Linux vs Windows vs Mac

Something happen to a windows Master Boot Record (MBR) that you’re responsible for? Want a very quick, very easy way to restore it with nothing but your craft, native intelligence and a liveCD?

Boot into your Ubuntu LiveCD on the offending machine. Once Ubuntu starts up, go to System -> Administration -> Software Sources and enable (by checking it off) the Universal repository.

Now, open a terminal session (Applications -> Accessories -> Terminal) and type the following:

sudo apt-get install ms-sys

ms-sys is a program used to write Microsoft compatible boot records.

Now you’ll need to figure out what partition is the one hosting your Windows operating system. Back in the command line, type:

sudo fdisk -l

That will list the available partitions. You’re looking for a partition that says something like

/dev/sda1 1 9327 74919096 83 NTFS

The two important bits are the ‘/dev/sda1‘ which is the partition itself and the ‘NTFS‘ which tells us it’s a Windows formatted partition. So your Windows partition exists on your drive sda and it’s partition 1. The MBR for drive sda (assuming you boot into windows using it’s native boot loader) is what you want to repair.

We want to fix the MBR on /dev/sda. To do so, type:

sudo ms-sys -m /dev/sda

You’ll want to change the ’sda’ bit if your results from ‘fdisk -l‘ are different. If for instance your windows install is on sdb or hda.

Once you do that, reboot the machine, removing the LiveCD from the drive and Windows should come back to you.

source

Vixta Is a new Fedora 8 based Linux os,which use kde environment and it is meant to look like Microsoft vista.

Goals:
1)Absolutely free
2)Spread linux
3)No need of Config.
4)User-Friendly.
5)Eye-catching.
6)Like Microsoft Vista in look and Feel

Too bad they didnt include features and stability as a goal.
Vixta a is a welcomed concept,but its still in childhood stage it need lot of development to be fully featured OS.It have stability issue and crashes.It have some kde applications like Kate, Konquerer,Ktorrent and Kolorpaint but KMail or Kontact is missing.Kernel support was limited,i couldn’t find any matching source.After updating the kernel it wont boot.Vixta discussion forum is not very active most questions are anwered like “refer documentation”.The vixta kernel donot include modules to enable cpu scaling in modern operating system ,i think its because they wanted to save space.
My dell xps m1530 laptop was hotter than with any other OS i have still used especially while compiling source code.Another irritating bug was the blinking panel,which would disappear while doing cpu intensuve tasks,but luckly will come back.

Conclusion:
Vixta is a nice idea,But to make it a good operationg system it have much distance to go.Its plus points are familiar looking with nice eye-candy. I suggest you install using virtual box as i did.Its source code is not provided,they tell any way its very similar to fedora so its not worth reproduce the same code.But think its not fair according to GPL every linux distro must provide its source code.Lets hope things get better in future and they will provide the source code..

Download:http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=206087
VIXTA website:http://vixta.sourceforge.net/index.php

Linux is Very Stable operating system unlike windows.It have very less crashes, stuckes and freezes which is very common with windows.But at rare cases this may occur in Linux.

We have 3 Quick ways to fix this problem without switching off your computer or rebooting it.

1)If only some applications are not responding not the whole desktop is frozen

Take system->Administration->System Monitor.
Then select the frozen application.Now click Kill process.

2)Try the key combination of Ctrl + Alt + Backspace to logout.Then login.

3)Use Virtual console
This way is little complicated than the first one but better method.Press
Ctrl + Alt + F2 to take the virtual console.Then log in and type:

ps -ax | grep startx

This command will return the PID of the Xserver.
Kill Xserver

kill -9 PID_Number

Return to your first console.

Press Alt + F1.

The new major version of vlc player has been released.It a new qt4 interface full screen controls, better playlists options,new video format support,many video and audio improvements andalbum art support.So upgrade is highly recommended.

