Dated Hardware, Waiting for Hardware and the Nokia N900 in 2013

The Nokia N900 was released in November of 2009 - three and a half years ago. When I bought my first N900 in January of 2010 it was a huge upgrade for me in terms of both speed and software freedom (coming from a Blackberry). The idea of having a computer - a true computer - that was also a phone was amazing. The same device I used to send text messages, I also installed applications on using apt-get. True multitasking - my applications stayed open until I closed them, not until the operating system decided it wanted to kill them. I didn't mind paying the 450 USD it cost to purchase the brand new N900 out of contract - this was an awesome piece of technology!

Fast forward to 2013. Three years later I have gone through 2.5 Nokia N900s (I say 2.5, because the first two each broke in different ways and I was able to build a working device from their left overs) and still have it sitting on my desk as I write this. Three years is a long time in the world of mobile hardware and the N900 easily shows plenty of signs of aging. Compared to my wife's Nexus 4, it loads applications and web sites slowly.

So why is it I hold onto hardware/software that deserves an upgrade? Simple - no one has released a comparable replacement. At first I did not want to trade my true Linux operating system in for this dribble called Android everyone raves about. Upon giving Android a chance though - I could make do with it. The HTML5 supporting browsers on Andriod really provide a decent web experience (which beyond text messaging is what I mainly do on a mobile device).

The hold up then? The hardware. I'm not talking about the speed of the hardware though - I'm talking about the lack of design. Almost every modern mobile that is sold today is a pure touch device. Hardware keyboards are a thing of the past it seems.

Am I truly the last person left alive who doesn't like a software keyboard taking up half of my sub-10 inch screen while I type something?

When I search for modern cell phone hardware I certainly feel that way.

I have hope though! Within the next year we are expecting at least three new mobile operating systems to enter the landscape:

• Ubuntu Mobile
• Tizen
• Firefox Mobile

I hope against all open that one of the hardware makers supporting these operating system breaks the current tread of touch-only devices. Maybe then I and stop picking up old N900s on Ebay when my existing one breaks!

~Jeff Hoogland

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Bodhi Linux Nexus 7 Drive

So I was on the Kernel Panic Ogg cast last night (the episode should be for download later this weekend). While we where discussing a number of things related to Bodhi our ARM port and tablet interface came up. ARM hardware is a very different beast from your normal x86/64bit devices. Meaning even if you have functional kernel drivers for a given device - you still often need a seperate file system images for each device you wish to be easily installable on.

Currently we provide easy to install ARM images for the RaspBerry Pi and the Genesi Smartbook - the latter of which I am actually writing this post from. By the end of this month I hope to be able to add the MK802 I've written a bit about to our support devices as well.

The point of this post however is to see how much interest there is in us creating a Bodhi image for the new Nexus 7 tablet. I've had a couple of users express interest about it on our forums and there was positive buzz about it on the Ogg cast last night.

The main thing holding us back is a lack of developer hardware - I don't own a Nexus 7. We only need a single unit to get our work done, so if you are a Nexus 7 owner that has an interest in running Bodhi on your device and you can spare 5$ (or even 10$) please consider sending it our way via the button below so we can purchase a Nexus 7 to work with.

Edit/Update: In just 5 short days we've managed to collect enough to pick up a development unit! Hopefully we can have some Bodhi images live by the end of the month. If you are still looking to help support us - servers do take money to maintain. You can do so by donating directly to the Bodhi project.

Thanks to everyone who helped out.
~Jeff Hoogland

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HOWTO: Check Hard Drive Health with Linux

I've been experiencing full system lockups on my netbook off and on for the last few weeks now. Up until recently though they had been few and far between so I'd just been ignoring the issue. A few days ago however they got bad enough to the point where I had to restart my system three times in the same hour.

Needless to say shortly after that I started running system checks. A quick boot into memtest showed that my RAM was A-OK (which is good considering one stick of RAM is stuck to the netbook's mother board). The next piece of hardware I checked was my netbook's SSD. Almost all modern hard drives have "SMART" controls today to allow you to check their current health status.

I booted my netbook from a Bodhi live USB drive and did a quick:

sudo apt-get install gsmartcontrol

GSmartControl is a GUI front end for smartmontools - a library that lets you interface with your drive's SMART controls and run various health checks on the drive. The interface is fairly straight forward and right clicking on one of the displayed drives gives you the ability to begin checking it.

There are options for a short test (which takes a minute or two) or a longer test (which can take up to several hours on larger drives to complete - depends on the size of your drive).

After my netbook finished the longer test I was greeted with some bad news - my SSD was failing in one area and getting close to failing in others:

At any rate GSmartControl is a fantastic tool for checking the health of your drive that is fairly easy to use. Hopefully the results of your drive check will be better than my own!

~Jeff Hoogland

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Raspberry Pi vs MK802

There has been a ton on news in the open source world revolving around the Raspberry Pi. It was one of the first low cost, ARM computers to be targeted at the hobbyist and educational markets. I've owned a Raspberry Pi for many months now and while it does an alright job at playing media files and acting as a small server - for most computing tasks it simply didn't have enough resources available to be useful.

