How To Enable Root (Super) User in Ubuntu

How To Enable Root (Super) User in Ubuntu: "

If you are new to Ubuntu and have been using other distros like Fedora or openSUSE before, then you may find it frustrating that when you issue the 'su' command it will result to authentication failure.

By default, access to root account password is disabled in Ubuntu for added security measures. But if you really want to enable root (super) user in Ubuntu just like you can on other Linux distributions, you can do it in two ways.

One way it to set a root user password by:

$ sudo passwd root
Enter new UNIX password:
Retype new UNIX password:
passwd: password updated successfully

After this, you will now be able to successfully use the 'su' command:

$ su -
Password:
#


You can always disable the root user password through this command:

$ sudo passwd -l root

The second and probably the simplest method of enabling root user in Ubuntu is by executing either of the following:

$ sudo -s

or

$ sudo su -

That's about it. I hope some of you out there will find this simple tip on how to enable the root (super) user in Ubuntu useful.

"

Oracle virtualization introduction guide

Oracle virtualization introduction guide: "This introductory guide to Oracle virtualization is designed to help you define and understand the basics of Oracle virtualization including Oracle's VM."

What's up with Ubuntu 9 and Karmic

Most twittered topics :

Ubuntu 9

Karmic Koala

First time ever a Linux distro hit this.

Twin Apple Fangirls Pwn Twin PC Clones [T-shirts]

Twin Apple Fangirls Pwn Twin PC Clones [T-shirts]: "

See what I meant? The command + C and command + V t-shirts look so much better. And I'd rather have daughters than sons. The latter are just too rambosterous. [Flickr via Geeks Are Sexy]

"

Los Angeles Goes Google Apps with Microsoft Cash

Los Angeles Goes Google Apps with Microsoft Cash: "Dan Jones writes 'The Los Angeles City Council has approved a US$7.25 million, five-year deal with Google in which the city will adopt Gmail and other Google Apps. Interestingly, just over $1.5 million for the project will come from the payout of a 2006 class action lawsuit between the City and Microsoft (Microsoft paid $70 million three years ago to settle the suit by six California counties and cities who alleged that Microsoft used its monopoly position to overcharge for software). The city will migrate from Novell GroupWise e-mail servers. For security, Google will provide a new separate data environment called 'GovCloud' to store both applications and data in a completely segregated environment that will only be used by public agencies. This GovCloud would be encrypted and 'physically and logically segregated' from Google's standard applications. Has cloud computing stepped up to prime time?'

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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The day of the Koala

The day of the Koala: "

Today is the day, the day of the Karmic Koala aka Ubuntu 9.10. Get it here…

High-5 to everybody in GNOME, KDE, Xorg, Ubuntu and Canonical! Now where is that Lucid Lynx running around?

"

Building the Ultimate KDE Desktop with Arch Linux

Building the Ultimate KDE Desktop with Arch Linux: "IT News: 'In this multi-part article, I'll first give you a general overview of installing this awesome distribution, and then in subsequent parts I'll kick it up a notch and walk you through installing the best KDE features out there and even clone some features of other KDE distro's while we're at it.'"

10 Useful Things To Do After Installing Ubuntu 9.10 Karmic Koala

10 Useful Things To Do After Installing Ubuntu 9.10 Karmic Koala: "

You’ve installed Ubuntu 9.10, now what? Here are my top 10 tips for getting a fresh install feeling your own…

1. Install Codecs, flash, Microsoft Fonts and DVD playback stuff

Ubuntu cannot – for legal reasons- ship with a lot of popular media codecs, plug-ins and other useful bits and bobs. If they wanted to, they’d have to pay and thus so would you.

The snappily titled ‘Ubuntu-Restricted-Extras’ package gives you all of this – Adobe Flash for watching YouTube videos, Microsoft Core Fonts for viewing some sites properly, Java, MP3/M4A/ACC/ETC playback, .RAR extraction, pretty much most video codec's one would likely need (.avi, .divx, .wmv, etc) and a ton more besides.

Installing all of this stuff is literally a click or so away: -

• Open Ubuntu Software Centre
• Search for ‘Ubuntu Restricted Extras’
• Click install

If you don’t mind being using the terminal then simply enter: -

• sudo apt-get install ubuntu-restricted-extras

Or for ultimate laziness just click the apt link below to be prompted to install: -

• Click me to install Ubuntu Restricted Extras

DVD Menu Navigation

To fully enable DVD Menu support you’ll have to get your hands dirty by opening a terminal and typing: -

• sudo /usr/share/doc/libdvdread4/install-css.sh

…but that’s pretty much it!

2. Install your Graphics Card Drivers

Enabling your graphics card is really quite easy in Ubuntu. If you want to use the latest supported driver simply open up the Appearance menu and turn compiz on. This will prompt you to install any driver for your device that isn’t already installed.