The latest vlc nor gimp in not available in ubuntu repository so u will have to add a software source in the repository.You cannot visit the vlc site and download vlc from that site as in windows you have to do the below steps:

1)Remove old VlC

Remove the previous version of VLC to avoid a conflict when u upgrade. Remove vlc or gimp in Synaptic or in the terminal:

In terminal:

sudo apt-get remove vlc

2)Include new repository.

Click System ->Administration ->Software Sources ->Third Party Software.

Press Add & paste in this repository:

deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/c-korn/ubuntu intrepid main

Close Software Sources & Click reload the repositories.

3)Install vlc

To install Vlc:
sudo apt-get install vlc

If you have a source code,to make it an application program, you must first compile it.The advantage of distributing software is that you can use it any linux distro,as u already know deb file is only for debian based linux like ubuntu.Rpm is for red hat based fedora suse etc.

The source code is usally available in two forms of tar balls.
1)Tar.gz
2)Tar.bz2

To complie source code we need system software called compilers.By default they are not given in ubuntu so to get all the compliers in one go type in console:

sudo apt-get install build-essential

Now you are ready to complile source code.I recommend first u read README file.

To complie source code in tar.gz format

1)tar -xzf file_folder.tar.gz
2)cd file_folder
3)./configure –prefix=/usr NOTE:If you already have the source configured you will see make file in some directory,you can skip this step.Go there using command:
cd file_folder
4)make
5)make install

To compile source code in tar.bz2 format
1) tar -xjf file_name.tar.bz2
2)cd file_name
3)./configure –prefix=/usr
4)make
5)make install

Use ./configure –help to see the options for that program, and then you can enable/disable anything you want.

Compiz Fusion is the great project which have brought fame to Linux with its awesome eye-candies .So lets first install the latest version of compiz fusion.

NOTE:If u have graphics card,first u must Install driver for the card before installing compiz.To how to install driver in a easy way click here:

In terminal type:

gksu gedit /etc/apt/sources.list

Add this line to the end of file

deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/compiz/ubuntu intrepid main
Now save and close the file.

Type: sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get upgrade
To install compiz type:

sudo apt-get install compizconfig-settings-manager compiz-fusion-plugins-extra compiz-fusion-plugins-main compiz-plugins emerald

Right Click on the “workspace switcher” on the bottom right corner of desktop near trash.Make column =4.

Take Compiz Setting Manager System->Preferences->CompizConfig Settings Manager.Tick Desktop Cube,Cube Rotation,wobbly windows,ring switcher fire effect etc as u prefer.

Now close all applications and logout and login.Right click desktop,then visual effects,Now click extra effects.

Again take Compiz Setting Manager System->Preferences->CompizConfig Settings.Scroll down to Cube Reflection and Deformation. Activate it. Click on it to go to its configuration page.Press Ctrl + Alt + mouse left button to rotate desktop.

If u want Cylinder or Sphere

Under the Deformation tab, select Cylinder or Sphere in the Deformation dropdown box. Now you will get desktop rotation to cylinder or sphere mode.Then close.

To use ring switcher.Press windows key+Tab.

USEFUL KEYBOARD COMBINATIONS:

SUPER+SHIFT+DRAG LEFT MOUSE = draw fire
SUPER+SHIFT+C = clear fire
CTRL+ALT+DRAG LEFT MOUSE = rotate cube
CTRL+ALT+LEFT ARROW = rotate cube
CTRL+ALT+DOWN ARROW = flat desktop
SHIFT+ALT+UP = initiate window picker
CTRL+ALT+DOWN = unfold cube
ALT+TAB = window switch
SUPER+TAB = flip switcher or ring switcher, depending on which is enabled.
ALT+F7 = initiate ‘move windows’
SHIFT+F9 = water effect
SHIFT+F10 = slow animations
CTRL+ALT+D = show desktop

For Grouping and Tabbing:
SUPER+S = select single window
SUPER+T = tab group
SUPER+Left = change left tab
SUPER+Right = change right tab
SUPER+G = group windows
SUPER+U = ungroup windows
SUPER+R = remove group window
SUPER+C = close group
SUPER+X = ignore group
Hold the SUPER button then select the windows you want to group and then hit SUPER+G.

