Tag Archives: Ubuntu
Create a Linux Tablet Distribution
A Linux Distribution with tablet solely in mind is missing, there have been a couple of recent attempts such as Enlightenments Tablet Spin and Meego’s Tablet UX which is still being worked on for the recent version 1.2. So instead of waiting around and letting your tablet PC collect dust, how about you create one yourself following a few simple steps. So lets begin shall we? For this tutorial I’m going to be using my Viewpad 10 as my Tablet of choice as well as using Ubuntu 11.04 as a base for my custom Linux Tablet Operating System. I am also assuming that your hardware is compatible with Linux.
What you’ll need:
- A Tablet
- A Linux Distribution
- USB Ports
- 1GB or Larger USB Stick
- USB Keyboard
- Wireless Internet Connection
Install Linux on your Tablet:
I’m not going to go into too much detail into this, all I’m going to say in this step is if you don’t know how to already create a bootable USB stick check my previous blog post out to see all the popular available applications which will create a bootable Linux Live USB Stick. Once you’ve got a bootable USB stick plug it into your Tablet and select your USB stick in the BIOS in order to boot from the USB stick. Once the USB stick has booted go to your Linux Distribution’s of choice installer. From here follow the steps which are displayed on the screen. Once all the steps have been completed restart your device and make sure you have switched back to booting from your primary hard drive.
Installing Gnome-Shell
Gnome-Shell is a fantastic interface for tablet users such as you and I. It supports finger scrolling through the Applications menu and many more Touch Friendly features. If you’ve chosen Fedora 15 as your Tablet OS base then you’re luckily to have it pre-installed as the default interface. If your Linux Distribution of choice has it included in it’s repository then you can install gnome-shell package just like you would with any other package (Ubuntu 11.10 users can use “sudo apt-get install gnome-shell” to install it.
If you are a Ubuntu 11.04 user like myself then you will have to add the Gnome3-Team PPA. To add the Gnome3-Team Personal Package Archive make sure you’re connected to the internet and then open up your terminal (This is where the USB Keyboard comes in handy) and enter these following commands:
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:gnome3-team/gnome3
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get dist-upgrade
sudo apt-get gnome-shell
Log out in order to return to the GDM then select the Gnome-Shell session (The name varies it might be labelled as “Gnome-Shell” “GNOME” but just keep trying each option if you are unsure which one to pick and you’ll probably find it eventually.)
If you find that you are coming across some strange theming issues when using Gnome-Shell in Ubuntu 11.04 then just enter in these two commands:
sudo apt-get remove gnome-accessibility-themes
sudo apt-get install gnome-themes-standard
Then reboot! (Thanks to this useful thread at the ubuntuforums)
If the problem still occurs you might need to manually select the default Gnome-Shell theme, Adwaita, you can do this by useful gnome-tweak-tool which can be installed by using this command:
sudo apt-get install gnome-tweak tool
To run gnome-tweak-tool simply open up the ALT+F2 run command box and type in “gnome-tweak-tool” once the application appears click on “Interface” on the left hand-side menu in the application. From here select the first drop-down box labelled “Gtk+ Theme” make sure “Adwaita” is selected, same goes for the “Cursor Theme” drop-down box. That should fix any theme issues.
FIX: Downgrade GDM (Ubuntu 11.04 users only)
For some strange reason version 3.0.2 of the GNOME Display Manager refuses to Automatically login, this function is vital for tablet users since we don’t have a physical keyboard so we won’t be able to enter in our password every time we log into the operating system. Luckily the previous version of GDM (Version 2.3.2 can be used instead) to downgrade the GDM we need to go into “Synaptic” from here search for GDM in the search bar. Once you have found the package select it and then go to the “Package” tab then go down to the “Force Version…” option, make sure you select 2.3.2 of GDM then lock that version using the option on the “Package” tab. Once you’ve done all that click the big “Apply” button in Synaptic package manager and close it down. This should allow you to automatically log into Gnome-Shell.
(Thanks to this post)
Installing Useful Applications
There are some very useful applications to install on any Linux operated tablet devices, for example in order to enter text into your device you will be needing a on screen keyboard (They are also called Virtual Keyboards) Linux doesn’t have a wide range but I have found “Florence” to be a very useful virtual keyboard since it has features such as Auto-Hide, Transparency, custom colours, etc. Unfortunately when I tried using it in Fedora 15 it refused to work. Luckily, a group of developers have been packaging Meego’s keyboard, Maliit for Fedora! Follow this link in order to try out Maliit for yourself on Fedora.
This next application isn’t a tablet-specific program but is very useful for any gnome-shell user. If you missed the suggest previously in this tutorial then you should install gnome-tweak-tool it allows you to do some useful tweaks in gnome-shell from one click, such as allowing desktop icons, showing the day of the week in the clock, showing the Close, Minimize and Maximize icons and so much more.