3. Enable Compiz Desktop Effects

Everyone loves a bit of eye-candy and it can safely be said that Compiz Fusion (or whatever it’s calling itself these days) is the world leader is superfluous-come-useful desktop bling. For sure.

Whether you want the “Desktop Cube”, an OS X like Exposé or just some simple window animations enabling Compiz is quite easy! It already comes pre-installed so you just need to turn it on!

Open the Appearance window

• System > Preferences > Appearance
• Select ‘Desktop Effects’ Tab
• Check either ‘Normal’ Or ‘Extra’

If you don’t have your graphics card drivers installed Ubuntu will, at this point, search for available ones and install them.

Tweaking Compiz

If the default “options” don’t give you all what you want, you can tweak every aspect of Compiz to your liking.

Want to draw fire on the screen? Want to set Exposé to a ‘hot corner’? All of this and about a million further options/effects can be sorted through the Compiz Config Manager.

• Open Ubuntu Software Centre
• Search for compiz-config
• Install

You can now tweak/enable/go mad with Compiz settings via: -

• System > Preferences > Compiz Config

If you only want to use the “main” options such as the cube, wobbly windows and window animations you may prefer only install the aptly named “Simple Compiz Config Manager”.

It’s a cinch to use.

• Open Software Centre
• Search for Simple Compiz
• Install

4. Get More Themes!

Open up the appearance menu by going to:

• System > Preferences > Appearance

Here you will find a selection of themes to choose from – including the gorgeous dust theme.

For a wider selection of well designed themes install the community themes package. This will give you some gorgeous new ones

Install Community Themes

5. Get GNOME Do

GNOME Do is somewhat hard to explain unless you’ve tried it – but it’s best described as an intelligent and instantaneous launcher; you hit a shortcut key, type a few letters of what you’re looking for and et voila! It finds it instantly and you’re on your merry way.

It has a raft of great plugins that further expand it’s useful-ness, too. You can find files and folder, search the web, post to twitter, send grand-ma an E-Mail… In fact if you can think of it there is more than likely is a plug-in for it!

Dock

The most popular ‘mode’ for Gnome Do is the ‘Dock’ interface. You enable it via the preference menu of GNOME Do. It works in the same was as Do only in a Dock-like interface.

It also comes with some very very neat docklets – such as Weather, Trash, Battery & a GMail notifer.

6. Ubuntu Tweak (It makes your life easier!)

“Ubuntu Tweak is an application designed to config Ubuntu easier for everyone.” yells the official spiel on the official website and it couldn’t be truer!

It adds a ton of extra repositories to your system (such as the Chromium Browser, Banshee Development version, Gwibber daily, etc), it gives you –safe- cleaning options (unlike Computer Janitor which can literally hose your system), allow you to set preferred applications for each individual file type, quickly and easily enable some awesome nautilus scripts and even lets you change the ‘ubuntu logo’ in the panel menu! And this is only a brief over-view…

Download/Install

• Select the correct .deb file for your system (i386 = 32bit, amd64 = 64bit (inc. intel 64bit)
• Double click it
• Install

Download Ubuntu-Tweak

Once you’ve installed it head straight to the Application section and enable some PPA’s and install some awesome applications!

Check out: -

7. Change The Panel Clock Appearance

The default clock set up is, quite frankly, lame. You can turn it into something of beauty with a few basic tweaks.

Run gconf-editor

• (ALT+F2 > gconf-editor)

Open up

• apps> panel> applets> clock_screen*> prefs

* this may be called something else; open up any applet until you see the correct ‘values’ in the right-hand screen.

• Double click on the format value and change it to ‘custom’

Then paste one of the ‘styles’ below into the custom_format field.

Humanity Style

This clock style matches the humanity panel set-up nicely.

• ^{<span rise="3000" font_desc="Droid Sans 7.5" color="#878787" weight="normal">%a %d %b</span>}%n_{<span font_desc="Droid Sans 7.5" color="#878787" weight="bold">%I:%M %p</span>}

Time Style

This one is great for netbooks.

• <span size="smaller" color="#c8c8c8">% a% d% b </ span> <b>% H:% M </ b>

8. Install a Twitter Client

Gwibber is the preferred choice of Twitter client for Ubuntu. Supporting a ton of social network and services from twitter, identi.ca facebook to flickr, flyakite and Digg.

You can easily keep up-to-date with your social network services – reply, tweet, message, post etc. It even integrates with the messaging applet on the main gnome panel, too!

You can install Gwibber by clicking on the apt-link below: -

• Install Gwibber

For a choice of other Twitter clients check out my review of 6 top twitter apps.

9. Empathy Vs Pidgin Vs Everyone

If the default messaging application ‘Empathy’ doesn’t do it for you, there are lots of other choices.

The previous default IM client ‘Pidgin’ is still a very worthy choice and although it can’t support webcam over MSN like Empathy it does come with an awesome plug-in framework allowing you to add to functionality and features to Pidgin.

