New default artwork for Debian “Squeeze”

In Debian Project News – November 22nd, 2010 Artwork for Debian Squeeze has been revealed, and i think its a pretty good choice!

Check out Space Fun!

Tuxicity

Sid or Sidux?

Having a look at Sidux 2008-04;

Sidux is based on the unstable branche of Debian, better known as Sid.
I decided to give it a go and see if its a good idea to use Sidux in stead of Sid.

I decided to try the kde-lite-amd64 live iso.
The boot up of the cd was remarkebly fast (compared to Ubuntu) and ended up with a good looking KDE 3.5.9 but unfortunately without a wirelss connection, so I opened the Sidux handbook available in the menu, and selected Internet and Networking, and chose Getting online > Ceni.
Ceni is a text based tool for wireless that asked me a few questions and before I knew it I was online with my wireless, the kernel on the live cd is 2.6.28, and the needed ath5k module was available, nice!

Time to run the installer, I had a partition available for / (root) and decided to hook up my /home partition for my /home/tuxicity.
The installer was easy to use, I chose to format / and leave /home as is, and continued with the installer.
Unfortunately the installer will not let you use a user name thats already set up on your /home so I had to make up a new name, I was not very happy with this “feature”. Also the installer does not tell you after setting up your partitions which ones are going to be formatted and which ones are going to be hooked up.
I had my fingers crossed when the installer started to do its automated thing, but everything went fine and my /home remained in tact 🙂 . The installation was quick and after reboot I went into my fresh KDE environment, looking the same as on the live cd, including the still working wifi!! The wifi setup was transported to my hd , very good!!
I did a apt-get update and apt-get install kde to install the rest of KDE and was ready to go in no time.
Sidux is great for people who prefer KDE3.5* over KDE4, its all Debian and runs like a charm.

I also installed Gnome (apt-get install gnome) and set up the GNOME Display Manager known as GDM(dpkg-reconfigure gdm).

Gnome looks pretty much like the Gnome used on Debian, and runs fine, but a Gnome2.20 with some 2.22 parts is a bit old, and as a Gnome user, too old for me.

After installing Xfce 4 Desktop Environment version 4.4.2 (apt-get install xfce4) I logged into a standard Debian Xfce4 environment, all works fine.

Conclusion:

Sidux is a great Debian system, KDE3.5* centric, easy to install and to configure and includes the (now) latest kernel (2.6.28).
The Sidux tools seem to work very nicely; wireless was a breeze.
The feel of Sidux is fast and snappy, and it looks nice, specially with KDE.
Sidux is not really for the Gnome people,  the version is a bit outdated. (This will probably change when the next version of Debian aka Lenny becomes stable).
XFCE4 also runs fine, no news or novelties, like Gnome its all “Debian “. (XFCE4 will also be more updated as soon as Lenny comes out).
If you would like to use Debian Sid, I would go for Sidux; Sidux keeps running when there might be breakage in Sid, it has a more recent kernel and is easyer to maintain and set up.

Tuxicity.

gstreamer0.10-ffmpeg-full Does Not Work properly in Sid.

A minor issue with Totem and playing .avi files in Debian sid:

After todays updates I could no longer play .avi files (Green screen) for some reason. gstreamer0.10-ffmpeg-full of the Debian Multimedia repository no longer works.

Solution was to use gstreamer0.10-ffmpeg of the Debian Main Repository.

Debian-Multimedia’s gstreamer0.10-ffmpeg-full claims:

“This package contains all the encoders disabled in the official Debian package.

I assume the current glitch will be fixed soon.

Tuxicity.

Howto: Install NVIDIA manually in Ubuntu and Debian

Since some prefer to install the NVIDIA driver manually here s how its done in Ubuntu and Debian.

First get the needed packages (Assuming you have the needed repositories) as root or sudo:

apt-get install build-essential linux-headers-`uname -r`

————————————————–For Ubuntu users only—————————————————-

Purge nvidia-glx-new if it is installed:

sudo apt-get remove nvidia-glx-new –purge

Adjust your linux-restricted-modules-common file:

sudo nano -w /etc/default/linux-restricted-modules-common

change

DISABLED_MODULES=””

in

DISABLED_MODULES=”nv nvidia_new”

In stead of using nano you can also use another editor of course.

