I know that it’s been about three weeks since Hardy Heron was released, but my delayed writing of this review was intentional to a certain extent.  Although I was busy with finals and solar car team stuff, I still use Ubuntu for my day-to-day operations.  I have taken this long so that the developers have the opportunity to iron out more bugs before it makes a real impression on me.

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I’m now back in Sugar Land, TX, and I will be back for only the weekend.  Afterwards, I’m returning to UT to work with the solar car team.  Many people tell me, “Wow, that sucks!” but I think quite the contrary.  I am passionate about getting this car built; and even though I haven’t done much in the way of design, I have devoted at least a hundred hours this semester to working with logistics, documentation, IT, and outreach while maintaining my school-social balance.  As far as this weekend is concerned, I suspect the schedule looks something like this, with studying and more solar car team stuff wherever I can fit it:

Saturday:

• Calculate the tab with my parents
• Teach little brother how to blow the dust out of his laptop
• Remove gunk from my littlest brother’s computer
• Do FAFSA forms in front of my parents

Sunday:Celebrate Dad’s birthday

Monday:Day of fun with two very close friends while returning to Austin.

Cleaning up my little brothers’ computers reminds me of why I love Linux so much.  In Windows, we are constantly bombarded with pop-ups from the diverse range of software installed asking you to update or to deliver some message/ad.  Also, it continues to baffle me as to how a limited user should be allowed to make global changes to a computer.  Microsoft, there is a reason why I would want to place a user on a “limited” account — it’s because I don’t want them installing programs willy-nilly.

For all you fun-loving folks out there, I will have fun… I promise.  I will have fun in the pursuit of my passions.  That road trip to Calgary, AB, Canada IS going to happen!

About a month ago, I put in my $10 for some Ubuntu case badges from the Massachusetts LoCo (reference). They arrived yesterday, and I immediately replaced my Windows Vista sticker with it:

The SCO case was one of the things that troubled my first months on Linux bliss.  As I remembered it, the lawsuit alleged that the Linux kernel contained portions of Unix.  SCO then went on a RIAA-like crusade of suing companies and users to obtain license fees.  What amazed me was that SCO continued court proceedings even after auditors found no evidence of infringing code.  Add to the fact that they were suing bigwigs such as IBM and Novell, and you have what equates to a company with a death wish.

On Friday, August 10, 2007, this death wish came true as Judge Dale Kimball ruled that the rights to Unix belongs to Novell, not SCO (reference).  On Monday, the stock proceeded to lose more than 2/3 of its value.  A closer examination of the stock’s historical prices yielded an even more disturbing revelation: If one were to have bought the stock back in 2000 and still has it now, he/she would have lost 99% of what they invested.

In any case, this post is dedicated to Judge Dale Kimball for his judgment that allows Linux users like me to use and explore Linux in peace.  As a parody to the motivational posters, here is a little something I whipped up to commemorate this event:

As of Ubuntu 7.04 (Feisty Fawn), the distribution featured something known as “Restricted Drivers Manager” to appease open-source purists who basically believe that anything closed-source is bad.  I believe that this could not be further from the truth.  I believe that being open means:

• Creating a better alternative for cheaper
• Presenting all the choices to the end-user
• Being willing to meet other vendors halfway
• Enabling the end-user to pick and choose a solution that would work for him/her.

From making mistakes installing the nVidia graphics card drivers on my computer numerous times, I have finally learned the magic sequence to do things without ever touching the Restricted Drivers Manager.  I call it the 10-Step Program to 3D Acceleration:

1. Install OS
2. Update.  If there is no kernel update, skip to Step 6
3. Reboot (into the new kernel, obviously)
4. Uninstall everything that has to do with the old kernel, install build-essential
   
5. Reboot
6. Install graphics drivers and configure accordingly
7. Reboot
8. Test 3D acceleration
9. Install programs
10. Restore files (if any)

The Restricted Drivers Manager will tempt you to click on it twice, but ignore it like an itch and it will go away.

My spring break consisted of formatting all the computers in my house and reinstalling Windows XP. We also added a new server for printing. The print server runs Ubuntu Linux 6.10 and was capable of sharing the printer through Samba or CUPS (i.e. a HTTP address). I am writing this to share with you the frustration of trying to find that file that contains the driver. Instead, I was forced to install the entire suite of software HP wants me to install. Even then, I was unable to change the port to a network port. What happened to the old days?

I remember the days when installing a printer involved the process of plugging it in, putting in a CD, and going through Windows’ “Add New Printer” wizard. and selecting the .ini file. The printer proceeds to just work. If this printer were to be on the network, I would do the procedures again on each client with insignificant adaptations to the procedure.

