I recently acquired a new router which I flashed with the dd-wrt software [DD-WRT v24-sp2 (07/22/09) mega] I recently learned about openDNS and wanted to try it. Not sure if this software is linux based (I don’t really think so…) but it definitely is open-source. Here’s how I got it working:

• set up an account (free!)
• opened up my dd-wrt router in a browser window
• under Setup->Basic Setup tab I left everything the same, except for this:
  • section: “Network Address Server Settings (DHCP)”, in which I changed the first two static DNS servers to the openDNS servers (previously they had been ’0′).
  • those server addresses are:
    • 208.67.222.222
    • 208.67.220.220
• then went under Services->Services and to the “DNSmasq” section
  • had to make sure that both DNSMasq and Local DNS were checked “enable” and then under “Additional DNSMasq Options” put strict-order
  
  

And that’s it! After that the openDNS site confirmed that I was using their servers. Pretty simple.

So far I’m loving the options the free membership offers, especially the filtering you can do. I highly recommend checking out openDNS if you can.

If you use Chrome or Chromium (and I highly suggest you try them out if you don’t!) here are a couple extensions for Gmail that I discovered that I actually use a lot. Not ground-breaking or breathtaking, but very useful:

Gmail checker – shows if you have any new emails and how many, and also serves as a shortcut to Gmail (opens it in a new tab)

Send from Gmail – does exactly what it says, it just copies the address bar of whatever page you are on and opens up a small gmail window to compose mail with that address in the email. It’s great for tossing pages at friends!

I think this has been available for some time in a testing repository somewhere, but now it’s official. Download yer official copy of Google Chrome for Ubuntu here. I installed it and it even supports Xmarks (bookmark synchronization) – install that here.

Just installed it myself – loving it!!!! There is a way to install it through a repository, but I can’t, for the life of me, get that to work here on my wife’s laptop. Once I figure it out I’ll definitely post that….sometime….

Anyways, you can now enjoy aanother very secure and fast browser!

One of the great draws (and just plain fun sides) of Linux are the visual effects available for managing your desktop and windows. CompizFusion is one of the most popular and most powerful programs offered. Here I’m going to walk through a few ‘basic’ tweaks you can do to customize the way your desktop behaves.

For the sake of simplicity, I’m going to assume that you are running Ubuntu (probably the latest, 9.04). If you don’t, then you will have to do a wee bit ‘o research to  see how to download/install it for your distribution. In Ubuntu, you install it this w:

sudo apt-get install fusion-icon emerald compizconfig-settings-manager simple-ccsm

Ubuntu actually comes with CompizFusion, so that command just installed some controllers and stuff to help you manage it.

Now, before you get started, open up System -> Preferences -> Startup Applications. Click on the “Add” button and fill out the information thusly:

• Name: Fusion Icon
• Command: fusion-icon
• Comment: Compiz Controller

Click the “Add” button in that window and you’re done – now the Fusion Icon will control your window managers when you boot up next.

Now hit Alt+F2 and type in “fusion-icon” in the window that opens up – it will probably finish the command for you. Your screen might blink, but when the program starts running you should see a little box-type icon on your panel (wherever your icons are on there). If you right click on it there will drop down a list of options. Right now, I want to take note of the top two.

• Settings Manager – this will open up the primary Compiz Configuration window (we’ll get to that in a minute)
• Emerald Theme Manager – this opens up the manager for Emerald, the default window decorator for Compiz. You can download tons of great/awesome Emerald themes at gnome-look.org – just do a search for ‘emerald theme’.

Now, to open the Compiz settings window you can use the “Settings Manager” option from the icon discussed above. You can also right-click on the desktop, choose “change desktop background”, and then click on the “Visual Effects” tab, and there should now be a fourth option, “Custion”, with a button for “preferences” (that will open the settings manager as well) [you have to have the simple-ccsm package installed for this option to be available]. Lastly, you can use the menus to open up the settings manager: System -> Preferences -> CompizConfig Settings Manager.

Now, to the fun stuff….I’m just going to go through some of the changes I like to make so you can see what can be done – feel free to experiment and try stuff!

