Tips, tricks and tutorials» Tips and tricks, tutorials

Howto Install Vietnamese Input Method ibus-unikey in Ubuntu

admin — Fri, 07 May 2010 16:17:49 +0000

IBus (Intelligent Input Bus for Linux/Unix OS) become the main Language Input Method manager since Ubuntu 9.10. For Vietnamese people and ones who want to learn and type Vietnamese language, unikey is usually the best choice in Windows and Linux as well. This article is going to guide to install ibus-unikey in Ubuntu.

Ibus-Unikey package is maintained by Ubuntu-VN community, so ibus-unikey or scim-unikey is always in their PPAs. So we can easily install and get package update whenever the new version is released.

Add Ubuntu-VN repository

For Ubuntu from 9.10, Ubuntu 10.04, just open Terminal and type this command:

$sudo add-apt-repository ppa:ubuntu-vn/ppa

Update system and install ibus-unikey

Next, just update your system:

$ sudo apt-get update

And insall ibus-unikey package:

sudo apt-get install ibus-unikey

DONE. Now you can choose to add Unikey in the Vietnamese language selection of IBus Preferences.

Rating: 8.0/10 (6 votes cast)

How To Remove Twitter Updates From Facebook?

admin — Thu, 22 Apr 2010 16:18:35 +0000

I am usually using Facebook and Twitter together, so sometimes I feel lazy to post what I am doing to both Facebook and Twitter so I was always looking for a good application which can automatically post my Twitter Updates to Facebook. Finally I was so satisfied with this Twitter application.

But by time it is really annoying that every my Twitter updates show up in Facebook, and my friends always said I am a spammer ^-^, but couldn’t know how to prevent it to steal my updates until today.

What do you have to do ?

- Go to that application
- You can see the option Block this application. Just click that link, so your Twitter updates will no longer be posted in Facebook.

Rating: 0.0/10 (0 votes cast)

Free Online Tools To Make Up Your Twitter Background

admin — Wed, 21 Apr 2010 14:28:09 +0000

I am a Twitter fan so far, so I have been always looking for good enough tools to make up my Twitter background. Today, after working, just spent little time I can have a overview of those tools, thanks to hongkiat.com article.

Is the default blue background of your Twitter page starting to look stale, or is it just me? It’s time to spice up your Twitter page with a little more personality – a little more YOU! With the growing trend of Twitter usage, it’s only logical to treat Twitter as an impression of yourself. And as you would personalize the profile picture of your Facebook, why leave your Twitter as one of the faceless crowd?

Just choose one suitable tool for you from here

For me, I choose http://www.freetwitterdesigner.com to design my background. That online tool works like a online Photoshop program, so I can easily design make my own background. Just have a look http://twitter.com/ngohaibac

Rating: 0.0/10 (0 votes cast)

How to configure Windows Firewall for FTP Server

admin — Wed, 14 Apr 2010 12:02:40 +0000

At this moment, I am using one Windows Server 2008 running on an VPS (Virtual Private Server). Like before, I always want to setup system by myself to make sure to know what is on my system. The first time, I was thinking to use Linux server, but I changed my mind at last to choose Windows since uTorrent runs very well and is supported and recommended on almost well-known Private Torrent Trackers such as hd-torrents, bit-hdtv, bitme, bitspyder, … I can use XAMPP since I am very familiar with, but I just wanted to face with Windows stuff

I will briefly introduce some steps that you need to go though.

1. Need to install IIS7 and setup Web Server (if you want to share data through HTTP protocol) and FTP Server 7.5 based on these tutorials from IIS

2. The above steps are not difficult, they can be done around 30mins or 1h included waiting time. But the most difficult task is finding the way to configure Windows firewall for FTP Server even read this steps many times.

FTP Server has data channel and control channel (usually 21), so we need to forward all needed ports though Windows firewall. Below is setting for FTP Data channel Port Range:

If in Windows Firewall configuration, you just allow port 21, you can use command to list data, but you can’t read data since there is only one port for that. When I used FireZilla I got this message:

Error: Could not read from socket: ECONNRESET – Connection reset by peer
Error: Disconnected from server
Error: Failed to retrieve directory listing

So one important step here is let Windows Firewall understand and allow the FTP assigned ports by run those commands under Command Prompt as Administrator: (base on this help)

netsh advfirewall firewall add rule name=”FTP Service” action=allow service=ftpsvc protocol=TCP dir=in

And disable stateful FTP filtering so that the firewall does not block any FTP traffic:

netsh advfirewall set global StatefulFTP disable

So now I can enjoy download files from my server

Rating: 0.0/10 (0 votes cast)

How to setup Video calls in Skype on 64-bit Ubuntu system

admin — Sat, 27 Mar 2010 14:48:20 +0000

Skype is a software to make free video and voice calls, send instant messages and share files with other Skype users. You can use Skype in almost famous platforms: Windows, Linux, Mac OS and for your mobiles as well. For Linux users, you can easily download and install Skype binary package from here.

