Top 5 Things to Do After Installing Ubuntu

Ubuntu on Dell Inspiron 1420

Earlier I posted that I had installed Ubuntu on an old computer, but didn't really go into any detail about the hardware.  It's a 5 year old Dell Inspiron 1420 that was running with the original Windows Vista (service pack 2 installed).

This poor old laptop had a couple rounds of spyware/malware and was pretty buggy to the point no one wanted to even try to use any more.  Almost to the point of recycling it (or donating to a worthy cause), but thought why not install one of the new Linux distributions on it for fun.  Turns out it gave the old Dell a brand new lease on life!

With that said, I'd had some problems with the wireless drivers related to the hardware on this model, the Dell Wireless 1395 WLAN Mini-Card.  I had read previously about issues with proprietary drivers, etc.  Ubuntu connected via wireless without a hitch but I always had to manually reconnect the wireless after a reboot.  Researching showed several others having the same problem with 12.04 and recommended a different connection manager - wicd - but that caused more problems on the Dell because wireless broke all together.

Long story short, I put the default network-manager back and decided that the issue wasn't with Ubuntu but rather the drivers.   Still want to link to an article about an alternative for later:

Broadcom Wireless on Ubuntu

more Ubuntu changes

After setting up a nice screensaver in Raspbian on the Raspberry Pi, I realized that my laptop with Ubuntu 12.04 only had the default blank screen available.  Not to be outdone by the RasPi, I found some information about why Ubuntu's screensaver is the way it is and what to do about it:

How to Add Screensavers to Ubuntu 12.04

more Raspberry Pi

Here's something very interesting - combining my two newest hobbies Ubuntu Linux and RaspPi - A Raspberry Pi Build Cluster for Ubuntu

Never mind that I can't actually watch the YouTube video with Raspbian :-P

Still, if it could be done, I think having a modified Ubuntu that could run on the Raspberry Pi would be cool!

Setting things up on Raspberry Pi

Just for fun, I thought I'd buy one of these little Raspbian kits and get back into using Linux (and maybe learn some Python and Perl and the way). In fact, I'm posting this today from the RaspPi! Cool stuff but not as easy out-of-the-box like Ubuntu 12.04.

So, blogging some steps that I took to customize and optimize Raspbian:

1) Installed Iceweasel (version of Firefox) and moved cache and profile to RAM disk (surf the web much faster!) - Firefox Ramdisk
2) Added some new shortcuts to the desktop (I'm using the default LXDE desktop GUI) using LXShortCut  and added/modified the program menu with LXPanel

3) Oops, I deleted the log-out button from the panel! Never did find a graphical way to put the button back, but did find out how to restore.  Rename the directory ~/.config/lxpanel (to something like ~/.config/lxpanel_bad) and reboot.  LXDE will create a new panel from the default configuration.  Note the dot in .config (it's normally a hidden directory).

Next up is to clone my SD card so I have a copy of Raspbian just the way I have it setup now in case I screw things up again!