Ubuntu Linux News

Novell acquired by investment group for $2.2b, sells IP to Microsoft

2010-11-22T08:19:00.000-08:00

Novell, the parent company of SUSE Linux, openSUSE and the Banshee media player, has agreed to be acquired by investment group Attachmate Corporation for $6.10 a share, totalling approximately $2.2bn in value.

Novell also announced in the press release that they will be selling, as yet undisclosed, intellectual property assets to CPTN Holdings LLC, a consortium of technology companies run by Microsoft, for $450m.

Novell is no stranger to business deals with Microsoft, having previously signed together a 5-year patent protection deal for SUSE users, giving rise to improved interoperability between OpenOffice and Microsoft Office.

Attachmate plans to run Novell and SUSE as separate business units, adding to Attachmate's repertoire of technology holdings. The acquisition deal is yet to approved by regulators and stockholders.

Novell's CEO Ron Hovsepian had this to say of the merger:

“We… believe the transaction with Attachmate Corporation will deliver important benefits to Novell’s customers, partners and employees by providing opportunities for building on Novell’s brands, innovation and market leadership.”

Earlier this year, Novell was in talks with a number of other private equity firms to sell off its non-Linux businesses, but were reportedly unwilling to pay the price Novell was asking. The company rejected a $2bn takeover bid from the Elliot Associates hedge fund.

What this takeover of Novell means for the wider Linux scene is anyone's guess.

How to install 64-bit Adobe Flash on Ubuntu

2010-11-22T07:47:00.000-08:00

Does Flash grey out periodically for you on Ubuntu, with both Chromium and Firefox? Are the interactions via clicking and hovering slow to respond? The standard Flash install (flashplugin-installer) suffers from many issues, and these problems are only compounded for 64-bit users.

Well, native 64-bit Flash has returned for Linux! Ubuntu Linux 64-bit users can now benefit from the added security of Flash 10.1, on Ubuntu Lucid 10.04 and Ubuntu Maverick 10.10.

Installing it is easy, and you have two options. Adding the 64-bit flash PPA, or installing it via a .deb package.

Installing native 64-bit Flash on Ubuntu via PPA

I have this PPA enabled myself, and I can report it works flawlessly. Maverick, Lucid and Karmic users can run the following commands on the terminal (which will remove any existing 32-bit Flash installations):

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:sevenmachines/flash

sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get install flashplugin64-installer

Installing native 64-bit Flash on Ubuntu using a .deb

Not everyone is too keen on using a PPA, adding that longer wait while updating. You can also download a .deb from Sevenmachines' Launchpad:

For Ubuntu Maverick 10.10: flashplugin64-installer_amd64.deb
For Ubuntu Lucid 10.04: flashplugin64-installer_amd64.deb
For Ubuntu Karmic 9.10: flashplugin64-installer_amd64.deb

You should notice improved stability and responsiveness with native 64-bit Flash: I sure did!

How to install Google Earth on Ubuntu 10.10

2010-11-22T07:27:00.000-08:00

Users of previous Ubuntu versions (Ubuntu 10.04 Lucid and earlier) had the liberty of installing Google Earth simply by running a .deb package available from the Medibuntu repository. Unfortunately, there is no such archive available for Ubuntu 10.10 Maverick Meerkat users. This post will describe how to install Google Earth on Ubuntu 10.10 via alternate means.

First, open a terminal (in Applications > Accessories > Terminal), and run:

sudo apt-get install googleearth-package

If you are on a 64-bit system, also install the ia32-libs:

sudo apt-get install ia32-libs

Now we can build the Google Earth .deb package by running:

sudo make-googleearth-package --force

Wait for the terminal to return to the prompt. If there are no errors, there should now be a Google Earth .deb package in your working directory in the terminal. This is probably your home folder.

Back in the terminal, run:

sudo apt-get install gdebi-core

sudo gdebi googleearth *and hit tab*

And that's it! You should now have a Google Earth launcher under Applications > Internet.

Have fun exploring the world!

How to open RAR archives in Ubuntu

2010-11-22T07:09:00.000-08:00

Have you downloaded a .rar archive, only for Archive Manager to spit the dummy? This is a common issue for users of Ubuntu 10.04 and Ubuntu 10.10.

Could not create the archive. Archive type not supported.

Well, don't worry - the solution is simple. There are two options for opening RAR archives in Ubuntu:

unrar is a closed-source package, and can open any valid RAR files you throw at it. Open up the terminal, and run this command.

sudo apt-get install unrar

unrar-free is an open-source package, but may have troubles with some RAR archives. To install, open up the terminal, and run this command:

sudo apt-get install unrar-free

After either of these packages have been installed, .rar files will open seamlessly in Ubuntu's Archive Manager (just right-click, and Extract Here).

Ubuntu Wiki design updated to orange

2010-11-21T22:28:00.000-08:00

The Ubuntu Wiki's design has been updated to the new coloring scheme, to bring it into line with the rest of the Ubuntu.com website.

The wiki is still based on MoinMoin, as this was only a theme change.

Canonical looking for kernel engineers

2010-11-21T22:12:00.000-08:00

News is surfacing that Canonical is looking for two kernel engineers, with the role of "[ensuring] high-quality Linux kernel support in Ubuntu, focusing on bug fixing, patch maintenance, and upstream development in support of Ubuntu."

The company also recently posted job offers for ARM kernel developers, to support its push into the mobile computing arena with Ubuntu.

Canonical came under fire earlier this year after the release of a report on the contributions towards Linux development from various companies. Canonical made 4487 commits to the kernel, while other companies like Novell and Red Hat made 45,349 and 70,790 commits respectively.

Mark Shuttleworth wrote a lengthy blog post in defense of his company's participation in the open-source ecosystem.

These job offerings by Canonical would suggest that they are beginning to allocate resources towards kernel and driver development, whilst also focusing on the user experience.

So, everyone in the Linux ecosystem stands to benefit from Canonical's improved participation. This is great news!

Unified menu comes to Firefox 4 for Linux

2010-11-21T20:15:00.000-08:00

The Firefox 4 nightly builds for Linux have received some long-overdue lovin' - the unified menu button has been added.

Mozilla developers initially stated that they had no plans to add the feature, so this may not make it to the final release candidate for Linux.

Users can head on over to the Mozilla nightly site to download the latest Firefox client. You'll have to manually extract the archive and double-click the "firefox" executable to launch it: no .deb's for Ubuntu users, unfortunately.

Once it's up and running, go to View > Toolbars, and uncheck "Menu bar" - the unified menu should then appear next to your tabs.

There's a handy guide on the Ubuntu wiki for users wishing to run the Minefield nightly client on a separate Firefox profile to your stable client. Comment back here if you need any help with that.