With the 32-bit Ubuntu box, you simply just plug Webcam or use build-in webcam, turn Skype and enjoy chatting with your girlfriend, however with the 64-bit counterpart, you have to do some tricks to make it works. Otherwise, you can’t see anything even you still can see camera file in /dev/video0

1. You have to locate v4l1compat.so library in your system. User Terminal and type this:

$ find / -name v4l1compat.so 2>/dev/null
/usr/lib/libv4l/v4l1compat.so
/usr/lib32/libv4l/v4l1compat.so

Use /dev/null to ignore errors can appear during searching for that lib.

2. You then have to load that library before other Skype libs by using LD_PRELOAD. You can read this article to see how LD_PRELOAD works: Modifying a Dynamic Library Without Changing the Source Code

So now create a file in anywhere you like with this folowing content:

#!/bin/bash
LD_PRELOAD=/usr/lib/libv4l/v4l1compat.so /usr/bin/skype

And don’t forget to set execute permission to that file (chmod u+x ./yourfile).

Rating: 10.0/10 (1 vote cast)

How to fix Sound problem of Windows 7 in notebook MSI VX600

admin — Wed, 23 Dec 2009 15:13:59 +0000

I have been using Windows for a long time so far. Recently I switched to Windows 7 and was surprised about its performance. The most interesting thing in Windows 7 is that it can automatically recognize the new hardware and install it, so I didn’t need CD driver for installing drivers like I did before. I am a Linux fan, but I still use Windows because I am using some particular softwares that run only in Windows.

But actually it made me crazy with the default sound driver, I couldn’t enjoy great sound like before in Windows XP. Searching in the Internet and found out there are a lot of people out there got the same problem like have no sound, there is crazy noise, … and there are also a lot of solutions. But the easiest way is use the default drivers provided by the manufacturer.

Step 1

Uninstall the old driver from Drive manager by typing those words in the search box, find sound and uninstall it.

Step 2

Use the driver disc and find audio folder under audio and install it. After that, restart the system again. The audio driver in here is Realtek High Definition Audio Codec R2.04 (09/12/2008).

You can download that driver from here or simply search that version driver from Google.

Note: not the latest version because I have tried it and the same problem had occurred, so be careful.

Rating: 10.0/10 (3 votes cast)

How to install packages from GetDeb

admin — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 18:56:33 +0000

Homepage: http://www.getdeb.net

Today, I went to the GetDeb website just because I wanted to download the latest Filezilla FTP application for my Ubuntu 9.10, and I was really surprised that now they have a very great website and also their own Repository. Before it was so difficult to access this website, even couldn’t see anything, I thought just because it is so famous among websites for very huge Ubuntu fans, and now they change to the new server and also technical supports. Thank GetDeb people so much for their efforts to bring a lot of benefits to Ubuntu fans. In here, you can easily find some famous applications such that Pidgin, Filezilla, …

As you know that, there are 2 ways to install a package: compile from the source or install from Ubuntu repositories. So GetDeb people just compile every new sources into ready install .deb files, so everyone can just download them and install. Therefore, it take just little time for everyone.

There are 2 ways you can download packages from GetDeb website:

Go directly to GetDeb and download the latest .deb files and install manually but you will not know whenever there is a update package without always checking this website.
Install GetDeb repository. This post almost covers the second method.

Install repository

Use the following instructions:

Install the getdeb package.
Or configure the repository manually:Go to System-Administration-Software Sources, Third-Party Software tab, Add:
```
deb http://archive.getdeb.net/ubuntu karmic-getdeb apps
```

Add the repository GPG key, open a terminal window and type:

wget -q -O- http://archive.getdeb.net/getdeb-archive.key | sudo apt-key add -

Click the “Install this now” button below the screenshot of the desired application.

Have fun with your always update packages.

Rating: 10.0/10 (1 vote cast)

How to upgrade Pidgin and fix Yahoo problem in Ubuntu 9.04

admin — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 03:06:27 +0000

Some days ago, I couldn’t even sign in my Yahoo account in Pidgin. At that time, I guessed that having some problems and was waiting for upgrade version of Pidgin. Finally, the new version 2.5.7 has been released on 20th June wih new bug fix.

Version 2.5.7 (06/20/2009)

Yahoo Protocol 16 support, including new HTTPS login method; this should fix a number of login problems that have recently cropped up. (Sulabh Mahajan, Mike “Maiku” Ruprecht)
Only display the AIM “Unable to Retrieve Buddy List” message once per connection. (Rob Taft)
Blocking MSN users not on your buddy list no longer disconnects you.
When performing operations on MSN, assume users are on the MSN/Passport network if we don’t get network ID’s for them.

In my option, I always want to get newest packages from their repositories instead of default Ubuntu’s repositories, so we need to update PPA.

