Kubuntu: Linux For my Mother?

Hey guys,

I've managed to get my mum to agree to let me install Kubuntu on her laptop (using the hard drive from my laptop, so she doesn't loose winblows). This is a BIG achievement, trust me on that!

She hasn't seen it yet, but its running ALOT faster... i thought i was going to have to get some more RAM for the machine, but i don't think thats really necessary (Not if i can get her to use Kubuntu anyway).

Apart from the usual (Multimedia codec's, firefox, acrobat, setting up printers)... is there anything else i can do to make KDE even better?

she mainly uses her laptop for Ebay and her digital camera, although she doesn't tend to edit images is there anything more user friendly than the GIMP?

also, what Kernel is best for a Intel Celeron 2.6Ghz?

[ot]
Im really liking kde on my machine! screenie attached

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Krita might be worth looking into, also KolourPaint if she's into MS Paint. :O But GIMP is the most powerful free graphics software in the world, so it's pretty hard to find something which can compare and also be free. There's another front-end for GIMP called CinePaint which has actually been used professionally by Hollywood many times in the past, I don't know if you'll find that easier or harder though.

That is a Pentium 4 with the L2 cache chopped off. Get a P4 kernel if you're not going to compile your own.
[ot]

Very slick, looks like a wonderful work environment to me. [/ot]

 

Kernel

i found two which i *think* might be the best for her machine,

• kernel-image-2.4.27-2-686
• kernel-image-2.4.27-2-686-smp

whats the difference between the two? I'll have to get round to compiling my own kernels sometime, but it wouldn't be the smart choice for this machine until I've done it a few times successfully on my own machines! (i did it when install Gentoo, but i was following a guide to the letter ).

I was thinking about setting up a repository on my machine, well... more of a update cache, but it would mean updates for her machine would be downloaded at network bandwidth (100MBit) and not our ADSL bandwidth (2MBit, which im constantly tying up!). any easy way to do this?

[ot]
yeah, i love the setup I've got atm... the 4 pixel wide bar in the top right hand corner tucks away the taskbar, so i get the full screen (1280x1024) to myself (Firefox full screened looks great like this!)

Ive even got VMware installed, with a windows 2000 VM for anything i cant get to run under wine!

All thats left to to do is install the nvidia stuff, which keeps on leaving me without X (hence why i haven't done it yet!).
[/ot]

 

SMP means "symmetric multi-processing"... it's for multi-CPU or multi-core rigs. You want the non-smp one.

Learn how to setup apache or proftpd and create an anonymous, read-only share for your /var/cache/apt/archives/ (where updates are downloaded)... even so, it's a bit advanced (and complicated) for a tiny home network, so I can't really recommend it in your case.
[ot]

Yeah, I love how flexible KDE is (and most other Linux window managers are also). You can make it just about as productive as possible for your own unique style.

That's a great way to do it if you're still stuck with some Win-only proprietary stuff.

Have you seen my walkthrough?
[/ot]

 

Advanced = Fun If it works then the updates will be downloaded in seconds, instead of minutes... Kubuntu has alot more updates than windows (mainly everything on the system can be updates, not just the OS), and there not just monthly (which is really a bonus) so something like this should help stop her getting the wrong impression! (seems a bit sneaky, but hey why not )

[ot]
no AT, im not trying to educate you! most of the above was for anyone browsing these posts!
[/ot]

 

OK, but the sharing is the easy part. If you figure out a way to easily and automatically provide an index for all the files in your /var/cache and a gpg signature for it all, I'll be impressed.

 

is that a "I dont know how to do it, and i dont think you'll manage to work it out?"

Ive been thinking about it for quite awhile, if all updates come from one machine on the local network (instead of a server on the internet) then updates only have to be downloaded once... obviously the more machines you have the bigger the advantage!

If You had your own 'repository' set up, then would you not be able to add new packages to be installed on all your machines?

 

No. Incidentally I do know how to setup a local Debian repo mirror, and indeed I know how to setup a custom repository (though even if I didn't, it's very well documented). But I also know that there's a lot of bandwidth involved in the former, and a lot of elbow grease involved in the latter. If you feel either scenario is justified for only 1 PC, or if you just want to try it as a learning scenario, then by all means, be my guest. However, if you think you're going to be saving time or bandwidth by doing either for only one computer, I think you'll find it's simply not the case.

