Stupidoo!!!

I was doing a apt-get dist-upgrade and was asked by one of the upgrade jobs to choose whether or not to take the default package configuration or to keep my own configuration. I chose to take a look at how different those two were and wasn’t able to come back by press enter on the OK. So I Control-C it to come out of the window–bad idea. I received this message:

E: dpkg was interrupted, you must manually run ‘dpkg –configure -a’ to correct the problem.

Took me a while and some googling to try to find out what’s wrong with it. I run “dpkg –configure -a” and couldn’t get myself out of it. At the end, with the help from this post, I learned that I’ve forgotten to put “sudo” in front of it. Big time…

Huh? This guy is not serious, …oh, he is?
Let’s see…”Giving up the GIMP is a sign of Ubuntu’s mainstream maturity“, and how would you explain it to a lay Ubuntu user like me?
The explaining itself would be a tough job. When I saw the title, I was like…this guy is as funny as me. But I was wrong. Man! He’s serious!

If you go read the article, you will see that it’s a group decision in a high profile Ubuntu meeting. Ya, just like the Software Center thingy, not all Ubuntu people are equally wise. Some of us have to be stupid so I can write about them on Stupidoo, you know.

So what’s wrong with GIMP? It’s big and complicated…eh…hello? My notebook computer is like almost 4 years old and you don’t hear me complaining. Why would you want to do that to right something that is not wrong? As the the author trying hard to explain about the process being open and all, I know that he doesn’t feel right either.

Anyway, let’s hope Ubuntu can keep good work with the semi-annual release. Marketing wise, this approach will push Windows aside in a couple of years if the Ubuntu guys make less mistakes like removing GIMP from the distro.

*Turn off your Visual Effects and the dual/extending monitor works!!

Well this is probably nothing much for most people. It is, to me, that the dual monitor thingy is finally working. The thing is, I am using two monitors here and Ubuntu 9.10 RC’s did not support them to work side by side. Now it is and I can type on one screen a search on the other. Guess what? Happy as a clam!!

[I went to my office and did the same thing on my TravelMate 3000 (I have a 3010 at home) and it didn't work. Turned out that it worked right after I changed the Visual Effects to None. So, maybe it's been working? Stupid me/Ubuntu!]

:”>

I’ve never thought I would say something like the title, but I was installing the Ubuntu 9.10 Alpha 6 daily (yesterday’s) build, and it is sooooooooo KUUL!!

The installation sequence windows are smooth and well layouted and coloured. The splashes…wow!! Talking about rocks!! The small Ubuntu white logo on a pure dark screen is awesome! And the Usplash spotlighting is like no one! You know what? I didn’t even like the Mac stuff. I have to say, this time, I am seriously impressed.

Thank you Ubuntu guys, for the great OS we are enjoying. Beware, my friend Bill Gates…(oh, he kinda retired already), Ubuntu 910 is coming, don’t let it become your 911. You guys need to work harder doing your job from now on because if you don’t, we (yep, this time, we) will take yours.

I don’t know if I am the only one who has noticed (complained) but the sound of TravelMate 3010 has been lost since I upgraded to 9.10. I had to use command shell to “sudo alsa – reload” and then restart Firefox so I can play Bejeweled with dignity (read “sound” here). After I don’t know how long, finally I noticed today (after who knows how many hundreds of updates installed), the sound stays now. I still have to click on the greyed out sound icon in the system area to drag the sound level for audio to appear but I don’t have to restart Firefox now. The audio is there!

I am glad they fixed this problem (partially) and I am playing Bejeweled happily (also partially).

First of all, I can’t spell the name Karmic Koala (I spelled Kwala as I heard). All an all, those Ubuntu guys come up with great names and I appreciate it. If only we can spell or pronounce them with certain degree of ease…I don’t know, I wouldn’t want any version of Ubuntu to be named “Kungfu Panda.”

Oh, right, I was upgrading Ubuntu 9.10 Beta 2 days ago and the wireless died on me baby Acer TravelMate 3010 (ya…ya… it’s old but nice laptop, alright?). I knew I was not alone but I always do my part of the job. So I checked and checked. System–>Preferences–>Network Connections didn’t respond. System–>Administration–>Network gave me the network adapters to configure but of course not working. I actually knew it wouldn’t…(a hunch told me it has to be something easier than that, I mean if you designed the Network part there you’d know it’s not supposed to be used). It actually refused to take in any configuration I entered, always gave me some data incorrect can’t save thingy alert box.

