I'm trying to unlock a headless server running an encrypted version of Ubuntu 14.04. It is a clean 14.04.2 install with all updates as of writing.

I went thtrough the standard shenanigans with dropbear and busybox, i.e.:

# INSTALL
sudo apt-get install dropbear busybox           # on server

# ENABLE AND CONFIGURE IP
sudo sed -i 's/NO_START=1/NO_START=0/g' /etc/default/dropber
sudo sed -i 's/BUSYBOX=y/BUSYBOX=y\nDROPBEAR=y\n/g' \
            /etc/iniramfs/iniramfs.conf
sudo sed -i 's/DEVICE=.+/DEVICE=etho0/g' \
             /etc/iniramfs/initramfs.conf
sudo sed -i 's/IP=.+/IP=IP=192.168.0.11:::255.255.255.0::eth1:off' \
            /etc/initramfs/initramfs.conf
sudo update-initramfs

# COPY DROPBEAR SSH KEY
# WRONG: sudo cp /etc/dropbear/dropbear_*_host_key /tmp
sudo cp /etc/initramfs-tools/root/.ssh/id_rsa /tmp             # BETTER!
sudo chown $USER:$USER /tmp/id_rsa

scp server:/tmp/id_rsa ~/.ssh/id_rsa_dropbear_server           # on client

sudo reboot                                                    # on server

# CONNECT TO SERVER
ssh -vv -i ~/.ssh/id_rsa_dropbear_server \
        -o 'UserKnownHostsFile=~/.ssh/known_hosts.initramfs' \ 
         [email protected]                                     # on client

So I copied the auto-generated ssh-key and did a minimal configuration of dropbear. To my surprise two three things are malfunctioning:

1. The system ignores the IP settings. I found in my router's "connected devices" site, that the server has the ip 192.168.0.27 despite my configuration. So I tried the listed wrong IP with: ssh -vv -i ~/.ssh/dropbear_dss_host_key -o 'UserKnownHostsFile=~/.ssh/known_hosts.initramfs' [email protected]. That connects to dropbear but:
2. Dropbear ignores all public keys other than its own in /etc/initramfs-tools/root/.ssh/authorized_keys (tested with dss - maybe also rsa).
   Solved: Dropbear wants a passphrase for the key, which I do not have. So I tried an empty passphrase. With which dropbear drops to password authentication and wants the root password, that is not set.
3. Custom hook scripts seem to be partially ignored. These are scripts that worked in older install!

Here is the whole ssh session.

I added my usual public key file to dropbear's known hosts in the server's /etc/initramfs-tools/root/.ssh/authorized_keys and tried to ssh with my usual key. That didn't work.

I added the line GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="ip=192.168.0.11::192.168.0.1:255.255.255.0::eth0:none" to the server's /etc/default/grup and updated grup. That was meant to fix the IP issue. But that didn't work either.

I'm now thoroughly annoyed and at the end of my patience. Where did I go wrong? Also, is the syntax for the IP settings right because one guide says ::eth0:off and the next says ::etho:none?

Edit

There is someone with what seems to be the same problem on 15.04.

Edit 2

I can now connect to the server. Turns out, I had copied the wrong private key to use with dropbear. The error has been corrected in my script above. But adding keys still doesn't work (i.e. to dropbear's authorized_keys file). There's word you need to convert the public keys, that you want to add to /etc/initramfs-tools/root/.ssh/authorized_keys to dropbear's format, but I don't want to spend time searching how. I only tried dss public keys. Maybe dropbear just likes rsa better?

Also I noticed, that custom hook scripts don't seem to work. They are not included in the initramfs' directories but lsinitramfs -l /boot/initrd.img-3.16.0-43-generic lists them as part of the image. The IP settings are still ignored as well. Even if I add GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="ip=192.168.0.11::192.168.0.1:255.255.255.0::eth0:none" to the grubconfig in /etc/default/grub and update everything.

Edit 3

So it seems that /usr/lib/dropbear/dropbearconvert INPUTFORMAT OUTPUTFORMAT INFILE OUTFILE is the program to convert keys. The FORMAT parameter can be either openssh or dropbear. But it doesn't seem that's the answer on how to add keys to the servers /etc/initramfs-tools/root/.ssh/authorized_keys. The existing key there already is in openssh's public key file format. So adding other openssh-format keys shouldn't be a problem. Yet it is.

