A look into the future - check out gnome-shell

I tried gnome-shell some days ago. I'm running it default on my laptop now actually. The design is intuitive and it is perfect for us that have several applications running at once and want to switch between all windows easily. It's very good-looking and allows you to work more effective than all others desktop managers I've tested.

If you're interested in what might be the beginning of a new GUI for operating systems, check out the official website: http://live.gnome.org/GnomeShell

If you wan't to install it, here's instructions for Ubuntu 9.10:

1. Start "Software sources" (find in menu or: alt+f2, write "gksu --desktop /usr/share/applications/software-properties.desktop /usr/bin/software-properties-gtk")
2. Check "Community-maintained Open Source software (universe)" by clicking on it
3. Click on close
4. Open a terminal (alt+f2, write gnome-terminal)
5. Write "sudo apt-get update" in the terminal
   
6. Write "sudo apt-get install gnome-shell" in the terminal
7. Now it's installed, just write "gnome-shell --replace" in the terminal to start it.

If you want to make it default:

1. System --> Preferences --> Startup applications
2. Click on add, write "gnome-shell --replace" in the command field. Write what you want in the other fields.

Be prepared that gnome-shell might crash your system if you're unlucky. It didn't crash my system, but everything got very slow for a while and then gnome-shell was shut down, writing "Software rasterizer detected, abortingaborting and using fallback: /usr/bin/metacity". Note that I ran gnome-shell from a live cd without proprietary drivers for my ATI HD4850. Probably this caused the problems. I haven't had any problems on my laptop, used gnome-shell on it for almost two weeks.

BTW if you run Fedora 12 you can enable gnome-shell by entering desktop effects and click on a button.

Ubuntu 9.10 installation can't find my harddrive

Hi. I tried to install Ubuntu 9.10 a while ago. But in the partition manager within the installation software I couldn't find my hard drive. This was quite frustrating since I had no problems installing Ubuntu 9.04 (or older) and Ubuntu 9.10 did find my hard drive in GParted.

I think it's my motherboard that Ubuntu dosen't like. I have a Asus P5Q Pro (the hard drive is a Samsung 500GB SATA). However I did find a solution to this problem. Start the live-cd and do the following:

1. Cancel the installation (if you started it), shutdown the installation software (ubiquity)
   
2. Open terminal (alt+f2; write gnome-terminal)
3. Write "sudo gedit /lib/partman/init.d/30parted" in terminal
4. Comment out the following:

        # Skip devices that are part of a dmraid device
        if type dmraid >/dev/null 2>&1 && \
           dmraid -r -c >/dev/null 2>&1; then
            if part_of_sataraid $device && \
               [ -f /var/lib/disk-detect/activate_dmraid ]; then
                continue
            fi
        fi

It should look like this when you're ready:

#        # Skip devices that are part of a dmraid device
#        if type dmraid >/dev/null 2>&1 && \
#           dmraid -r -c >/dev/null 2>&1; then
#            if part_of_sataraid $device && \
#               [ -f /var/lib/disk-detect/activate_dmraid ]; then
#                continue
#            fi
#        fi

Now just save the file. Start the installation and your hard drive should be found. This worked for me at least. Of course you shouldn't do this if your hard drive actually is a part of a dmraid. In my case my hard drive was tagged as part of a dmraid falsely.

I'm actually a bit disappointed at Ubuntu 9.10 compared to Ubuntu 9.04. Ubuntu 9.10 doesn't boot sometimes, just hangs in the boot process and doesn't write any information about why. And it doesn't boot faster then Ubuntu 9.04, or at least it doesn't feel as it boots faster. However if it's working as it should (compatible hardware is used) it's very good. The sound configuration manager isn't even comparable with the old one, it's much better. Everything looks a bit nicer and it's very stable.

Use this solution (as all solutions I publish here) at your own risk. If you have critical data I wouldn't recommend you to try this solution without taking a backup.

Hi

Hi. I just mention what the blog will be about here. I have thought for a while about writing down solutions to diffrent computer related problems, just so I remember how I did next time the problem occurs. Example of problems: Ubuntu can't find my harddrive; PHP isn't working; FFMPEG can't convert 3gp to flv; C is mean to me; Java do not obey my instructions and so on.

In short I will write about my solutions to diffrent technical problems, just to document the solutions.

BTW, English isn't my native language, just so you know, if you haven't noticed yet :)