Firefox Download Day Certification

Have you downloaded Firefox 3.0 at Download Day and helped Firefox to set a new world record?

Yes? Get your certificate then :)

Synergy

Synergy is a great piece of software. It allows you to, and I quote, "easily share a single mouse and keyboard between multiple computers with different operating systems, each with its own display, without special hardware". Yes, your could use Linux, Windows or Mac OS. I'm only using it between to Ubuntu machines, so share your eXPerience if your using Linux and Windows for example.

Check here a little animation.

After you install and setup Synergy you only need to move your mouse to the right, left, up or down of your monitor (according to your setup) and your automatically gain control of the other machine. Now your mouse and keyboard will work there. To return to the main machine do the opposite.

This means that if your are using Synergy between your desktop and laptop, and the laptop is to the right of your desktop monitor, you'd move your mouse to the right to gain control of the laptop and to the left, in the laptop, to gain control of your desktop.


Install

• Go to Applications > Add/Remove and look for synergy
• Install QuickSynergy (a GUI for Synergy)

Firefox 3.0 is out

Firefox 3.0 is out !!! :)

Download now.

Firefox Download Day is June 17, 2008

It's annouced!! Firefox 3.0 will be released in June 17, it's a Tuesday.

Firefox is trying to set a Guinness World Record, so don't forget, pledge now and download Firefox 3.0 next Tuesday.

Migration to WordPress

I'm migration the blog to WordPress.

In the process I'm changing/fixing:

• the overall look of the blog
• the post categories
• some html related problems/improvements in some posts

I'm also redirecting http://lof-ubuntu-xp.lofspot.net/ from Blogspot to WordPress.

All the posts from the old blog are already migrated.

Please, let me know what you think.

ufw - Ucomplicated Firewall

I'm starting to play around with ufw (Ucomplicated Firewall), a firewall for Linux.

It's command line based, but simple enough.

I'll update this post as I play along.


Enable/disable ufw

$ sudo ufw enable
$ sudo ufw disable 

Default policy

• mostly open ports

$ sudo ufw default allow

• mostly closed ports

$ sudo ufw default deny 

Allow/deny services syntax

$ sudo ufw allow|deny <service> 

Add rules syntax

$ sudo ufw allow|deny [proto <protocol>] [from <address> [port <port>]] [to <address> [port <port>]] 

Delete rules syntax

$ sudo ufw delete <rule type> from <ip address> to any port <port number> 

Firewall status

$ sudo ufw status 

Firewall loaded

To                         Action  From
--                         ------  ----
24800:tcp                  ALLOW   100.000.1.1

Examples

$ sudo ufw allow proto tcp from 100.000.1.1 to any port 24800
$ sudo ufw delete allow proto tcp from 100.000.1.1 to any port 24800
$ sudo ufw allow ssh
$ sudo ufw delete allow ssh

Removing old kernels from your system

After a while you're starting to collect kernel versions on your system.

Since Hardy came out, with kernel 2.6.24-16, we had two kernel updates, so, in grub we have now entries to kernels 2.6.24-16, 2.6.24-17 and 2.6.24-18.

We just need one to boot in, and we and the most recent one of course. Still, when deciding to remove an old kernel be aware of possible problems.

Virtualbox for instance, needs a module to the specific kernel you're running. Every time a new kernel is released your Virtualbox setup will not work until your upgrade the said module.
So, if you need to use Virtualbox and you don't yet have the new module, you could just restart into the old kernel.

So, think before you remove old kernels.


Removing old kernels

• Check what versions you have installed

$ sudo dpkg --list | grep linux-image

•   Output example

ii linux-image-2.6.24-16-generic 2.6.24-16.30 Linux kernel image for version 2.6.24 on x86
ii linux-image-2.6.24-17-generic 2.6.24-17.31 Linux kernel image for version 2.6.24 on x86
ii linux-image-2.6.24-18-generic 2.6.24-18.32 Linux kernel image for version 2.6.24 on x86
ii linux-image-generic 2.6.24.18.20 Generic Linux kernel image
ii virtualbox-ose-guest-modules-2.6.24-18-generic 24.0.3 virtualbox-ose-guest module for linux-image-
ii virtualbox-ose-modules-2.6.24-18-generic 24.0.3 virtualbox-ose module for linux-image-2.6.24

• In this example, only the first 3 rows are candidates to go. Make sure you don't remove the kernel you're using.

$ uname -r

• To remove, for instance 2.6.24-16

$ sudo apt-get remove linux-image-2.6.24-16-generic

• Update your grub list

$ sudo update-grub

And that is that.

Firefox Guinness World Record

Help Firefox get the Guinness World Record for the most software downloads in 24 hours.

All you have to do is download Firefox 3 within the 24 hour after is release.

The launch day will be announced soon, so bookmark this link.

You can also get involved, and spread this record attempt.