A Couple of Ubuntu Linux Tweaks

I've been using Linux a bit more to keep up my skills since I spend most of my time at work dealing with Windows. I also rolled back to the stable release of Ubuntu because dealing with a pre-release distro is more than I want to deal with at home.

One of the things I missed the most when using Linux was using the thumb button on my mouse for going back when web browsing. I found instructions to set it up at the Back/Forward Buttons Howto and it works great.

I originally found the link from the Ubuntu Linux Forums.

The How to make your fonts smooth enough to drool over topic is a nice tweak too.

Leaning a Little to the Left

I've been hearing DJ Shadow's remix of Radiohead's "The Gloaming" on KEXP a bit, and wow what a great mix. He mixed it with great samples of Dubya. You can find more info about the album at Green Plastic Radiohead. They also have a second post with a scan of the album cover (I love it!).

On the same note, I love Bright Eyes' "When the President Talks to God". I found the lyrics over at jukeboxgraduate.com, and it is supposed to be a free iTunes download.

I have to think pretty hard to come up with anything positive that's come from the prez, but at least he's motiviated many artists to produce some great art.

On The Bleeding Edge

I've been running Ubuntu Linux (dual booting with XP) for a little while. Today I decided to upgrade it to the beta of Ubuntu's next release, Hoary.

I started out with an apt-get dist-upgrade. It doesn't look like it picked up everything, but seems mostly usable.

I switched from XFree86 to the X.Org server in the upgrade, and it broke my Nvidia binary driver, maybe because the kernel (and associated Nvidia kernel module) wasn't flagged for an automatic update. The driver version and the kernel module for it ended up with a version mismatch. Manually installing an updated kernel (2.6.10) and an updated linux-restricted-modules using apt got X11 into a usable state.

There were enough errors in the upgrade I wouldn't recommend it for any production system (although that comes with the territory of a pre-release version).

Kites On Ice

I went down to Kites On Ice at the Memorial Union Terrace to enjoy the great weather and I took a few photos.

Great weather and quite a crowd. Have a look at my photos here.

I don't mind 50 degree weather in early February.