Monday, June 23, 2008

How to install the Stackswitch plugin on Ubuntu Hardy

Today after many hours of trying I finally installed the stackswitch plugin for Compiz Fusion on Ubuntu 8.04. The fianl result was disapointing, at least for me, because I didn't really like it, but for anyone that's open to new experiences, go a head!

First what you need to do is install Compiz Fusion from Git source. In order to do this follow this instructions.
Note: first uninstall the previous version of compiz, then follow the instructions.
Note 2: the installation takes a while, so when the terminal goes crazy, just leave it, it'll finish eventually.
Note 3: Restart the Computer
Note 4: in order to run Compiz Fusion Icon on start up go to System>Preferences>Sessions and add another item for Compiz.

After you successfully installed Compiz Fusion from git, it's time to install the stackswitch plugin. (Other experimental plugins will be installed, but on Hardy the stackswitch requires additional setup)

1.Open a terminal and write this command to download the nescessery files:



This will create a folder in your home folder named "stackswitch"

2. Go to the folder typing:



Remember to replace "username" with.... your username.

3. Then type the following lines one by one (once you are in the stackswitch folder)




4. Reload the window manager, and Stack Switch Plugin will appear in Settings Manager under Windows management.

Now you can use the plug in. Although I appreciate more the cube deformation.

Screenshots of stackswitch, sphere, cilindar and the snow plug in.


My favorite, the Sphere. You can set it as screensaver under the screensaver plugin. (Flying windows are available as screensaver too).


The Cilindar (is this spelt correctly? Spellcheck gives me Celinda as alternative):


Snow. You're gonna love this.



The Stackswitcher.

Sunday, June 22, 2008

Evolution of Continents



A short video I made out of 14 pictures, depicting the movement of the continents through the ages.

Saturday, June 7, 2008

Digg's Duplicate Detection System

You just gotta love it, I usually don't pay much attention to the duplicate stories, but this just widens your eyes.

How to remove Vundo/Virtumonde trojan?

I got burned by this motherf**king (sorry for the language) trojan twice. The first time the explorer was quiting everytime I opened a folder and no antivirus was able to detect it. I tried Vundofix, VirtumondeBegone, HiJackThis etc. I even reinstalled the OS, but the trojan was persistent. After two days a message appeared offering a "help" (paid help of course), I ran Kaspersky then, and I got rid of it.
The second time I fried the motherfu**ing b**tard's as* (again, sorry for the bad english) much easier and faster.

THE SOLUTION

What you need is SpybotS&D (Search and Destroy). It's freeware made to get rid of adware. You can download it here. You can choose the beta version or a stable release which is recomended.

Install Spybot, and update it. Then run it and scan your computer. This will take a while. After it's finished look carefully if any of the results is actually something you need (which I doubt it, but if anyone is using cracked OS, the crack might be on the list). Select the Vundo or Virtumonde entry and click Fix Selected Items. Now Spybot will get rid of most Virtumonde/Vundo entries, but some will be unable to.
That's where Spybot will ask you if you want to run Spybot at startup. Choose Yes or OK, I don't remember which was it, and restart your computer.
After restarting only Spybot will run and start checking for problems again. (This is the waiting part which could be about 30 minutes. And again after finishing click Fix Selected Items, but this time since no other program is running Spybot will remove the Vundo/Virtumonde trojan.
Choose Exit from the menu bar and Windows will start.

And that is how it's done.

If any questions, comment. I'll try to help. if it works please do tell, again.

Thursday, June 5, 2008

How to fix the rc.local problem on Ubuntu Hardy

(When rc.local hangs at boot)

I installed Hardy Heron (dual boot with Vista) and it was working fine with the nvidia-glx-new drivers (8500 GT). But the TV-out didn't work or I don't know how to set it up and I installed Envyng, and from than on everything got messed up. The system would boot to the point where the rc.local script runs (which is unedited) than hang and boot in low-res. I uninstalled envy and reinstalled the drivers from synaptic but it still didn't work. Booting in recovery mode only helps the current session, or you would have to boot in recovery mode always, but the desktop effects will be pour. THE SOLUTION IS THIS:

1. First uninstall Envy, nvidia-glx and nvidia-glx-new. (there's a chance you might need to remove compiz too, but first try it like this)
2. Download the latest NVIDIA drivers for Linux. (here's a download link, or visit nvidia.com and download the driver from there)
3. After downloading NVIDIA-Linux-x86-173.08-pkg1.run you need to install it. This is actually the fix, installing this beta driver. How to install it:
-save the file in a folder (Ex. Documents), but remember or write down the path to that folder (/home/username/Documents)
-exit the X enviroment Ctrl+Alt+FF2
-login again and use this lines one by one:

sudo /etc/init.d/gdm stop

cd /home/username/Document

(Note: you can use any folder to save the file as long as you know how to get to it, this is an example. Just make sure the file is in that folder. BTW this is not a line just a note don't write this)

sudo sh NVIDIA-Linux-x86-173.08-pkg1.run

(Accept everything, even if it seems to complicated, all you need to do is select Yes and OK)

sudo /etc/init.d/gdm start

sudo reboot

That's it, your computer will restart, and you will need to adjust the resolution, choose the model of your screen and fix here and there something but the main problem will be fixed. For example with me at first the windows were incomplete, but after I chose driver, screen and screen resolution in Screen and Graphics it fixed the problem)