Enabling Java applets in Firefox on Ubuntu

First problem I've encountered with Ubuntu was trying to use Facebook's photo uploader from Firefox. It all started out well: I went to the the page and was told I needed to install Java, and Ubuntu presented me with a list.

Here is where I made my first mistake, I installed the first one on the list, which wasn't Sun's JRE. I can't remember the name of the one I installed, but after sitting through the installation I got back to Facebook and had a dialog pop up saying the GNU classpath had not been set, or something along those lines anyway.

So I went to verify my Java plugin, and got a message saying I wasn't running the latest version, and provided links to download the latest. Not really knowing what an RPM was, I chose the "Linux (self extracting file)" option, and consulted the instructions.

Second problem came now. The first instruction was to SU to root, which required a password, and I'm pretty sure I never set a root password when I installed.

But no problem, I just chose System - Administration - Users and Groups from the top menu in Ubuntu, selected the root user and assigned a password. I then carried on following Sun's instructions to install Java, which were simple enough.

Then came the section Enable and Configure, in which I had to tell Firefox to use this new JRE for applets.

Neat little tip that I didn't know about in Firefox is that if you type about:plugins in the address bar you're given a list of the installed plugins, which I was able to use to remove the old plugin that didn't work.

The plugins are just symbolic links in the firefox/plugins directory, so enabling one plugin means creating a new link in there, and removing the other effectively uninstalls the old one.

Job done, Facebook's photo uploader (and I assume other Java applets) now works properly.

Using Ubuntu

I must say I do like all the nice animations and flourishes that Ubuntu gives to all the windows. They seem to float, fade and snap to position a lot smoother than I've seen on Windows. I particularly like how they seem to stretch and flop into place when you maximise to full screen.

I've not had many problems either. Today I've been doing a lot of admin stuff setting myself up to start contracting in a couple of weeks: just the usual sstuff of writing letters, sending emails, copying files to my USB stick, editing images; and I've been fine.

Makes me think back to reading a comment on this Digg article, which said:

I'll use Open Office when it stops looking and running like Word 97

But he's being overly harsh. I've only used the word processor for a couple of letters and was quite pleased with the whole experience. It lets you write documents, checks spelling as you type, auto corrects typos, format text and the like: what more can you need?

How many features of Office do you actually use day-to-day? Do you really need to fork out 200+ quid to have those when you can do most things using free software?

Only thing I will say though, is that the title bar of windows I have maximised occasionally disappears when I hover over it. I'm not sure if this is a feature though, to stop you clicking the bar when you mean to click the menu along the top. But it's a minor annoyance at best, and I've enjoyed the experience so far.

Installing Ubuntu

So I've decided to take the plunge and dual boot my desktop PC with XP and Ubuntu. I've played around with the LiveCD version for about an hour, so I know what to expect.

I'm following these instructions, but I needn't have bothered as the setup wizard is pretty self explanatory. The only thing I needed to double (and triple check) was the disk drive I'm installing to.

I have 2 physical hard drives, one with Windows (C:) and one that I just used for data (D:). Preparing for installing Ubuntu I copied everything I needed from D: to an external drive. But knowing that the C: and D: names were Windows specific I checked in the LiveCD environment what names Ubuntu gives the drives.

The installer's currently at 70% as I write this on my laptop, so I hope that my D: drive really was called /media/sdb1, or else I've just buggered my machine...

It should be fine though... I think.... C: was the master drive, and D: the slave, so it made sense that I would have an sda1 and an sdb1. I hope anyway.

82% now, currently Configuring apt, whatever that means.

88%, Importing documents and settings... strange, as I told the wizard I didn't want to do that...

94%, Configuring hardware... I guess if it's all going to fall over in a heap then it'll probably do it now...

Done. Although I'm sure it said it was removing something before that window popped up. Not sure what. Restart now, I guess now I find out if I've screwed up...

Well I've got a boot menu at least, 3 different instances of Ubuntu (generic, recovery, and memtest86+) and Windows XP! Cool, I'll boot back to Windows to make sure I've not messed up. Yay! Still there, and I can no longer see my D: drive, which is as expected if the partition table has changed.

Now for the proper test, will it boot to Ubuntu?

Well it's asking for a username, and the display looks a hell of a lot better than in LiveCD mode. Very quick to get to this stage too.

Apparently I need to enable some "restricted drivers", as my graphics card needs a driver from Nvidia, which isn't "free software" as the Ubuntu people can't look at the source code. That driver's downloading now. And it installed itself too, that was easy enough. But I need to restart. Ok, restart.

That was very quick there, although I guess all operating systems are when they're first installed.

Right, so what're these software updates it's telling me about? Apparently there are 196 updates to apply, a total of 245.4MB. Might kick that off tomorrow. Oh, neat little window animation there when I closed it.

So, right: looks like that's installed then. Easy enough, if a bit nail biting at times. Only took about half an hour as well. Although I'm not sure about that brown swirl of a desktop background, have to get rid of that. I'll have a play and see how I get on.

Vista vs Linux

Neil's commented on seeing a Vista Vs Linux video on YouTube. Check it out:



Direct Link Here

Ubuntu - First Impressions

I downloaded the latest ISO image of Ubuntu a few days ago, and tonight I finally got around to burning it to a CD so I could actually use it.

For those of you that don't know, Ubuntu is a Linux distribution focusing on usability. I guess the aim is to tempt people across from their Windows PCs by giving them something that's as simple to use but free and more secure.

Anyway, my limited Linux exposure was about 6 or 7 years ago with Red Hat and SUSE, and although they were relatively easy to get to grips with I didn't think they were ready for the masses.

Fast forward a few years to Ubuntu, and you get an OS that you don't even need to install if you only want to try it out. With LiveCD you just run the entire thing from CD so you can try before you commit to installing it. Old news to some people I know, but the whole "try before you buy" thing is certainly impressive when you're talking about something as complex as an operating system.

So that's what I've been doing tonight, playing with the LiveCD version to see what it's like. I'm impressed enough to want to install it put it that way. I've got a second hard drive and intend to dual boot Ubuntu and XP, the documentation looks pretty straightforward, but I'll write more when the time comes.