jbeard4's questions

I have a Dell Inspiron Mini 1012 running Ubuntu 10.04 and Windows 7 Starter in a dual-boot configuration.

The CPU runs much cooler in Windows than it does in Ubuntu, even when the CPU has been idling. For example, I'm in Ubuntu now, the CPU has been idling for some time, and the CPU temperature is 72 C according to lm-sensors and coretemp.

The machine actually overheated in Ubuntu at one point, just from running the CPU at 100% for an extended period of time. Again, this problem only occurs in Ubuntu - I have never noticed a heat issue in Windows.

I have tried using the CPU Frequency Scaling Monitor GNOME applet to set my CPU speed to 1GHz (instead of 1.67GHz) and Powersave mode, but this does not seem to affect the idle temperature.

Here is /proc/cpuinfo:

processor   : 0
vendor_id   : GenuineIntel
cpu family  : 6
model       : 28
model name  : Intel(R) Atom(TM) CPU N450   @ 1.66GHz
stepping    : 10
cpu MHz     : 1000.000
cache size  : 512 KB
physical id : 0
siblings    : 2
core id     : 0
cpu cores   : 1
apicid      : 0
initial apicid  : 0
fdiv_bug    : no
hlt_bug     : no
f00f_bug    : no
coma_bug    : no
fpu     : yes
fpu_exception   : yes
cpuid level : 10
wp      : yes
flags       : fpu vme de tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic mtrr pge mca cmov pat clflush dts acpi mmx fxsr sse sse2 ss ht tm pbe nx lm constant_tsc arch_perfmon pebs bts aperfmperf pni dtes64 monitor ds_cpl est tm2 ssse3 cx16 xtpr pdcm movbe lahf_lm
bogomips    : 3325.06
clflush size    : 64
cache_alignment : 64
address sizes   : 32 bits physical, 48 bits virtual
power management:

processor   : 1
vendor_id   : GenuineIntel
cpu family  : 6
model       : 28
model name  : Intel(R) Atom(TM) CPU N450   @ 1.66GHz
stepping    : 10
cpu MHz     : 1000.000
cache size  : 512 KB
physical id : 0
siblings    : 2
core id     : 0
cpu cores   : 1
apicid      : 1
initial apicid  : 1
fdiv_bug    : no
hlt_bug     : no
f00f_bug    : no
coma_bug    : no
fpu     : yes
fpu_exception   : yes
cpuid level : 10
wp      : yes
flags       : fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic mtrr pge mca cmov pat clflush dts acpi mmx fxsr sse sse2 ss ht tm pbe nx lm constant_tsc arch_perfmon pebs bts aperfmperf pni dtes64 monitor ds_cpl est tm2 ssse3 cx16 xtpr pdcm movbe lahf_lm
bogomips    : 3325.07
clflush size    : 64
cache_alignment : 64
address sizes   : 32 bits physical, 48 bits virtual
power management:

Does anyone have any advice as to how I can get my CPU to run cooler under Ubuntu?

Update:

Here is the output of powertop, after running it for about a minute:

Cn                Avg residency       P-states (frequencies)
C0 (cpu running)        (13.7%)         1.67 Ghz     2.8%
C0                0.2ms ( 0.0%)         1333 Mhz     0.3%
C1 mwait          0.3ms ( 2.2%)         1000 Mhz    96.9%
C2 mwait          0.5ms (14.2%)
C4 mwait          0.8ms (69.9%)


Wakeups-from-idle per second : 1303.9   interval: 10.0s

Power usage (ACPI estimate): 13.3W (2.7 hours)