If you are a Mozilla Firefox user then make sure to check out the Grab and Drag add-on. This will allow you to scroll through webpages by using your finger, if you are a Google Chrome user then check out ChromeTouch which does a similar job in Chrome.
Tablet Tweaks
In order to get an even more better experience using Linux on a tablet you can do some tweaking with the interface. For example, one useful tablet tweak is to enable holding down your finger to right click. To do this in Gnome-Shell simply click on the “Accessibility” indicator then select the bottom option labelled as “Universal Access Settings” from here, select the last tab in the application window “Pointing and Clicking” and switch the second button to “ON” which has the title “Simulated Secondary Click” make sure to set the acceptance delay to “Short”.
Note: If it doesn’t work straight away restart!
So I hope this guide has come in useful and has given your tablet device a new life as a fully fledged Linux-operated tablet! If you have found a useful tip or a program useful on a tablet then make sure to share your suggestion with everyone in the comment box below!
Have fun!!
Which Linux Distributions work on the Viewpad 10?
Does your touchscreen only work with two fingers pressed down? Or does it not work at all? Don’t worry! There is plenty of solutions! The problem is that you are using a Linux Distribution with an old version of the Linux Kernel. A couple of months back, I made a tutorial on how to get the Viewpad 10 touch screen working on Ubuntu 10.10 Maverick Meerkat. This involved downloading the ENAC Multi-touch drivers from their Git repository. Well in the recent version of the Linux Kernel (2.6.38) the ENAC Multi-touch drivers are included this means that your touch screen will function correctly straight out of the box!
Some Linux Distributions currently already running on version 2.6.38 of the Linux Kernel, here is a quick list of the Distributions that do:
- Ubuntu 11.04
- Fedora 15 Beta
- Fuduntu 14.9 (After running an update)
If you are a Ubuntu user but don’t want to make the leap to Ubuntu 11.04 just yet and are running on Ubuntu Lucid Lynx or Maverick Meerkat still you can grab the version 2.6.38 of the Linux Kernel from a PPA repository, this also includes Linux Mint users, Bodhi Linux users, Peppermint OS users and anyone else who is running off of a Ubuntu derivative. To install Linux Kernel 2.6.28 simply enter these couple of commands into your terminal:
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:kernel-ppa/ppasudo apt-get updatesudo apt-get install linux-headers-2.6.38-1-generic linux-image-2.6.38-1-generic
After that, simply reboot your Viewpad 10 and you should have a working Touchscreen! If you want to double check to see if the Kernel installation worked correctly, then simply reopen your terminal and enter this command:
uname -a
Also, Viewpad 10 users who are a fan of Android you will be glad to know that Viewsonic have updated the Viewpad 10’s Android image to a more recent version of Android, 2.2 (Froyo) you can grab the download link from their site.
So hopefully you’ve got a bit of an insight on what is required for getting Linux to running correctly on the Viewpad. I can’t wait to get writing my next tutorial since it will be all to do with getting Meego running smoothly on your Viewpad 10.
But for now, go have a play with the Linux Distributions I have suggested on your Viewpad 10, make sure to comment below if you’ve found some great Tablet-Specific apps, Florence and Onboard are great Virtual Keyboards (Hint hint). 
Ubuntu 10.10 & Viewpad 10
Hello Everyone, this is a short guide on how to get things up and running once you’ve installed Ubuntu 10.10 (Maverick Meerkat) on your Viewsonic Viewpad 10. The main issue with Ubuntu 10.10 or with many other different Linux Distributions is that the touch screen has a few issues. Before I begin I’d just like to thank @Jev42 for guiding me to this website which contains all the information about the Viewpad 10’s touch screen.
Requirements
Requirements for this tutorial:
Overview
So once you’ve installed Ubuntu 10.10 onto your Viewpad 10 you’ will notice that the touch screen doesn’t function like it should, instead it requires two fingers to be pressed in order to interact with anything on the screen which is very unusable doing everyday activities, I believe this is occurring because of Ubuntu not detecting the Hanvon 10.1 multi-touch screen correctly.
Getting Started
Lets get started with fixing this issue, first of all press the System tab then go to Administration then select Synaptics Package Manager.
Once Synaptics has loaded up you will need to install a few packages. Firstly search for “build-essential” in the search bar at the top right of the window. Right click on the “build-essential” package and then select Mark for Installation on the right click menu.
Next search for a package in the search bar named “git” then it’s a matter of marking it for installation like you did with the previous “build-essential” package.
Once you have selected both packages for installation it is a matter of pressing Apply and following all the steps until both of the packages have been installed. Once you have installed the packages close down Synaptics and then click on the Applications tab on the top left of your screen then go into Accessories and open up the Terminal.