See above.

Sure. You just have to build a release.gpg and DiffIndex which covers each package in your repo. And if you're maintaining a custom repo of your own, you also have to maintain & freshen packages and remove stale ones.

 

I'm definitely not looking to mirror any repositories! Thats FAR to much bandwidth! Any recommendations on guides for setting up a custom repository? (I Will have a look myself, so no bother if you don't know of any!)

Its more of a learning scenario, with the benefit of the updates only being downloaded once for mums laptop, systers computer (dual boot) and my laptop+Desktop.

Sounds like fun!

I don't suppose a caching Proxy server would be any easier? (would that work with the repositories?)

[ot]
The Kernel update went without any glitches
installing multimedia codec's etc with automatix now.
[/ot]

 

Roberto C. Sanchez's Homepage

If that's your type of fun, I have a few thousand MP3s which could use re-tagging.

You'd have to setup a pretty aggressive caching proxy, but the process would be more straightforward. See here.

[ot]

GJ
[/ot]

 

Although i do have dual Ethernet, Ive had to abort the caching proxy idea! I cant have other family members machines relying on my machine... it would only get me into hot water! (it would make my machine a production system, and you dont :swear: around with production systems if there working fine! [and i do love tinkering with my machine ] )

Im going to play with the Debian repository how to, if anyone has any more ideas for kubuntu they would be appreciated

[ot]
Thanks AT
[/ot]

 

There are a lot more packages updated than you normally download, so maintaining a complete repository for 1 computer, (you will install different packages on each most likely, so you need to have a complete repo mirror, and that will eat more bandwidth than it saves).

 

All machines are running kubuntu... and therefore will need the same patches for everything that comes with kubuntu by default.

I don't need a complete repository mirror, any package that can be downloaded from a repository i set up is still one less downloaded from the official repositories, which helps save my bandwidth and the bandwidth of the official repositories.

and as i only have a 2MBit line, its also a :swear: load faster! (It will make a MASSIVE difference to fresh installs needing updates!)

 

I don't think you understand what Addis is saying. He's saying that unless you have exactly the same software on each computer, you will have to maintain quite a varied array of packages. Chances are, you won't have exactly the same software packages on multiple OS installs, since each machine will be used by different people and since they weren't created from a single image.

Basically, the bottom line is that it will be a pretty substantial PITA for almost no payoff, if any at all. As Addis and I both mentioned, you'll probably eat up more bandwidth maintaining your local repo than you would just letting each system update independently.

 

When did i was going to include packages in this repository that i hadn't already downloaded?

I Know the order of which source of packages will be used can be set... so a updated package will be downloaded from my machine, if available... if not, then it will be downloaded from the official repository's.

[ot]
It could be interesting if every machine was setup like this... a sort of badly implemented P2P network for package upgrades

I say badly implemented as if 2 machines decide to update at the same time (and the rest are off / not requesting updates), then they would both download the packages from the official repository's as when asked (neither machine would report they have the packages...) instead of one machine downloading them and passing them to the second machine...
[/ot]

 

OK, I've managed to muck up the resolution....

I was playing with setting in "Monitor and display" in "System Settings" and now i im stuck with 640x480... before it was set to (and worked very well with) 1024x768.

When i set the resolution to anything higher than 640x480 the screen becomes completely messed up. s/c attached!

Unfortunately i cant remember what i changed.... (or even when i did it now, lack of sleep is starting to get to me).

It looks like the right hand side of the screen is being replicated onto the left hand side, and vice versa

 

Did you change the settings for the specific user, or change system wide resolutions in /etc/X11/xorg.conf?

 

i was using the "System Settings" program under Administrator mode, so i would guess it was system wide.

 

ok, if no1 knows whats wrong how would i go about getting graphics settings back to what they where on the fresh install? (what needs to be replaced / modified / deleted ).

i have the latest ATI drivers installed, they had been working fine for quite a few reboots before i had a few beers

 

failed attempt, mother dearest wont budge

spose i should just wait until all the other computers are running much better than her laptop, then propose the solution again