The SUPER key is the Windows key on most keyboards.

So what if Ubuntu is a fast operating system?… There is always room for some more tweaking… and I am talking here about some aspects that are NOT useful for the end-users (yes YOU, the regular Ubuntu user). The hacks presented in this guide will greatly improve the overall performance of your Ubuntu 8.04 Linux OS.

WARNING: Please follow the instructions below very carefully, in the order in which they are listed and reboot your machine after each one. It is also possible to do them all at once, but rebooting after each one is much safer. Why? Because if your system won’t work properly at a certain point of the tutorial, you’ll know what’s the last thing you did and you can revert back to the initial configuration. I’ve applied all these tweaks on three (3) different configurations (with SATA and IDE hard drives) with success!

Step 1 - Boot tweaks

Tweak One - Boot profile Administration -> Login Window…

…input your password, go to the fifth tab (”Security”), check the ‘Enable Automatic Login’ option and choose your username from the drop-down list.

That’s it! Close the window and reboot. You will notice that the system will automatically log you in and remember that you’ve just lost a few important seconds!

Step 2 - System tweaks

Tweak One - Speed up your hard drive

The following tweaks assume that you are using an ext3 filesystem for your Ubuntu OS and they will offer a noticeable performance boost! However, there is also a bad side of them… if you don’t have an UPS and your system will power off accidentally or because of a power loss, YOU WILL LOSE IMPORTANT DATA!

Open a terminal (Applications -> Accessories -> Terminal) and type:

CODE
sudo gedit /etc/fstab

WARNING: The following is just an example! Do NOT copy the lines into your /etc/fstab file! Just REPLACE the options marked with underline with the ones marked with bold!

From this:

# /dev/sda1
UUID=19f70288-7340-40c0-82d1-ee4b218fee1d / ext3 relatime,errors=remount-ro 0 1

To this:

# /dev/sda1
UUID=19f70288-7340-40c0-82d1-ee4b218fee1d / ext3 noatime,nodiratime,errors=remount-ro,data=writeback 0 1

See the following screenshot if you do not understand…

Save and close. Now type the following command in the terminal:

CODE
sudo gedit /boot/grub/menu.lst

And add the following option…

rootflags=data=writeback

…to the end of the following lines:

# defoptions=quiet splash vga=795 (by default, Ubuntu doesn’t have the “vga=795″ option on this line. It appears if you did the second tweak from the first step (see above)).

# altoptions=(recovery mode) single

They must look like this…

Save and close, and paste the following command in the terminal:

CODE
sudo update-grub

Type now the following command in order to manually change your filesystem “on-the-fly” into writeback.

CODE
sudo tune2fs -o journal_data_writeback /dev/sdb2

ATTENTION: Please note that /dev/sdb2 is MY root (/) partition. If you have the root (/) partition in another place (for example /dev/sda1 or /dev/sda2) change it accordingly. Please look in /etc/fstab for this!

That’s all, now reboot your system and when you get back, you should feel an increased speed in video, image or audio usage.

Tweak Two - Tuning Swappiness

If you have been running Linux systems for some time and you have used applications like ‘top’ to see what’s going on in your machine, then you’ve probably wondered: Where has all my memory gone? You should know that the largest place it is being used in is the disk cache, as the cached memory is free and it can be replaced anytime if a newly started application needs that memory. Linux systems are made like this to use so much memory for disk cache because the RAM is wasted if it is not used and if something needs the same data again, then there is a very good chance to be in the cache memory.

Open a terminal (Applications -> Accessories -> Terminal) and paste the following code:

CODE
sudo gedit /etc/sysctl.conf

Now add the following line at the end of this file:

CODE
vm.swappiness=10

The number at the end of this line can be between 0 and 100. At 100 the Linux kernel will prefer to find inactive pages and swap them out, while value 0 gives something close to the old behavior where applications that wanted memory could shrink the cache to a tiny fraction of RAM. Save, close and reboot.

