Here’s how I setup a desktop shortcut in Lubuntu:

Open Terminal (on Lubuntu, it’s called LXTerminal, but any terminal will do).

Verify that you have lxshortcut installed by entering this into Terminal (enter your root password when prompted):

sudo apt-get install lxshortcut

Now to create the desktop shortcut, enter this in Terminal:

lxshortcut -o ~/Desktop/nautilus.desktop

A GUI window will pop up and you can enter the details as you like. I wanted a desktop shortcut to launch Nautilus file browser only, so I entered where it says Command:

nautilus --browser --no-desktop

NOTE: Those are double dashes in front

Finish customizing the name and icon for your new shortcut and Save. Now you will have a desktop shortcut to use Nautilus within Lubuntu.

Initially, this took many hours and lots of googling for answers. I’ve decided to list the steps below. On the second pc, the entire process only took 45 minutes to setup.

I used a linux distro called CRUNCHBANG (#!) and I chose the lite version – it’s lean and mean linux goodness.

Download the .iso file and burn it to a CD. I use k3b to burn cd’s on my Ubuntu system. It is important to burn the .iso file as “bootable”.

Set you old pc to boot from the CD rom (go into the BIOS and make sure it’s set to boot CD first). Now, boot the system with the CRUNCHBANG CD in the pc. CRUNCHBANG will now be running from the CD. This is a bit confusing as it looks like it’s installed to the hard drive…but it’s not. Yet.

Right-click on the Desktop and choose “Install” and then “Install CRUNCHBANG”.

Follow the on screen prompts to install. For more detailed instructions on the installation, refer to the CRUNCHBANG Installation Guide.

Be sure to use the same workgroup name as the other pc’s on your network and write down what you called this pc. You will need this later to connect to it.

Next, we’ll need to install Samba (for file sharing) so that any Windows computers on our network can see the share as well.

Open Terminator (terminal) either by right-clicking the desktop and using the menu or pressing the “Windows” key and the “T” key. CRUNCHBANG has these “SUPER” key shortcuts that you will soon find very addictive.

Let’s make sure our repositories and such have the latest updates, so type or copy/paste this line:

sudo apt-get update

Now, let’s install Samba. In the Terminator window, type or copy/paste this line at the flashing prompt:

sudo apt-get install samba

Next let’s install Samba configuration editor. Enter or copy/paste this into Terminator:

sudo apt-get install system-config-samba

Use the text editor to edit this file. Be sure to enter the exact workgroup name of your network. Otherwise the other computers on the network won’t “see” this share.

From Terminator enter:

sudo nano /etc/samba/smb.conf

Optional – edit the host name in /etc/hostname

Be aware that when you make changes to smb.conf you then need to restart Samba for the change to take effect. From Terminator, enter:

sudo /etc/init.d/samba restart

In the file manager, create the folder to share and give it RW permissions as Root. If during the course of this tutorial, you can’t read or write to the share, that is most likely due to permissions. I had to open my permissions to “see” the share, and then narrow them down until I got it just right.

I found using the default file manager difficult to “see” the shares, so I installed Nautilus. At terminator type or copy/paste:

sudo apt-get install nautilus

And since Nautilus likes to mess with the desktop, I disabled a few things. Remove all the interference of Nautilus desktop by running these from terminal. Use copy/paste into Terminator to make sure you enter it correctly:

This will disable Nautilus desktop:

gconftool-2 -s -t bool /apps/nautilus/preferences/show_desktop false &

Do not let Nautilus set the background image:

gconftool-2 -s -t bool /desktop/gnome/background/draw_background false &

Make Nautilus use spatial mode, should start-up quicker:

gconftool-2 -s -t bool /apps/nautilus/preferences/always_use_browser false &

Make Nautilus show the advanced permissions dialog:

gconftool-2 -s -t bool /apps/nautilus/preferences/show_advanced_permissions true &

Next let’s attach that physical folder to Samba, so the rest of the network can see it and read/write to it. At Terminator, enter:

sudo system-config-samba

If you want to set this computer up as a “headless” server (one with no monitor, keyboard, mouse, etc), you can install Vino to be able to remotely connect to it for administration and such. Pretty handy stuff!

To install Vino (for remote connections) on the file sharing computer, in Terminator type or copy/paste:

sudo apt-get install vino

If the computer that will be connecting to it is Linux, run this command at the teminal prompt on that pc:

sudo apt-get install xtightvncviewer

If you will be connecting to it thru Windows, just use “Remote Desktop”.