My dedicated x86 media PC I'd been using for some time died a few months back and I had been searching for a low cost replacement for the system - I finally found it in the ARM powered MK802 device.

I've been using the MK802 almost daily for close to a month now and it shocks me that this awesome device hasn't gotten more press in the FOSS world. I plan to write a formal review of the device in the next week, but for now I would like to simply do a comparison between the MK802 and the latest RPI Model B device:

	MK802	Raspberry Model B
Processor	1.5ghz	1.0ghz
RAM	1 gig	512 meg
Internal Storage	4 gig	None
USB Ports	One	Two
Networking	Wireless	Wired
Video Out	HDMI Mini	HDMI, RCA
Audio Out	HDMI	HDMI, 3.5m
Storage	Micro SD	SDHC
Size	8.8 x 3.5 x 1.2 cm	8.560 cm × 5.4 cm
Cost+Shipping to US	38.50	43.33

In addition to having superior specs at a lower price point than the RPI Model B, the MK802 also included an HDMI mini to HDMI cord, power adapter, and the device is in a case by default instead of just being a raw board. Needless to say I am impressed with the little device. For those interested in picking up an MK802 I got mine from Amazon here.

~Jeff Hoogland

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HOWTO: Enable nVidia Graphics on OSX86

So I've been tooling around with OSX on my Sager laptop again and spent a short bit of time running around in circles trying to get my nVidia graphics enabled again. Getting this done with a modern OSX86 release is fairly easy if you know how (it doesn't even require installing a kext).

Simply open a terminal and run:

sudo nano /Library/Preferences/SystemConfiguration/com.apple.Boot.plist

Type your password and press enter. In the file that is opened simply add these lines. Above the line that reads this.

Press ctrl+x to close the file and press "y" followed by enter to save the changes. Reboot your Hackintosh and you should be good to go. I'll be enjoying the Diablo 3 beta on mine.

As a side note sorry for the lack of posts this month. My school semester is coming to an end and life has been crazy of the late - expect some good postings come May (including hopefully a HOWTO for running Diablo 3 on Linux).

~Jeff Hoogland

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Lenovo ThinkVision USB Monitor Review

I picked up a new toy a couple of weeks ago - a secondary monitor for my multitude of computers. The screen I picked up though a slightly different from your every day monitor. Lenovo recently released a USB monitor called the Lenovo ThinkVision:

The ThinkVision sports a 1366x768 resolution (720p for you media centric folks out there) and has a nice crisp image. The reason I opted for a USB monitor is because my favorite netbook lacks a standard video out port (plus now with my normal laptop I can have a three monitor setup!). Another thing worth mentioning is that is addition to connecting to your PC via two USB ports - the ThinkVision also draws all of it's power through USB, meaning you won't have to scramble to find an additional outlet when using this extra screen.

So far I've just been using the screen as a nice large terminal at home when using my netbook. I have several weekend trips planned for this summer and the ThinkVision is designed to be mobile. It has a built in stand:

 and it comes with a protective plastic cover that can clip over the screen when transporting the monitor.

Like a good deal of hardware the ThinkVision only comes with a driver disc that supports Windows operating systems. Thankfully the screen uses the same display driver as most USB display adapters - DisplayLink. OSX users can find a driver download here and my fellow Linux users out there should be happy to know that DisplayLink drivers have been in the mainline kernel since the 2.6.38 release (meaning they are included in most modern Linux distributions by default).

The price tag on the ThinkVision is 200 USD and you can pick one up directly from them here.

~Jeff Hoogland

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Lenovo Multimedia Remote (Keyboard/Mouse) Review

Whenever I am working on something, be it homework or one of my various tasks for Bodhi I almost always have the TV on in the background. I have a lot of work that I do - so that amounts to a good deal of television hours. Even with this being the case though, I have not watched more than a few hours of network television in the last three years.

A few years back I took a spare PC I had laying around and turned it into a dedicated media PC. It runs pretty much 24/7 attached to my 32" LCD television. Most people don't sit right on top of their television and I am no exception to this rule. Thus in order to control my media PC I needed some form of wireless control. For a good deal of the last three years I've struggled with using a Logitech wireless keyboard and mouse. While these generally worked they chewed through batteries, had poor wireless range and other various issues.

Late last month I acquired a new device to replace my old keyboard and mouse. It is a Lenovo Enhanced Multimedia Remote. The Lenovo remote is essentially a keboard/mouse combination that is designed to fit in the palm of your hand:

I must say after having used this little device for a couple of weeks I am fairly impressed with it. The range on the device is fantastic - I can go anywhere in my front room and get a flawless signal to my PC. The keyboard is of good build quality and the raised keys make for a pleasant typing experience. The dimensions of the keyboard are slightly bigger than your average smart phone keyboard - meaning that anyone who can text fairly quickly will have no problem working with this keyboard at an impressive speed.