Top causes for wakeups:
  33.4% (611.7)   chromium-browse
  26.5% (483.7)   PS/2 keyboard/mouse/touchpad interrupt
  17.7% (324.3)   [extra timer interrupt]
   7.8% (142.9)   [kernel scheduler] Load balancing tick
   2.3% ( 41.2)   ekiga
   1.9% ( 34.0)   [eth1] 
   1.6% ( 29.4)   rhythmbox
   1.3% ( 24.5)   USB device  1-8 : USB2.0-CRW (Generic)
   1.3% ( 24.2)   Xorg
   1.1% ( 19.8)   desktopcouch-se
   1.0% ( 18.5)   [ehci_hcd:usb1, uhci_hcd:usb2] 
   0.8% ( 15.5)   [acpi] 
   0.6% ( 10.8)   [kernel core] hrtimer_start (tick_sched_timer)
   0.4% (  6.9)   [kernel core] add_timer (wl_timer)
   0.3% (  5.3)   parcellite
   0.2% (  3.6)   gwibber-service
   0.2% (  3.0)   [Rescheduling interrupts] 
   0.2% (  3.0)   wpa_supplicant
   0.1% (  2.3)   python
   0.1% (  2.3)   gnome-terminal
   0.1% (  2.1)   beam.smp
   0.1% (  1.9)   multiload-apple
   0.1% (  1.8)   NetworkManager

Update:

Upgrading to kernel 2.6.38-1 via PPA actually seems to make the wakeups-per-second as bad or worse:

PowerTOP version 1.12      (C) 2007 Intel Corporation                                                                            

Cn                Avg residency       P-states (frequencies)
C0 (cpu running)        (13.2%)         1.67 Ghz     9.6%
polling           0.0ms ( 0.0%)         1333 Mhz     1.1%
C1 mwait          0.5ms ( 4.2%)         1000 Mhz    89.3%
C2 mwait          0.7ms (50.8%)
C4 mwait          0.5ms (31.8%)

Wakeups-from-idle per second : 1465.2   interval: 10.0s                                                                                                                   
Power usage (ACPI estimate): 13.5W (3.6 hours) (long term: 12.6W,/3.9h)

Top causes for wakeups:
  35.8% (483.6)   PS/2 keyboard/mouse/touchpad interrupt
  27.0% (364.4)   chromium-browse
  21.0% (284.5)   [extra timer interrupt]
   2.7% ( 36.0)   kworker/0:0
   2.5% ( 34.3)   [kernel scheduler] Load balancing tick
   2.5% ( 33.8)   Xorg
   1.5% ( 19.9)   desktopcouch-se
   1.1% ( 15.1)   [acpi] 
   0.0% (  0.1)D  flush-8:0
   0.9% ( 12.5)   USB device  1-8 : USB2.0-CRW (Generic)
   0.9% ( 12.0)   [ehci_hcd:usb1, uhci_hcd:usb2] 
   0.1% (  0.7)D  upowerd
   0.6% (  8.3)   parcellite
   0.5% (  7.3)   [ahci] 
   0.5% (  6.1)   gnome-terminal
   0.3% (  3.6)   gwibber-service
   0.2% (  3.0)   [kernel core] timer_action (ehci_watchdog)
   0.2% (  2.8)   [kernel core] hrtimer_start (tick_sched_timer)
   0.2% (  2.2)   python
   0.1% (  2.0)   multiload-apple
   0.1% (  2.0)   beam.smp
   0.1% (  1.7)   [Rescheduling interrupts] 
   0.1% (  1.6)   [eth0] 

The program 'upowerd' is writing to file 'history-rate-DELL_2T6K207N-52.d' on `/dev/sda5`. This prevents the disk from going to powersave mode.

 Q - Quit   R - Refresh  
0$ notes  1$ todo  2$ dev1  3$ dev2  4$ dev3  5$ srv  (6*$bash)  7-$ bash                                                                                    05/26  2:03PM

I have put Ubuntu on my mum's desktop computer. Unfortunately, the open source radeon driver does not work well with the onboard ATI graphics, and ATI's proprietary driver no longer supports the hardware at all. In order to use the ATI proprietary driver with this hardware, it is necessary to use an older version of Xorg, which is now only available in versions of Ubuntu older than 8.10. Unfortunately, the open source radeon driver seems to be causing X to lock up intermittently when my mum uses Audacity.

I'm willing to accept that some hardware is not well-supported on Ubuntu, and so, because this is a desktop computer with a couple of free PCI slots, I think a better solution might simply be to plug in a new graphics card that might have better driver support, and to disable the onboard ATI card in the BIOS. The requirements for this card are that it be inexpensive and have robust (preferably open source) driver support in Ubuntu 10.04. Heavy-duty graphics processing power is not a requirement. A second-hand card on Ebay would also be fine. Can anyone make some recommendations?

