Updates

Over the last couple of days there have been updates to all of my Linux systems. All the updates have included new kernels. No doubt this was due to the recent discovery of a few security holes in the older versions.

Doing similar updates on different distros allowed me to compare how they are handled. I have 3 systems I use regularly and all received updates. I still run Feisty on my laptop, no special reason but it works and I haven’t bothered to change it. It requires a little customisation to the Grub menu to run correctly eg. acpi must be forced to load. Every time the kernel is updated I must redo the changes.

My main machine triple boots Fedora ( my main system), Ubuntu Gutsy (to play with KDE4) and XP (because I occasionally need it). Fedora is on a separate  hard drive and XP and Gutsy share the other drive. Although Gutsy recognises XP it refuses to acknowledge the other drive exists and won’t include Fedora in any Grub menu it creates. I have to edit menu.lst and do a grub-install to be able to get to my main system. Fortunately I keep a copy of Fedora’s menu.lst on an XP drive and just copy and paste.

So where is this little rave going? Well Fedora needed to be updated too and it created a new Grub menu but it kept all the changes I had made to the existing one. Why can’t Ubuntu do that? It would make life so much easier.

Enabling Desktop Effects

Here are some notes on enabling and using Compiz Fusion to add desktop effects in Linux, more specifically Fedora although most comments will apply to other Linux distros.

Why would you want too?

It goes without saying that desktop effects have a real wow factor. When you first start using them you may find yourself just playing, sorry experimenting, just for the fun of it. However if you need a further reason see this Lifehacker article on the efficiency gains you can achieve. You may even make up for the time you spend “experimenting”.

Some Useful Information

For some interesting details on installation and operation of Compiz Fusion on Fedora 8 including keyboard shortcuts to make the best use of your new features see here. The same page has links to HowTos for other distros including Ubuntu. However don’t install the packages listed there. They are from the Fedora repositories and have some problems and some features are missing. The Fedora forums have a link to updated packages which don’t have those problems.

Update: One of the problems referred to above seems quite common. That is the titlebar disappears after enabling effects. The updated packages solve this problem.

A search on Google for your distro and Compiz will probably turn up many more pages. However view quite a few to make sure you are getting the right information. Initially I was under the impression that my low end video card wouldn’t work. I have an ATI Radeon 9250 which was recognised by Fedora and uses the radeon driver. Following the above links I was able to get it working in KDE and Fedora 8. No doubt it would work on other distros and with Gnome.

Starting Fusion Icon on Reboot

Actually this will work for any application you want to start automatically when your system starts.

Fusion Icon starts Compiz as well as putting an icon in the System Tray that has options for changing the Window Manager, setting Emerald and Compiz options. Once you have it set up you will want it to start each time you log in. In Gnome this can be done in the Sessions Manager. Type fusion-icon as the application to start.

In KDE open Konqueror and select Go from the menu bar. Go to Autostart, this puts you in your Autostart folder. Anything in here will be run when KDE starts. Right click in any blank area and select “Create New” – “Link to Application”. Under the Application tab enter fusion-icon in the “command” field. When you leave that screen a new entry will appear. Restart to make sure everything is working.

Raw in a Nutshell

Explaining the difference between Raw and jpg is difficult sometimes even when dealing with experienced photographers.  Here is a link to a primer, it talks about Google’s Picasa but the sections on Raw are applicable everywhere. I agree with the conclusions drawn at the end too. What do you think?