The mouse on the device is a fairly interesting design. It reminds me a of a more fluid implementation of the "nub" mice older laptops used to have built in by default. Directly below the mousing area there is a vertical raised bar that acts as a scroll bar - very handy when web surfing. It is easier to see the mouse/scroll bar in action so the following is a short demo video of the "Remote":

While the product page claims the device is only compatible with various flavors of MS Windows - I have had absolutely no issues with the device on my Linux media PC which runs a build of the 3.0 kernel (meaning it should work on most all modern Linux distros). Beyond being a useful toy at home, I also plan to drag my remote along with me once I start teaching classes so I can work the PC I am presenting from anywhere in the room.

Finally, the price tag on this little guy is 80 USD. So while this is more expensive than your average wired keyboard and mouse it is about the same cost as most quality wireless keyboard and mouse combos.

~Jeff Hoogland

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Confused about iPads in Education

It's been nearly two years since I got my first Asus convertible tablet/netbook, loaded it up with Linux and started kicking it around with my every day to classes. In general I have found it to be an extremely useful tool.

I need to type notes or prepare a presentation? Not a problem - it is a netbook after all and can perform all the same functions as a laptop. I need to take hand written notes? I don't have to keep track of notebook paper that I always inevitably lose. I simply fire up Xournal and can use any stylus (or even a pen with a cap over the tip) to take notes on the computer just as if I was writing on a notebook. 

My netbook convertible does what any good piece of technology should - it makes my life easier.

You want to know what doesn't seem to make anyone's life easier during class? Those iPad's I've seen piles of people caring around campus with them this last year. In fact, I've never once seen an iPad used productively to take notes in a classroom. You can't type notes effectively on the dang thing - at least I've yet to find anyone that can match my 90+ WPM using a touch screen keyboard. You also can't take hand written notes effectively due to the poor quality of basically every capacitive stylus in existence.

One useful thing the iPad can do is function as a calculator. Another thing I've heard proposed is replacing text books with ebooks on the iPad. You know what else has all the functions of a calculator and can read ebooks and pdfs? You guessed it - my netbook.

The biggest joke at the end of all of it? Even the "16GB" version of the iPad costs more than the highest end Asus T101MT.

Maybe I'm just not "hip" enough to see the need for them, but it seems to me if we want to revolutionize how our students learn using technology they would be better served if that technology came in the form of something other than an "iPad" or capacitive tablet of any sort. Whats your take on it?

~Jeff Hoogland

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Genesi MX Smartbook Review

Genesi currently offers two products with the EFIKA mx51 ARM board. They are the SmartTop and the SmartBook. I own one of their SmartBook models and today I would like to do a comprehensive overview of the device.

Size/Weight: 
The size of the Smartbook is exactly what netbooks where intended to be when they where first created. It is thin and lightweight while still being a functional tiny laptop. The device weighs just under 1 kilogram and has a form factor of 160x115x20mm.

Hardware:
The Smartbook sports an 800mhz ARM processor, 512MB of RAM and 16gb of internal storage. One of the benefits of being an ARM chip is that the Smartbook is fan-less - making it silent while running. For wireless connectivity the device has b/g/n support for wireless networks, as well as 2.1 + EDR for bluetooth and optional 3g support. In terms of ports the Smartbook has two USB jacks, SD card slot, micro SD card slot and an audio out port. The screen is your typical 1024x600 resolution you get on most 10" netbooks to date.

The keyboard on the Smartbook is easily the best keyboard I have ever used on a 10" netbook. It has a full six rows of keys and takes up over 90% of the width of the device. It is a chicklet design so typing is a smooth and easy process. The track pad in contrast to the keyboard might very well be the worst track pad I've ever used on any netbook or laptop. It is tiny and the left/right click buttons are awkward to press down. Thankfully it has the saving grace of being able to left click by simply tapping on the pad. Holding a left click and moving the mouse is a painful process though.

The hardware in the Smartbook isn't going to break any land speed records, but then again if you need some serious computing power odds are a netbook isn't for you. 

Software:
The Smartbook comes with Ubuntu 10.10 as it's default operating system. Honestly the default Gnome 2 desktop is a bit sluggish on the Smartbook hardware. Thankfully the power of the Ubuntu repositories is at your finger tips and you can very easily install LXDE or some other light-weight desktop of your choice. Because the Smartbook is an ARM device, some closed source technologies (such as Adobe Flash) do not support it.

If you are not a fan of Ubuntu, fear not - because the Smartbook is easily one of the most open source friendly ARM devices currently in existence. I just recently published a guide for getting Bodhi running on the device. Beyond this I know other people have had success running Debian, Arch and Gentoo on the Smartbook. 

Battery:
One of the most important questions with any netbook - what is the battery life? Due to it's ARM processor the Smartbook sees far better battery life than any other netbook it's weight. On a full charge with average usage the Smartbook sees between 6 and 7 hours of battery. The battery itself is also easily removable/replaceable.  