I'm trying to enable dual monitors in Ubuntu. This is working fine, but every time I do it, desktop effects is disabled. I think I've found the reason why, though:

https://wiki.ubuntu.com/X/Config/Multihead/

As with the GNOME XRandR configuration method, setting Virtual to too large a value may result in a loss of hardware acceleration, and thus an inability to use Compiz and its desktop effects.

When I use the GNOME monitor applet, or the Monitors configuration in the System menu, the default xrandr settings puts the second monitor to the right of the first, and, as I found with this bug, for most monitors this creates a virtual desktop larger than the maximum 2048 horizontal resolution needed for hardware acceleration on my netbook hardware.

So, it seems like if I can modify xrandr's default settings so that it places the new desktop above or below (north or south of) the main LVDS display, then hardware acceleration, and therefore compiz will continue to work. Can anyone tell me, what is the easiest way to achieve this?

UPDATE:

I have confirmed that multihead support with desktop effects and hardware acceleration works when I move the external monitor display north of the main LVDS display. Right now this involves the following process: plugging in the external monitor, starting the Monitors configuration menu, desktop effects are disabled automatically (and all of the windows on my workspaces are moved to the first workspace), repositioning the external display so that it is north of LVDS display and clicking apply, and then navigating to the Appearance menu and telling it to reenable desktop effects. Is there a simpler way do this?

UPDATE 2:

OK, so I thought that perhaps the GNOME Monitors configuration screen was trying to be clever, and might be disbling desktop effects. So, I just tried using the xrandr command-line client instead, as follows:

xrandr --output VGA1 --above LVDS1

When I do that, desktop effects are still disabled, and I need to manually reenable them. This, despite the fact that hardware acceleration works, and there is never a point where hardware acceleration stops working because the horizontal dimension of the virtual display is too large. So what program is trying to be clever, and is turning off desktop effects when it doesn't need to? And how do I make it stop?

If there were a way to re-enable desktop effects from the command line, which I could then put into a script along with the proper xrandr invocation, I would accept that as a workaround.

UPDATE 3:

OK, here's my script to enable a second monitor with desktop effects. It might be evil, I'm not sure:

second-monitor.sh

xrandr --output VGA1 --above LVDS1
sleep 3
compiz --replace &

The sleep statement might not be necessary.

If there's a better way to do this, please let me know.

UPDATE 4:

This is a Dell Mini Inspiron 1012.

Here are my system specifications:

lspci -vv

00:02.0 VGA compatible controller: Intel Corporation N10 Family Integrated Graphics Controller
    Subsystem: Dell Device 041a
    Control: I/O+ Mem+ BusMaster+ SpecCycle- MemWINV- VGASnoop- ParErr- Stepping- SERR- FastB2B- DisINTx+
    Status: Cap+ 66MHz- UDF- FastB2B+ ParErr- DEVSEL=fast >TAbort- <TAbort- <MAbort- >SERR- <PERR- INTx-
    Latency: 0
    Interrupt: pin A routed to IRQ 29
    Region 0: Memory at f0b00000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=512K]
    Region 1: I/O ports at 18d0 [size=8]
    Region 2: Memory at d0000000 (32-bit, prefetchable) [size=256M]
    Region 3: Memory at f0900000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=1M]
    Capabilities: <access denied>
    Kernel driver in use: i915
    Kernel modules: i915

00:02.1 Display controller: Intel Corporation N10 Family Integrated Graphics Controller
    Subsystem: Dell Device 041a
    Control: I/O+ Mem+ BusMaster+ SpecCycle- MemWINV- VGASnoop- ParErr- Stepping- SERR- FastB2B- DisINTx-
    Status: Cap+ 66MHz- UDF- FastB2B+ ParErr- DEVSEL=fast >TAbort- <TAbort- <MAbort- >SERR- <PERR- INTx-
    Latency: 0
    Region 0: Memory at f0b80000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=512K]
    Capabilities: <access denied>

lsmod | grep i915

i915                  287458  2 
drm_kms_helper         29329  1 i915
drm                   162409  3 i915,drm_kms_helper
intel_agp              24375  2 i915
i2c_algo_bit            5028  1 i915
video                  17375  1 i915

I've been happily using Compiz with the Grid plugin on Ubuntu 10.04 on my Mini Inspiron netbook. However, due to battery life issues, I'm considering downgrading to a lighter Ubuntu derivative, and would like to try Lubuntu, which uses the Openbox window manager. I'm wondering, is there any way to make Openbox behave a bit more like a tiling window manager, in a manner similar to the Compiz Grid plugin?

