Linux for Keysers | Adventures in Open Source

sudo apt-get install nautilus-open-terminal

When I left home last night, I had full functional working 3D desktop effects. Once I added my two 1600x1200 monitors this morning and resized my virtual desktop size past the breaking limit, that all went bye-bye. :( I vaguely remember reading that increasing the desktop size on my video card will automatically disable this wonderful feature. Surprise. It did. Well, at least with the old video driver, it's still smoother than the newer ones. Bummer though. I was really liking all the extra "new OS" bells and whistles. Maybe I can find a work-around someday, but I highly doubt it. EDIT: Here's the URL that discusses the root of the problem (I think it still applies to 8.10, but I'm not certain just yet... will look further): http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=580891 And some more specific to the Dell Latitude D430: http://www.winchen.de/PHPWIKI/doku.php/public/delld430 Workaround: Switch xorg.conf on bootup depending on whether or not external monito

Every once in a while, you come across a version of a driver or package that is just better than newer, "updated versions". If you want to keep the old one and stop getting reminders about the new ones, just open Package Manger, select the package you want to keep and then click "Package -> Lock Package" from the menu. This will prevent auto-updates from happening to that package. Also, you can force an old package to be reinstated from this same menu. This would have helped me a TON and saved a lot of time with my video driver woes...

Add the repositories from c-korn here: https://launchpad.net/~c-korn/+archive/vlc Add the GPG key from the same location. Open your package manager and add the latest stable version of VLC.

I'm using the xserver-xorg-video-intel driver version 2.4.1-1ubuntu10 (default that installed with 8.10) and the graphics performance is MUCH better than 2.6 or 2.7 was for my Intel chipset (Dell D430). Guess newer isn't always better... 3D Desktop effects even work somewhat!

Immediately after I reinstalled 8.10, I noticed my Windows keys behaving badly. I actually forgot that this was something I had to deal with before. It boiled down to changing the default behavior of the Windows key in the keyboard layout "Other Settings" panel to map it to the "Super" key. Viola. I can now assign it at will. Here's a link to a write-up about it: http://www.psychocats.net/ubuntucat/windowsmodifier/

It took a long time, but I'm willing to concede defeat now. Ubuntu 9.04 sucks on Dell D430 hardware. Perhaps it was the half-baked release for older hardware. Perhaps it was the decision to go exclusively to open-sourced drivers. Perhaps it was just all the little irks I got tired of dealing with. In the end it doesn't matter. It all added up to wasted time and effort trying to either correct or work around the myriad of problems with video drivers, bluetooth drivers, and other nonesense you shouldn't have to deal with in Ubuntu. After all, it worked nearly flawlessly in 8.10 so why shouldn't it for 9.04? It *is* supposed to be an upgrade after all. At any rate, I *downgraded* to 8.10 last night. I have to tell you, I missed my perfectly functioning video drivers. I still need to see if I need to reinstall the latest broadcom wireless drivers, but that's in my previous posts. In the end, I learned that newer isn't always better. I'll take a look a