I continue to wish for those days because it gives me the control I need to get a job done right in the most efficient and economical fashion possible. In the course of making things easier and more “idiot-proof,” I believe that the manufacturers actually complicated the process and introduced more points where things could go wrong. Perhaps this happens only because I am using an all-in-one printer and that I should separate printer and scanner again. Nevertheless, I believe that consumers should have control should they desire it. I, for one, am not willing to buy a $300 printer for the sake of its networking capabilities; and I am sure that some cannot justify buying one printer for each computer. Indeed, I see it as uneconomical and harmful to the environment.

Introduction
Although about four months earlier than I intended, I got a new computer because my parents wanted another computer in the house. When selecting the computer, I was open to other options (Apple, Lenovo/IBM, Toshiba, and HP), but it turns out that Dell offered the best specs for the money. As a matter of fact, I had to give up my dream of owning an Apple because a similarly-customized computer would have cost an additional $1,000 (even after educational discount). After spending a day backing up information and restoring my little brothers’ computers, I got to spend some quality time with my computer. Obviously, the first thing I did was to completely wipe the drive and install my Windows XP Professional and Ubuntu Linux 6.10 (Edgy Eft) combination. While the Dell Inspiron e1505 looks deceptively similar to the Dell Inspiron 6000 (we’ll call it “the i6k” from now on), there were certainly many changes under the hood. In addition to discussing the differences in build, I will also discuss a few hurdles Linux users may encounter.

Specifications

• Intel Core 2 Duo T5600 (1.83 GHz)
• 2 GB DDR2 RAM @ 667 MHz
• 80 GB HDD @ 5400 RPM
• Intel PRO/Wireless 3945 abg
• nVidia GeForce Go 7300 w/ 256 MB DDR
• WSXGA+ (1650×1080) display with TrueLife
• 9-cell battery

Total cost (including taxes and shipping): $1,500.34

Overall observations

In the three days I have used this computer, the e1505 was an improvement with respect to quality over the i6k. For starters, the speakers sounded better. Even with the loudest music, the threshold at which the speakers clip and emit a metallic sound was significantly higher. Although the TrueLife display option was advertised to improve viewing of movies and photos, I highly recommend opting for it because the improved contrast ratio makes reading text easier, especially for those who also want a higher-resolution screen. Finally, the i6k was known for being cool on one side but quite hot on another. The left leg now gets some heated love from the computer. Unfortunately, the consistency in heat dissipation did not reduce the temperature on the right side, but that may be because of the newer processor.

Working with Linux

After installing off the Live CD, I proceeded to boot into Ubuntu to install more programs. As it was starting up, it would stop working halfway. I pressed Ctrl+Alt+F1 to turn off the splash image and then Ctrl+Alt+F8 to go to the console with diagnostic messages. I initially blamed it on fsck (file system check), and reinstalled with several different partition configurations. However, what I did not remember was that Ubuntu does not use NetworkManager and still relies on a relatively primitive method of establishing communications. Indeed, the /etc/network/interfaces file looked like this:

auto lo
iface lo inet loopback

auto eth0
iface eth0 inet dhcp

auto eth1
iface eth1 inet dhcp

auto eth2
iface eth2 inet dhcp

auto ath0
iface ath0 inet dhcp

auto wlan0
iface wlan0 inet dhcp

I proceeded to install network-manager-gnome and its dependencies and edited /etc/network/interfaces such that everything but the first two lines were commented out (you can comment out a line in a configuration file by adding a ‘#’). This solved my problems.

If I had to name the most unpleasant experience during my three years of running Linux, it would have to be running an ATi graphics card. Although I learned how to cope and perform the procedures necessary to install the driver and compile the driver, it was not reliable enough for XGL and did not even support AIGLX. By acquiring the e1505, I was able to see first-hand that nVidia’s drivers are leaps and bounds ahead of ATi. Not only was I able to use AIGLX, but I was able to change my screen configuration on-the-fly without restarting X.

Conclusion
Through the process of initiating the e1505 into my family’s fleet of computers, I have learned that Ubuntu hangups at startup were not caused by fsck. Rather, the networking script was trying to obtain IP addresses for all the interfaces (including a few non-existent ones). A relatively trivial change in /etc/network/interfaces and the installation of network-manager-gnome and its dependencies solved this. Additionally, nVidia continues to gain favor in the Linux community with their user-friendly graphics drivers that far surpasses ATi’s offerings. Although I wiped off the MediaDirect partition, I will work on restoring it during my next round of reinstalling Windows.