I'm using an HP EliteBook 9470m. It has one single combined input jack for microphone and headphone. I get clear nice sound with headphones missing a microphone, i.e headphones with only a three contact jack as shown on the right in the picture below.

When I use my phones headset (four contact connector on the left in the picture below), I get somewhat weak sound. I have to keep pressing the headset's button to get full sound quality.

I assume Ubuntu does not auto-detect the kind of jack that is plugged in. How do I get Ubuntu to recognize my mobile's headset?

I was using a custom keyboard layout. Basically I modified the us-mac layout to fit my ideal of a math-heavy version of the regular us layout that also throws German umlauts into mix. It went well and worked marvelously for 6 consecutive versions of Ubuntu. Today's version Upgrade (from 13.04 to 13.10) broke that streak. I now have the usual crappy Macintosh-Layout.

Now xkb just ignores my layout and all of the other changes I make in /usr/share/X11/xkb/symbols/us (tried to switch '0' and '9' everywhere and rebooted - no effect). Why is that?

I suspect I have to do an extra step now for the changes to take effect or something like that. Anyone care to point me in the right direction?

I am not sure if I'm looking at a network problem or a bug here. Since the update to 4.2.0.11 my Skype can't connect any more. My room-mate has the same problem. We're both on Ubuntu Raring Ringtail 13.04 on an EliteBook 9470m in my case. Does anyone have the same problem, or do you know of a bug-report?

(Update: Turns out it's neither a bug nor a network problem. Tor exit-nodes are blocked by Microsoft. See my answer below!)

Both purge-reinstall (including the removal of ~/.Skype) and using the .deb from skype.com (version 4.2.0.11_1) instead of the repositories did not help. Running Skype from the command line did not give additional messages.

I don't know how to decode the log files in ~/.Skype/Logs but the usual logs in /var/log/ show no anomalies. Changing the port Skype uses to one that is forwarded to my machine by the router, did not work either. Nor did running Skype as root.

The fact that I can get it running on the same machine, when I use tethered connection of my mobile points towards a network problem, but then again other machines in our household have no problem at all and I didn't change any network configurations for half a year.

I have been googling for a terminal lens, i.e. a Unity lens that integrates the terminal into the usual dash replaces the current Alt+F2 functionality.

For instance one could have a line of icons as it currently is, with command history sensitive to the typed word, and below that terminal output. All I could find on this were stale old posts in the Ubuntu Forums and an old brainstorm.

Does anyone know of a working terminal lens for Unity, like my mock-up above?

The shell session should say everything: I can't delete a file (movie.avi) although I have write permissions. I don't get what the problem is. Have I missed something?

confus@homeserver:/home/narur$ id
uid=1000(confus) gid=1000(confus) groups=1000(confus),4(adm),24(cdrom),27(sudo),30(dip),46(plugdev),106(lpadmin),117(sambashare),118(debian-transmission),1001(narur)

confus@homeserver:/home/narur$ ll | grep movie.avi 
-rw-rw----  1 narur narur 1,4G Jan 11 09:42 movie.avi

confus@homeserver:/home/narur$ rm movie.avi 
rm: cannot remove `movie.avi': Permission denied

# # # # SOME INFOS ON MY SYSTEM:
confus@homeserver:/home/narur$ lsb_release -dc
Description:    Ubuntu 12.10
Codename:   quantal
confus@homeserver:/home/narur$ uname -a
Linux conserve 3.5.0-21-generic #32-Ubuntu SMP Tue Dec 11 18:51:59 UTC 2012 x86_64 x86_64 x86_64 GNU/Linux

I changed the disk on my laptop and installed Ubuntu on the new disk. Old disk had 12.04 upgraded to 12.10 on it. Now I want to copy my old keyring with WiFi passwords, ftp passwords for nautilus and ssh key passphrases.

I have the whole data from the old disk available (is now a USB disk and I did not delete the old data yet or do anything with it - I could still put it in the laptop and boot from it like nothing happened). On the new disc that is now in my laptop, I have installed 12.10 with the same password, user-id and username as on the old disk. Then I copied a few important config files from the old disk (e.g. ~/.firefox/, ~/.mozilla, ~/.skype and so on, which all worked fine... except for the key ring:

The old methods of just copying ~/.gconf/... and ~/.gnome2/keyrings won't work. Did I miss something?

