Silly Rabbit...

This is one of those "it figures" things...

I was fiddling about on my desktop, doing some Mint updates, when I glanced at the laptop pile next to the desk.  Oh yeah, the T400...

I think I mentioned the problems the Thinkpad T400 had a while back.  I'd been using it on the road, loaded up with Bodhi Linux, and had just finished out the project I was on, when I started having odd problems.  Turned out it was a graphics thing, and needed some tweaking.  When I got it back from the shop, I fiddled with it for a bit (I'd installed Zorin on it to replace Bodhi, which I'd just never really been happy with), then set the thing aside, moving on to whatever else was floating on the agenda.

Well, having nothing better to do with a Sunday, I decided to drag the 400 out and give it a run.  My initial thought was to install Manjaro with OpenBox on it, and see how that worked.  However, while digging through my stack of CDs/DVDs, I ran across a copy of Fuduntu 2013.2, which I'd downloaded/burned, and forgotten about.  (Do you see a sort-of behavior pattern emerging?)

Oh, what the heck?  I remembered reading about Fuduntu, and thought it'd be cool to fiddle with, as I have nothing even remotely close to Fedora on any of my systems.  So...  I did a liveboot to test, and everything worked fine...  Next stop, full installation.

Not bad, I must say.  The installation was fast and painless.  everything worked right out of box.  I was impressed.

Until I pulled up the terminal and entered "sudo yum update".  I get back an odd message about being unable to connect, etc.  For giggles, I enter "sudo yum upgrade".  Same deal.

A quick run to the GUI software update yields a single package, and that's it.

Hmmm...  Something's starting to click here...

Now, of course, the more observant out there are already chuckling at my expense.  A quick trip to Distrowatch showed that, as I'd begun to suspect, Fuduntu has been discontinued.  A little further research confirmed.  Fuduntu is no more.

Big sigh.

I guess I'll have to start looking for something else to put on the ol' T400 here.  Manjaro is still an option, but if I do, I think I'll go for a version other than the OpenBox one...

But, for now, I'm going to leave Fuduntu on here.  I rather like what I'm seeing.  And this is the latest version, so it's still up to date.  I'm not sure if any of the repositories are still on line or not (as they are for Saluki, which I can still get software for).

I seem to have a knack for picking the winners here, don't I?  I find something I like, and find it's been discontinued.

Oh well...

Following Up

Yeah, I am on the Panasonic CF-29, and no I haven't installed Puppy yet.  Though I did just have Precise 5.6.1 livebooted, and it ran fine.  Save, of course, for the trackpad and the touchscreen.  I have yet to figure out how to deal with either.  (Though I seem to have accidentally spruced up the trackpad in XP.  That's mildly embarrassing.  To be honest, I'm not even sure what I did...)

The CF-29 is such a big, clumsy, lumbering beast, you just have to like it.  And it is built like a tank, which would make it a great system for carrying it around in the boonies, where I like to lurk on my time off.  But I would soooo prefer some version of Linux on it. Especially given Microsoft's idiotic (for their consumers) plan to kill off XP.  (Yeah, I know...  I'm not thinking corporately...  But...  Geez...)

In any event, it's getting kinda late, and the CF-29's battery is getting a little low.  Probably switch over to the Toshiba for the rest of the evening.  Maybe do some research...

The bumbling tech noob's work is never done...

Never satisfied

The "new" Toshiba is cruising along merrily, and I couldn't be happier.  I've been wanting to take it "out on the road" today, but it's a Saturday, and I really don't want to be toting a fairly large laptop about.  Not only that, but it's boiling hot and humid out, not the best weather to drag our electronic friends out in.

While cruising around online, I dropped into Carl Draper's Tech Thoughts blog.  He's much more knowledgeable than I'll ever be, and has some truly cool stuff going on, so I like to drop in every now and then and check things out.

One of his entries was on getting Linux up and running on an older Panasonic Toughbook, which of course got me thinking about my Toughbook, which has been sitting, forlornly waiting ever since I installed its new CD/DVD drive ages back. 

I did a quick CD test of Puppy on it (Precise 5.6, I believe) right after installing the new drive, and things worked fairly well.  Puppy at least recognizes the touchscreen, and I seem to remember it also saw/recognized the wireless.  However, the touchscreen calibration is off (I gather this is a common problem when going to Linux on these systems).  And I really need to use the touchscreen, as the touchpad seems to be overly slow.

I was quickly browsing through some old entries on installing Linux on Toughbooks, and noticed a possible cure for the touchpad calibrations.  It also reminded me to go in a check the acceleration settings on the touchpad.  I've still got Windows XP on the CF-29, and was having trouble updating (due to having FireFox as the default browser; you know that story), so I'd be glad to get something more workable (and up to date) installed.