Ok, let’s configure the server , in a terminal type :

vino-preferences

Set it how you want it and save/close.

Let’s make sure vino starts automatically upon reboot, so back in terminal type or copy/paste:

/usr/lib/vino/vino-server &

Done! Let’s check our work by going to another computer on the network. If it’s a Linux pc use Nautilus (the default file browser) to browse the network to the share or click File -> Connect to Server and enter the name of your computer and the share manually.

Basically, I just opened Terminal in Super User mode (found this in my menu system at Applications | System Tools | Terminal Program – Super User Mode). You will need to enter your root (super user aka su) password before proceeding.

Next, I entered this at the command line:

sudo rm -rf /home/YOUR HOME DIRECTORY HERE/.local/share/Trash/files/*

note: there is a space after the -rf and mind the capital letters as they matter to linux.

**caution: this will really really really delete stuff so be careful**

First, we need to add the repository where all the cool backports and upgrades are. At the command prompt, type:

sudo nano /etc/apt/sources.list

and add this line at the bottom:

deb http://www.backports.org/debian lenny-backports main contrib non-free

To save, use CTRL – X and Y to save.

Now we need to add the public key ring for backports, at the command prompt, type:

wget -O – http://backports.org/debian/archive.key | apt-key add -

Once that is successful, update apt by entering:

apt-get update

Finally, we’re ready to install Open Office 3 on Debian Lenny. Type this at the command line:

apt-get -t lenny-backports install openoffice.org

And it will show dependancies and what files it will need to download and install. If all looks ok, enter Y and the install will commence.

Got my info from a few sources here and here.

If your extraction left you with file(s) that have multiple underscores or spaces, right-click the file choose Rename. Edit and remove extra spaces and underscores but leave the extension .ttf . This will make it a lot easier to copy these files from the command line as you’ll see in a moment.

Open up your Terminal as Super User (su). I usually just select Applications | System Tools | Terminal Program – Super User Mode

Enter your su password.

At the command prompt, path out to your Desktop directory by entering:

cd /home/name_of_your_homearea/Desktop

*Note: In Linux, case matters, so Desktop must have the capital D.

*Note: Enter the exact name of your home area after /home/

To copy the ttf files to your fonts area, enter this at the command line:

cp name_of_file_you_downloaded.ttf /usr/share/fonts/truetype/

If you are wanting to copy and entire folder to the fonts area, at the command prompt enter

cp /home/name_of_your_homearea/Desktop/folder_name /usr/share/fonts/truetype -r

*Note: There is a space after cp and after the folder name in the command line

You will have to restart your computer for the changes to go into effect but that’s it!

If you want to check and make sure the files are successfully copied over, open your file explorer and path up (usually it will default open in your home area, so you’ll need to use File | Open Parent a few times to get all the way to the top of the file structure. From the top (double-click Computer and choose Filesystem), path out to usr/share/fonts/truetype and you should see all your fonts including the newly copied ones.

*Note: If you can’t see certain directories, they may be hidden. To view hidden files and folders, select View | Show Hidden from your Explorer window.

Interested in installing the Microsoft fonts to your Linux system in one quick download? Check out this fab tutorial by Mark Sanborn.

Awhile back we learned how to transfer your own legally purchased mp3’s to your Verizon cellphone and be able to listen to music without having to purchase songs thru Verizon’s very expensive and clunky “service”. You can find that tutorial here.

The only thing I can think of that would cost anything  is the actual text message you will be sending yourself with the ringtone attached, so check your rate on “picture messages” before going too crazy.

Using Audacity, an opensource, free, sound editor available for both Windows and Linux platforms, we can crop our legally purchased mp3’s into “ringtone length” midi files. Let’s walk thru it.

Download and install Audacity. For Linux, I just use Synaptic Package Manager | Search for Audacity | And install from there as any dependancy files will be automatically installed as well, including the very important LAME encoder. If you are installing this on Windows, make sure you install and configure the LAME encoder which will allow you to export as mp3.

Now that Audacity is installed and configured with the LAME encoder, let’s open an mp3 that you want to crop for a ringtone.

Open Audacity and choose File | Open. Path out to an mp3 file and Open it. It may take several seconds for Audacity to open it and then you will see the file in the timeline window (click the image below for a larger screenshot of the Audacity interface):

Listen to the song by clicking the play button and make a note of what section of the song you want to crop as the ringtone.