Tweak Three - Concurrent booting

If you have a dual-core processor or one that supports hyper-threading then concurrent booting allows Ubuntu to take advantage of them. Just open a console and type the following code:

CODE
sudo gedit /etc/init.d/rc

and find the line CONCURRENCY=none and change it to:

CODE
CONCURRENCY=shell

Save, close and reboot your computer.

That will be all for now. With these tweaks, your system should perform better and boot faster. Please report if you see any improvements to your system and if anyone has more improvements, you can post them below so others will know about them!

Enable Repositories

You can turn on more repositories of programs and packages. These let you install more software on your computer. Run “Add Applications”. This is in the bottom of the Programs menu in Gnome, and under the Utilities menu in KDE.

1. Open the Settings->Repositories menu.
2. Click on “Add”. Select Ubuntu 5.10 “Breezy Badger”
3. Mark all the checkboxes. Click Ok.
4. Click on “Add”. Select Ubuntu 5.10 Security Updates
5. Mark all the checkboxes. Click Ok.
6. Click on “Add”. Select Ubuntu 5.10 Updates
7. Mark all the checkboxes. Click Ok.
8. Click Ok.

Menus

Kubuntu

Install Kubuntu

Install

Installing Kubuntu will add the K Desktop Environment (KDE), and a bunch of basic programs. It will not replace your Gnome desktop, it only provides an alternative. There are two methods of installing packages like this:

Command Line

Open a command prompt, in Gnome you can find one called “Terminal” in the “Utilities” menu. Type the following: sudo apt-get install kubuntu-desktop. Enter your password and press enter. A prompt should appear asking if you really want to install all this stuff; type Y and press enter.

Package Manager

I usually only use a package manager when looking for packages I want, which is most of the time. If I know the name of the package it is much easier to install it from the command line. In the system or settings menu (the right one on the top) find Synaptic Package Manager. Search for the package named kubuntu-desktop, right click, select mark for installation. Click on Apply in the toolbar. Answer yes to all the questions about whether you really want to install it.

Switch to KDE

In the right menu at the top of the screen select log out. This takes you back to the login screen. Click on the session button and select KDE. Enter your username and password. The login manager will ask if you want this to be your default session type; select yes.

KDE

Double Click to Open Files

The first thing you’ll want to do is get rid of that annoying single click opens files business. I don’t understand this behavior; how are you going to select files if clicking on them opens them?

Click on the K in the lower left corner of the screen. Select the System Settings menu item. This opens KDE’s settings. Under hardware click on Mouse. There is a section labeled Icons, in which Single-click to open files and folders is marked. Mark Double-click instead. Click on the Apply button. Close the System Settings program.

If you have already switched to using control center instead of system settings you can use it instead.

List Menu Items By Name

Menu items are listed by description by default. This is stupid. Right click on the panel (the bar at the bottom of the screen) and select Configure Panel or Panel Menu->Configure panel depending on which one is available. Open the Menus tab. Change Menu item format from Description (Name) to Name (Description). Click on Ok.

Get the Debian Menus

This isn’t specific to just KDE. The Debian Menus list all of the programs installed on your computer, and are fairly well organized. They are great for finding programs you haven’t used, and mining for shortcuts to put in other menus. To get them install the menu and menu-xdg packages. You will need to have already enabled the extra repositories in the first section.

Open a command prompt; you can do this by opening K Menu->System-Konsole. Type the following in the prompt, entering your password and Y where appropriate:

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install menu menu-xdg
update-menus

Make System Settings work nicely

The default System Settings behavior is annoying. There are three things you can do about it.

Use Settings Instead

In the System Menu select settings. If you have removed it from your panel you can add it to the K Menu by right clicking on the panel, selecting Configure Panel, and in the Menus tab, under Optional Menus check System and click Ok.

