Sysadm:Ubuntu

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For collecting useful tips or links about using Ubuntu with our hardware and configuration.

Generally useful links:

Contents


Before installation

  • Add computer to dhcpd.conf
  • Add hostname to cfagent.conf (also add it to the class ubuntu)

1st steps

  • After installing the base system log in as user, change to root with "sudo su" and assign a root password if you like.
  • Edit /etc/apt/sources.list and uncomment to universe lines.
  • Now do 
 apt-get update 
 apt-get dist-upgrade
 apt-get install cfengine2 cvs debfoster portmap nis openssh-server
 apt-get install syslog-summary logcheck
 apt-get install thinkpad-base tpctl tpb ibm-acpi
 cd /var/lib
 rm -rf cfengine2
 cvs -d :pserver:cfengine@cvs.is.informatik.uni-duisburg.de:/services/cvsroot login
 cvs -d :pserver:cfengine@cvs.is.informatik.uni-duisburg.de:/services/cvsroot co cfengine2
 cfkey
 cd /var/lib/cfengine2/inputs
 make cfagent
 /usr/lib/yp/ypinit -s marcie.is.informatik.uni-duisburg.de
  • Edit /etc/hosts and delete the localhost.localdomain entry, and swap the hostname with localhost, so that the first line reads: 
  127.0.0.1       hostname      localhost
  • If you need to install nis from home, so ypinit from marcie does not work, you can do the following steps: 
 ssh root@marcie
 vi /etc/ypserv.securenets
 uncomment line with #255.255.255.0   134.91.40.0
 /etc/init.d/nis restart
 start vpnc
 /usr/lib/yp/ypinit -s marcie.is.informatik.uni-duisburg.d
 revers ypserv.securenets

Graphics

ATI Proprietary Driver Installation HowTo

This Section guides you through the installation of ATI's binary driver (fglrx). I will assume you are either running Ubuntu Dapper Drake (6.06 LTS) or Edgy Eft (6.10).

  • At first we have to make some adjustments to /etc/X11/xorg.conf with your editor of choice. If the Section "Extensions" does not already exist add it at the end of the file 
  Section "Device"
          Identifier   "ATI Graphics Adapter 0"
          Driver       "fglrx"
          ...
  EndSection

  ## DRI with composite doesn't work as of now
  Section "Extensions"
          Option  "Composite"     "0"
  EndSection


  • Ubuntu provides ATI binary drivers in their linux-restricted-modules package. Be sure to add the following line to /etc/default/linux-restricted-modules-common 
  DISABLED_MODULES="fglrx"


  • Now make sure that your X Server is stopped and remove the fglrx module if you use are using an older version of it. 
  sudo -s
  
  /etc/init.d/kdm stop      # Or whatever display manager you chose
  modprobe -r fglrx


  • This is to make sure that you have all needed packages installed 
  apt-get install module-assistant build-essential fakeroot dh-make debconf libstdc++5


  • If you use Ubuntu's kernel images you have to install the matching kernel headers. If you build your own kernel you probably know what you are doing ;) 
  apt-get install linux-headers-$(uname -r)


  • Now remove any possible old versions of ATI's driver packages 
  apt-get remove xorg-driver-fglrx
  apt-get remove fglrx-kernel-$*


  • Fetch the installer archive and let it build packages for your platform. 
  cd /usr/src/
  wget http://a248.e.akamai.net/f/674/9206/0/www2.ati.com/drivers/linux/ati-driver-installer-8.29.6.run
  chmod +x ati-driver-installer-8.29.6.run
  ./ati-driver-installer-8.29.6.run --buildpkg Ubuntu/edgy      # Or Ubunt/dapper for that matter


  • Install the packages 
  dpkg -i xorg-driver-fglrx_8.29.6-1_i386.deb
  dpkg -i fglrx-kernel-source_8.29.6-1_i386.deb
  dpkg -i fglrx-control_8.29.6-1_i386.deb


  • Now it's time to build the kernel module 
  m-a update
  m-a prepare
  m-a build fglrx
  m-a install fglrx
  
  depmod -a


  • Start your X server 
  /etc/init.d/kdm start


  • And check if it worked. The output of fglrxinfo should look something like that: 
  display: :0.0  screen: 0
  OpenGL vendor string: ATI Technologies Inc.
  OpenGL renderer string: RADEON 9600 Generic
  OpenGL version string: 2.0.6065 (8.29.6)


  • The new driver now supports Pair Mode, which means you can have 2 Monitors with different resolutions using a common framebuffer (aka BigDesktop). You can either use fglrx-control to set it up or add one of the following lines to the Device Section of your xorg.conf: 
  Option   "DesktopSetup"   "horizontal"             # Screen 0 left of Screen 1
  Option   "DesktopSetup"   "horizontal,reverse"     # Screen 0 right of Screen 1
  Option   "DesktopSetup"   "vertical"               # and so forth
  Option   "DesktopSetup"   "vertical, reverse"


From ibm-acpi.sf.net:

Note that on many models (particularly those using Radeon graphics chips) the X driver configures the video card in a way which prevents Fn-F7 from working. This also disables the video output switching features of this driver, as it uses the same ACPI methods as Fn-F7. Video switching on the console should still work.