Using the select tool,  click and drag to highlight the area for the ringtone. You won’t have to be too specific right now, we will tweak the crop in the next step. Just generally select the area you want. With it selected, it should look like this:

Next, click on the menu Edit | Trim, which will leave just the selection, cutting away the rest of the song. Great! Now let’s fine tune our trim and save it to send to your cellphone.

Click on the Zoom tool,  to zoom in on each side of the song. Click and drag with the Select tool, to highlight the area you want to cut away. From the menu choose Edit | Cut to trim away the highlighted area. I like to use Cut, as then I can “undo” if needed. Continue this process until you are happy with your ringtone track.

Now, let’s export it and get it ready to send to the cellphone. From the menu, choose File | Export. This dialog box will pop up. I recommend making the name of the file short for simplicity in viewing the file on your phone. Verify that mp3 is the export format type and where the file will be saved:

Click Save. You will get an additional popup for tagging the file (the meta information), I usually just leave the defaults and click Ok:

Now, we have to rename the file to midi, so that our cellphone will recognize it as a ringtone. Easy enough. Just edit the file extension and change it from mp3 to midi. Make sure you are changing the file extension and not just the file name. For example:

Dragostea_Din_Tei.midi

Now, to get that midi over to your cellphone with a picture/text message.  You can use gmail, Yahoo, etc to send an email to your cellphone with the midi file attached.

Send an email with the attached midi to YOUR_CELLPHONE_NUMBER@vzwpix.com

When you receive the message on your cellphone, open it and download the attachment. Now you can save the download/attachment as a ringtone! That’s it!

Remember, check your rates/plan to see if there are extra costs for you to receive PICTURE messages. That’s the transport we are using to get the ringtone to your phone. Other than that, free ringtones from your own music collection, custom edited by you – how cool is that?!

For exhausting information on using Audacity, check out the Tips wiki here.

I created this tutorial while experimenting on my Samsung U550. In general this process should work for most phones on Verizon. If you need a more exhaustive tutorial, check out Audacity’s version of Making Ringtones.

And if you need info on other cellphones and carriers, check out Howard Forums.

First download the latest deb package of KompoZer to your Desktop.

Next, open up your Terminal as Super User (su). I usually just select Applications | System Tools | Terminal Program – Super User Mode

Enter your su password. Now, lets install the package with gdebi by entering gdebi plus the path to the downloaded file at the command line. Press the Enter key to begin the install.

gdebi /home/your_home_folder_name/Desktop/name_of_file_you_downloaded

See an example of my entry at the command line and the name /location of the downloaded file – click the image to enlarge. Remember, Unix/Linux based system are case sensitive, so Desktop has to be capitalized in your command line.

Now you will see gdebi unpacking the file and checking for dependancies. It will display the author’s description of the package. And it will ask if you want to install KompoZer. Enter Y and press the Enter key.

Now it will do the actual install. When it’s done, and Terminal returns to the command prompt, type logout to exit Terminal. Click image for a larger screenshot:

That’s it! Kompozer is now installed! I found the icon for it under Applications | Internet.

Now, how to use it, right?! From the fine folks on the sourceforge forums for this app, sessileoak posted some links to two guides. Check them out here:

And for everything you ever needed for installing, setting up, and building the perfect debian lenny system can be found in this awesome tutorial by falco on the How To Forge site. Many thanks to falco – all kudos and good karma to you for your great instruction.

Well, I finally found a package that will rip audio cd’s to mp’3 in Linux! Let me walk you thru how to set it up and use it.

Use your package manager, or aptitiude, to install kAudioCreator. Comment if you need to know how to do this or look at this tutorial that walks thru installing stuff in Linux. I downloaded it using my package manager Synaptic, searching for the keyword: kAudioCreator

After Kaudiocreator is installed, you will find the icon off your menu. Mine happens to be located at Applications | Sound & Video | kAudioCreator

Insert your legally purchased CD into the cdrom drive. Now, on my linux system, SoundJuicer automatically pops up. No big, just close whatever program automatically opens.

When you open kAudioCreator for the first time, you will get an error message that tells you to configure your settings. No problem, we were going to do that anyway right!

