Flash on 64 bit Ubuntu is 1 good reason to install Google Chrome

http://support.google.com/chrome/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=108086

Adobe Flash is directly integrated with Google Chrome and enabled by default. Available updates for Adobe Flash are automatically included in Chrome system updates.

bash_profile bashrc Mac users think differently

Been trying to hack my Macbook to replace my Ubuntu work environment.
although MOST things are portable .. but I am finding that Mac users actually live with a lot of inconveniences for which there are hacks / solutions ..

like the aerosnap feature in Win7?
do yourself a favour and get this
https://github.com/fikovnik/ShiftIt


One thing that brings a chuckle to my face.
There's a lot of sites that 'solves' the missing bashrc problem by inserting in the the bash_profile that 'Mac uses instead'
http://superuser.com/questions/147043/where-to-find-the-bashrc-file-on-mac-os-x-snow-leopard-and-lion

Oh gosh just rename your bashrc to bash_profile and hope ur bash customizations ain't Mac averse

I am still trying to find how to write to NTFS in Lion .... I can't believe that if it's working fine in Ubuntu I might possibly have to fork out money to implement this. Seriously Apple should just pay for the NTFS licence just to make the point that Mac is friendlier to multi platforms OR allow users to implement NTFS write with the caveat that it's a reverse engineered hack


Update:
vim syntax isn't turned on by default (WHY??)
quick fix

cp  /usr/share/vim/vim73/vimrc_example.vim ~/.vimrc

context coloring in bash Terminal (Why would Mac ship with default B&W color schemes?)
http://superuser.com/questions/324207/how-do-i-get-context-coloring-in-mac-os-x-terminal
Check out the link above,
essentially insert these 2 lines

export CLICOLOR=1export LSCOLORS=GxFxCxDxBxegedabagaced

into your .bash_profile (not .profile )

Note: when working with vim, try to remember that crtl works as control and command is as per Linux / Win (not fun to mix up the keys on important documents)

add this alias will keep you from pulling your hair out when working in Mac and Linux environments

alias md5sum='md5 -r'

Note that it will mean nothing in Linux
But if you liked to use 'md5sum -c' like me, you might have to install md5sum proper :( I am delaying this but I don't think looking md5sums by eye is fun or accurate)

Bash autocomplete is turned off by default in Torrent Server

Gah! Can't believe this feature is turned off in stock installations of Torrent Server. :)
Thankfully Ubuntu documentation is a plenty
http://embraceubuntu.com/2006/01/28/turn-on-bash-smart-completion/

To enable smart completion, edit your /etc/bash.bashrc file. Uncomment the following lines, by removing the # in the beginning of the lines:

#if [ -f /etc/bash_completion ]; then
# . /etc/bash_completion
#fi


Update: hmmm got bash completion to work for admin user but not the ionguest .. suspect is some bash issues :(

Update 2: yes the reason is because the default bash login shell is /bin/sh and not /bin/bash which you can change using the chsh command
tip courtesy of
http://linuxwave.blogspot.com/2009/03/changing-default-shell-in-ubuntu.html

where's dos2unix on Ubuntu?

I have no idea why this is not installed by default ... anyway .. 


sudo apt-get install tofrodos
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree      
Reading state information... Done
The following NEW packages will be installed:
  tofrodos
0 upgraded, 1 newly installed, 0 to remove and 0 not upgraded.
Need to get 21.0kB of archives.
After this operation, 86.0kB of additional disk space will be used.
Get:1 http://sg.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ lucid/main tofrodos 1.7.8.debian.1-2 [21.0kB]
Fetched 21.0kB in 2s (8,629B/s)        
Selecting previously deselected package tofrodos.
(Reading database ... 249542 files and directories currently installed.)
Unpacking tofrodos (from .../tofrodos_1.7.8.debian.1-2_amd64.deb) ...
Processing triggers for man-db ...
Setting up tofrodos (1.7.8.debian.1-2) ...
 


NAME
       tofrodos - Converts text files between DOS and Unix formats.

SYNOPSIS
       fromdos [ options ] [file...]
       todos [ options ] [file...]

DESCRIPTION
       DOS  text  files traditionally have carriage return and line feed pairs
       as their newline characters while Unix text files have the line feed as
       their newline character.  fromdos converts text files from the DOS for‐
       mat to the Unix format, while todos converts text files from  the  Unix
       format to the DOS format.
 

Booting Ubuntu off a USB thumb/hdd

Hands up for those who feel frustrated burning CDs of linux distros only to find out at boot that the burn went wrong and you have failed md5 checksums on the disc thereby restarting your installation process!

there's other stuff like haven't to reinstall all your favourite programs like gvim bioperl etc.. cos the liveCD doesn't contain them. 

Have always known that you can boot off a USB thumbdrive, so I found an old seagate 10 GB HDD (dun laugh! I finally found a use for it!!) plugged that in a USB casing,
followed the instructions in here for making a casper-rw for persistent file settings

downloaded the proprietary ATI drivers for my motherboard. and off I go in experimentation!
will update this post for my experience!
I hope CentOS will behave well in this manner! Not relishing the experience of having to burn another failed DVD


UPDATE: Darn Gigabyte MA785GT-UD3H refuses to boot from my USB HDD nor my 2 GB  thumb!
the bios recog the HDD, and thumb
for the former it just hangs there.
the latter gave a boot error with no specifics!
no idea why!

New Job new distro

Have started in a new job!
but basically am doing Next Generation Sequencing Bioinformatics.
Sounds like a mouthful but hope it goes well.

1st week was spent on sourcing a cheap cluster for analysis. but 'cheap cluster' is an oxymoron!

Playing around with CentOS now. So far, its less than enjoyable compared to Ubuntu. Especially the 7 CDs or single DVD downloading.
I can't understand why making people download so many RPMs would be a good thing for bandwidth or convenience.

I miss my Ubuntu box. but setting up a HPC cluster using Ubuntu might be tricky without tech support.

Any advice for those familiar with ABI Solid's offline cluster setup?

Fix right alt in Ubuntu 9.10

You need to select System and Preference and then Keyboard.

then you need to choose Layout then Layout Options.

then under key to choose 3rd level choose Right alt key to never choose 3rd level.

The description is counter intuitive as in 7.04 you actually have to choose right alt to be 3rd level when u want it to behave like R-alt...