Tips, tricks, hints, and hacks

I’m pleased to announce that my new book—Ubuntu Pocket Guide and Reference—is almost finished! 

The book is a concise yet comprehensive guide to day-to-day Ubuntu use. It conveys core competencies quickly, without the need to wade through thick manuals, and provides a lasting reference for all stages of your Ubuntu journey. 

It will be available from 14 January 2009 in two separate editions. The Print Edition will retail exclusively through Amazon.com for a recession-busting $9.95. The PDF Edition will be available to download entirely free of charge. Yes, you read that right! The full thing will be available for $0.00! No catches!

More details will be released closer to the launch date, so watch this space. You might also want to keep an eye on the book’s official website: www.ubuntupocketguide.com.

Ubuntu Kung Fu has been reviewed on this week’s Ubuntu UK Podcast. I must admit this is the first time I’ve listened to the show but I’ll definitely be listening again. If you’re a fan of sardonic British humor, and also Ubuntu, then you’ll really enjoy it. 

To listen to the show you can subscribe using RhythmBox (or iTunes if you’re running Windows or Mac OS X) by clicking the link on the left. Alternatively, click here for a link directly to the MP3 file for the show (circa 11MB).

(The following is an extract from my best-selling book Ubuntu Kung Fu, which contains over 300 tips, tricks, hints, and hacks for Ubuntu).

Ubuntu’s wifi support has gotten steadily better over the years, and with Ubuntu 8.04 (Hardy Heron) it’s safe to say that the majority of wifi devices will work fine. However, if you find that yours doesn’t (you’ll know because it will be like no wifi hardware is installed), help is at hand in the form of Ndiswrapper.

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I’ve written a review of the latest Ubuntu release for Lifehacker, the excellent tech and productivity blog:

http://lifehacker.com/5072351/a-users-look-at-ubuntu-810-intrepid-ibex

In a default Ubuntu setup, right-clicking a file offers the opportunity to open it with an application or delete it, rename it, and so on. Wouldn’t it be useful if you could add your own right-click option that performed a specific action on the file? For example, if you right-clicked a Microsoft Word or OpenOffice.org document, how about if a Print document option appeared? If you right-click an image, how about if an option appeared to shrink the image or sharpen it?

All of this is possible using the Nautilus Actions add-in. As its name suggests, this lets you add options to the right-click menu that perform certain actions on particular types files. It’s simple to create your own action, but hundreds of ready-made scripts are available and can be imported easily.

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Here are some tips for Ubuntu users who use notebook computers, including how to sync files effortlessly between a laptop and desktop, how to switch CPU speeds on the fly from the desktop, how to power-save your hard disk, and more. Only one or two are specific to notebooks so desktop users may find them interesting too. Continue reading →

Ah, the command-line! Refuge for the scoundrel, proving ground for the true expert, tool of choice for the power-user. 

The following 10 tips explain how to do cool and interesting things at the command-line. They’re not specific to Ubuntu but they were written with Ubuntu in mind, and have not been tested on other distros. But all should work on most versions of Linux or even Unix. 

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Ubuntu Intrepid Ibex is to be Ubuntu’s next release, due in late October this year. It’s gingerly marked as “experimental” and, as with all Ubuntu releases, follows just six months after the previous version—Hardy Heron. The message is usually that those who want stability and support should stick with the long-term support release, while those who want to help test Ubuntu, and get a taste of cutting-edge software, should try the newer versions. But is this true, or even advisable, in the case of Intrepid? 

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The history of computing is one of giants being toppled. Remember DEC and Wang? No? Well, that says a lot. 

A giant is in the process of being toppled right now. Arguably, Microsoft is thrashing about in death throes as the era of personal computing ends.

At the moment, Ubuntu is the giant of the Linux world. If giants are always being toppled, and if you read any of the social networking sites such as Digg, you might get the impression that gOS is just about to do that. Is it true? Is gOS an Ubuntu killer?

Let’s take a look at the newest beta release—”3.0 Gadgets Beta“—to find out. 

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Ubuntu’s boot menu is provided by GRUB (GRand Unified Boot loader). Some other distributions use LILO, but GRUB has many benefits: it’s simple, small, and relatively easily configured.

Below I explain how to add a “wallpaper” to the GRUB boot menu, and then explain how to add password protection. Both tips are taken from my new book Ubuntu Kung Fu, and should work OK on other distributions of Linux, although I’ve only tested these steps on Ubuntu 8.04.1.

Let’s crack on with it.

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