Cost:
One of the most attractive things about the Smartbook is it's price tag. The Smartbook will only set you back 199 USD. Not a bad price at all for this little guy.

Wrapping Up:
I've had my Smartbook for a couple of months now and all in all I am very pleased with it. In fact the only thing that I dislike about it (and was mentioned above) is the trackpad on it. This really isn't a huge deal though as I've taken to carrying around a small USB mouse for when I need to do a good deal of mouse work - which isn't often.

Whether or not the Smartbook is right for you is something only you can decided. If you are looking for something light, portable and a very good battery life - there is no beating the Genesi Smartbook.

~Jeff Hoogland 

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HOWTO: Bodhi Linux on Genesi Smartbook

Edit/Update: You can find the latest release here -> http://www.bodhilinux.com/downloads_mobile.php

I mentioned a short while ago that Genesi had become a Bodhi affiliate. They sent me one of their Smartbooks to get hacking at and today I would like to share my first batch of public files for it. The following is a short HOWTO for getting a Debian Wheezy file system with the Bodhi Enlightenment desktop running on your Genesi Smartbook.

First - Preparing the SD Card:

You will need an SD card that is at least 4GB. We need two partitions on this card, the first is a small EXT3 partition (at least 64MB) and then a second EXT4 partition that takes up the remainder of the card. Use your tool of choice to prepare the SD card, personally I prefer "GParted":

Second - Getting the Files:

Two archives contain everything you need to get Bodhi rolling on your Smartbook. Grab the latest rootfs and boot partitions from here.

Third - Extracting the Files:

Place the boot archive in the ext3 partition of your SD card and extract the files there. Place the rootfs archive in the ext4 partition of your SD card and extract the files there.

Thats it - you are all set! Simply place the SD card in your Smartbook and boot it up. In a few moments you should be greeted with an Enlightenment desktop. The default user information is:

Username: bodhi
Password: bodhi 

The bodhi account is configured to be able to use "sudo", but a root account is also in existence with a password of "bodhi".

Known Issues:

This is a early release for others wanting to help me test and debug things. It is fairly functional in it's current state, but please be aware of two issues with the first release I am aware of -

• Audio is non-functional
• Shutdown/Restart/Suspend cannot be done via Enlightenment Menu

If you figure out a fix for either of these please pass it along!

Installing to Internal Memory:

If you like the Bodhi image and want to install it to your internal system memory (typically much faster than an SC card) it is fairly easy to do so. By default the internal drive has two paritions, one located at /dev/sda1 and a second at /dev/sda2. Mount these while booted from the SD card and remove their current contents. Then simply extract the boot archive to /dev/sda1 and the rootfs to /dev/sda2. Finally, you will need to remove the default boot.scr the boot archive provides and rename the boot.scr.sda to simply boot.scr

Trouble Shooting:

If you encounter an issue getting Bodhi setup on your Smartbook please do not leave a comment here about it. Instead open a thread in the Genesi Section of our user forums.

Photos:

Finally here are a couple of slightly terrible photos of Bodhi booted on my Genesi.
 

Cheers,
~Jeff Hoogland

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Whats good for the Goose should be good for the Gander

I think many in the world of FOSS take for granted that a good deal of our x86 compatible hardware works with their operating system of choice. In fact all the fuss about a possible lock out with the coming of Windows 8 attests to this fact. x86 hardware has always been fairly free and it should remain as such right?

Yes it should.

Something that really bothers me though is the fact that ARM hardware is treated in a very different way. What do I mean by this? Well as someone who has worked with over a dozen different pieces of ARM hardware from many different manufactures I can tell you installing an alternative operating system on such a piece of hardware is almost never a pleasant experience.

Before I go on I would like to clarify that by "install" I mean physically run the operating system on the hardware. Not just running it inside a chroot like so many Android users seem content to do on their hardware. In my opinion being told to be content with a chroot setup is just like being told I should be happy simply running Linux inside of Windows via a virtual machine.

Even devices that advertise themselves as open source loving (such as my beloved N900) are a nightmare and a half to install something such as Debian on. Don't be fooled by devices that ship things like Ubuntu Linux by default either. I recently purchased a Trimslice with the hopes of installing Debian on it and it has been an up-hill battle to make it work (one I still haven't won). Once you manage to get the operating system installed even that is only half the process - next you have to hope you can somehow get all your hardware functioning.

Why does all this headache happen? Well, partially it is because of lack of standards in the ARM world. A vast variety of hardware that all have different external components make this task difficult. This difficultly is multiplied two fold when you take into account that most of this hardware has no open specifications. 

In the end my question to the open source community is why is this acceptable for ARM hardware? Why do you continue to rejoice about every new Android device that gets released riddled with closed source modules that are next to impossible to make work under actual Linux.

Just as many of you would be upset if you where told that desktop (or laptop) you bought had to keep it's default operating system I am more than a little annoyed that a good deal of the ARM hardware out there comes with this stipulation attached.