1. Edit: I figure one needs to copy files not located in the users home directory as well. I copied the whole old /home/confus (which is my home directory) to the fresh install to no effect. That whole copy is now reverted to the fresh install's home directory, so my /home/confus is as it was the after fresh install.

2. Edit: The folder /etc/NetworkManager/system-connections seems to be the place for WiFi passwords. Could be that /usr/share/keyrings is important as well for ssh keys - that's the only sensible thing that a search came up with:

find /usr/ -name "*keyring*

3. Edit: Still no ssh and ftp passwords from the keyring. What I did:

• Convert old hard drive to usb drive
• Put new drive in the laptop and installed fresh version of 12.10 there (same uid, username and passwort)
• Booted from old hdd via USB and copied its /etc/NetwrokManager/system-connections, ~/.gconf/ and ~/.gnome2/keyrings, ~/.ssh over to the new disk.
• Confirmed that all keys on the old install work
• Booted from new disk

Result: No passphrase for ssh keys, no ftp passwords in keyring. At least the WiFi passwords are migrated.

4. Edit: Boutny! Ending soon...

5. Edit: Keyring's now in ./local/share/keyrings/. Also interesting .gnupg

I'm a bit annoyed by the Update Manager. Since I upgraded from 12.04 I get this message, after installing updates:

I Find it utterly useless. It just another thing that pops in my face. If an update failed I get an error message regardless. It's interface 101 that you don't need a message when everything went well. How do I get rid of it or file a complaint so that it will not be included in future versions?

I know this is a minor thing but for some reason it really annoys me.

Update: Launchpad Bug

For a given hardware configuration, how do I find out if Ubuntu will run on it? What considerations should I take into account when choosing an Ubuntu version and flavour such as:

• Xubuntu with a lighter desktop than the usual Gnome and Unity
• Lubuntu with the even lighter LXDE desktop

Obviously Ubuntu does not run on some processor architectures. So how do I go about choosing the right version and derivate. How can I find out the minmal system requirements?

tl;dr:

How do I make gnome automount USB devices with permissions so that everyone in the group can access them instead of just one user that is logged in at the time the USB storage is plugged in?

(Here the group is called confus and the users narur and confus are both in that group. Only narur was logged in, at time of USB plug in so only narur can access the USB device - even after a sudo chmod g+rw. How do I change that?)

Details:

I run a media server at my home. It is connected to a projector as only monitor. Form time to time I like to plug in a USB drive to copy stuff from the server to said drive. The drive gets auto-mounted by the usual gnome shenanigans. Obviously I don't want to turn on the projector (take a while and is not good on the lamp). So I login to the server over ssh and do the copy over terminal from another PC.

Problem is, the USB drive gets mounted under a different user than the user I log in as via ssh. My ssh user doesn't have the rights to open the mount point chosen by gnome although it is in the same group. For clarification see this terminal session:

confus@conserve:/media$ id
uid=1000(confus) gid=1000(confus) groups=4(adm),8(mail),20(dialout),24(cdrom),46(plugdev),113(lpadmin),114(sambashare),122(admin),126(debian-transmission),135(debian-tor),1000(confus)

confus@conserve:/media$ ll
total 28
lrwxrwxrwx  1 root   root      6 Mar  8  2009 cdrom -> cdrom0
drwx------  1 narur  confus 4096 Oct  8 16:53 contemplate     # <-- USB drive
drwxr-xr-x  2 root   root   4096 May  3  2010 iso
drwxr-xr-x  2 confus confus 4096 Dec  8  2009 usb1

confus@conserve:/media$ sudo chmod -R ug+rwX 4009-D44F/       # <-- Doesn't do anything
[sudo] password for confus: 

confus@conserve:/media$ ll
total 28
lrwxrwxrwx  1 root   root      6 Mar  8  2009 cdrom -> cdrom0
drwx------  1 narur  confus 4096 Oct  8 16:53 contemplate    # <-- No change after chmod
drwxr-xr-x  2 root   root   4096 May  3  2010 iso
drwxr-xr-x  2 confus confus 4096 Dec  8  2009 usb1

My ssh user is "confus" while the disk is mounted for the user "narur". Obviously a simple chmod doesn't do since its a mount point. The problem exists for every USB storage device.

