Posts tagged DE

10 Rocking Features in 10 Days: Better Firefox plugins and Gnash

Oct14th
2007 Leave a Comment

Written by Sathya

Corey Burger n his 5th part of the 10-parti series: Today we turn to all the improvements for Firefox including the a better way to install plugins and the arrival of Gnash, a Free flash player.So what is this new way to install plugins?

One of the most powerful features of Firefox is all the amazing plugins available for it. However, sometimes those plugins don’t work with the version of Firefox you may have. To solve that problem, the Ubuntu developers have created a list of high-quality tested plugins that can be easily installed in Ubuntu 7.10.

News addon, Adobe, Apple, apt-get, Arch, driver, drivers, Firefox, flash, flash player, free, free software, IM, install, intel, LV, move, New, os, plugin, Screen, software, synaptic, Ubuntu, videos, X

10 Features in 10 Days: Desktop Effects with Compiz

Oct14th
2007 Leave a Comment

Written by Sathya

Corey Burger continues in the 4th part of his series, Today we soldier on to Desktop Effects with Compiz Fusion. It can be safely said that few features are as keenly desired as Desktop Effects. Ever since Compiz was announced XXX years ago, users and developers have been playing with the bling-tastic effects and wondering when it will hit a desktop near them. Well, the wait is no longer. Ubuntu 7.10 is the first major distro to ship Compiz enabled by default, for all users to have fun with.

So what is all fuss about these Desktop Effects?

Not only do Desktop Effects bring you lots of bling and shiny effects, they do offer a more natural feeling desktop, such as desktops sliding instead of jumping, scaling to see either all desktop or all windows and much more.

And what does the default 7.10 Compiz do?

One of the hardest tasks with enabling Compiz was finding the right set of plugins and features to turn on by default. As such, there are three features that stand out:

Wall of desktops
Alt-Tab Window Switching
Scale Windows

Refer to my previous blog post for more details on these

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Ubuntu 7.10 Supports Install-Time Encryption

Oct13th
2007 1 Comment

Written by Sathya

If you have wanted to encrypt your Ubuntu installation on your hard drive quickly and easily, with Ubuntu 7.10 “Gutsy Gibbon” it’s become even easier now that the alternate installer supports encrypting partitions. However, the Ubuntu 7.10 “Gutsy Gibbon” Ubiquity installer currently lacks LVM and dm-crypt support.

The Ubuntu Wiki states: “Both the graphical and the alternate installer now support encrypting the hard disk.” However, using yesterday’s LiveCD with Ubiquity (v1.6.5) still hadn’t contained the encryption functionality when doing a manual partition. If the Ubiquity installer doesn’t support encrypting the hard drive in time for the Gutsy Gibbon release, we imagine it should ready in time for Ubuntu 8.04 Hardy Heron, which happens to be an LTS (Long Term Support) release. READ MORE »

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QGRUBEditor – The QT4 GRUB Editor

Oct13th
2007 1 Comment

Written by Sathya

Description:
QGRUBEditor is a system tool to view and edit the GRUB boot loader. It offers many features and it is the perfect solution for those who want to change the way GRUB works, without messing with GRUB’s configuration files.

HOW TO INSTALL:
Install by entering into the extracted folder and typing (in the console)

qmake-qt4

make

sudo make install

For more information see the INSTALL file.

Have fun!

Changelog:
v.2.1.0
——-
*ADDED: Created a library (which however doesn’t use pure C++ but relies on Qt4) from the old source code
*ADDED: The first time the application runs it prompts the user about the built-in auto backup feature.
*ADDED: Default Entry is now highlighted and explicitly declared as Default
*ADDED: New setting: the user may select the highlight color
*FIXED: Utilised the at(x) function instead of the [] operator in the vectors to slightly improve speed (only where applicable)
*FIXED: Set icon size spinboxes’ maximum and default to 32
*FIXED: In order to erase the contents of strings, = QString() is utilised instead of = “”
*FIXED: Global Context Menu was reimplemented in a different manner
*FIXED: Updated the “No Root Permissions” warning message, because QGRUBEditor may not load if you delete one of the 3 files it mentions.
*FIXED: Improved the desktop files
*FIXED: Updated About box’s description
*FIXED: Did some minor corrections
*I18N: Updated the Greek, French, German, Russian and Ukrainian translations

Get it from QT Apps

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KDE 4 Preview

Oct13th
2007 Leave a Comment

Written by Sathya

KDE 4 is coming. It’s starting to look and behave mature enough to use it on a normal desktop. This article is a little introduction to what you might be expecting from the brand new KDE due later this year.