~Jeff Hoogland

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Hybrid Throw Down: Dell Inspiron Duo vs Asus T101MT

For whatever reason tablets are all the craze this year. The tiny laptops known as "netbooks" that had dominated the couple of years prior are forgotten by many. Those of us that do real work on our computers know the value of having a physical keyboard. At the same time some of us have use for a touch screen, but don't want to carry two physical devices.

Enter the tablet/netbook hybrid. A number of different companies make such devices and I have personally owned ones made by Dell and Asus. Asus actually makes two such devices, you can see them compared here.

Today I would like to compare two 10" netbook/tablet convertables: the Dell Inspiron Duo and the Asus T101MT.

Size and Weight:
The Dell Duo is slightly larger and heavier than the Asus model with dimensions of:


11.22" x 7.66" x 1.03" and weighing 3.39 pounds.

The T101MT comes in at:

10.39" x 7.13" x 1.22" and only 2.86 pounds.

Keyboard:
Both netbooks have chiclet keyboards so typing on both is a pleasant experience. Because the Duo is physically larger though it's keyboard is just a bit bigger. Because of this it has an over all better layout. Even after a full year of usage I still miss hitting the right shift key on the T101MT every now and then because of the keyboard layout.

T101MT Keyboard:

Duo Keyboard:

Screen:

This is the first part we see a large difference between the two devices. The screen on the Asus is a resistive, multi-touch screen with a maximum of 1024x600 resolution. The Dell on the other hand has a capacitive, multi-touch screen which has a slick 1366x768 max resolution. Whether you prefer capacitive to resistive may be the deciding factor on these two devices for you.

Keep this in mind though. I personally use the touch screen largely for taking written notes. A resistive screen is much better suited for this purpose. 40$ and three capacitive stylus's later I have yet to find one that is as accurate/as good as using generic resistive stylus for such a task.

Ports:
External ports is the one area where hands down the T101MT crushes the Duo. The Duo only has three ports: 2 USB and an audio out. The T101MT on the other hand has pretty much what you would expect from a netbook. 3 USB, audio out, microphone in, SD card reader and VGA.

Thats right - they couldn't even squeeze an HDMI mini onto the Duo.

AC Adapter:
This may seem like an odd thing to mention, but the T101MT does have a much better AC adapter. The Duo power brick comes with a short cord by default and does not have a light on the brick letting you know it is on. The T101MT also comes with Velcro ties by default for packing up the adapter neatly.

Over All Design:

Dell and Asus both make pretty solid hardware. I haven't owned the Duo for quite as long yet, but I can say is built at least as solid as the T101MT is. While the Duo is a bit larger, there is no doubting it has a certain "sleek" factor to it with the clamshell design and the screen that flips back instead of spinning around.

Dell Duo

Asus T101MT

Processor:

The current versions of the T101MT ship with the exact same Intel Atom N570 that the Duo has. The N570 is a 1.66ghz dual core with hyper threading. Take note if you are buying a used T101MT that some of the first wave of these units had the older N450 atom chip in them.

RAM:

The Duo has one RAM slot and by default comes with a 2gig stick of DDR3 800mhz. The T101mt comes in two different revisions currently. The higher end T101MT comes with 2gigs DDR3 1066mhz (two 1gig sticks). The lower end T101MT comes with 1gig DDR2 by default (that can be upgraded to two).

Hard Drive:
By default both laptops make the choice of coming with a platter hard drive. The Duo comes with a 320gig 7200rpm drive. The higher end T101MT comes with a 320gig 5400rpm drive and the lower end model comes with a 250gig.

As someone who firmly believes hard drives with moving parts are a piss poor idea in both tablets and netbook I have replaced the drives in both units. In this respect, both units are poorly designed. With the T101MT you need to tear apart almost the entire unit to get to the drive. The Duo requires, not quite as much, but still a good deal of work to get at it's drive. If you are not someone that works on mobile hardware on a regular basis I would not recommend doing this upgrade yourself.

Webcam:

If you care about your webcam quality the Duo might be the right pick for you. The Duo sports a 1.3 mega-pixel camera, while the T101MT has a piddly 0.3 mega-pixel.

Bluetooth:

The Duo has an internal bluetooth module while the T101MT does not.

Battery:

The battery life of the two systems is fairly close. With the stock drive right under three hours of normal use is about average on both units. If you pop a solid state drive into either machine it increase to almost four hours. Also worth noting is that the T101MT has a removable/replaceable battery while the Duo needs to be torn apart to replace the battery.

Operating System:   
Both these units come with copies of Windows 7 by default. You are not stuck with this OS though. Linux works equally well on both the Duo and the T101MT. 

Cost:
The Dell Duo is right around 600$ (depending on where you purchase it from) and the higher end T101MT is close to this, right around 550$. If you are looking to pay a bit less than this the lower end T101MT comes in 100$ less around 450$. 