——————————-End for Ubuntu users only———————–

Now download your NVIDIA Driver from here or, if you want an older one, go here (links may change in the future)

Now you have to drop into a terminal with the command ctrl-alt-f1

Log in as user and become root or use sudo and key in

killall gdm

or

killall kdm

to kill your X session.

Now you can install your NVIDIA driver with the command as root (Ubuntu users use sudo)

sh /path/to/NVIDIA-Linux-x86-whateverversion.run

When the installer asks if it should edit your xorg.conf choose yes (make sure you have your xorg.conf backed up!!)

After installation key in as root (sudo for ubuntu users)

gdm

or

kdm.

You should now get back into your login screen. (If not try a reboot and otherwise you are pickled)

If you are not sure what this all means its better not to try any of this.
Ubuntu does not support this in any way shape or form.

Tuxicity.

Transmission 1.21 and GIMP 2.4.6 Have Arrived in Sid

Todays updates in Debian Sid provided me with the latest stable version of Transmission and Gimp.

Transmission is the BitTorrent client I use; its light, fast and easy to use. Gimp has proven itself and needs no further comment.

Tuxicity.

DeVeDe and Dependencies

I use DeVeDe to create my dvd’s, its easy to use and does what I want it to do.

I use the Debian-Multimedia Sid repository to get it and have no complaints.

What baffles me however is the fact that mkisofs, and in todays update, imagemagick are not included in the dependencies.

DeVeDe reports it needs these programs to be able to work.

Tuxicity.

Gstreamer, Movies and Debian Sid Part 2

Streaming Audio did no longer work on some stations in Rhythmbox so I had to reverse a change I did in my previous post.

apt-get install gstreamer0.10-plugins-bad fixed the issue , gstreamer0.10-plugins-really-bad  was automatically removed, and issue is fixed.

Tuxicity.

Gstreamer, Movies and Debian Sid

To play movies I use Totem, (Movie Player in the Gnome menu) but for some reason I could not play the .avi files and .asf files anymore.

Totem is no longer able to play those files after my last (todays) update.

So I decided to try the gstreamer plugins from Debian-Multimedia,  unstable (Sid) repository.

I installed the packages gstreamer0.10-ffmpeg-full and gstreamer0.10-plugins-really-bad.

Installing the packages auto-removed the packages i originally used from the Debian repository being gstreamer0.10-ffmpeg and gstreamer0.10-plugins-bad.

Movies play fine again now.

Tuxicity

My Teacher is Making a Switch

Yesterday I visited an old friend of mine, hadn’t seen him in years.

He (R) tought me the basics of computing back in the 90ties on a PC running MS-DOS, and later Windows 3.11 and Windows 95.

R actually inspired me to buy a PC and and, with his guidance, I learned how to use it.

Until 2001 I used Microsoft software, the last OS I used was Win2k , in my opinion, relatively, the best product they ever made.

In 2001 I switched to RedHat 7.1 and, after some distrohopping, now I use Debian, dual booting with Windows XP. (XP is mostly for my son who likes to play games)

My old friend stuck to Microsoft.

Yesterday he told me he was switching to Ubuntu, I responded how much I liked Debian and stopped using Ubuntu a while ago.

He asked if Ubuntu was a good Distribution for beginners, and suddenly I realized he was the beginner now, planning a switch I made 7 years ago, and told him it is a good distro for beginners indeed.

Its good to visit an old friend off an on :-).

Tuxicity.

Proprietary NVIDIA Driver Fails to Install on Linux 2.6.25 Kernels

I Decided to compile a 2.6.25 kernel form source to use on my Debian Box.
Why? Because I can.

Interestingly the installation of the proprietary NVIDIA graphics driver Failed!

After some Research I found some information on nvnews.net.

So if you do a manual install of a  proprietary NVIDIA graphics driver on a Linux 2.6.25 kernel, make sure to read it!

The patch worked Flawlessly

Tuxicity.