I know I could write a udev rule and I know that device based solutions exists. But there should be an easier solution to this problem, that's native to gvfs.

Update:

• Related post on superuser
• Related launchpad bug
• Another related launchpad bug.

Nothing has changed since 2009. This is embarrassing. There should be an easy work around for this problem at least.

In a background Python script I need to detect, when the system just woke up from suspend. What is a good way that does not rely on a root script but rather on python modules such as DBus?

I'm new to dbus so I could really use some example code. From what I read it's related to

org.freedesktop.UPower /org/freedesktop/UPower org.freedesktop.UPower.Resuming

Can anyone help me out with some code that connects the resuming signal to callback?

Zeitgeist logs your activity in Unity. Is there a way to look at the raw logs it creates?

Since Skype 4.0 I'm not able to open more than one chat window. If I want to chat with more than one person I have to close person one's chat window and open one with person two. Even if I click on person two's entry in the contact list and click on "chat" the window of person one will be replaced with person two's chat window.

I suspect there is an option in the preferences o change this obnoxious behavior but I can't seem to find it.

So how do I have Skype 4.0 open a separate chat window every person without replacing the old one?

Again this problem is new in 4.0, i.e. 2.0 Beta didn't have that problem.

I want to install Ubuntu to a USB hard drive so that it will run on all systems, that can run the LiveCD and store persistent data on a regular ext4 partition rather than a casper-rw file. In every other way it should behave like a regular Ubuntu installation.

The problem

With Startup Disk Creator one is able to put the LiveCD image on a USB-device. Changes can be made persistent but are stored in a file that is limited to a few GB in size. Said persistent file (additionally to being size restricted) has the problem that it isn't readable like data on a normal partition.*

My question

So how do I get the LiveCD on a USB disk in such a way that the changes are stored in a normal partition rather than a persistence file? Also the persistent changes shouldn't be restricted to a few GB in size but use whole partition of many 100 GB if need be.

I suspect there is a tutorial out there for this, but my google-fu is just not good enough to find it.

tl;dr:

Sytem should run on all hardware configurations, have full functionality of the LiveCD and be stored on a regular ext4 partiton without using ramdisks and casper-rw. FU casper-rw.

*I know one could mount the casper-rw file from another OS and get to the data this way but that's a hassle.

Bash has a myriad of useful shortcuts. For instance Alt+B, which moves the cursor back one word. Only I have assigned this particular combination and a few other shortcuts to do things in gnome. The trouble is, i've gotten used to it. Alt+B opens my browser and I'd like for it to stay that way, except when I work in gnome terminal.

Hence my question: How do I disable global shortcuts, (like the one to open my browser) and enable bash's own shortcuts, exclusively when working in gnome-terminal? Is there a way to tell gnome that the active/focused application's shortcuts take precedence over global shortcuts?

Okay, so I want to run a GUI application as daemon on a server without X. The application is a java program. It can be configured in a configuration file so the GUI is not necessary to use it. Unfortunately it doesn't have a shell executable.

I knew that one once, but forgot the solution. Basically there is a program which fakes an X-server to other programs. Finding that would be the ideal solution. Just can't remember what it was called.

I'm getting serous with a project of my own and need a good documentation on the appindicator module for python. What I've found so far:

1. API documentation on dev.ubuntu.com
2. Community wiki entry
3. API documentation on the C code
4. Nice blog post

what's wrong with them:

1. Just a list with no explanations on the arguments, returns and on what the methods do
2. Only design considerations and backgrounds - little that would help with actual programming
3. Stuff missing the python module has (e.g. create_menu_from_desktop)
4. Much useful information compressed but not complete

So basically I need something as detailed as 3. but for the python module.

Example on my problem:

void build_menu_from_desktop (desktop_file, desktop_profile)

What's are the arguments supposed to be and what does the method do? My guess is, the method creates menu entries from a '*.desktop' file. But if so, why does it need more arguments than just that file? Which entries in the file does it take the menu items from? It's questions like this I'm having a bit of a hard time finding an answer for.

