I updated the Ubuntu HCL site with my experience of the previously mentioned 3g mobile connect card. Take a look here.
Huawei E170 (Networking) - Ubuntu Linux Hardware Compatibility List
My 3g mobile connect card I got from Mobily was detected automatically on Ubuntu, which is version 8.10. The connect card is Huawei e170. The first couple of times I tried connecting it didn’t work. When I checked the settings I found that everything was empty except the “Number” which was *99# and the “APN” was “web2″.
I thought I remembered that the APN was “web1″, so I changed that and it worked. Then I configured it to automatically connect. So as soon as I connect the USB 3g mobile stick it detects it and connects right away.
Using it on Ubuntu is a breeze compared to using it on my XP partition. First the detection of the USB device is slow, then I have to start the Huawei software, then it queries the USB device to check network status, which can take about 10 seconds. Then if everything is ok, I have to click on “Connect”.
Btw, when I checked the configuration settings for the software I got from Mobily, it turns out that “web1″ is for postpaid accounts and “web2″ is the setting for prepaid accounts. I have a postpaid account.
This can be considered as negative mark on the Ubuntu HSPA driver. It should have given the choice of both prepaid and postpaid, then know the right APN for each. Where it only asked to use Mobily or STC.
Often documents are written in Arabic using specific Windows fonts, so when the document needs to be viewed on Ubuntu it might not display correctly. One method to solve this problem, is to use the fonts from your Windows partition within Ubuntu.
First create a new directory within Ubuntu under the system’s truetype fonts path, for your Win fonts:
sudo mkdir /usr/share/fonts/truetype/mywinfonts
Then copy the fonts from your windows partition into your newly created folder “mywinfonts”:
sudo cp /media/system/WINDOWS/Fonts/* /usr/share/fonts/truetype/mywinfonts/
Now you need to reload the font cache for the new fonts to be available immediately:
fc-cache -f -v
I upgraded my desktop to Ubuntu Hardy 8.04 when it first came. Ubuntu 7.10/Feisty was running fine before that.
Immediately after the upgrade things worked great. The Compiz effects were cool. The new NetworkManager seemed nice.
A week or two later I started to notice that random application would stop responding and at other times the gui would hang. Then one, I noticed the when I booted up the machine I would get an error at first “Internal error, failed to initialize HAL!” accompanied by the NetworkManager showing the network disconnected, even though the network was up and running fine — I could browse, ping and everything normally.
I did some googling to figure out if anybody is having this. The answer is: yes. The solution: no clear solution. At least I couldn’t find one that really applied to me. Also, I kept hitting old bugs from old versions of Ubuntu for both problems.
I ignored these problems for a few weeks, but it seemed the hanging was increasing in frequency — or it could’ve been that my patience running thin.
Finally, my machine froze up and did not recover during a reboot. It would freeze up right after icecast2 then mysql started. So I autoremoved both icecast2 and mysql hoping that would fix. No luck. … No its time to get dirty and look at the logs. …
I will keep you posted.
I thought I’d list my favorite Firefox extensions for easy access:
And if you don’t have Firefox yet, you can download it from: http://getfirefox.com/
Good news (BBC NEWS | Technology | Q&A: Googles Android.) I’m relieved that the rumours of a Google Phone (GPhone), were not true. This initiative is much more beneficial to the market and end-users in the long run.
Open Source/Linux has been on mobile handsets for a while, but no great successes yet. Hopefully this alliance can help push free software into the middle of where things are happening. Once an open source product has feature parity with existing mainstream products, this will fuel market acceptance, which can then unleash further creativity of open source developers. A great example of this transition is what happened with Mozilla’s Firefox.
I’m surprised that other Linux Mobile firms did not get on the bandwagon. It might make sense for ACCESS (owner of PalmSource) to join the club, as the have GNU/Linux based Mobile Operating System ALP (ACCESS Linux Platform.) We’ve been hearing about ALP for the past few years, yet I haven’t seen show up on any phones. Since PalmOne/Palm Inc. doesn’t seem to want it (See nice Wikipedia page on this,) that might make a good partnership with this alliance.
FreeMind is a free mind mapping software and Open Source clone of the cool Mindmapper.
Mind mapping software is very useful for organization of information. It can be very useful for Brainstrooming sessions, organizing thoughts and priorities, and even for simply remembering things.
Looks like a serious upgrade, 7.10 More Info | Ubuntu.
The servers seem a bit slow to download right now. I’ll try getting it a few days later.
I’m hoping that device driver enhancements, will fix some of the graphics problems that I’ve been to lazy to figure out on my notebook (Lenovo T60p.)
Technology News: Embedded Linux : PalmSource Debuts Linux Platform for Handhelds: “Access subsidiary PalmSource on Tuesday announced its much-anticipated Linux-based operating system for handheld devices. The Access Linux Get Linux or Windows Managed Hosting Services with Industry Leading Fanatical Support. Platform (ALP) will bring full compatibility to devices with a Linux core.”
“ALP is based on the Linux 2.6.12 kernel and contains several application programming interfaces (APIs) linked together by a graphic interface called MAX.”
I was a bit confused about what the difference is between FS and OSS. So I have been reading up on it. I’ve read about 5 different articles, and I’m still not sure what the difference is. Free Software does not mean software that you pay Zero money for as this article points out (by Richard Stallman.)
Free Software briefly means that you have the “freedom” to use, redistribute, study, modify and improve the software.
Which is similar to OSS. So far, I believe that the main difference is that “Open Source Software” sounds cooler, and is easier to market than “Free Software”. And that is the problem, as I understand Stallman tries to point out: market share should not be the primary goal, but the primary goal is the freedom itself that FS/OSS provides. So in this quest for market share, some freedoms are being sacrificed. (Such as using non-free software with the GNU/Linux, and all the problems that might entail.)
So to rephrase my current understanding of this issue: the primary difference between the FS and OSS philosophies is that FS refuses to use non-free software even when there is no alternative. (Please correct me if I’m wrong .)
Myself, I don’t know what non-free software that I’m using on my machine other than the Flash plugin, and maybe some codecs. (I wonder if there are Free flash and realplayer alternatives for Linux?) Maybe there is more to this issue than I currently understand.
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