Final Thoughts: 
I'm not going to say here which unit is better. As with many things the answer to this question is "it depends". It depends on what you are looking for, it depends on what you need and it depends on what you are looking to spend. Hopefully my summary here will help you choose which of these two units is right for you though!

~Jeff Hoogland 

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HOWTO: Scale Your Display under Linux

Something that has always annoyed me about a good deal of netbooks is the fact that someone decided that 1024x600 was an acceptable maximum resolution. While this isn't always an issue, it becomes extra annoying when you attach an external display to your tiny computer. By default your are typically forced into one of two choices:

1.) You run both screens in 800x600, rendering over 20% of your netbook's internal display useless.

2.) You run the external screen at 1024x768 and the internal screen at 1024x600 and have the bottom 168 pixels show up on the external display, but not on the netbook.

Something many people don't know about is that the display tool xrandr has a really nifty "scale" option you can utilize to make your netbook's screen behave as though it has a higher resolution than it really does. For instance if you have the second case I mention above you simply need to run the command:

xrandr --output LVDS1 --mode 1024x600 --scale 1.00x1.28 --panning 1024x768

in terminal (note your internal display name may vary, most laptops default to LVDS1 though). After running this you will see your netbook display adjust itself so the height of 768 is smushed into it's normal 600 units. This appear a small bit stretched in this mode, but so long as you don't get too crazy with the scale factor it is hardly noticeable.

~Jeff Hoogland

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Enlightening your Dell Duo with Linux

I recently set out to get a new tablet/netbook combo. After reading many reviews about different models I settled on a Dell Inspiron Duo. One thing you will find most all of the Inspiron reviews have in common is that they mention the touch software layer running on Windows 7 is slow. If I said this surprised me it would be a lie. With this in mind I set out to get the Enlightenment desktop running on this device in a cool way. Below is a video of the Enlightenment desktop via Bodhi Linux 1.2.0 running on my Dell Duo:

If you'd like to create a similar setup on your own Duo simply install Bodhi (or any distro with a current E build) and then follow the instructions I detailed here. Then under your key bindings add detection for the screen changing states. Under Action select Launch->Command in the Action Params put the command:

enlightenment_remote -default-profile-set ProfileName

Note when selecting the profile name it needs to be the exact name that is listed for that profile in your ~/.e/e/config directory. Otherwise Enlightenment will crash in a bad way.

Have any questions or comments feel free to drop a message below.

~Jeff Hoogland

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Asus Tech - You will NOT fool me Twice

So I wrote a post at the start of this month describing a positive experience with Asus's support involving my netbook that was running Linux. I would like to advise all the other Linux users out there not to make the same mistake I did -



Just because tech support doesn't blame your operating system, doesn't mean they know what they are doing.



To recap what happened, after a little over a year of usage my T101MT up and died. It got a power light, but the screen didn't post any image. The Asus tech claimed that the after market SSD I installed had shorted out the motherboard.



While I thought their diagnosis was odd, I accepted it as I was getting back a working netbook free of charge. Their conclusion was however very wrong. When I got the netbook back I used it for less than three hours (without a hard drive, booted from an SDHC card) when the screen cut out again. This time, I consulted my older brother and he had a brilliant idea (which I can't believe I missed) - lets plug it into an external screen.



And... Poof! It worked.



Thats right, the Asus tech replaced the motherboard without checking to see if the internal display worked properly.



After almost an hour on hold waiting to talk to a manager, I chewed them out a small bit and even got myself free two way shipping. I was promised a different tech would work on the system and was even told me I should send the SSD back so they could reinstall it. It sounded as though the issue was resolved.



Five days later I received an email from the same tech as before informing me that the motherboard was dead again. Well clearly some one at Asus messed up. I called and got a voice of a manager the first time, I left my contact information. 24 hours later I had still heard nothing back, so I called again. This time I got through to someone and they promised to make sure the issue was sorted and would call me back when they had reached a solution.



Two days later I received an automated email telling me the netbook had shipped out again. They never returned my call.



The kicker? They didn't get the computer returned before my classes started like the first manager said they would try to do. In fact, it was returned (finally working) a week after classes started.



In the mean time I have purchased a dell tablet to take my notes on and I plan to sell the Asus once I reinstall a new hard drive in it. I don't think I'll ever be buying an Asus again - it is wrong to tell a customer you are going to return a call and then never do it.





~Jeff Hoogland

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HOWTO: Linux on the Dell Inspiron Duo

I recently invested in a new toy. A Dell Inspiron Duo netbook/tablet convertable:


I was pleased to see that most all of the netbook was functional OOTB with the 3.0 variation of the Linux kernel my latest Bodhi build was running (including multi-touch on the track pad). I plan to write a full review later on, today however I would simply like to share two tricks for getting some important functionality out of your Dell Duo while running Linux.