Since our own Alaukik asked me to put a few scripts under GPL-License I wondered if I am doing it correctly. The points that concern me are:

1. Do I have to include the whole license with my project or is a comment like # Copyright by John Doe, 2011 Licensed under the MIT license: http://www.opensource.org/licenses/mit-license.php legally sufficient?
2. Do I have to include my real name or is an e-Mail or other alias legally waterproof?
3. Is the year important? I would guess 'yes' as copyrights expire in most countries after a certain period. What happens if I don't?
4. Should I use GPL over MIT? I tend towards MIT as it is more permissive and I don't care whether my scripts are used in closed source software.

Update:

There is a very good page on 'How to use GNU licenses for your own software'. The gnu website also makes suggestons on how to aply the licenses to your project (™Flimm). That covers a lot for the GPL.

Bottom line - license choice:
If you want to support free software, don't use too free a license. Disallowing proprietary use gives free software an edge over proprietary programs. In theory with some licenses re-usage of your code must credit your original. But re-usage is difficult to proof and some corporations might just not credit you. However, if you do want to spread your software as wide as possible, i.e you don't care about proprietary products using your software, then use MIT or LGPL. If in doubt use the more restrictive license and add a line, saying you may consider permitting uses outside of the license terms on a by-case basis. This way commercial users with a project worthy of your work have a chance.

Bottom line - copyright dispute:
Include as much information as you dare to make proving it's really your brainchild easier. Have a lawsuit over the ownership in the back of your head. Poor man's copyright is mailing a printed copy of your source to your home address. If the envelope is unbroken, the postmark is valid evidence at court and provides a date and a verified address. An e-mail instead of your full name to identify you should be okay and sufficient proof but: Better safe, than sorry.

I have a .jar file which is notorious for malfunctions. When a malfunction occurs, only a restart helps. I have a way to detect that malfunctions (reading the log-file of said .jar) So I want to write a script, that kills the process whenever the malfunction occurs. The problem is:

confus@confusion:~$ ps -A
...
4438 ?        00:00:00 java
4439 ?        00:00:00 java
4443 ?        00:00:00 java
...

The process name of all running .jars is naturally "java". How do I find out, which of these "java"-processes is the one I want to kill, i.e. the one running foobar.jar?

Original Question:

After I replaced my Ubuntu 10.10 with 11.04 all I get when I Ctrl+Alt+F1–F6 into a tty is a black screen. Also when I boot there's a while of black screen after grub2 menu is displayed. Then until just before gnome starts it stays black.

I have an Nvida Geforce Quadro FX 770M on my HP EliteBook 8530w. How do I get my ttys (aka 'virtual terminals') to work again?

My efforts in chronological order:

• So grub and gfx-payload seems to be the problem, I figured. I went along with this guide for higher tty resolution. Which led to the grub2 menu displaying in my native resolution rather than 800x600. The black screen problem remains.

• I googlehit some bugreports on other nvidia cards having that problem.

• I tried uninstalling the nvidia driver. No effect. Also tried different resolutions

• With an older version of the kernel it works. Though not perfectly. The ttys are usable, black screen between grub2 menu and gnome start remains. Not really a solution.

• Tried so much, that I lost track. Reinstalled grub2 and linux-image-2.6.38-8-generic. Then did this to my /etc/default/grub in accordance with the aforementioned guide (/etc/grub.d/00_header edited as well):

  GRUB_DEFAULT=0
  GRUB_HIDDEN_TIMEOUT=0
  #GRUB_HIDDEN_TIMEOUT_QUIET=true
  GRUB_TIMEOUT=3
  GRUB_DISTRIBUTOR=`lsb_release -i -s 2> /dev/null || echo Debian`
  #GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="quiet splash"
  GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX=""
  GRUB_GFXMODE=1680x1050x32
  

  To my surprise I can now use my ttys in native resolution. Black screen between grub2 menu and gnome login screen is still there though. That is annoying since I also use an encrypted disk thus having to enter my passphrase in total dark... Still looking for a solution but urgency is low.

• Downloaded and installed a later version of nvidia driver. No difference to last edit.

• Tried GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX="vga="-parameter. No effect.

• nomodeset has no effect. not even in combination with vga=...

• Tried echo FRAMEBUFFER=y > /etc/initramfs-tools/conf.d/splash no effect (see comment)

• On the verge of resignation...

• Bounty period soon to end.