The Linux Questions Thread: a bunch of pitfalls, but technically it's possible

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Serious Hardware/Software Crap > The Linux Questions Thread: a bunch of pitfalls, but technically it's possible

Heran Bago: Aug 18, 2006

Really dumb question here.
I want to update from Edgy to Gusty with the Live CD. How do I do it without actually installing fresh over the partition? Or would it be better to do a fresh install than upgrade like with Windows?

# ¿ Nov 5, 2007 09:42

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# ¿ Apr 26, 2024 19:05

Heran Bago: Aug 18, 2006

I installed ubuntu not too long ago and have some random questions. Sorry if I'm unclear or use Windows-specific terms. These could also be more debian or distro specific.

Is there a linux equivalent of Norton Ghost? I really don't want to have to go through the driver issues and various set-ups again should I wipe the drive.

How can I make the directories whose names begin with a period normally visible?

How can I make the graphical file browser as dangerously free as windows'? I want to be able to open text files and edit/save them right from the GUI as that's what I use to locate a lot of things. I can only seem to do it with sudo from the terminal. Basically, I want the explorer-equivalent to have sudo powers.

I also want to change the permissions on my NTFS drive but I can look that up. I know that these kinds of things are disabled for safety but poo poo.

Also, what are the best window decorators? I only remember Emerald from when Beryl was the cool thing.

Heran Bago fucked around with this message at 07:04 on May 27, 2008

# ¿ May 27, 2008 07:00

Heran Bago: Aug 18, 2006

Your Japanese Dad posted:

Are you doing this from the GUI interface? Right click and hit "Show hidden files" and it should propagate across Nautilus (the GUI file browser) and all GTK apps.

Thanks. How about from the terminal with 'dir' or 'ls'?

Zuph posted:

Oh come on, it was the last post on the previous page!

Oops. Well thanks.

tehk posted:

The better solution is get some nautilus scripts like the 'Edit as root' one.

Perfect!

# ¿ May 27, 2008 17:23

Heran Bago: Aug 18, 2006

Scripts in Nautilus aren't appearing for me. Neither with the right-click menu nor the file menu, not even as root. I've been googling and can't figure out why it isn't there. I installed scripts (nautilus-script-collection) and nautilus-script-manager seems to be fine.

On top of that I can't turn off the wallpaper/background in Nautilus. Just the whole desktop which takes icons with it.There are other background managers but it seems insistent on hogging it. I might have to compile my own, but first I have to round up the libs like eel that aren't in the repositories.

Guess I'll try other file managers. =/

# ¿ May 27, 2008 22:57

Heran Bago: Aug 18, 2006

tehk posted:

Blah I am not sure abut scripts any more but there is a better solution that I just remembered.

That's much better.

I figured out that nautilus-script-collection didn't actually install any scripts. At least, not where it's supposed to.

What I really need to get used to is the directory structure. It's a mystery to me if I should look for program data in usr, bin, sys, etc. They all sound so good.

Heran Bago fucked around with this message at 02:15 on May 28, 2008

# ¿ May 28, 2008 02:11

Heran Bago: Aug 18, 2006

I have been playing around with my netbook and am quite enjoying a fork of Ubuntu on it. I was curious about the possibility of video capturing from one computer to the other with the VGA-port. I haven't found anything saying that it is specifically VGA-out only, but after searching it doesn't seem that the VGA ports on laptops are ever used for anything other than outputting to a second monitor.
I understand that a video card isn't a capture card, but I'm curious if anything like that is even possible.

It would be quite cool to capture video output or better yet use another laptop as a second monitor. This seems like an idiotic question considering my research turns up nothing. But it might be possible!

Also, is there a way to invert screen or window colors in gnome/Ubuntu without compiz?

# ¿ May 20, 2009 13:42

Heran Bago: Aug 18, 2006

I switched from Backtrack 5 to the new Ubuntu. Now I just can't connect to a Wireless AP.

What is my wireless hardware? Rather how do I figure it out?
lspci -v doesn't say. And it's not in the Additional Drivers. The device manager equivalent isn't where I remember it and nothing else in System > * is related to hardware.

E: I am pretty sure it's a Ralink RT2500 after searching, but Ubuntu uses it as wlan0 and doesn't list proprietary drivers.