Making the Screen Work:
Without a working touch screen the Duo is basically just an over priced netbook. To get the screen working you need to simply add one thing to your grub2 command line. On most distributions you can add the needed command to your /etc/default/grub file. Look for the line that starts with

GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT

If this line does not exist, add it. Then add the option usbhid.quirks=0x0eef:0x725e:0x40 to it. Your line should now look something like this:

GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="usbhid.quirks=0x0eef:0x725e:0x40"

Finally, run

sudo update-grub

On your next reboot your touch screen should now be functional.

Adding Key Bindings for Changing Modes:
On Windows 7 the tablet adds a touch layer UI when you switch the laptop into tablet mode. It does this by detecting when the screen changes positions. To add this functionality to Linux you simply need to run the following commands as root -

setkeycodes e073 148
setkeycodes e074 149

Once you have run these commands changing the position of the screen to all the way down (or bring it up) each triggers a different "key press" your desktop key binding manager should be able to address. On Bodhi (or any E desktop for that matter) you can easily configure these key presses to change profile using the enlightenment_remote command. Also worth noting is you will need to run these commands every time you start up your computer. I just added them to my /etc/rc.local file.

Have any questions feel free to drop a comment below and I'll do my best to help you get it sorted out.

~Jeff Hoogland

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Getting Connected to Illinois State University ISUNET from Linux

This week I started a masters program in mathematics and a job as a graduate assistant at Illinois State University. My laptop is never far from my side, so of course one of the first things I did on campus was connect to the internet.



Or at least attempt to.



There are three main wireless networks at Illinois State University.



isunet - The main network for staff, students and alumni

isunet-guest - A guest network

isunet-setup - A wireless network for "easily configuring your isunet"



I connected to ISUNet-Setup, opened a webrowser and was on my way. It checked my browser for java plugin support (which of course it had) and then I was promptly informed my operating system did not support automatic setup. I was told to contact the Help Desk for the manual configuration instructions.



The page was poorly designed though. It did not provide a link to Help Desk website or provide a phone number. After finding the website via Google on my N900, I noticed they had a search function. I was shocked to find that searching "linux wireless" did not yield any results. In fact even searching simply "linux" did not find anything in any of their pages.



What a shame.



Being the persistent person that I am (and having an hour to kill before class). I marched myself on over to the help desk building and found their main office. The person behind the desk was fairly friendly and actually ended up being fairly useful. Our conversation went something like this:



Me: "I need the manual configuration instructions for ISUNet."



Him: "Are you sure? Are you running Windows or Mac?"



Me: "Linux."



I was slightly surprised at this point, normally saying that "L" word to customer support for tech trips them up a whole lot, this guy seemed to know his stuff though.



Him: "Oh, well the setup will vary with your system - but what you are looking for is WPA2 Protected EAP (PEAP) in your security settings. Once there just use your ISU login for the user name and password."



He jotted down what he said on the back of a piece of paper. I nodded, took the notes and was on my way.



Once I turned my laptop back on, I discovered connecting was fairly simple using the Gnome desktop's nm-applet (which is what Bodhi Linux and a number of others also use). You simply click on the network manager icon and select isunet, after clicking this a security window will pop up, automatically detecting the Security type. You will however need to change the Authentication setting to use PEAP (I think mine defaulted to TLS).



Towards the bottom of the main window, there will now be a spot for entering a user name and password (after selecting PEAP). Here, you enter the same thing you use to log onto iCampus. After filling in this information, hit connect and you should be on your way.



Needless to say this setup is not hard if you know what you are doing/what you are looking for. What is disappointing though is that these simple settings are not found anywhere on the ISU tech help website (or anywhere I could find on Google for that matter). I know for a fact I am far from the only Linux user at ISU - I saw someone using an Ubuntu powered tablet in one of my classes already :)



Cheers,

~Jeff Hoogland

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Asus Support - Excellent and Linux Friendly

I've been recommending Asus computers to friends and clients for some time now. After my recent dealing with the Asus support/repair center I will continue to recommend them for the foreseeable future.
It is rare that I keep whatever computer I have for more than a year's worth of time. Because of this I had never, until last month, had to RMA an entire laptop. It just so happened that last month my Asus T101MT (that I have been very happy with) up and died on me. I was using the system when the screen just cut out. I pressed and held the power button, waited a moment and then fired the system back up.

Nothing, nada, not even a bios screen posted.

I had some extra sticks of DDR2 memory laying around so I tried swapping those out before I called in for an RMA. No luck there. So I looked up when I had purchased the netbook only to discover it was one whole month out of the warranty.

Wonderful.

I'd heard stories from fellow Linux users about companies not honoring hardware warranties, unless Windows was reinstalled on the system. It's wrong, but it does happen. I called up the Asus support line and after jumping through a countless number of automated menus I arrived at someone who could help me. After being walked through a few id-10-t checks the person on the phone agreed with me that the unit needed to be sent to a repair center. It's didn't matter that the system was running Linux, it was a clear hardware issue.