Use Kcontrol Instead

Kcontrol has the same components, listed differently. You can find it under Debian->Apps->System->Kcontrol. There are two ways to add it to your menus:

• You can right click on the K menu and select menu editor and copy kcontrol from the debian menus into the main menu; you may also want to move System Settings elsewhere.
• You can also enable the preferences submenu; right click on the panel and under Panel Configuration in the Menus tab under Optional Menus check the box next to Preferences. This enables a menu that contains not only a link to KControl, but also to all the settings applets individually.

Make the applets open in new windows

Right click on the K menu and select menu editor. Click on System Settings at the bottom of this new window. Change the command from systemsettings -caption "%c" %i %m to systemsettings --noembed -caption "%c" %i %m. Click on the Save button. Quit.

Get shutdown buttons in KDE, login automatically

These commands make KDE your default desktop so that auto-login will get you to the right place and use KDM as the login manager so that shutdown buttons show up in KDE. Open a terminal and copy and paste the following commands. Press Enter. Enter your password when prompted.

echo startkde > .xsession
sudo bash -c "echo /usr/bin/kdm > /etc/X11/default-display-manager"

Open the KDE control center and under System Administration open Login Manager. Click the button to enter Administrator Mode; the border should turn red. Under the Convenience tab mark the checkbox for “Enable Auto-login”. Click Apply. Close the window.

You will be automatically logged in to KDE the next time your computer boots. Starting with that session the shutdown buttons will work when you pick Log out…

Different Taskbars for Different Desktops

My taskbar gets very cluttered with many programs open. Opening programs on different desktops keeps the windows uncluttered, and it will keep your taskbar uncluttered to. Right click on the panel and select configure panel. Click on the big blue taskbar button on the left. Unmark “Show windows from all desktops” and click Ok.

Konqueror

Konqueror’s default behavior is to try to make the file manager behave like a web browser. This is kind of annoying, and makes file management type stuff hard. I recommend making all of these changes to Konqueror’s settings:

1. Open a Konqueror window by opening your home directory in the System Places menu (the one next to the K Menu).
2. Select the Settings-Configure Konqueror menu item.
   1. Under Behavior, in Misc. Options, check both “Open folders in a separate window” and “Show network operations in a single window”. This will make folders opened in Konqueror open in new tabs instead of replacing the folder you were looking at. The network operations thing keeps windows less cluttered when moving files around.
   2. Under Appearance uncheck Underline filenames.
   3. Under Web Behavior, in Tabbed browsing, open Advanced Options. Uncheck “Open as tab in existing konqueror when URL is called externally”. Click Ok. This keeps web pages and folders from ending up in the same konqueror window, which is awkward. You might want to uncheck the “Open new tabs in the background” option if you are annoyed or confused when opening a folder doesn’t make it show up.
3. Click Ok to close and keep your new Konqueror settings.

Now we’ll arrange the window in a more usable manner.

1. Press F9 to make the directory tree visible.
2. In the Settings->Toolbars menu check Main Toolbar.
3. In the Settings->Toolbars menu check Extra Toolbar.
4. Arrange the Toolbars in a pleasing manner. I like Main first, then extra, then the location bar on the next line.
5. Select Settings->Save Kubuntu File Manager profile. Click Save.

GRUB

You might not want Ubuntu to always boot as default. If so you’ll probably want to do two things: Make the previous operating system boot by default and make the boot screen pretty so you’ll notice it. Steps marked with an * can be omitted if you don’t want the pretty boot screen.

