“…I am having trouble viewing my menu bar that usually appears across the top of my screen. The volume control used to be here and now I don’t get volume at all. How do I get the menu bar to reappear?…”

1) Try this command in Terminal:

metacity –replace

2) If the above command did not work, try the following:

“Menu bars” are called “Panels”. Try right clicking on the bottom panel and selecting “add new panel” (that’s the wording, if memory serves me correctly). Drag the new blank panel to the top. Then add the applets you want to that panel.

The applets you want might be:

Quit applet at the right
Volume control to left
Network monitor to left
Notification area and then user switcher.
On the left side of the panel, add the Menu bar applet.

I hope this helps!

Note: An afterthought, maybe it’s an issue with Compiz or with your system hibernation? If so, try the command: killall gnome-panel and see if that (restarts and) restores the visibility of your panel?

“…Just upgraded to 10.04, so am having to log in each time the computer suspends/screen locks. I am the only one with physical access to this computer, so prefer to configure so that password is *not* required to bring the screen back up after suspend. How do I configure this change? Have been unable to find answer on this site or via GoogleLinux…”

I never turn passwords off as this poses a potential security risk. You may be the only one using your PC, but I’ll bet that you surf the Internet? If so, turning the password requirement off is almost like hanging a “help yourself” sign on your PC. Because, (unless I’m mistaken?) no password would be required to install things on your PC, leaving sites you visit the potential to install good and “bad” things on your PC.

Nevertheless, have you tried the following commands in a terminal?

sudo visudo
%admin ALL=(ALL) ALL
%admin ALL=(ALL) NOPASSWD: ALL

I’d suggest a better way to go is to enable the Automatic Login feature for Ubuntu. You can do it this way (using the GUI):

System -> Administration -> Login Window
Enter your root password at the prompt.
Select the “Security” tab.
Check on “Enable Automatic Login”.
Use the dropdown menu to select your username.
Click the “Close” button and you’re done.

I hope this helps you!

“…I downloaded the new .deb package from Opera… and I want to uninstall it because it will not load any web pages, making me crazy… how to I uninstall it?”

I’m assuming it was a .deb package that you downloaded directly from the Opera web site. (As a side note, I had the same issue with Opera, in that it refused to load web pages on a local web server – I also removed Opera).

To uninstall any .deb package, use the following syntax:

sudo dpkg -r <name of package>

So… to remove an Opera .deb installation, the command is:

sudo dpkg -r opera

Don’t forget to remove the hidden .opera directory inside your home directory! Doing so will give you a “clean” start if you want to reinstall Opera.

I hope this helps.

“… I’m using Ubuntu 9.04… the “Check for Updates” in Firefox is grayed out and apt-get does not upgrade Firefox… I’m stuck at 3.0.18, how can I get upgraded?…”

This is an issue, I’ve encountered before. The newest versions of Firefox are not yet in the repositories, and the “Check for Updates” is disabled on purpose. I tried upgrading Firefox via PPA’s on a couple occasions, butthe updates failed and I ended up with broken packages! In my opinion, the following steps might serve as a safer way to upgrade.

In your existing Firefox version (3.0.18), install the following extension manager, named FEBE, in case something happens to your extentions, you’ll be able to reinstall them:

FEBE: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/2109

Use FEBE to backup your extensions.

Also, just in case something happens to your saved passwords, you can back those up as well with an extension named “Password Exporter”: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/2848

Backup up your passwords.

Finally, don’t forget to backup your bookmarks in case something goes wrong.

In a Terminal, run the command:

which firefox

You should see this answer displayed:

/usr/bin/firefox

This guide is based on the pathing above. If the steps below are not followed properly, then this will not work! ALWAYS make sure you have BACKUPS of data you do not want to lose, in case something in your system goes terribly wrong.

Now, let’s use the Terminal to move into Ubuntu’s temporary (working) directory:

cd /tmp

Download  Firefox 3.6 for Ubuntu 9.04 (Jaunty):
wget “http://download.mozilla.org/?product=firefox-3.6&os=linux&lang=en-US”

(The above is for the North American version, you can change that to meet your needs).

Extract the contents:
tar xvjf firefox-*.bz2

We are going to copy the new version of Firefox to a directory called “firefox-3.6″ (instead of “firefox”), this way we can  revert back to the original Firefox 3.0.18 is needed.