For now leave the Terminal window open in the background since you will need to prepare an empty folder somewhere in your system. It’s a good choice to create a new folder in the Home directory. You can get to here by clicking on the Places tab at the top of your screen then clicking on the Home Folder option. Then simply right click in the home folder and select Create Folder make sure to give it a short and easily to remember name, I’ve called my folder “Hanvon”.
Terminal Time
Now that you have created your new folder go back into the Terminal Window and change your directory to the new folder by using this command:
cd <insert your directory here>
So for me, for example, I needed to type in this:
cd /home/ojdon/hanvon/
Press enter to change to the directory, next step is to copy this command:
git clone git://git.lii-enac.fr/linux-input/enac-drivers
Let that run then change to the enac-drivers directory by typing in the following command:
cd enac-drivers
Once you’ve changed to the correct directory it’s just a matter of typing in this command:
git checkout ubuntu-10.10
Now it’s time for compiling the drivers into the Linux Kernel, a simple make command will compile the drivers, you just need to type:
make
Then install the drivers by using this command:
sudo make install
Then enter in your password and press enter, then you will be asked if you want to install everything, just press “y” on your keyboard and you are away! Once you’ve finished your touch screen should be working as usual.
Further tweaks
I’m planning on making a separate blog post on how to tweak Ubuntu to make it more tablet friendly but for now here is a very useful tweak. In order to get a right click function like in Windows XP: Tablet Edition or in Windows 7 (Holding down your finger for a few seconds) is actually very easy to do. You simply press the System tab then select Preferences then go to Assistive Technologies from here you need to press on the Mouse Accessibility button then check the Trigger secondary click by holding down the primary button. This should activate right clicking by holding down your finger on the touch screen.
Special Thanks
So that’s it, pretty simply in the end. I’d just like to thank @jev42 for introducing me to the ENAC website. I think I’m going to have a play around with Ubuntu see if I can create a more tablet-friendly interface then try and fix the touch screen issues in Fedora and Meego since they’re a bit different to fix compared to Ubuntu.
Me and my Eee – Ubuntu 10.4 Review
So like I said at the end of the last “Me and my Eee” article, I was going to take a look at the second version of Ubuntu 10.4, yes I know it’s just a week and a bit to go until the final build is released but I thought I’d give all you readers a insight into the 10.4 version a few days before the final is out so you can determine if it’s worth downloading or not, so you don’t have to waste your bandwidth and most importantly your time. Anyway, onto the review!
My Experience
So I put the beta 2 image of Ubuntu 10.4 onto my usb via Ubootnetin and then booted the Live CD/USB from my Netbook. Now, it’s been a while since I last tried the last release of Ubuntu but this new version definitely is a lot quicker booting off the USB than the 9.10 version.
Once you’re loading up Ubuntu 10.4 you will be greeted by a nice smooth looking purple splash screen, this only takes about a minute or so when running of my cheap USB. Once you reach the desktop you would notice that the 10.4 release has got a brand new dark theme compared to the bland grey theme in the previous versions. You will also noticed that they have gone with a “Mac-like” layout for the windows, but don’t worry you can always select many of the previous themes if you want the windows buttons switched from the left back to the right.
After I had a quick look around the 10.4 version I decided that I ought to install it in order to get the full experience of this new Ubuntu release. The installer is pretty much the same as the one used in the 9.10 release so there is nothing much to mention about it. Installation was pretty quick however not as quick as Eeebuntu 3.0 like I previously used, but this is probably because it’s a new so it means more features to install, no real problem really, it wasn’t sluggish and did install in minutes.
As usual, after I finished installing Ubuntu 10.4 to my hard drive the first thing I did was give it my personal touch by doing simple tasks like changing the desktop image (I’ve reused the Lego Star Wars background from my Eeebuntu installation because frankly… it’s awesome!) and thought it would be cool to take the idea of using a GNOME panel and transforming it into a dock-like application launcher like the Eeebuntu team did with their OS.
When it comes to discussing programs I have noticed that they have included a great application called Gwibber, I’m currently using this for my twitter account since it gives me notifications to when someone mentions me in their tweet, but I do believe that this program also allows you to connect to several different social networking sites. I have noticed that there is other new applications included in this new one such as “simple scan” which I’ve heard is a great little app for all you people who scan in documents sadly, I don’t so I can not judge it myself.
Pros
Ubuntu 10.4 compared to the previous versions seems a lot quicker and a lot more responsive; heck the boot time is almost as quick as Windows 7 on here if not quicker! I’m sure once the final version has been out for a few months we’ll start seeing a few cool tips on how to knock of a couple of seconds off of our boot times too!
Cons
My only nit pick with this latest version of Ubuntu is that this new theme just feels a little bulky, so it takes up a bit of screen space, but trying to get as much screen space as possible on our tiny screens is vital! But there is no problem in changing to a thinner theme, I guess.