I have written an application, and I'm now interested in creating a Debian package and setting up a PPA. The application is written primarily in XSLT, and includes a very thin front-end that can be written in any language that can access an XSLT processor. I currently have front-ends written in JavaScript (able to run in the browser client, and from the command-line under Rhino) and Python. I'd also like to write a front-end entirely in bash, and simply use one of the command-line XSLT processors available in apt.

There are several available via apt, including xsltproc, xalan, and 4suite's xslt processor. I'd like to make the bash front-end flexible so that it is able to use any of these command-line clients, and will simply use whichever is available.

How can I best express in terms of Debian's package dependency system the relationship between my package and these three other packages, which is a logical disjunction (OR relationship)?

My package relies on xsltproc OR 4suite OR xalan. Ideally, when my package is installed, the user should be prompted to choose any of these three package to install as a dependency; and if one of these packages is already installed on the system when my package is installed, then no additional dependencies should be installed. Is such a thing possible with Debian packages?

I created a screencast using recordmydesktop which produced an .ogv file. I believe this is an OGG file encoded using the Theora codec. I'm wondering how can I convert this to MPEG4/H.264? I've tried to use FFmpeg in a naive way, as follows:

ffmpeg -i demo.ogv -f mp4 demo.mp4

However this produces an evil blob of dark greens and grays when trying to play it again in MPlayer. I then tried to get more sophisticated, using the command-line flags specified here:

ffmpeg -i demo.ogv \
       -s 352x288 -vcodec libx264 -vpre default \
       -acodec libmp3lame -ab 192k -ac 2 -ar 44100 -f mp4 \
       demo.mp4

But, the result was the same.

If anyone has any insight into what might be the best way to accomplish this task, I'd appreciate it if you could let me know.

I just bought a Dell Mini 1012, which comes with a Broadcom Crystal media accelerator chip. I'd like to know what is the current state-of-the-art with regard to using this hardware on Ubuntu? What I mean by this is, what is the best way to install drivers to make use of this hardware, and what media players currently support it? I've read that XBMC currently does, but what about gstreamer?

Ideally, I'd like to find a solution so that I can accelerate Flash videos using the device. It seems like one strategy may be to download Flash videos to the hard drive and play them with an external, Crystal-enabled media player, and so that seems like one option, but I'm wondering if any of the free flash alternatives (Gnash and Lightspark) support hardware acceleration of flash video using the Crystal API?

It seems like there is a lot of information about all of this on the web, but it's not consolidated, and seems like a rapidly moving target, so any insight anyone may have into this would be appreciated.

I just tried integrating xmonad with GNOME on Ubuntu 10.04, according to the instructions found here: http://www.haskell.org/haskellwiki/Xmonad/Using_xmonad_in_Gnome#Ubuntu_Karmic

Unfortunately, I was not successful at getting it to work. I'm wondering are there any tiling window managers that are easy to install and use inside of GNOME as a replacement for Metacity or Compiz?

Update I just got xmonad working inside of GNOME. This was a two-step process:

First, execute this line inside of GNOME:

gconftool-2 -s /desktop/gnome/session/required_components/windowmanager xmonad --type string

As described here: http://haskell.org/haskellwiki/Xmonad/Using_xmonad_in_Gnome#Setting_up_Gnome_to_use_Xmonad

Second, and most critically (this was the step I was missing), add the following to ~/.xmonad/xmonad.hs:

 import XMonad
 import XMonad.Config.Gnome

 main = xmonad gnomeConfig

As described here: http://xmonad.org/xmonad-docs/xmonad-contrib/XMonad-Config-Gnome.html