop" CD (I only pressed F3 before booting to select the Italian keyboard) and double-clicking on the "Install" icon on the desktop.
After answering a few questions, the live system gets copied to the hard disk, some unneeded packages are uninstalled and you are told to reboot.
I use netenv (more on this later) to manage different network profiles: since it has some issues with the new NetworkManager application, I disable the former before rebooting, using the following commands from a terminal.
$ echo exit |sudo tee /target/etc/default/NetworkManager
$ echo exit |sudo tee /target/etc/default/NetworkManagerDispatcher
First boot
After booting from hard disk, take a look at the output of dmesg: everything should be fine.
Ubuntu 7.04 symlinks /bin/sh to /bin/dash (instead of /bin/bash, as usual up to 6.06).
This leads to errors in scripts provided by "universe" or "multiverse" packages: to get rid of these errors, simply restore the "default" shell with
$ cd /bin
$ sudo ln -nsf bash sh
Then, clean the apt cache and upgrade the system to the current available versions of the installed programs:
$ sudo apt-get clean
$ sudo apt-get update
$ sudo apt-get upgrade
$ sudo apt-get autoremove
Desktop effects
Video acceleration can be obtained only by installing the proprietary NVIDIA drivers, through System -> Administration -> Restricted Drivers Manager.
Enabling "NVIDIA accelerated graphics driver" from there will install the nvidia-glx package and automatically configure X.org to make use of the proprietary driver.
Ubuntu provides a newer NVIDIA driver: you can install it (removing the default one) with:
$ sudo apt-get install nvidia-glx-new
After rebooting, Desktop effects (compiz) can be enabled from System -> Preferences -> Desktop Effects.
Restricted Formats
I used this howto to add support for restricted formats (mp3, DVD, Java, Flash).
The required steps are:
Click Applications → Add/Remove. In the top right, change the setting to All available applications. Then select Other in the left panel and then select the Ubuntu restricted extras package. Click OK.
To play most DVDs you'll need the libdvdcss2 package. This package is available using Medibuntu. This is a third party package, and not supported by Canonical.
https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Medibuntu
$ sudo apt-get install ubuntu-restricted-extras
$ sudo apt-get install gstreamer0.10-pitfdll gstreamer0.10-ffmpeg gstreamer0.10-plugins-bad gstreamer0.10-plugins-bad-multiverse gxine libxine-main1 libxine-extracodecs ogle ogle-gui
$ wget http://www.dtek.chalmers.se/groups/dvd/deb/libdvdcss2_1.2.5-1_i386.deb
$ sudo dpkg -i libdvdcss2_1.2.5-1_i386.deb
$ wget http://www.debian-multimedia.org/pool/main/w/w32codecs/w32codecs_20061022-0.0_i386.deb
$ sudo dpkg -i w32codecs_20061022-0.0_i386.deb
$ sudo apt-get install mplayer
$ sudo apt-get install soundconverter audacity mpg321 vorbis-tools gstreamer0.10-fluendo-mp3 vlc vlc-plugin-esd
$ sudo apt-get install mozilla-helix-player
Sun Java JDK
The installation of the Sun Java JDK can be easily achieved with:
$ sudo apt-get install sun-java6-jdk
$ sudo update-java-alternatives -s java-6-sun
I also installed the Java JDK documentation, downloading jdk-6-doc.zip to /tmp (chowning it to root.root) and installing it with:
$ sudo apt-get install sun-java6-doc
$ sudo rm /tmp/jdk-6-doc.zip
Additional packages
#0# Email # fetchmail mailx mutt postfix \
#1# Email (universe) # dovecot-imapd freepops spamassassin spamc \
#1# Utilities (universe) # arj clamav clamav-daemon unzoo \
If you plan to install NetBeans, you will have to download the netbeans-5.5.tar.gz package from here and move it to /tmp before installing the netbeans5.5 package.