Step 1: Setup PPA

To setup the PPA, copy-and-paste these commands into a terminal:

sudo apt-key adv --recv-keys --keyserver keyserver.ubuntu.com \
     67265eb522bdd6b1c69e66ed7fb8bee0a1f196a8

and

echo deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/pidgin-developers/ppa/ubuntu \
    `lsb_release --short --codename` main | \
 sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/pidgin-ppa.list

Step 2: Update pidgin

Update repositories by typing command:

sudo apt-get update

Now you will be able to get new Pidgin version.

Have fun and enjoy your Pidgin messenger.

Please have a look at http://www.pidgin.im for more information.

Rating: 10.0/10 (1 vote cast)

How to setup Dual Monitor in Ubuntu 9.04 with ATI Driver

admin — Wed, 10 Jun 2009 08:07:16 +0000

I am working in my Lab with 2 19′ LCD Monitors. I have search Google about this issue when I finished installing Ubuntu 9.04 and I was unable to configure to use 2 monitors.

My desktop computer’s configuration:

Intel(R) Core(M) 2 Quad CPU Q6600
DDR3 4GB
ATI Radeon HD2600XT

After I try to install ATI Drivers supported from ATI website I have figured out how to configure Ubuntu 9.04 to work with 2 monitors and I found some intersting thing as well. In this case, I am using 2 digital ports of those monitors.

Step 1: Install driver

Install ATI Driver from ATI website instead of driver from Synaptic: How to install ATI Graphic driver for Ubuntu 9.04

If you used ATI driver from synaptic, you should disable this by going to menu System -> Administration -> Hardware drivers, and install the driver again.

Step 2: Configure

Firstly, open the Catalyst Control Center by going to Applications menu and choose ATI Catalyst Control Center (super – user) or type this command in the Terminal: amdxdg-su -c amdcccle

In the tab Display Manager, you will be able to config 2 monitors to work Independently by choosing Single (Independent display)

Note that, now you can reboot your system and see what will happend, because you can face the resolution issue that you can’t configure again in the next step. If you got the lower resolution you can change by going to the properties tab on above figure. Don’t worry about that, you can do it.

The interesting thing is you can have 2 monitors work independently. 2 monitors seem to be separate from each other and you can’t drag a application from this monitor to other monitor. If you like this option, you can keep it and don’t need to follow next step.

If you want to drag windows from this monitors to other, you can enable Xinerame feature in the Display Option tab:

Important notice

If you upgrade the new Linux kernel, you might have a display problem, you can fix it by using root terminal at bootup screen to install ATI Driver again based on step 1.

I have success to configure dual monitorss on my system, and enjoy my time hehe.

Have fun.

Rating: 8.5/10 (2 votes cast)

How to install Picasa in Ubuntu

admin — Sat, 30 May 2009 19:51:24 +0000

Homepage: http://picasa.google.com

Today, I am going to upload my pictures from last party, I suddenly remember a such powerful and great image management: Picasa from Google. Actually, I love Google products because of their simple characteristics. Picasa application can run cross-platform on Linux and Windows OS as well. In Windows, it use this one also.

Now Picasa 3 comes with new features:

Improved integration with Picasa Web Albums

You can sync your Picasa 3 and Web Albums edits, change your online album settings from Picasa, and delete online albums from Picasa.
Better uploading with the upload Drop-box and bandwidth throttling.
New Retouch tool to remove unsightly blemishes and improve photo quality.
Improved Collage tool lets you have total artistic control over your collage content and layout.
Auto red-eye: same results, less work for you.
Easily add text or watermarks to your photos.

There are 2 ways to install Picasa on Ubuntu: download .deb file or using reposities.

Download .deb file

By going to download page: http://picasa.google.com/linux/download.html you can download the latest version and install by clicking on the .deb file

Download .deb file:
http://dl.google.com/linux/deb/pool/non-free/p/picasa/picasa_3.0-current_i386.deb

Open terminal and install .deb or simply click on the .deb file:

sudo dpkg -i picasa_3.0-current_i386.deb

Command line configuration for APT

I like this wa because I will not care about newer version or not. Ubuntu will notice automatically

On an APT-based system (Debian, Ubuntu, etc.), you must download the key and then use apt to install it and refresh your package indexes.
For more information on Google’s package signing key, see the Signing Key page.

Run these commands as root:

wget -q -O - https://dl-ssl.google.com/linux/linux_signing_key.pub | apt-key add -
apt-get update

Recent versions of apt-get will automatically attempt to verify packages on download. If an appropriate key is not found or if the package is corrupted, you will get a message like the following:

WARNING: The following packages cannot be authenticated!
packagename

Add the following rule to e.g. /etc/apt/sources.list, or if your distro has the /etc/apt/sources.list.d/ directory, add it to a file called google.list in that directory:

# Google software repository

deb http://dl.google.com/linux/deb/ stable non-free

then use apt as usual, e.g.

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install picasa

I hope you love Picasa like me

Rating: 7.5/10 (2 votes cast)