So, there's the next project, when I work up the motivation:  Get Linux up and running on the Toughbook.  All the while playing with the Toshiba.

I think my materialism is getting the better of me.......

Well...

Yeah, I did it again...  I found another clunker laptop to add to the "fleet."  I tripped across this one a while back, and was able to snag it for a really low price.  It's another Toshiba, a Satellite L305D with an AMD Turion X2 processor, 3 GB of RAM, and a 250 GB hard drive.  Not exactly cutting edge, but...  And, unlike the last Satellite I picked up, this one is in great condition.  Only a little wear on the keyboard.

Came to me with Windows 7 on it, which went the way of the dodo very quickly.

I had in mind to put Linux Lite on it, which may come as a surprise to those who remember my last go 'round with that distro.  However, probably to the surprise of many, I actually like that OS.  It has trouble with some of my Thinkpads, but runs fine on my older Toshiba.

However...

Yeah, I did.  When I went looking for my LL disk, I couldn't immediately find it.  So, I grabbed something else.

Netrunner.

I thought, what the heck, I'll give it a try.  Second chances are all the rage these days.

And so, apparently, are repeat performances.  Other people swear by Netrunner, but I can only swear at it.  It runs perfectly (if slowly) from live boot, but when it's fully installed to the hard drive...  aaaAAARRRRGGGGGHHHH!!!

Luckily, I found my 64-bit version of Linux Lite just as I was about to approach internal self-combustion...  A quick installation later, and ka-ZAM!  I was up and running.  I was also testing a new battery I got for the system (a 9 cell, replacing the 6 cell the system came with), and all seems well.  It's giving good performance.

I think I'm going to gently begin retiring the older Toshiba Satellite, and move this one into its slot.  And bring Linux Lite up into my front line OS list (alongside OS X, Puppy, and CrunchBang).  I think it'll work quite well.

I'll give it a workout over the weekend, and see how things go...

In the Boonies

Well, I've been a bit lax again.  But it's been work that's intruded.  I'm still on the road, but soon to be home, and hopefully doing some computerized stuff.

I did tote the my X60s along with me as a bit of amusement in the evenings.  (The heavy lifting was the "new" MacBook Pro, which provided service above & beyond.  And totally Microsoft Office-free, I might add.)  I also brought along a selection of thumb drives with various Puppy Linux distros loaded up.

I think I mentioned in the last few entries that I'd botched up a frugal install of PhatSlacko.  Well, I just decided to do a complete reinstall on the thumb drive, as I wanted to alter the size of the swap file I'd set up.  Of course, there's no CD/DVD drive on the X60s, and I wasn't carrying my external, so I did the somewhat clever thing and downloaded a fresh copy of the .ISO.  Everything went fine till I used the Grub4Dos configuration tool (I follow the IcyOS installation model) under Saluki...  Well, when I went to boot up, I got a nice Saluki splash screen with Grub, even though it was listing Puppy Slacko 5.5 (which, of course, is what PhatSlacko is) in the menu.  However, it wouldn't boot...  Just sat on a blank screen after I selected Puppy Slacko from the menu...

Sigh.

Back to the drawing board.  And remembering that I still had the PNY micro thumb with my first copy of Phat on it with me.  Which made me want to beat my head into the desk, as I could've just installed from it using the "Universal Installer", rather than waiting for the .ISO to download...

Deep sigh.

But I now have a fully functional new install of PhatSlacko on a newer thumb drive.  Which, of course, is why I'm running MacPup 529 right now...

Bigger sigh.

I have also been running UPUP Raring, which I dearly love.  Smooth as glass.  Yeah, it does have the older-style, cartoon-y, almost BeOS-ish (well, to me anyway) looking icons and all, but...  Smooth as glass.  If I were handing a version of Puppy to someone who'd never used it before, I honestly thing this would be the version I'd set up and give them.

Smooth.  As.  Glass.

While cruising through the Puppy Linux forums, I ran across an older listing for a version of Puppy designed to run on the OLPC, the "One Laptop Per Child", XO system.  And I felt like an idiot, because that had never crossed my mind.  Of all the Linux distros out there, Puppy would be perfect for OLPC.  Absolutely tiny, even with huge amounts of bundled software.  Able to run entirely in RAM.  Screaming fast on lower-power processors.   Egads!  Perfect!

And then I remember, with abject horror, Nicholas Negroponte announcing that we really should have a version of Windows running on the OLPC system...

Uh....  No.