Conclusion
Ubuntu Lucid Lynx has redeemed it self from it’s previous sluggish versions, I would really consider this as a strong competitor for a main Operating System to use on my netbook. So with that, it’s won itself 5 E’s out of 5.
EEEEE
Now I’m off to promote these reviews, I’ve got a few ideas for the next “Me and my Eee” review, although, I think I’ve decided on doing the top 10 applications for your Windows based netbook. But until then…
OVER AND OUT!
Me and My Eee – Eeebuntu 3.0 Review
Introduction
Hello there, welcome to the very first edition of “Me and my Eee” a project I’ve been planning on doing for some time now. (Was even thinking about making a separate blog for it) This project is mainly about my personal reviews on certain topics surrounding the tiny machines called Netbooks. I fell in love with these underpowered machines ever since I laid my eyes on them, they’re great!
These articles aren’t going to be your bog standard review but more of a “Journal” approach to things such as Operating Systems (Yes, I’m an OS Hopper), cool accessories or any awesome Netbook oriented software and games, just so people can have a better idea at what the daily experience is like before they try it out for themselves (I’m sure you don’t want to waste your time and money, do you?) Before I begin I’d like to introduce you to my Eee.
My 904HD Model Eeepc, an Eeepc if you already didn’t know is Asus’ brand of Netbooks. Here are the basic specs of my Netbook:
80GB Hard Drive
900 MHz Intel Celeron Processor
2GB of RAM (Upgraded from 1GB)
Intel 915GM Graphics Card
So as you can see it’s not too bad for your average Netbook. It’s not designed to be a high performance gaming machine but a portable device to read the odd email, play a few classic games, chat and browse the internet. You get the idea. Anyway on with the show!
My Experience
So this is Eeeubuntu 3.0, based off of Ubuntu 8.04 but more directed at Netbook users, if you don’t know already Ubuntu is one of the most Linux Distributions available to download for free. I’ve used Eeeubuntu 3.0 for a while in the past before and have recently reinstalled it since I’m in need of a Windows 7 product key. So it’s was sort of Substitute for the time being… Well that’s what I thought until I actually started to mess around with it for an hour of two.
Once I installed it (In a matter of minutes) I decided to have a little play around with it, just customizing a few things and just giving it my personal touch and of course doing what I like to do best, optimize and remove crap from the OS in order to give it a faster boot time and of course make it more responsive when actually using the Operating System.
The above screenshot is what my desktop currently looks like, First thing first was too change the background image to a cute “Netbook Resolution Optimized” image (1024×600) of Lego Stars Wars… On Bikes! I did a few more cool things like implement the Aero Snap features from Windows 7 into Eeeubuntu 3.0 using this guide.
After I’ve finished designing it to my liking and installing the essential programs for my daily usage such as Google Chrome and LAMPP, a Linux version of the software XAMPP, I gave it a quick reboot, 45 Seconds on battery mode, not bad at all really, it’s tolerable. There is definitely more stuff to take out to reduce that boot time too, I just did the usual things like stop any unwanted start-up programs, removed the boot splash screen, etc.
The Pros
Eeeubuntu 3.0 is definitely worth getting over the standard version of Ubuntu, my personal reason behind this is that the pre-installed software that comes with Eeeubuntu 3.0 is so much better for me, personally, than what comes with the bog standard Ubuntu, such as aMSN, a Linux Client for Windows Live Messenger, the interface is very similar to the official client, especially if you download the MSN Version 7 skin. It also comes with a pre-installed application that gives you control over various hardware inside your netbook by a single click of a button! Such as CPU Scaling, Enabling/Disabling hardware such as WiFi and Webcam which is very useful when you’re on battery power and you want to save every last bit of energy.
Another little bit that I love about this OS is that the developers have made a dock to launch all your favourite applications straight from your desktop using just one single GNOME panel, this is such a great idea since it means you won’t have to download any fancy programs such as Avant Window Navigator.
The Cons
The only major con is that it’s quite old now, a few of the repositories are now dead, but don’t worry there is a forth version currently in development, you can download it by going to their site at: www.eeebuntu.org
Conclusion:
If you want a clean, simple and yes USEFUL Linux Distribution for your everyday netbook needs then this is perfect! Especially if you don’t have the time to customize a standard Ubuntu installation in order to make it friendlier for a Netbook.
I’m going to give Eeeubuntu 3.0 a perfect 5 E’s out of Five!
EEEEE
Not bad for the first OS to be reviewed! Let’s see if other Operating Systems can live up to Eeeubuntu 3.0!
And that’s all from me today, folks! Sorry it’s a bit of a mismatched review, but hey give me a break it’s my very first review ;] Hopefully the articles will get a better structure once I get writing more. Tomorrow, I’ll hopefully be downloading the latest Ubuntu Beta and see how that performs on a Netbook and hopefully have a review up next weekend. But until then…
OVER AND OUT!