UPDATE: There's now a patch for the X.org Radeon driver which addresses this issue. Some people are reporting success with the patch while others are still having problems. For more information: [1]

Resolution

The new laptops have a native resolution of 1600x1200 which is really nice. However, the 19" TFT choke on that. Since I don't know any X-conf-magic I made do with specifying the following modes in xorg.conf: 

 Modes   "1280x1024"  "1600x1200"

This starts in 1280x1024 with a virtual desktop of 1600x1200. The following script has been added to my .xinitrc: 

#!/bin/bash
xrandr -q |
  grep "^[ *][0-9]" |
  cut --output-delimiter : -c0-3,6-16,40- |
  sed "s/:/\n/g" |
  sed "s/*/ /g"  |
  zenity --list --column "SZ" --column "Resolution" --column "Refresh" --separator : |
  xargs -n1 xrandr -r 60 -s

Letting me choose between the best reslution for stand alone and docked mode.

As an alternative to this nifty script, you can install the Display Geometry Switcher applet. This will give you an applet with a drop down menu of screen resolutions. 

 sudo apt-get install gnome-randr-applet

After the package is installed right click the panel and choose "Add to Panel..." then select "Display Geometry Switcher".

Fluxbox 

 apt-get install menu fluxbox fluxconf fbpager fbdesk xfonts-artwiz eterm
 apt-get install xmms wmclock wmbattery wmxres wmload wmusic wmnd
  • Important: switch on anti-aliasing in fluxbox configuration!

Firefox

Version Bug

Ubuntu distributed a new version of Firefox which contains the security fixes from Firefox 1.0.4, however, they did not update the version number, so we have no way to tell whether your copy of Firefox contains the security fixes or not. A request to Ubuntu to update the version number has been filed at Ubuntu Bug 10681. A workaround you can use to get access to addons.mozilla.org is given in comment 3 on that bug. Please ensure you have updated to the latest Firefox package using apt-get, Synaptic, or the Ubuntu Update Manager before trying the workaround.

Font Rendering

Font rendering in firefox was really crappy for some websites. I tried 

  apt-get install kcontrol gtk2-engines-gtk-qt acroread-plugins
  kcontrol
  --> Appearance & Themes --> GTK Styles and Fonts --> GTK Fonts
     set to use another font: Bitstream Vera Sans

But apparently that didn't work. I "solved" this now by forcing websites to display with my fonts. --Sascha

  • I had no trouble with andy fonts using gnome. --Claus-Peter

Plugins

To get some useful plugins (restart firefox afterwards, check with about:plugins): 

  apt-get install libflash-mozplugin flashplugin-nonfree sun-j2re1.5 
  apt-get install mplayer-386 mplayer-fonts mozilla-mplayer

We added this linking to cfagent. Please verify that it works, otherwise so this 

  cd /usr/lib/mozilla-firefox/plugins
  sudo ln -s /usr/lib/flashplugin-nonfree/libflashplayer.so .
  sudo ln -s /usr/lib/flashplugin-nonfree/flashplayer.xpt .
  sudo ln -s /usr/lib/j2re1.5-sun/plugin/i386/ns7/libjavaplugin_oji.so .
  sudo ln -s ../../mozilla/plugins/libmozswfdec.so
  sudo ln -s ../../mozilla/plugins/libflash-mozplugin.so

In /etc/mplayer/mplayer.conf change vo=x11 to vo=xv

I got the error message: 

  Internal Error on Browser End: No manager for initializing factory

This was due to a wrong java plugin link.

Psi 

apt-get install psi kcontrol
  • Change fonts for messages etc. under options to some nice ones from the ArtWiz package
  • Change fonts for GUI with kcontrol

xmms 

apt-get install xmms gstreamer0.8-plugins gstreamer0.8-mad gstreamer0.8-lame w32codecs

apt-get install flac xmms-flac xmms-shn xmms-shn xmms-wma ...

