date: '2006-10-14 12:59:43'
layout: post
slug: mounting-windows-disks-under-linux
status: publish
ref: http://ubuntuguide.org/wiki/Dapper#How_to_mount_Windows_partitions_.28FAT.29_on_boot-up.2C_and_allow_all_users_to_read.2Fwrite
title: Mounting windows disks under Linux
wordpress_id: '117'
categories: Programming
I followed these instructions for how to mount a FAT partition read-write for communication between Windows and Linux on my laptop. I also followed the instructions further down to mount the main windows NTFS partition read-only.
It is a pity that the Ubuntu System->Administration-Disks->Partitions GUI does not allow you to do this. THough at least I was able to use the GUI to find out the device names of my partitions.
date: '2006-10-12 16:44:12'
layout: post
slug: fixvideoresolutionhowto-community-ubuntu-documentation
status: publish
ref: https://help.ubuntu.com/community/FixVideoResolutionHowto
title: FixVideoResolutionHowto – Community Ubuntu Documentation
wordpress_id: '115'
categories: Futzing
One problem with my Ubunto installation on my laptop is that the max resolution I can set was 1024x768 which is pretty crowded for doing software development in Eclipse. So I followed the instructions in FixVideoResolutionHowto – Community Ubuntu Documentation:
sudo cp /etc/X11/xorg.conf /etc/X11/xorg.conf.custom
sudo sh -c 'md5sum /etc/X11/xorg.conf > /var/lib/x11/xorg.conf.md5sum'
sudo dpkg-reconfigure xserver-xorg
update
Well, that worked, but not without problems. I was asked a daunting amount of questions by the dpkg-reconfigure xserver-xorg program. When asked what were the allowed resolutions I just selected everything — the instructions seemed to suggest that was safe. I suppose I should have rebooted into Windows to check what are reeally allowed. Now I do get Ubuntu running in higher resolution, though a bit distorted I think because the aspect ratio is not quite right. However if I try to change the resolution using the Preferences UI the computer freezes and has to be hard-reset.
update 2
Firstly, I forgot to mention that I needed to to a CTRL-ALT-BACKSPACE to restart X to see the effect of the above change.
Secondly, a strong warning: when I tried to do this on a desktop machine on which I was installing Ubuntu a few days later it killed X and threw me back to the command line. I think it was because I chose the option to automatically detect the monitor. In that case all I really wanted to do was increase the monitor refresh rate to avoid an annoying flickr. So after the above technique failed I instead I edited the /etc/X11/xorg.conf config script modifing the monitor refresh rate line to
VertRefresh 43-85
and restarted X. That seems to have worked fine.
date: '2006-10-12 15:04:15'
layout: post
slug: setting-up-laptop-for-dual-booting
status: publish
ref: http://www.ubuntu.com/download
title: Setting up laptop for dual booting
wordpress_id: '112'
categories: Programming
Well, I just received a new laptop at work and our IT department put their standard Windows XP image onto it. I decided I wanted to be able to also run Linux on this machine.
Step 1: Before I even logged into Windows for the first time I rebooted off a Partition Magic CD and shrunk the Windows partition to half the size of the 93 GB disk. I then added a small 2GB FAT partition where I will be able to share files between Linux and Windows. The remaining space I left unallocated.
Step 2: I logged into Windows got on the web and downloaded the latest Ubuntu ISO which was 6.06 LTS (Dapper Drake). And burned a CD.
Step 3: I rebooted off the Ubuntu CD and clicked the install icon on the desktop. I chose the option to use the remaining empty space (not overwrite whole disk). After the installation completed and I rebooted, everything worked fine. By default it boots into Linux, but there is an option to choose Windows instead.
Step 4: I did a little customization. I used the Applications->Add/Remove menu item to add Thunderbird which I am more familiar with than the Evolution mail client that comes with Ubuntu. I also used this nice graphical installer to install Emacs which is of course the One True Editor.
There, that was not too hard.
date: '2006-10-12 15:08:08'
layout: post
slug: java-se-downloads
status: publish
ref: http://java.sun.com/javase/downloads/index.jsp
title: Java SE Downloads
wordpress_id: '113'
categories: Programming
I had to go to Sun's Java SE Downloads web site to download Java, which is not available via the Ubuntu installer. I considered using one of the open source Java SDKs intead but I make extensive use of Java 1.5 features which are not yet I think well supported by non-Sun compilers.
The installation is not quite as magic as the Windows installation but it is fairly convenient. You get a self-extracting file that you execute. This simply unpacks the Java SDK into a directory. I just left the SDK directory as a subdirectory of my home directory. No root access needed; no messing around with system areas needed.
date: '2006-10-12 15:45:28'
layout: post
slug: eclipse-downloads-home
status: publish
ref: http://www.eclipse.org/downloads/
title: Eclipse downloads home
wordpress_id: '114'
categories: Programming
Next I went to the Eclipse downloads home to get the next vital piece of Java development kit. I just extracted the Linux archive file into a subdirectory of my home directory, navigated into that folder and executed it. It started up right away using the 1.4.2 GCJ Java SDK that comes with Ubuntu.
The next thing I added to Eclipse was subversion support. First I went to Window->Preferences->Install/Update in Eclipse to add the HTTP proxy for my corporate firewall. Then I followed the subeclipse instructions for downlading and installing from within Eclipse.
I also need CVS for some projects but for some reason I could not get that to work from within Eclipse even after I had installed the system CVS from the Ubuntu installer. So in the end I used the command-line CVS to check out my module and din an Import from within Eclipse to read it in.
I used Windows->Preferences->Java-Installed JREs to add my newly installed Sun JDK 1.5. Then I set the Java compiler level to 5.0 so that my code would compile OK.
date: '2006-10-11 15:31:24'
layout: post
slug: wp-cache-and-the-blank-page-problem-at-blogging-blog
status: publish
ref: https://web.archive.org/web/20061027164106/http://www.bloggingblog.net/wp-cache-and-the-blank-page-problem/
title: WP-Cache and the Blank Page problem at Blogging Blog
wordpress_id: '110'
categories: Programming
WP-Cache and the Blank Page problem at Blogging Blog
I was running into this problem as I attempted to speed up this blog using WP-Cache. The fix described here worked like a charm.
date: '2006-09-07 14:29:00'
layout: post
slug: draft-of-brochure-for-enchanted-hills-house
status: publish
ref: http://107starlite.com/brochure.html
title: Draft of brochure for Enchanted Hills house
wordpress_id: '103'
categories: Personal
Well, we now have a draft of the brochure offering our house for sale.
date: '2006-08-30 13:44:00'
layout: post
slug: our-house-is-going-on-the-market-soon
status: publish
ref: http://107starlite.com/
title: Our house is going on the market soon
wordpress_id: '102'
categories: Personal
Our house will be going on the market just after Labor Day.
date: '2006-06-18 11:55:00'
layout: post
slug: police-sting
status: publish
ref: https://web.archive.org/web/20071010163013/http://www.skew-t.com/?id=20060510191903
title: Police Sting
wordpress_id: '101'
categories: SF
San Francisco's Finest are making sure drivers stop for pedestrians.technorati tags:San Francisco
date: '2006-06-13 08:45:00'
layout: post
slug: guerrilla-urban-micro-park
status: publish
ref: https://web.archive.org/web/20101010030237/http://www.rebargroup.org/projects/parking/
title: Guerrilla Urban Micro Park
wordpress_id: '100'
categories: SF
You too can unfurl some turf and create a suprisingly congenial small park in an urban parking space.