Skin of Stars

Since it’s only a few days since the release of Ubuntu’s Intrepid Ibex, I though I might do a quick note on how to upgrade from the Long Term Stable (LTS), Hardy Heron (if you are a Windows user and you just want to try out the new version, you can use the Wubi Installer and treat it just like any other Windows application). It is worth noting that a new install will often be a far quicker process and provide you with a clean slate. You can also save almost all of your personal settings and files if you installed / (known as the root directory) and /home in separate partitions first time around, allowing you to just install the new OS in /

In this post though we shall assume that you just with to upgrade an existing install and as such save all your setting, files, etc, with the minimum of fuss.

Normally when a new release comes around your update manager will tell you that a new version is available. Yet from Hardy to Intrepid this will not happen because Hardy is an LTS. There is, as always, a way around this. It is as follows; System > Administration > Software Sources, then the Updates tab. At the bottom it will say Release Upgrade. You’ll then want to change that from “Long term support releases only” to “Normal”. After that head back to System > Administration > Update Manager and you will be offered the choice to upgrade to the latest release. Click that button and follow the prompts.

As you run through the upgrade you will be prompted with questions as to whether you want to keep/merge/replace certain configuration files, normally ones you have changed. There is one that you must replace (or merge if you know what you are doing) and it is called menu.list. This file selects things like what kernel to boot from and you should use the latest that comes with Intrepid. Good luck.

These machines aren’t all fun fun fun, sometimes you have to use them for some more serious work. In this post I’m going to tell you how to make your own php/mysql web development environment on your own Ubuntu desktop. Once you’ve done this you won’t need to keep uploading files to your server just to check if something works.

Firstly I’d like to point to the post that originally helped me do this at webmasterview.com.

Now, time to open up our trusty terminal. It is possible to do this through synaptics, but its quicker to do it like this:

First thing is to install mysql for databases on our machine. Copy this bit of code into your terminal:

sudo apt-get install mysql-server

Next we need apache2 as our webserver. Here is the code:

sudo apt-get install apache2

Then we need to get php:

sudo apt-get install php5

There are our three basic components. Now we need to hook them together:

sudo apt-get install libapache2-mod-php5

and

sudo apt-get install php5-mysql

Now that’s just grand. We’ve now got all the elements that we need to serve files to the net. The thing is, we’re only doing this so we can work on stuff at home, in which case what we’re really looking for is an easier way to do so. What we need to do is have a public_html folder in our user directory. Perhaps now would be a good time to do that. The next step is making that work on the webserver we’ve just installed. Run this snip of code:

sudo a2enmod userdir

Then restart apache:

sudo /etc/init.d/apache2 force-reload

You should now be able to reach your home folder via http://localhost/~yourusername/

Finally we want to be able to administer our mysql databases. Though there are many good tools for doing this I still go back to the web based phpMyAdmin. Apart from the fact that it’s highly automated (which suits me just fine) it’s also a very common program to find on your paid hosting, so would also be very familiar when you go live. For the quick and dirty way of getting it up and running, download phpMyAdmin and extract to your public_html folder. Personally I rename it to something a little easier. Then rename the file within from config.example.inc.php to config.inc.php and within that file put something in the blowfish_secret field. Then all you have to do is navigate your browser to something like http://localhost/~yourusername/phpMyAdmin

addendum

If your server is going to be visible from the big bad world and this is your everyday machine then you need to turn off that user public_html stuff (it’s insecure for general use!). To do that just enter this instruction

sudo a2dismod userdir

then reload apache as before

Its got to that time of the month where I have to reinstall my operating system. I can’t blame the system, it is each and every time, without fail, my fault. I can’t help but keep tinkering and playing with them till they fail on me. I remember when I first started playing with the things I would have to reinstall before I’d even finished the first install! At least now here are often months between.

I thought this time I might get out of my comfort zone for a bit. I decided to install the new fedora 8. I will be totally honest now and admit that it lasted on my machine for two days before I switched back to ubuntu. The problem wasn’t with fedora per say, I could see almost immediately that this was a far more stable operating system with many of the features I like built in straight out the box. It clearly benefits from the good breeding of Red Hat. The problem I have is that I’m not an expert by any stretch of the imagination and fedora is clearly built for people who have some idea what they are doing. From what I found there seemed to be very little documentation for novices and to be honest I don’t have the time for that sort of learning curve.

So here is what seems to have happened. I have acquired the same disinterest in learning a new operating system that my Windows using counterparts have always had. I hope this doesn’t stick.

Ubuntu coming to a Tesco near you.

http://linkpot.net/kidnap/
http://linkpot.net/chastened/

For one of my school projects I have to write programs for Microsoft (R) Windows (TM). I know that this makes sense, lets be honest its in most peoples homes. The problem I have is that I didn’t have it in my home. I’ve been using Ubuntu (a linux thing) on all my machines for more than six months now and have barely touched anything with Windows since. So, I knew that a new version of Ubuntu was coming out on Thursday so yesterday I decided to wipe my laptop and replace it with Windows XP in order to make school a little easier (I’ll also get more BBC content, as a bonus). And here is where the problems started…

Correct drivers were not included. Why is this something the the OSS boys do so well with so little help yet a company with so much money for research do so badly? I mean, the drivers were available on the internet, I just couldn’t get on the internet to find them because the first set of drivers I needed were network drivers! Even when I used other machines I found the documentation was atrocious. I got that annoyed with it I had to give my computer to someone else to fix before I started beating it.

I’m not saying life’s a beach as soon as you go open source, infact its far from it. To be honest, my other problems were things that I would have just been used to before. Things like programs organised by manufacturer rather than what they do. Maybe this is why its hard to go back, you get used to something and you’re happy. Its like trying to revive an old relationship I guess, lets be honest, you broke up for a reason.

So in a couple of days Windows will be partitioned off and placed in a back corner of my machine. I’m not going to completely delete it this time but I’m afraid to say I can never embrace it again.