Copy the executable to /usr/lib/:

sudo cp -r firefox /usr/lib/firefox-3.6

Move the older version (3.0.18) to “firefox.old”:
(This way you can revert back to it if needed)

sudo mv /usr/bin/firefox /usr/bin/firefox.old

Create the links to the correct verion of Firefox will run:

sudo ln -s /usr/lib/firefox-3.6/firefox /usr/bin/firefox-3.6
sudo ln -s /usr/bin/firefox-3.6 /usr/bin/firefox

Now open Firefox and you should be running version 3.6. If not, then some of the steps above were not followed (or Firefox was not in “/usr/bin/firefox”).

If you ever need to revert back to your older version of Firefox, you can run the commands below in a Terminal:

Backup the existing:
sudo mv /usr/bin/firefox /usr/bin/firefox.bak

Now restore the older version:
sudo mv /usr/bin/firefox.old /usr/bin/firefox

You should notice that your settings, bookmarks, passwords are all intact (as they are stored in your user profile – /home/<username>/.mozilla). We backed them up just in case there was an issue.

I hope this helps!

“…I’ve made too many coasters, where is the link to check the MD5 of the Ubuntu iso downloads… Someone told me I should check them before burning, but I can’t find them anywhere…”

I have had the same issue untill I bookmarked the page. But for ease of reference to all new users here’s the link:

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/UbuntuHashes

I hope it helps some of the readers. Make sure you book mark it!

For Ubuntu 8.04 users, please try the instructions below. (I’m not in front of a Hardy, 8.04, box right now, so please comment below if you find I’ve made a mistake; and I will correct it – Thanks). If I recall correctly, these packages are not in the “regular” Ubuntu repositories. To get them installed, we can create the appropriate entries in our sources/list, add the GPG keys and then use Aptitude to complete the installation.

For Google Chrome, try the following steps.

Add the chromium-daily PPA to your sources list:

sudo gedit /etc/apt/sources.list

Append the following:

# Chrome Source
deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/chromium-daily/ppa/ubuntu hardy main
deb-src http://ppa.launchpad.net/chromium-daily/ppa/ubuntu hardy main

Next add the GPG key with this command:

sudo apt-key adv –keyserver keyserver.ubuntu.com –recv-keys 4E5E17B5

Update with this command:

sudo aptitude update

Then try to install Chrome withthe following command:

sudo aptitude install chromium-browser

As for Google Earth, I’m sure it’s in the Medibuntu repository. Here are the steps:

Add the Medibuntu source:

sudo gedit /etc/apt/sources.list

Append the following:

# Medibuntu Source
deb http://packages.medibuntu.org/ hardy free non-free
deb-src http://packages.medibuntu.org/ hardy free non-free

Next add the GPG key with this command:

wget -q http://packages.medibuntu.org/medibuntu-key.gpg -O- | sudo apt-key add

Update with this command:

sudo aptitude update

Now try this install command:

sudo aptitude install googleearth-4.3

Have any suggestions, changes or know another way to do this? Feel free to say so, in the commonts section below.

“…I am running Ubuntu Linux.  I want to wipe my hard drive.  How do i do that?…”

I’m assuming that you don’t have another computer you can plug that hard drive in? Additionally, you cannot wipe a hard drive if you have no OS to run the software. And finally, I assume by wiping, that you are referring to writing 0′s and 1′s via several passes over the hard drive.

I have come across an Open Source solution that does this, it’s called Darik’s Boot And Nuke.

In general, you download the image from here: http://www.dban.org/download, burn it to a CD and boot off that CD. Follow the prompts and select your appropriate configuration options.

Note: If there is data on the hard drive that you wish to keep, make yourself a seperate backup on some other media BEFORE you wipe the drive.

“…because all the DVDs I was burning were useless. Thanks for helping with that, only thing, how do I check the md5sum stuff? Should there be a separate file showing what it is? Where do I find what it’s supposed to be? Thanks for…”

This is a common occurrence, we download a CD or DVD, only to find that it’s not working properly. I learned the hard way, ALWAYS check the md5sum BEFORE burning the iso!

1) The MD5SUM of any downloads (from Ubuntu) can be seen in the directory you download from: http://cdimage.ubuntu.com/releases/

Using Steve’s example (he was downloading Ubuntu 9.04 AMD64 Bit version), he’d surf to: http://cdimage.ubuntu.com/releases/9.04/release/ On that page will be a link to a file that says “MD5SUMS”. Clicking on that file (link) will display the following:

87babeda6724c3ea583534b53a9255c5 *ubuntu-9.04-dvd-amd64.iso
cca45d814048b5b322773561ad7c75d8 *ubuntu-9.04-dvd-i386.iso
60136ddda63d9e4c342013d5a71f4c9c *ubuntu-9.04-mid-lpia.img

So, the correct md5sum for the AMD64 iso is 87babeda6724c3ea583534b53a9255c5

That’s the first step.