And everytime you open kAudioCreator you will get a prompt about how to format your information from CDDB, the CD database that automatically fills in your artist, album and track information. Just select your preferred format:

Next we will configure the encoder. Click on the left icon that looks like a funnel:

Click on MP3 as the encoder type. Now we have to set the encoded file location and format. Here’s where it gets a bit tricky, trying to figure out the correct fomatting for how you want the tracks stored and written as files. The default location and format is:

~/%{extension}/%{albumartist}/%{albumtitle}/%{artist} – %{number} – %{title}.%{extension}

Let me walk you thru what each part means, so you can change as you prefer:

~ will put the files in a folder at your home directory.

/%{extension}/%{albumartist}/%{albumtitle}/% will put them in a folder based on the extension, in the default case, a folder called mp3. Then in a folder named for the album’s artist, and finally in a folder named after  the album title.

{artist} – %{number} – %{title}.%{extension} will names these files Artist – TrackNumber – Title of Track.mp3

So, the only thing I had to edit was where to store the files. I wanted them to go into an existing folder called Music. Everything else was cool so I simply removed {extension} and added Music to the path like so:

~/Music/%{albumartist}/%{albumtitle}/%{artist} – %{number} – %{title}.%{extension}

There is a File Location and Formatting Wizard if you need help and a beautiful “Defaults” button to reset everything. A note on the Defaults button. If you click it, it will set ALL the settings back to default. All as in every panel All. Use carefully.

I didn’t care for the wizard, but here’s a screen capture if you want to see it:

Next thing to set is the Ripper information. Click on the left icon that looks like a blue widget. Here we set the Default Temporary Directory, where kAudioCreator will use space to rip and then encode the files. This directory has to be writable, so for simplicity I just use my home directory. kAudioCreator cleans up these files automatically after ripping, so there’s no leftover junk in the home directory. Enter the location you want to use as a Default Temporary Directory and any other settings you want here:

Now, once these are set you won’t have to do this everytime. Yay! Let’s rip a cd! When you insert a cd, remember another program might popup, but close that program and open kAudioCreator. You’ll get the prompt for how to format your CDDB, choose one and you’ll have this screen:

Click either Select All Tracks or manually click the track(s) you want to rip. When you select a track, a check mark will be next to it like this:

Now click on the Rip widget icon:

To watch the status of kAudioCreator ripping your tracks (and then encoding them to mp3), click on the Job Status tab. It will rip first to OGG:

Then encode to MP3:

Finally saving it to your specified location:

So that’s it! Post any comments or questions on this tutorial below.

Once you download it, there will be several icons off your menu systems. You have to Use the Etherape (root) icon in Applications | Internet for it to work, otherwise it’ll open with an error. It has to be used as root.

Or open your Terminal as root then enter, “cd /” then “cd /usr/bin/” and then “sudo etherape”. You might have to type in your root admin password at this point to run it from the Terminal.

Yes, I have blocked out some of the IP addresses, but you get a general feel for how it looks. The size of the line grows and shrinks as network traffic increase and decreases to different addresses and services on your network. Pretty sweet!

If you click on View | Protocols you can see a simple status breakdown of all the network traffic, to go a bit more granular in your investigations. From this tool, I found that my Lenny distro was running a bunch of “extra” protocols that I didn’t need – such as mDNS, which I removed to optimize my internet connection even more.

I am on a network with Windows computers, so some of this traffic in my grid is theirs but then I have a good reason to yell at them for playing World of Warcraft when I’m trying to publish this blog, right!

Sure, you can run over to Terminal as Root and enter that command everytime your reboot and want to use Cinelerra, and yes, that’s 7 f’s. But why not make a more permanent change. This error message is just trying to say to allocate more memory space to Cinelerra. Cinelerra will be happy. Linux will be happy. You’ll be happy. So let’s go team!

Open terminal in super user mode, I just used the icon already on Debian, under Applications | System Tools | Terminal Server – Super User Mode and enter the following at the command prompt to make a backup of this file. You always make a backup, right!?

cp /etc/sysctl.conf /etc/sysctl.conf.backup

Now let’s edit this file. Enter this next:

nano /etc/sysctl.conf

At the very bottom of the file, add this line, and remember that’s 7 f’s, we’re talking memory size here. After adding this line, save and close the file, CTRL-X and then Y for yes to save it.

kernel/shmmax=0×7fffffff

Now, let’s put this file in action, at the command prompt enter:

sudo sysctl -p

Test by opening Cinelerra. Yay! No more annoying error message! Well, at least at startup.