WLAN 

apt-get install vpnc
  • configure ath0 as wlan device
  • copy existing vpnc.conf 
ifup ath0
vpnc-connect

Acroread 

apt-get install acroread

Playing DVDs 

apt-get install totem totem-xine libdvdcss2 libdvdread3 regionset
regionset
--> set regioncode 2 (necessary before any RC DVD can be played)

The libdvdcss is not availiable as package anymore in the ubuntu distribution. It is downloadable at 

http://download.videolan.org/pub/videolan/debian/pool/libdvdcss/1.2.8/

Fetch the deb package and install.

Playing Videos

Download: 

http://www.mplayerhq.hu/MPlayer/releases/codecs/all-20060611.tar.bz2

Then 

sudo mkdir /usr/lib/win32 
cd /usr/lib/win32
sudo tar jxvf /path/to/all-20060611.tar.bz2
sudo mv all-20060611/* .
sudo rm -rf all-20060611

LaTeX 

apt-get install tetex-base tetex-extra tetex-bin tetex-doc gv psutils
apt-get install kile lyx lmodern
rsync -avz marcie:/usr/sw/tex-add /usr/sw/
cfagent -u
chmod guo+x /etc/texmf
chmod -R guo+r /etc/texmf

Emacs / Gnus 

apt-get install ispell metamail openssl
rsync -avz marcie:/usr/sw/emacs/22.0 /usr/sw/emacs/

E-Mail / Postfix 

apt-get install libsasl-digestmd5 libsasl-modules-plain

Follow instructions from admdoc. Also: change myhostname in main.cf to the actual f.q. hostname instead of localhost.localdomain. The name of the relayhost and the name of the host in saslpasswd have to match ;)

Bluetooth 

apt-get install bluez-utils
echo enable > /proc/acpi/ibm/bluetooth

ThinkPad Buttons

The package tpb in Hoary seems to be broken: 

wget http://ftp.de.debian.org/debian/pool/main/t/tpb/tpb_0.6.3-2_i386.deb
dpkg -i tpb_0.6.3-2_i386.deb

Follow [2] for the rest.

Beagle

The debianized beagle package is quite sucky as it doesn't state all its dependancies. So you have to install everything manually: 

  apt-get install mono gtk-sharp sqlite libxss-dev libmono-dev libdbus-cil libgecko-cil

and a whole bunch of other packages which will be automatically installed as dependencies of the former. Now you can 

  apt-get install beagle

Follow the instructions to enable extended attributes for file 

  [3]

Start the beagle-daemon as user with 

  beagled

You can monitor the daemon activities with 

  beagle-status

After the daemon has indexed some stuff, you can start best (beagle's gui), which will sit in your tray until you call it (by default it's bound to F12). Issue a search and be amazed ;)

ssh/gpg

  • use gpg-agent for caching gpg keys 
apt-get install gnupg2 gnupg-agent pinentry-gtk2 keychain
  • edit you .gnupg/gpg.conf and uncomment the line use-agent
  • create a .gnupg/gpg-agent.conf 
pinentry-program /usr/bin/pinentry-x11
enable-ssh-support
write-env-file $HOME/.gpg-agent-info
no-grab
default-cache-ttl 43200
  • remove all the stuff about ssh-agent from your .xinitrc, .xsession or KDE startup scripts
  • add the following (of course replace the gpg key id with your own) 
keychain --clear ~/.ssh/id_dsa ~/.ssh/id_rsa 786F5A89
. ~/.keychain/${HOSTNAME}-sh
. ~/.keychain/${HOSTNAME}-sh-gpg

single sign on with ssh passphrase

Note: the following doesn't really work very well with the gpg-agent setup described above. Revert those changes if you have any problems getting this to work. Unfortunately the single sign on procedure doesn't work for the GPG key.

First install libpam-ssh 

sudo apt-get install libpam-ssh

Then, add two lines to /etc/pam.d/{gdm,kdm} (depending on your flavor of login manager), as well as /etc/pam.d/login, to include pam-ssh-auth and pam-ssh-session. My files look like this:

/etc/pam.d/gdm

auth    requisite       pam_nologin.so
auth    required        pam_env.so
@include pam-ssh-auth
@include common-auth
@include common-account
session required        pam_limits.so
@include common-session
@include pam-ssh-session
@include common-password

/etc/pam.d/login

...

# Standard Un*x authentication.
@include pam-ssh-auth
@include common-auth

...

# Standard Un*x account and session
@include common-account
@include common-session
@include pam-ssh-session

You may have to restart sshd, but maybe not. Restart gdm/kdm and you should be asked for your passphrase instead of a password on login. Same for console login. If you don't provide a passphrase (just hit ENTER), you will be asked for your password. If you do provide a passphrase however, the unlocked ssh key it will be fed to the agent, and you should be able to use ssh without additional hassle.

remaining problems

  • fonts used in window decoration don't seem to have umlauts and other special characters
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