1. Download the splash image, butte-splash-gimp.xpm.gz, and save it in your home directory.
2. Open up a console.
3. Run each of these commands to make the folder for images and copy the image there:

   sudo mkdir /boot/grub/images/
   sudo cp butte-splash-gimp.xpm.gz /boot/grub/images/

4. Open up the GRUB configuration file in a text editor: kdesu kate /boot/grub/menu.lst
5. Find this line; it’s right at the top:

   default		0

6. Replace it with

   default		saved

7. Add the following lines just after this line to use the pretty boot screen:

   foreground	FFFFFF
   background	336699
   splashimage (hd1,0)/boot/grub/images/butte-splash-gimp.xpm.gz

8. Change the (hd1,0) part to the drive Ubuntu is installed on. (hd0,0) is first hard drive first partition, (hd0,1) is first hard drive, second partition, (hd1,0) is second hard drive, first partition. If you arn’t sure you can look further down in the file for the root lines used in the Ubuntu boot options. Those are the drive and partition that Ubuntu is on.
9. It should now look something like this:

   ...
   # You can specify 'saved' instead of a number. In this case, the default entry
   # is the entry saved with the command 'savedefault'.
   default		saved
   foreground	FFFFFF
   background	336699
   splashimage (hd1,0)/boot/grub/images/butte-splash-gimp.xpm.gz
   
   ## timeout sec
   ...

10. Save the file and close the text editor.

The bootloader will now remember which operating system you used last and boot it by default. The bootloader will be pretty and hopefully attention catching.

xscreensaver

The kde screensaver module is broken and annoying in many ways, especially if you want to use your own pictures for the screensavers or want to select only some of the screensavers for random display. The original xscreensaver system is much nicer. Here’s how to switch:

1. Switch off the KDE screensaver. Open your KDE settings and select the “Look and Feel” “Screensaver” page. Turn off the “Enable Screensaver” checkbox.
2. Download this file. Save it in your home directory.
3. Open up a console. Type bash xscreen and press enter. When it asks you for your password enter it.
4. The xscreensaver settings will open and warn you that it’s not currently running. Click Ok to start it for this session. You can change settings right here.

You can get back to the settings in the K menu under Debian->Screen->Save->ScreenSaver Preferences. You can use a menu editor to copy this somewhere else too.

Using your own images for the screensaver.

In the Advanced tab in screensaver settings check the “Choose Random Image” box. Browse and select the directory your pictures are in.

If you are displaying images you may want to set Cycle After to a low number, like 1 or 2 minutes, so that the effects change frequently. Many of the screensavers have their own settings for how frequently they loadi images; a few use the same image for the entire duration. The following screensavers use your pictures:

• AntSpotlight
• BlitSpin
• Bumps - used for a bumpmap, image is pretty destroyed.
• Carousel
• DecayScreen
• Distort
• Flipscreen3d
• GFlux (grab)
• GLEidescope
• GLSlideshow
• MirrorBlob
• Ripples (desktop)
• RotZoomer
• RotZoomer (mobile)
• RotZoomer (sweep)
• SlideScreen
• Spotlight
• Twang
• XTeeVee
• Zoom (Fatbits)
• Zoom (Lenses)

Suggested Software

Get as much of the Restricted Format programs as you can.

I recommend installing the following packages:

gnucash

Double entry bookkeeping accounting software. Absolutely excellent. Do your books this way. Menu item will be in Debian->Apps->Tools which is annoying, copy it somewhere more accessible.

celestia

Like a planetarium, but more like a 3d tour of the solar system and beyond. there are amazing textures for celestia on the internet. Only get this if you have a good graphics card.

kde

An easy way to get all of the official KDE programs. Kubuntu already got most of these, but it’ll add more games, artwork, educational programs, accessibility programs. It’ll also install kdevelop and a couple other programs that aren’t of general interest, but it’s much easier than going through and selecting most of these packages individually. If you don’t want the whole shebang search for packages with names containing kde, and just select those describing the fields that are of interest to you. It’s a 115 MB download, and takes up another 350 MB of disk space.

gimp-data-extras, gimp-texturize

More brushes, gradients, palettes, and textures for the gimp.

ogle, okle

DVD players for Gnome and KDE. Both are nice

frozen-bubble

One of the best video games ever

lbreakout2

One of the prettiest video games ever

The following packages are worth noting:

wine

Runs lots of windows programs very well, just not the ones I like. Somewhat difficult to figure out how to use.

festival

Text to speech converter. Needed for KDE text to speech system to work. Still fairly primitive