There was something strange about SPDIF (a.k.a. IEC958) support in Ubuntu. This past Sunday, I was grappling with a visit from another nasty Gremlin (will post the full story another day). It all started while trying to fix an annoying problem with the SPDIF. Actually, I discovered later the problem turned out to be unrelated [...]
Recently, I was twice asked about how to change the date format in Ubuntu. I have never bothered to tweak this part in my own setup. So, when asked, I assumed it would be easy to do at first. However, upon searching the Ubuntu desktop, I couldn’t find anything that might change the date format [...]
By default, Ubuntu comes with a dictionary. Whenever you look up a word in this dictionary, it queries the online dictionaries for the results. This is fine if your have a 24/7 internet connection. However, if you are offline, mobile without internet, or has a flaky connection, using this dictionary becomes a pain. Occasionally, my [...]
Recently, I have been seeing a few more web articles and blog posts on the great user friendliness debate. This debate is all about which OS is the most user friendly, and it usually started from when someone claimed a particular OS is not user friendly. Rather than adding more hot air to the endless [...]
While the Linux OS in general, and Ubuntu in particular, has progressed so much in the user’s desktop (and in my opinion, to the point superior to other competing OSes), there is still room for improvement. I occasionally encountered situations where Ubuntu seemed to be lacking in some fundamental use cases. Just the other day, [...]
Previously, I wrote about installing Ubuntu Intrepid Ibex beta in my eeePC 900 here. In the “Fn keys” section, I mentioned that the audio control keys were working well after fixing the keycodes. However, recently I noticed the mute key (Fn+F7) is no longer functioning. I am not sure when it stopped working. I did [...]
Yesterday, I bought a new printer. As anyone who use Ubuntu/Linux knows, buying computer equipment can be a tough job. Many computer companies are our worst enemies. Despite the best effort of the open source communities and despite continuous improvement, hardware drivers remained one the main issue in Linux. Thus, when I began thinking about [...]
A few weeks ago, I was asked to set-up a small adhoc network with a bunch of PC, running Ubuntu Hardy Heron and Windows. Personally, I have always avoided using samba file sharing in my own network, and use NFS instead. I could get away with this because I don’t have any PC running Windows. [...]
My Ubuntu Intrepid Ibex desktop on eeePC 900 currently looks like this. Eh? That is nothing but the wallpaper? Well. it should actually look like this. But of course, the panels are hidden! By default, the gnome-panels took up 24px each. With two panels, you are out of 48px. The eeepc 900 small screen is [...]
Previously, I wrote about installing Ubuntu Intrepid Ibex beta in my eeePC 900 here. In the “Processor scaling” section of that post, I mentioned about setting the CPU governor to “ondemand” upon boot up. A better solution would be to set the cpu governor to “performance” if booting with AC power, and “ondemand” if booting [...]