Desktop Cube

Under “General Options”, go to the last tab titled “Desktop Size” and change the horizontal size to ’4′.  (Go back to the main options section) Under “Desktop”, check the box next to the option “Desktop Cube” – a warning might pop up saying something about a compatibility issue with Desktop Wall, just choose to disable the other and use Desktop Cube.

Next, in the same section, check the box next to “Rotate Cube”. Now this is fun. Place your mouse over the desktop (where there are no windows open), press Ctrl+Alt, and while holding them down, click on the desktop background and try to move it around. You should be able to just swing your “cube” all around. You can also flip the cube one side to the right or left using Ctrl+Alt+left/right arrow button.

Desktop Sphere?

Okay, I didn’t even know this was an option, and it kinda slows down my older laptop, but you can change the cube to a sphere or even a ball. Go down to the “Effects” category and check the “Cube Reflection and Deformation” option. By default I think it’ll just round out the cube into a sphere, leaving the tops and bottom flat. You rotate it with the same commands as the Cube, and if you want to tweak the look as well as the commands (key bindings) just click on the button and have at it!

Window Previews

This option is under the “Extras” section, and I think it is just effecient…

Window Animations

These are fun to play with. I like setting my minimize action to “Magic Lamp”. Go to the “Minimize Animation” tab and then double click on the line of text under “Animation Selection”, you should get a little pop-up window where you can change the animation to “Magic Lamp”. As soon as you close the window, the animation is active – try it out!

I also enjoy doing different opening and closing animations. Try out “Sidekick” for opening the normal type windows, and this time slow down the duration to between 500-600. Then maybe “Slide 2″ for closing, slowing down the timing on it as well.

You can also download some unsupported plugins which add even more animations. These plugins are less supported, so theres a chance something could go wrong…but I haven’t had any problems. You can get ‘em by running this in the terminal:

sudo apt-get install compiz-fusion-plugins-unsupported

After installing that there will be an option next to the “Animations” one which says “Animations Add-on”, check this and you’ll get even more animations. My favorites are “Airplane” for opening a window and “Skewer” for closing one.

Ring Switcher

This is similar to what Vista has for fancy switching (though the “Shift Switcher” is closer – I just like the “Ring Switcher” more). You’ll find it under the “Window Management” section. Check the keybindings. I have mine set to cycle through the windows for the present desktop with Super+Tab, while Alt+Super+Tab will switch through all open windows on all desktops. A very effecient way of maneuvering around.

Scale

This is pretty much the same as the Mac effect where all the windows are reduced in size and tiled on screen so you can choose the one you want to work on. This is also found in the “Window Management” section. Check the box and then click on the button. Go to the keybindings section. There are a ton of options, but the one I use is “Initiate Window Picker for All Windows” with a screen next to it. Click the button across from it, and choose the top right section of the screen (or a section of the screen where you rarely go…). Then check it out!

These are just a few of the things you can do with Compiz-Fusion. Play around, experiment – just keep track of what you change so you can undo anything you don’t like… Feel free to post some of your favorite Compiz plugins and why!

Well, the jones clan (or at least this one…) is expanding it’s reach online. That’s right, Terra, my blog-tastic wife, is going to have her own little domain (to be announced later).

Unfortunately, that means I gotta upgrade my web package through my provider, 1and1.com. They’re great, but apparently when you upgrade a package as I’m doing, it wipes out your databases (which happen to be essential for WordPress to manage the blog). So I’m backing up all my stuff, and the upgrade will take place sometime between tomorrow night and Thursday.

Therefore, if you haven’t heard anything from me, say, by Sunday night, check back here, at linux.zachjones.net to make sure you haven’t missed anything. If you registered on this blog (there’s a link on the right), and have subscribed that way, then you should be okay. But if you use an RSS feed reader (like Google Reader), I’m not sure what this transition will do to the RSS feed – hopefully nothing.

Sorry for any inconvenience – by next week this should all be resolved!

in working on customizing my new install, I ran across a reference to a system monitor that I thought looked pretty cool. It’s called Conky. Supposedly it’s a pretty lighweight program – so not much drain on the CPU, something I need for my rather aged systems.

run to install:

sudo apt-get install conky

The hard part about conky, I quickly learned, is the raw install you get is pretty, well, bland. not very cool… After customization, here’s what I ended up with (I am still working out a few kinks…):

screenshot of my conky program...so far...