Heran Bago fucked around with this message at 06:40 on Jun 12, 2011

# ¿ Jun 12, 2011 06:34

Heran Bago: Aug 18, 2006

kcncuda71 posted:

what kind of wireless card are we talking about? If it's a pci based wireless card, then it's gonna be in lspci. If it's a usb dongle, then lsusb should show it.

Inside so... Oh! lsusb does report a Micro Star International RT2573. I think that's the card, but then the issue is how to make it think that it's Ralink or make it work. To google!

e:

I found a good driver and gave it the old 'make' and then 'make install' but it still uses the old one!

If memory serves I need to blacklist the wireless driver it loads by default, but I have no idea how or which one. Any help?

Heran Bago fucked around with this message at 06:55 on Jun 12, 2011

# ¿ Jun 12, 2011 06:42

Heran Bago: Aug 18, 2006

I absolutely can not build the WPA_supplicant driver so I'm really considering switching back to Backtrack 5 where I'll try to get the Ubuntu software center to work.

BackTrack posted:

Also if you chose to add the ubuntu repositories to your Backtrack install, you will most certainly break your entire Backtrack install very quickly.

What, really? I should be fine if it's from the same version of Ubuntu BackTrack is based on, right?

I really like Ubuntu but hell if my history with it isn't synonymous with "wireless hardware issues."

Heran Bago fucked around with this message at 07:28 on Jun 12, 2011

# ¿ Jun 12, 2011 06:54

Heran Bago: Aug 18, 2006

Wheelchair Stunts posted:

I'm very surprised that wpa-supplicant isn't included in repositories. Perhaps you have to enable additional repositories via the apt sources?

Ralink's official drivers include/require a modified WPA-supplicant. To compile it though you are not always supposed to follow the readme. I managed to generate a config file but it still wasn't happy.

I would report a bug since this poo poo laptop (Averatec 2200) has perfect compatibility on the site but it's already widely reported in posts like the one I quoted. Also I just don't have good experience with bug reports.

After a day of trying I'm really switching to Backtrack 5. Maybe next time Ubuntu...

# ¿ Jun 12, 2011 22:32

Heran Bago: Aug 18, 2006

In Mate or anything else really is there a way to make the panel not show the names of open things? I'd like the active windows part of a panel to look and behave somewhat like in Windows 8. Google is telling me this is probably not going to happen.

# ¿ Jul 18, 2015 14:02

Heran Bago: Aug 18, 2006

midnightclimax posted:

Not using Mate, but I have the same complaint about Cinnamon. If you don't care about either of those, XFCE is able to do just that.

I read something about that, but after using xfce for a few minutes I just couldn't stand the default look of anything and couldn't find the themes. Thanks for the recommendation, maybe I'll try it again soon.

# ¿ Jul 21, 2015 02:49

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# ¿ Apr 26, 2024 19:05

Heran Bago: Aug 18, 2006

I'm trying to learn Arch Linux in VMs. I'm behind a proxy and having trouble getting the network going. Been googling this for a few days and kind of hit a dead end.

In Arch Linux's installation, I can do this:

code:

export http_proxy=http://proxyusername:proxypassword@proxyipaddress:proxyport
export https_proxy=$http_proxy
export ftp_proxy=$http_proxy
export rsync_proxy=$http_proxy
export no_proxy="localhost,127.0.0.1,localaddress,.localdomain.com" 
timedatectl set-ntp true
timedatectl status

If I do pacman -Syy after this, it works fine. Installation-guide works, but ping does not.

If I complete the installation and repeat these steps, it no longer works - it says no network.

If I try these steps in Konsole in the Manjaro installation medium, it does not work. "error: failed to synchronize all databases (download library error)".

I also have access to a .pac script. If I put this into the settings of Firefox in the Manjaro installation medium, that works for websites in the browser. If I put this script into the network configuration, it does not work.

What am I missing here?

edit:
A step further. These variables are not accessible as sudo without -E:

code:

sudo -E pacman -Syu

Or like this:

code:

sudo bash
export http_proxy=http://proxyusername:proxypassword@proxyipaddress:proxyport
pacman -Syu

The Manjaro installer must then be called from terminal:

code:

sudo -E Desktop/calamares

Still confused why setting these in 'Configure Network Connections' isnt system-wide, or why some things can use those settings but others won't.

Heran Bago fucked around with this message at 14:53 on Feb 4, 2022

# ¿ Feb 4, 2022 11:38

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Serious Hardware/Software Crap > The Linux Questions Thread: a bunch of pitfalls, but technically it's possible