Author: Korneliusz Jarzebski

It’s been a whole month when I’ve investigated the new environment called KDE 4. Honestly I wanted to wait till “Beta 3?, which should have appeared on 5th October. But as you all can see it has never happened. On the IRC channel #kde4-devel I was informed that the “Beta 3? should have been tagged yesterday but unfortunately it didn’t turn out to be true. Not waiting any longer I made my mind and I have updated the SVN and have run the cmake.

First glance

Right after running the KDE you can tell at once that new wallpaper is far more beautiful than the grey old one and the marvelous contrasting flower is well matched to the bottom bar. Unluckily it does nothing more than displaying the clock. The taskbar despite the fact it was on the bar didn’t display processes and all the effort I made to add there any applet or the Pager was in vain, and ended with a complete crash of the bar. The only thing I succeeded in was to put there the Kickoff menubar.

Kickoff – the new KDE menu

The first appearance of Kickoff was in SUSE Linux 10.2 as a new menu for KDE. The icons were arranged in five categories: Favorite, Applications, My Computer, Recently used, Leave. There is nothing more than the search box that helps you finding applications and documents. It’s too early to discuss about the new KDE menu even talking about its appearance. IMHO I wish that the searching engine wouldn’t be based on Nepomuk or Strigi. I’d like to mention that it is only the initial version of this menu in KDE.

Mandriva rolls out Linux 2008

Oct11th
2007 Leave a Comment

Written by Sathya

Lately, in the Linux desktop races, distributions like Ubuntu, PCLinuxOS and openSUSE have been taking most of the headlines. Older Linux company Mandriva isn’t ready to concede the desktop market to these Linux distributions as it releases its newest version, Mandriva Linux 2008.

Mandriva launched its latest community desktop Linux distribution, Mandriva Linux 2008, on Oct. 9. As in the past, Mandriva is releasing this free distribution via the Mandriva Club, the company-supported user group.

This new distribution is based on the 2.6.22.9 Linux kernel. Mandriva 2008 also has integrated a reworked hardware detection subsystem with support for many new devices such as graphics cards, sound cards and Wi-Fi chips. The revised hardware system also handles the automatic loading of drivers for permanently installed devices such as PCI and AGP cards, based on the lists of compatible devices provided by the drivers themselves.

This system also contains a list of preferred drivers for some devices that can be handled by multiple drivers. According to Mandriva, this results in even more accurate and comprehensive hardware detection than in previous releases.

For an interface, Mandriva gives users a choice between the KDE 3.5.7 and the GNOME 2.20 desktops. If you have superior graphic cards, you also have the choice of using either the Compiz/Compiz Fusion 0.5.2 or the Metisse 3-D desktop.

Mandriva 2008 also comes chock-full of Linux desktop applications. It includes OpenOffice.org 2.2.1, Mozilla Firefox 2.0.0.6, Evolution 2.12, and Thunderbird 2.0.0.6. The distribution also includes a wizard to import Windows documents and settings to make life simple for those who are moving from Windows to Linux or just dual-booting their PCs.

Mandriva Linux 2008 is available for download free of charge at the Mandriva Web site. The One installation CD is the recommended download with everything you need to start using Mandriva Linux 2008. This version comes with a full KDE desktop and application suite, Nvidia and ATI proprietary video card drivers, Intel wireless firmware, and the Adobe Flash and Sun Java browser plug-ins.

There are also versions that come without any proprietary software or drivers, and a DVD ISO download with everything that Mandriva has to offer. You can also download any version via BitTorrent

Source: Desktop Linux

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10 Rocking Features in 10 Days: Day 3: Sharing your computer with Fast User Switching

Oct11th
2007 1 Comment

Written by Sathya

Corey Burger in his third part of the 10 part series writes

Yesterday we took a look at all the handy new features of X in Ubuntu 7.10 and today we turn to Fast User Switching which allows you to easily share your computer with others

What is Fast User Switching?

Having different people access your computer using separate user accounts is one way to keep your computer safer. It’s convenient too because different people’s settings can be stored separately. But if you find it annoying to have to keep logging off and logging in all the time to switch user, then Fast User Switching is the feature for you!

