Linux – Page 2 – FoolControl

Debian PPA Utility

September 4, 2014

Debian remains to be my favorite distribution, however there’s one thing that’s missing, that thing is called PPA.

There were numerous discussions on this topic inside of Debian, but AFAIK without any visible movement. Thus, I decided to publish a utility I’ve been using for some time now.

PPA’s

Since its introduction, PPA’s are exclusively connected to Ubuntu and its derivatives (Mint, Elementary, etc …). But over time, a number of interesting projects appeared whose whole development is happening inside of PPA’s. To name few, I’m talking about TLP, Geary, Oracle Java Installer, Elementary OS and etc … Some of these projects are in WNPP without much happening for a long time, i.e: TLP

One option was to repackage these packages and then have them uploaded to Debian, or just go rogue and install them directly from its PPA’s. Title of this post might hint which path I took.

In theory, adding Ubuntu packages on your Debian system is a bad idea, and adding its PPA’s is probably even worse. But, I’ve been using couple (TLP, Geary, couple of custom icon sets) of these PPA’s on my personal/work boxes, and to be honest, never had a single problem. Also, setting Pinning priority to low for the PPA you added is never a bad idea.

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Enable global menu and HUD support in Eclipse IDE

January 13, 2013

As I couldn’t retain my curiosity for Ubuntu’s “Raring Ringtail” release, I ended up having a dual boot with Ubuntu 13.04 and Debian Sid.

Even thought at the moment 13.04 is only 24% complete, it’s already a pretty promising release. However, one thing that heavily annoyed me is that global menu and HUD (still) don’t work out of box with Eclipse IDE.

Being part of Debian Java team (working on Eclipse) I had to do something about it. To make it as simple as possible for you, I made a package which enables mentioned features.

Package is made for/tested and working on 32/64 bit architectures on 12.04/12.10/13.04 Ubuntu.

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:fooctrl/eclipse
sudo apt-get update & sudo apt-get install eclipse-enable.appmenu

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android-sdk-installer for Linux (Debian/Ubuntu)

July 19, 2012

This post is also available on/was written for OMG! Ubuntu

I’m fan of automation, as well as simplicity and as much as I tend to complicate my own life I generally enjoy making life easier for others. I’m of a belief that if you’re a Android developer who’s new to Linux and is using it as his development platform, you’ll have pretty hard time installing and setting up all the necessary tools.

Some people use Linux to make their life easier, not because they like to fiddle with Linux internals, for some time now I’m looking how Android SDK, Eclipse ADT plugin, hardware drivers as well as MTP support are installed as almost completely different components. And in order to install/configure some of these components you will need to role up your sleeves and dive into Terminal, something that almost every new or even experienced user will try to avoid.

That’s why I started thinking of ways how to make this process as simply as possible, and fast as possible. The solution I came up is called “android-sdk-installer“. Not very original name, I know, but this is a utility oriented to Linux (currently Debian and Ubuntu) which aims to automatically install and configures Android SDK, Eclipse ADT Plugin, adds hardware support for devices and enable full MTP support.

I did this project as part of my University Capstone project “Implementation of Android SDK into Debian Linux” where I explained everything down to the smallest detail as well as included the very first version of installer’s code. My intentions with this projects are to make current script fully working, after which I’m planning to package it into a Debian package as I’m the owner of Android SDK Debian ITP. Among many plans for the future one of the most important ones is to add a GUI as right now it’s represented in text mode.

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Linux power regression + overheating problem on ThinkPad [fixed?]

November 10, 2011

This post is also available on/was written for OMG! Ubuntu

This blog post isn’t only directed to ThinkPad owners as most notebook Linux users with Intel Core Duo 1/2 and i3/i5/i7 processors have been affected by this bug if not all. And yes, this problem is present on latest Debian Unstable and Ubuntu 11.10.

Prelude

I’m owner of Thinkpad X300, great machine except the fact that just recently I replaced its 3rd cooling fan! Yea, I do a lot of compiling and it’s on all the time, but still this kind of things shouldn’t happen. I first linked this problem to the fact that Thinkpad fan on Linux (as of 2.6.22) always works at what’s its basically maximum RPM, thus the reason there are numerous fan control scripts. My favorite one is Thinkfan, but controlling fan doesn’t really help if you have a overheating problem. For matter of a fact it working on its maximum speed might only help, with its own toll.

As of kernel 2.6.38 up until 3.1 (still present) there has been a problem of power regression but besides this I had slight problem with overheating. Regarding overheating in beginning I tried reporting bugs, tried different Thinkfan configurations, blamed proprietary software such as Adobe Flash for spiking up CPU temperature, however this problem was somewhat solved. After numerous battery calibrations and as these didn’t work in the end for battery life getting poorer with each day, I just blamed the factor that notebook was getting pretty old (~3 years).

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My DebConf11 summary and its after effects

October 22, 2011

Even though some three months have passed since DebConf11 has successfully ended, I still wanted to give you just a glimpse on how some parts were played through the eyes of a lunatic (read: organizer). Of course, blog post can’t come close near of explaining anything but at least it should give some insight and hopefully some pointers to the future DebConf organizers.

If you don’t feel like reading this much text you can listen to last episode of “This Week In Debian” podcast and after it just head to “Beginning of the end” part.

DebConf11

First of all I’d like to apologize if I offended or hurt anyone in this whole process as it wasn’t my intention and during DebConf organization this is nothing irregular, for you to get hurt or you hurting somebody else. One thing that got stuck with me this whole time is when Martín Ferrari approached me after I did bid proposal of Bosnia/Herzegovina for DebConf11 back on DebConf9 and told me “you have no idea what you just got yourself into” I played cool and said something along the line “of coure I do” and boy did I lie.

During DebConf organization you’re bound to make some of your decisions instantaneously in which you’ll lose something, the most you can do is assess what’s the thing you can “cut the cord” on, even though if that “thing” or a “person” for that matter might have meant something to you. You’ll lose things, relationships, friendships, contacts … at the times sense of humor and maybe even common logic. Some of it comes back to you, some the very next day and for some it may take longer. Some of it was lost irreversibly, but even in that case it wasn’t lost and could even be traced to some other cause.

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FoolControl – Phear the penguin

Category: Linux

Debian PPA Utility

Enable global menu and HUD support in Eclipse IDE

android-sdk-installer for Linux (Debian/Ubuntu)

Linux power regression + overheating problem on ThinkPad [fixed?]

My DebConf11 summary and its after effects