I put into the configurations into the Wireless Connection settings under Network and noticed that it required WEP/WPA encryption and I knew that I didn’t put any in my wireless AP. As I always say, if anyone put so much effort to get in, they deserve something in return. So I put some Access control there so my AP would only take the MAC addresses allowed. I think it should be secure enough…unless you hack into the AP (for what? to steal things from me? hahaha…let me know if you find anything worth stealing).

Anyway, today I switch to my beloved Windows XP (hey! hey! Stop that! …it’s just a figure of speech), and vola! The wireless is back. Oh…not so fast. The Ubuntu 9.10 wireless is still hiding. Darn…you see, Windows has never given me the problems. If Windows is a child I don’t love, at least s/he is leaving me alone doing my job…eh…not really, I have all sorts of problem with my friend Bill Gates over his ever-crashing smarty Word and the cover-1/3-of the screen Office 2007. I mean, seriously, you should check the display screen size of the Microsoft Office 2007 team. They must be using a 3-feet tall x 1-foot wide screen to come up with that thing.

Now that the hardware is sure to be working, I, with my best behavior, take my ethernet cable and plug it into my laptop  and connect to the AP. I configured the WEP/WPA and came back to the Network and this time I can save the configuration but still no luck even after reboot. I figure that I am not the only one with this problem, so I call my Update Manager to help. Luckily, after a 15 minutes update, the network icon came back to me on the top panel. I entered my access code for the WEP/WPA (you can only use one and don’t ask me the differences between them).

Now I am typing using this wireless connection and happy as a clam (…no, not really, not so dramatic. I am not nuts). Let’s say, to cure my Ubuntu pre-October syndrome, at least they can alert me that they are going to lift the wireless security a little bit. Wouldn’t you agree? Oh, again, then, everything could be just my mis-understanding. I am known for good at complaining, anyway.

This is so stupid you won’t believe it! I was using Ubuntu 9.04 on my Acer TravelMate 3000. You know Acer is not the smartest in designing computers so I am used to blame them on other things, but this one tops Acer: After upgrading to 9.10 (I know, it’s not October, yet) my touchpad stopped working after signing in. Strangely, it worked on the sign-in window. Mysterious, eh? So I was bored enough this evening to do a search. And what I found out was xorg issues. Yak! I hate that. In one of the pages I searched (Googled, but I don’t want to use google as a verb. I don’t like Google after switching to Gmail), I found someone mentioning stuff under System menu and…vola!! Here is my savior!! There’s a Mouse preferences under System, Preferences. Under the Touchpad, the Enable mouse clicks with touchpad was unchecked.

Would I be so smart to do that? Nah, I don’t think so. Whoever did that must be too smart to use Windows. (Ya, I am going to use Windows 7, at least in parallel with Ubuntu. My friend Bill Gates has been complaining to me for not using his OS.) (Check here for the technical information that you don’t need)

I know I am not alone here. I have used Ubuntu for months here. And the Firefox hangs on futext_wait problem has surfaced recently. I know it’s not just the 9.04 since I would have noticed it if it’s here with the fresh installation or updates. Actually, this futext_wait bug happens on my fresh installation of Ubuntu 9.04 only…which is on my desktop, which has a nice 24 inch LCD monitor, which I rely on for my important works such as blogging here (well, you don’t have to take this one). But anyway,  the bug is here and doesn’t seem to be going anywhere soon. Someone said that deselect Assistive Technologies would take care of it. Well, I don’t even have that checked. So, good luck to me.

Oh, and good luck to you, too, in case you are having the same problem.

I use Ubuntu 9.04 and what’s the name of it? Jaunty something. Well, sometimes it’s really not that jaunty. My printers all disappeared this afternoon when I tried to print a document. I have an USB-connected LaserJet 1020 and couple of network printers. They worked fine before today and suddenly just puffed.

Thanks to the good people in Google (for the search engine) and in the Ubuntu community (who post tirelessly solutions for different kinds of odd problems), I was able to fix it.

How?
1. sudo apt-get install menu
2. su-to-root -X -c /usr/sbin/wifi-radar

I found this solution from the Ubuntu Forums. My lovely printers are all back now.

Now, could someone tell me what the h**k does my printers have to do with wifi radar?