In a nutshell, Fast User Switching allows multiple users to switch quickly while staying logged in.

So how do I use it?

Well, first you need at least one other user on your computers. If you are uncertain about how to do that, please refer to this excellent wikipage on it or for the more visually inclined, there is a screencast (which also covers how to switch new users).

Once you have your users, it is pretty simple. On the upper panel, click on your name and you will see a list like this:

Choose the other user and you will get to a login screen. When they are done and logout, you are back to your screensaver. Unlock the screen and you are back on your desktop. It is that easy.

And yes, tomorrow, we will cover Desktop Effects with Compiz Fusion, as promised. Until then!

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GCC 4.2.2 Released

Oct11th
2007 Leave a Comment

Written by Sathya

Mark Mitchell announced the availability of GCC 4.2.2 saying, “GCC 4.2.2 is a bug-fix release, containing fixes for regressions in GCC 4.2.1 relative to previous GCC releases.” He adds, “the compilers in this release are covered by GNU General Public License version 3,” making GCC 4.2.2 the first released under the GPLv3.

GCC is the GNU Compiler Collection which includes C, C++, Objective-C, Fortran, Java, and Ada compilers. Download GCC 4.2.2 from your nearest gcc.gnu.org mirror.

More Here

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10 Rocking Features in 10 Days: Day 2: Bulletproof X and Graphical X configuration

Oct11th
2007 1 Comment

Written by Sathya

Corey Burger continues in Part 2 of the 10 part series in The Fridge: Yesterday we kicked this whole thing off and took a look at Deskbar and Tracker. Today we turn our attention to X, the graphical subsystem of any Ubuntu (or Linux or Unix machine). As any existing Ubuntu user knows, not only do you need to configure X, but breakages can happen. Thankfully with Ubuntu 7.10, there comes a few new features to help out with these problems, including better auto detection and configuration, Bulletproof X and graphical X config, for those times when you really to play with something. But first, some explanations

So what is X?

X, or X windowing system, is “a networking and display protocol which provides windowing on bitmap displays”, according to Wikipedia. It is also the basis of 99% of the GUIs on Linux and Unix systems such as Ubuntu.

So what is this “autoconfiguration” stuff?

Thanks to the awesome work of all the X.org developers, Ubuntu 7.10 now is able to detect your video hardware and monitor better, meaning in most instances, everything should just work. But what about those times that it doesn’t?

So I can config this graphically, right?

With 7.10, yes! The new displayconfig-gtk, written primarily by Sebastien Heinlein and based off the KDE systemconfig work, allows you to easily change the resolution, add another monitor, change your driver and more. Take a peak:

Graphical X configuration with displayconfig-gtk
Saving your broken X.conf with BulletProofX

Of course, not everything can always be roses and champagne. Sometimes things break, including X. Like most software, X reads off a configuration file to determine how to start up, including what monitor(s) and video card(s) you have. If this file gets corrupted, things can break, very very badly:

But hey, all is not doom and gloom any more. With 7.10, you are no longer given a useless and arcane error dialog, you are now shown displayconfig-gtk to allow you to fix that broken config and get back on your feet:

If you want to read a bit more, check out the X.org maintainer for Ubuntu, Bryce Harrington’s, article on BulletproofX

Tomorrow, it’s off to explore all the new shiny with Desktop Effects, as brought to you by Compiz Fusion. Until then!

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opensuse-xgl-settings

Oct10th
2007 Leave a Comment

Written by Sathya

cb400f has released his popular opensuse-xgl-settings for openSUSE 10.3, it is a GUI tool for KDE that makes installing and configuring Compiz Fusion painless.

And the friendly installer

Get it Here or here

News compiz, compiz fusion, dl, fusion, install, KDE, openSuSE, SUSE, X

Posts tagged DE

10 Rocking Features in 10 Days: Better Firefox plugins and Gnash

10 Features in 10 Days: Desktop Effects with Compiz

Ubuntu 7.10 Supports Install-Time Encryption

QGRUBEditor – The QT4 GRUB Editor

KDE 4 Preview

First glance

Kickoff – the new KDE menu

Mandriva rolls out Linux 2008

GCC 4.2.2 Released

10 Rocking Features in 10 Days: Day 2: Bulletproof X and Graphical X configuration

opensuse-xgl-settings

Stack Exchange Flair

Games I’ve been playing

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