I followed a pretty solid guide found here. I have to get conky to detect my internet activity from my wireless card (right now it’s trying to get it from my ethernet card, which I’m not using…), and I think I might want to moniter my swap drives as well…just thoughts.

Just be prepared to jumpt into a little bit of config file editing – but it’s not too rough. Actually, I think it’s a great way to start dipping your feet into it.

Well, my semester finally ended and I have been able to install Jaunty on me ‘ole laptop – as well as my desktop. I’m going to post a “super quick install” guide later. Right now, just a few of my initial thoughts on the Jackalope.

First impression is the new boot splash screen and login window – both are sharper-looking than the past ones. I do think the Intrepid default background was cooler. Other than that, the look is pretty good. I do wish gnome would sometime soon update the default look of their panels and windows. It’s pretty old-school.

One of the greatest adjustments which is readily apparent is the new notification system. I definitely like it. When I’ve got a chat in pidgin going, if I’m working in another window, it’ll pop up a notification of what has been said in the chat window. Which is especially good for me when I’m chatting with my wife…kinda wise to respond more quickly than slowly to what she says

As far as how fast the OS works…well, what I’m running it on won’t really show that. My laptop is a 1.5 Ghz Celeron, with 512 mg of RAM and a 60 Gb hard-drive. Not exactly top of the line – approximately 3.5 years old. The basic install runs very smoothly – it’s when I start running a bunch of programs (which I am rather infamous for) that things start to slow down a little. And that’s more to do with my laptop than the OS. If I want things to run more smoothly I can always switch over to Xubuntu (Xfce-based Ubuntu).

All in all, as far as I can tell, this is a very solid update to Ubuntu. You can download it here. But I’d suggest grabbing the Torrent file – I think that’s a little better way to download it (but that’s just a personal opinion…).

Came across this guide to using BitTorrent to upgrade from Hardy to Intrepid (instead of the normal method).

HOWTO: Using apt-p2p (torrent) For Faster Upgrades From Hardy To Intrepid – Ubuntu Forums

Might be worth a try, as I’m sure the servers are going to be pretty overloaded for the next few days. I am actually going to wait a few days before I attempt to upgrade (or reinstall completely – haven’t made up my mind about which I’m gonna indulge in)

okay, if you’re running Ubuntu and decide to install Kubuntu, during the installation of the latter, you are asked if you would like to keep GDM as the login manager, or if you want to change it to KDM (you get the question again if you install KDE 4). I opted to keep GDM because I was unfamiliar with the KDM login manager. Later, though, like a the good nerd I am, I got curious and wanted to try out the KDM login manager. I started a thread with the question, and here’s how I ended up getting it done:

Use this command in the terminal:
sudo nano /etc/X11/default-display-manager

then what pops up in terminal will be an interesting screen with a cursor after a line which reads like this:
/usr/sbin/gdm

change the line to read as this:
/usr/bin/kdm
(note that the line originally reads with the middle field saying “sbin” and it changes to “bin”, as well as changing the last field from “gdm” to “kdm”)

Then hit Crtl+o to save it and then hit ‘enter’ when it asks if you want to. And then use Ctrl+x to exit.

The guy who gave me most of this information on the thread mentioned some different ways to get kdm themes, but I couldn’t get the display manager installed, so I didn’t try them.

Well, over spring break I upgraded to Hardy Heron (Ubuntu 8.04) on my laptop. It went pretty smoothly. I’m still trying to get Avant Window Manager working the way I had it going in Gutsy. I think it’s actually going to be another month or so before they get everything on that ironed out so it works up to par.

Gnome-Do came in the regular repositories, which was a relief. Overall, I do enjoy it a bunch. I have had a little difficulty with Rhythmbox and Amarok sporadically not working, and whenever I try to watch trailers in Firefox Beta 3.0 the whole computer freezes up. I had to download Firefox 2 to use my school’s website to take tests and stuff because JRE (Java Runtime Environment) isn’t working that great in 3.0 yet.

Pretty good, overall, though, I’d say. I’ll be posting an installation guide this summer. I gotta get past exams before I spend much time on anything else.