I use to install the following additional packages:
#0# # sudo apt-get install \
#0# Cross Platform # smbfs \
#0# Development # build-essential cvs \
#0# Documentation # apache2-doc apt-doc bash-doc bind9-doc debconf-doc doc-linux-html doc-linux-text \
#0# # gnupg-doc grub-doc installation-guide-i386 perl-doc postfix-doc samba-doc \
#0# Editors # openoffice.org-style-tango vim \
#0# Games And Amusement # knetwalk \
#0# GNOME Desktop Environment # epiphany-extensions \
#0# Internationalization And Localization # language-pack-it language-support-it \
#0# Libraries # libfltk1.1 qca-tls \
#0# Libraries - Development # libncurses5-dev \
#0# Miscellaneous - Text based # chkrootkit kernel-package mysql-server ndiswrapper-common \
#0# Networking # nfs-common nmap ntp openssh-server samba traceroute \
#0# System Administration # alien john subversion-tools \
#0# Utilities # fakeroot \
#0# World Wide Web # firefox-themes-ubuntu libapache2-mod-php5 php5-mysql
#1# # sudo apt-get install \
#1# Base System (universe) # apt-file \
#1# Communication (universe) # tor \
#1# Documentation (universe) # apt-dpkg-ref apt-howto-en asr-manpages debian-history debian-policy \
#1# # festival-doc funny-manpages jargon-text maint-guide quick-reference-en sysadmin-guide \
#1# Games And Amusement (universe) # bomberclone bsdgames cappuccino fortunes-bofh-excuses planetpenguin-racer-extras supertux typespeed \
#1# GNOME Desktop Environment (universe) # beagle-backend-evolution gdesklets gdm-themes ontv \
#1# Graphics (universe) # cups-pdf cupsys-driver-gimpprint \
#1# Interpreted Computer Languages (universe) # expectk xmltv \
#1# Miscellaneous - Graphical (universe) # industrialtango-theme tango-icon-theme-extras \
#1# Miscellaneous - Text Based (universe) # module-assistant \
#1# Multimedia (universe) # festvox-italp16k festvox-itapc16k id3tool sox \
#1# Networking (universe) # aircrack-ng airsnort bitchx-ssl debmirror kismet netdiscover p0f tshark \
#1# System Administration (universe) # apt-show-versions rkhunter \
#1# Utilities (universe) # gphoto2 gpsdrive hddtemp mc sshfs vlock \
#1# Word Processing (universe) # foomatic-db-gimp-print xmlstarlet \
#1# World Wide Web (universe) # privoxy
#2# # sudo apt-get install \
#2# Development (multiverse) # netbeans5.5 netbeans5.5-doc \
#2# Documentation (multiverse) # doc-linux-nonfree-html doc-linux-nonfree-text php-doc rutebook
#3# # sudo apt-get install \
#3# Medibuntu (free) # k3b libdvdcss2 libk3b2-mp3 \
#3# Medibuntu (non-free) # googleearth skype w32codecs
Multiple networking environments
I use my laptop in several places (home, customers' offices, friends' homes), and I manage these network environments easily with netenv.
Install it and use the script provided as a Debian example (or this one, which requires gawk and manages multiple network interfaces, wireless settings and hosts in a friendly manner):
$ sudo apt-get install netenv
$ sudo install -m 755 ~bibe/public_html/feisty/netenv_setup /etc/netenv/
$ echo NETENV_SCRIPT=/etc/netenv/netenv_setup |sudo tee -a /etc/netenv/netenv.conf
Be sure that netenv starts during boot:
$ sudo update-rc.d netenv start 40 S .
I expect to build a netenv package with the tweaks I made to /sbin/netenv to make netenv run properly on Ubuntu.
I also add some altoptions directives in /boot/grub/menu.lst (leave these lines "commented", or you will lose them when updating grub) for commonly used network environments, say:
$ grep altoption /boot/grub/menu.lst
## altoption boot targets option
## multiple altoptions lines are allowed
## e.g. altoptions=(extra menu suffix) extra boot options
## altoptions=(single-user mode) single
# altoptions=(wired) NETENV=wired
# altoptions=(wireless) NETENV=wireless
# altoptions=(recovery mode) single
Grub configuration gets updated automatically at every linux-image installation: to do it manually, simply run
$ sudo update-grub
Alternatives
Debian's way to manage multiple programs for the same task (i.e., editors) is the use of alternatives, which are symlinks provided in /etc/alternatives/.
For instance, I set vim (instead of nano) as the system's default editor:
$ sudo update-alternatives --config editor [ select /usr/bin/vim.basic ]
FreePOPs
The FreePOPs project recently released freepops-updater-fltk, a graphical updater for freepops.
Until the new package makes its way through the official repositories, you can download it (and a newer version of freepops itself) from here.
$ sudo dpkg -i freepops_0.2.2-1-bkm_i386.deb freepops-updater-fltk_0.2.2-1-bkm_i386.deb
Then, run Applications -> Internet -> FreePOPs Updater to get the latest plugins.
Kismet Log Viewer
An interesting utility for viewing Kismet output as HTML pages is Kismet Log Viewer, available here.
To install it, download the latest binary (version 0.9.7) and
$ cd /usr/src
$ tar zxf /path/to/kismet-log-viewer-0.9.7.tar.gz
$ cd kismet-log-viewer-0.9.7
$ install -o <kismet_suid_user> -m 700 *.pl <kismet_logs_path>
$ install -o <kismet_suid_user> -m 644 logo.png <kismet_logs_path>
Reboot
Now the system is fully configured: reboot and issue a
$ dmesg |less
to verify that there are no errors and/or problems during the boot process.
TODO list
I still have to test modem, IrDA, firewire, bluetooth, the integrated webcam and the card reader.
I hope you will find some of these information useful, and if you have any suggestion for helping me to get everything to work, please email me at
bibe AT atworkonline DOT it