2) To check the md5sum of the iso you just downloaded, open a terminal and “cd” to the directory that contains your iso file (or include the full path to the file in your command). Once in the directory containing the iso (using the above example of the AMD64 iso), run your command using the following syntax:

md5sum ubuntu-9.04-desktop-amd64.iso

There will be a long pause, then your terminal will look something like below:

roger@ubuntubox:~$ cd iso
roger@ubuntubox:~/iso$ md5sum ubuntu-9.04-dvd-amd64.iso
87babeda6724c3ea583534b53a9255c5  ubuntu-9.04-dvd-amd64.iso
roger@ubuntubox:~/iso$

If the returned md5sum does not match the one listed on the Ubuntu site, then do not burn the iso and download a new one again. Sometimes funny things happen during transmission of data.

Hope this helps some of you out!

“… your solution said it was for Ubuntu 8.04, how do I find out what version I’m running?…”

There’s a simple, quick way to see what version of Ubuntu Linux you are running. Open a terminal and enter the command:

lsb_release -a

If you’re using Ubuntu 8.04 (Hardy), your output will look something like below:

roger@ubuntubox:~$ lsb_release -a
No LSB modules are available.
Distributor ID:    Ubuntu
Description:    Ubuntu 8.04.3 LTS
Release:    8.04
Codename:    hardy
roger@ubuntubox:~$

For reference, I might add that there are a couple other useful, informational commands you can use. Namely, to find out if you are using 64Bit or 32Bit:

uname -m

And to see your kernel version:

uname -r

“…I forgot my username and password on my ubuntu/Linux computer. How do I get back on? I have 2 computers just so you understand. One I use windows and the other I use ubuntu. I don’t want to throw the computer away so any help would be greatly appreciated…”

I’m assuming this is the username to log into Ubuntu, not the a password for GRUB or the PC itself (that is a password set in the BIOS, which is requested when the PC is turned on).

First off, there’s no need to throw the computer away, even if you are unable to garner the username or password; you can reinstall the OS.

The majority (if not all) of the Linux users I personally know, use their name as the username for regular login sessions and root as the username for administrative sessions. Ubuntu however facilitates sudo (or sudo su) via your regular username, if you’d like to perform administrative functions.

To obtain your username, try booting into the “Ubuntu Recovery Mode”.  Doing so will boot you into a root access terminal. To find your username you can look inside the home to see the usernames available. Each directory name corresponds to a username. For example, when you look inside the home directory and you see another directory called “joe” then joe is also a username, if you see “rhonda”, that’s also a username and so forth…

The command to list the contents of the home directory is:

ls /home

Another way of obtaining the usernames is to issue the command:

tail /etc/passwd

And receive output, like that looks like this:

jake@testbox:~$ tail /etc/passwd
messagebus:x:108:119::/var/run/dbus:/bin/false
avahi:x:109:120:Avahi mDNS daemon,,,:/var/run/avahi-daemon:/bin/false
polkituser:x:110:122:PolicyKit,,,:/var/run/PolicyKit:/bin/false
haldaemon:x:111:123:Hardware abstraction layer,,,:/var/run/hald:/bin/false
jake :1000:1000:Jake Test,,,:/home/jake:/bin/bash
uml-net:x:112:125::/home/uml-net:/bin/false
ftp:x:113:65534::/home/ftp:/bin/false
Debian-exim:x:114:126::/var/spool/exim4:/bin/false
sshd:x:115:65534::/var/run/sshd:/usr/sbin/nologin
vde2-net:x:116:127::/var/run/vde2:/bin/false
jake@testbox:~$

In the above output, I’ve made the username a bold, red colour.

One we’ve obtained the username, we’re ready to work on the password issue.

Side note: Recovery mode is an option on the GRUB boot menu. If you have a “hidden menu” (where it does not show the option to select)  press Esc (on the keyboard) and select the recovery mode option.

Let’s say we found that the username was “rhonda”, now we need to reset the password for this account. The command follows the syntax passwd username, using the above example,  the command would be:

passwd rhonda

A prompt will ask you to provide the new password.

Now simple reboot your PC with the command:

shutdown -r now

And log in using your username and the new password you created.