You can add Facebook chat, now playing status updates, twitter, extra smilies, interface tweaks and more.

Install Pidgin

Why not check out my top 5 plug-ins’ for Pidgin.

Emesene

Emesene 1.5 is a solid choice for MSN users. Not only does it resemble MSN looks-wise, it is feature full! It supports, among the “usual” features you’d find,: -

• Webcam Sending/Receiving
• Nudges
• Winks
• Now Playing
• Facebook Integration (via the facebook plugin)
• Themes

Install Emesene

10. Enjoy using it!

Forget about finding new apps or tweaking some part of Karmic for an hour or so and just use Ubuntu like anyone else would.

Browse the net, chat on Pidgin, type up that letter in OOo and listen to something awesome in Rhythmbox and enjoy the awesomeness of Ubuntu 9.10.

(That was cheesy, wasn’t it?)

© omgubuntu.co.uk 2009. | Ubuntu News, Tips, Apps and more.

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What If Microsoft Had Invented Twitter (My Take On An Idea From Tsahi Levent-Levi)

What If Microsoft Had Invented Twitter (My Take On An Idea From Tsahi Levent-Levi): "

My take on an idea from Tsahi Levent-Levi (seen through GigaOm).

P.S.: (Has nothing to do with this post) Thanks to @freenerd for giving me the hint about this TechCrunch post. (They missed attribution but fixed it shortly after my complain)

"

Ubuntu 9.10 vs Windows 7 unbiased comparison in Guardian (UK)

Ubuntu 9.10 vs Windows 7 unbiased comparison in Guardian (UK): "

The Guardian is not always known for it's unbiased opinion when it comes to OS reviews. There is a pleasant surprise for us free software users in this review however which compares Ubuntu 9.10 (out 29 Oct) and Windows 7. A balanced and well approached review. Worth a read.

"

Gmail account security tips

Gmail account security tips: "Posted by Sarah Price, Online Operations Strategist

As part of National Cyber Security Awareness Month, we recently posted about how to pick a smart password. Having a strong password goes a long way in helping to protect your data, but there are a number of additional steps you can take to help you keep your Gmail account secure:

1. Remember to sign out. Especially when using a public computer, be careful to sign out of your Google account when you're finished. Just click the 'Sign out' link at the top right corner of your inbox. If you're using a public or shared computer and want to be extra thorough, you can also clear the browser's cache, cookies and history. Then, completely close the browser. On your personal computer, you can also lock your computer with a password-protected screensaver if you need to step away momentarily. Learn the best ways to lock your screen in Windows or in Mac OS X. Forgot to sign out? Open up a new Gmail session on another computer and use Gmail's remote sign out feature to close any sessions that might still be open elsewhere.

2. Be careful about sending certain sensitive information via email. Once you send an email, you're no longer in control of the information it contains. The recipients, if they so choose, could forward the email or post its contents in a public place. Even if you know and trust the people you're emailing, that information may become exposed if their accounts become compromised or they get a virus on their machines. As a rule of thumb, should you need to provide a credit card number or financial account number to respond to a message, provide it over the phone or in person — not over email. And never share your password with anyone. Google does not email you to ask you for your password, your social security number, or other personal information — so don't send it!

3. Enable 'Always use HTTPS.' Any time you visit a webpage, your computer needs to send and receive information across the Internet. HTTPS is used to encrypt data as it is transmitted between computers on the Internet, so look for the 'https' in the URL bar of your browser to indicate that the connection between your computer and Gmail's servers is encrypted. We use HTTPS on the Gmail login page, and you can choose to protect your entire Gmail session with HTTPS as well. HTTPS can make your mail slower, so we let you make the choice for yourself. Open Settings and choose 'Always use HTTPS' on the General tab if you want to turn it on.

4. Be wary of unexpected attachments.To help protect you from viruses and malware, Gmail automatically scans every attachment when it's delivered to you, and again each time you open a message. Attachments you send are also scanned. That said, no system is foolproof, so if you happen to get an email from a friend with an attachment you didn't expect, don't be afraid to ask the sender what it is before you decide whether to open it.

5. Make sure your account recovery information is up-to-date. Your account recovery information helps you regain access to your account if you ever forget your password, or if someone gains access to your account without your permission. We currently offer several paths to account recovery. Every Gmail user must select a security question and answer — be sure to choose a combination that is easy for you to remember, but hard for others to guess or come across by investigating. Don't choose a question like "What is my favorite color?" as others may easily guess the answer. We also encourage you to provide a secondary email address and/or a mobile phone number, so we can send you a link to reset your password if you lose access to your account.

You can find additional security tips for Gmail in our Help Center. Learn more about protecting your computer, website, and personal information by checking out our security series on the Google blog or visiting http://www.staysafeonline.org.

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