I have my sneaking suspicions about where that blindingly dull-headed idea came from.  But, then again, I doubt my opinions really matter, me being one of the "little people who don't understand the 'bigger picture' ", and all.

I think I'm going back to playing with MacPup...

A Little Follow-up

I said in the last post that I was running through all my Pups on thumb drives.  Well, some of them just didn't make the cut.  The old copy of Precise Puppy 5.6, and the 8 GB drive copy of Saluki didn't pass the muster.  For some reason, Precise was having trouble with the sound system on the X60s.  (Very unusual, as I'd had no trouble in the past.)  And, obviously, I had multiple copies of Saluki floating around, so...  (The copy loaded onto the X60s, and a copy on a 32 GB thumb drive that's my Virtual Box testbed.)  So, GParted did its brutal work, and I soon had 2 blank 8 GB thumb drives to play with.

My first idea was fairly practical.  I did up a new copy of PhatSlacko 5.5.  My current copy is on an old PNY thumb drive.  It's the smallest thumb I have (which was sort of amusing...  you know, Phat Slacko on a small drive...  yeah, never mind...)  It's also the most fragile of the bunch, not even having a metal cover over the business end.  And I've had it for ages.  So I figured I ought do up a newer version, which I did.  I now have a version on a much newer Sandisk, which I feel a bit safer with.  I just tested it on the T60, and it boots fine.  (Though, yeah, I botched the shutdown, and didn't specify my save file properly.  Have to work on that later.  What I get for being impatient...)

The second thumb got a bit different use.  Let me preface by saying that I usually always download an .ISO, and then burn it to CD or DVD.  I'm not a big Unetbootn user.  And I usually burn all my Puppy .ISOs, just so I'll have them on CD.  It's a bit expensive in the number of CDs used, but...

Well, I changed my SOP this time around.  I was searching for another Puppy Distro to try, with an eye towards the Panasonic CF-29 I just fixed up a while back.  While doing so, I ran across UPUP Raring, which looked rather interesting.  I noticed it didn't have a PAE kernel, which would be necessary to try to run it on the CF-29.  So I downloaded the .ISO on my Mint desktop, booted into PhatSlacko from CD to do that particular installation, and while I had Slacko up, mounted my desktop HD, and the UPUP .ISO, and did an install to the other other thumb drive.  A run through with Grub4Dos, and...

It worked.  Very well, as a matter of fact.  I am running it right now on the T60, and it actually did its initial boot better than Slacko.   I had to set up the trackpad under Slacko (scrolling and tapping), but UPUP had it set out of the box.  Granted, the desktop has a cartoon-y, BeOS-ish look to it, but I don't mind.  In fact, I kind of like it.  Like the old Puppy days, it's distinctive.

I'm going to be doing some more fiddling (can't really call it testing), but I'm pretty sure this one is going to get burned to disk.  May be a good choice for the Panasonic.  We shall see...

For now, I need to reboot the T60 and upgrade its copy of CrunchBang.  (Yes, I still have #! on here.  It runs sooooo well, I just hate to replace it.)

And then...?????

Touching bases...

OK, that title really doesn't sound right, does it?  But you know what I mean...

I've been going 'round the computer corral, trying to make sure everything is up to date while I have the chance.  So far, several Macs have been brought up to speed, my old Acer's copy of CrunchBang has been brought up to date, and I even managed to fire up the old Toshiba and make sure Linux Lite was copacetic.

The past couple evenings, I've been digging through the thumb drive case and testing out the various Puppy distros I have there.  Was running PhatSlacko all last night.  Enjoyable, with no problems whatsoever.  I had actually thought about just grabbing a copy of Puppy Slacko and fooling with it, but why?  Phat has everything there already, and it's up-to-date.  (I do notice the slightly slower boot-ups that people have been complaining about with the Slack versions of Pup, but it doesn't really bother me.  The thing that does kind of get me is the last of a sleep/hibernate feature.  I'm not sure about the version of acpitool that's in the Slackware archives, so I haven't installed it.)

This afternoon, I've been playing with MacPup, USB booting onto my X60s.  Everything was/is pretty well kosher, save for a slight bobble with my wireless (I'd been using at the last hotel I was in, so it was looking for the open hotel wireless), and some strange issue with the sound system, where it boots up with everything muted...  Weird.  While I was using FireFox, I clicked on the "About" option, and the system immediately informed me that there was an update available.  I'm now using version 22, which makes me very happy.

So, all in all, a pretty slow computer day.  I need to go out into the "big room" for a  bit, and get some fresh air.  And actually try to get some real world stuff done.  Monday is another work week.

Run, run, run...