I mailed the laptop out and a few days latter I received a call from the Asus repair center. This is where I was further impressed with the Asus quality of service. Not only where they going to honor the warranty even though it was a month expired, but they discovered that the SSD I had installed in the system the week after I bought it had died and shorted out the motherboard with it. They offered to let me mail them the original 160gb hard drive to install into the unit with the replaced motherboard, but I opted to instead simply have them mail me a working hard-drive-less netbook. They also sent me back the bad SSD so I can get it RMAed (last time I will ever buy an ADATA product again).



So in short I was very impressed with Asus quality of service and they will have the continued support of this Linux user. I received the system back last week and it is working great! Much to my joy they even extended the hardware warranty for me an extra 3 months.

~Jeff Hoogland

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Why the Tablet Craze?

I made a post last year titled "The Year of the Tablet Computer". It is now over half way through 2011 and it seems the touch screen craze is far from over. Apple has released the second iteration of their iPad, we are up to our ears in Android tablets from various hardware makers and a Meego tablet or two might still exist before the year is up. I've played with the iPad a bit, I've used more than a few different Android tablets (I even own one for purposes of developing Bodhi for ARM) and I must say I'm confused what all the hype is about.

Beyond my Android tablet I own several other computers including a Sony Vaio Laptop, a Sager Laptop, an Asus Netbook and a Nokia N900. I've had the Android tablet for around a month now and I've found myself reaching for any of the other computers when I need to get something productive done. Even something as basic as light webrowsing just feels easier/more natural on a computer that has a keyboard on it. I know this is partially because of what I am accustomed to, but I find it annoying when I am using a device that already has a ten inch screen (or smaller) to have a keyboard popping up that takes up nearly half of it!

Now, I am not saying tablet computers are all bad. In fact if you are looking to take digital hand written notes they are an excellent tool. Other than this I have yet to come across a practical application a tablet does more effectively than any netbook computer. If you know of one - please enlighten me. Of course there is more to computers than just productivity as many of us know. Games can be a wonderful use for tablet computers. In fact I think half the time I spend using my tablet is when solitaire or some other touch-focused game is at hand.

In closing, I think tablets are great novelty items. If you have an extra few hundred dollars laying around and want a new toy - go ahead and pick one up. Just don't expect it to magically change your life or make it easier like many commercials would have you think. For purposes of getting work done a netbook is much better suited for those looking to own a tiny computer.

~Jeff Hoogland

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Lessons Learned: Linux + Sony Vaio F Series

My old sager laptop is still great for gaming with it's nVidia 265m GTX, but in terms of processing power it is no longer up to snuff in 2011. Earlier this week I finally made the move and picked up something that had an Intel i7 processor in it. I favor laptops for the mobility they offer and I was lucky enough to get a good price on a Sony Vaio VPCF115FM

The system screams with its i7 Q720, 6 gig of DDR3 RAM, nVidia 330m and a 500 gig 7200RPM hard drive.

The first thing I do with any new computer that comes into my possession is boot Linux on it of course. I just so happen to keep Bodhi 1.1.0 on my flash drive and soon enough I was booted into my live environment (the live CD booted faster on the system than Windows 7 could shutdown - no surprise there I guess). The 2.6.39 kernel detected all the hardware and the system booted to it's beautiful 1920x1080 resolution. The install went without a hitch and I was soon enjoying Bodhi on my new build system (which compiles packages much quicker than my old Core 2 Duo).

I bought this particular laptop not only for it's processor, but also because of the dedicated graphics card it has. After installation the next step was naturally to try and install the closed source graphics driver nVidia provides. First I tried installing the 275 driver we provide in the Bodhi repository. It seemed to install A-OK, but upon rebooting I was greeted by simply a black screen.

Not a big deal, I've been around the block a few times when it comes to nVidia and Linux. I promptly uninstalled the 275 driver and then proceeded to try the latest beta driver from the nVidia FTP. Install seems A-OK again, but once more I was greeted by only a black screen. I figured maybe it was a kernel issue. Having just recently added the 3.0 kernel to the Bodhi repo, I tried both drivers again with this different kernel - same results.

Next stop? The Linux Answer Machine of course. Which lead me to a Google Code page for Linux on the Sony F Series laptops. Then I made a critical mistake that cost me a good deal of time - I jumped into trying to fix the problem without reading the entire solution. When you come across information such as the nVidia install directions always remember the comments are valuable.

After a little over an hour of playing around with edids on my Vaio with no luck I started surfing through the comments and found a useful one. It mentioned that this setup was no longer needed with Ubuntu 10.10. After racking my brain for what the difference might be between Ubuntu 10.10 and Bodhi 1.1.0 I realized the largest difference was the kernel version. On a whim I installed the 2.6.35 kernel, installed the nvidia drivers from the Bodhi repo and poof! I was good to go (guess my first hunch about a kernel issue was correct).

Now, what exactly is different between the 35 kernel and the 39 and 3.0 kernels that caused the nVidia driver to no longer work properly on my Vaio is a bit outside my areas of expertise. At any rate though I am happy to have a fully working Sony Vaio with Linux! I am still a bit over joyed at all the processing power it has.



~Jeff Hoogland

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