Usually LAMP tutorials guide you to install one by one all the applications, that looks something like this:

sudo apt-get install apache2
sudo apt-get install php5
sudo apt-get install mysql-server

There is one more easy solution, and the only difference is that it installs all + some other packages for LAMP.

sudo apt-get install lamp-server^

When installation of new packages finishes you have you own LAMP setup! Test it entering http://localhost in your browser it should say It works!

Tip #1

For adding PhpMyAdmin execute the following command in console:

sudo apt-get install phpmyadmin

It is possible when you type in your browser http://localhost/phpmyadmin/ that phpmyadmin don’t runs. Then you have to create a link in your www directory:

sudo ln -s /usr/share/phpmyadmin /var/www/phpmyadmin

After doing this http://localhost/phpmyadmin/ should work now!

Tip #2

To have permissions to your www directory do following:

sudo chown username:username /var/www

Tip #3

Enable Apache mod_rewrite module and restart Apache for taking effects:

sudo a2enmod rewrite
sudo /etc/init.d/apache2 restart

You can enable or disable some other modules like this.

Now you have your LAMP up and the work can start :)

Wubi is an officially supported Ubuntu installer for Windows users that can bring you to the Linux world with a single click. Wubi allows you to install and uninstall Ubuntu as any other Windows application, in a simple and safe way. Are you curious about Linux and Ubuntu? Trying them out has never been easier!

Why to use it?

If you’re new to Ubuntu and other Ubuntu based installations (Kubuntu, Xubuntu) this is a great way to play with it, and if you don’t like it you can easily remove it!

What do you need for start?

You need a Kubuntu installation disc, which you can download from official Ubuntu site or Kubuntu.org, you can chose there from 32-bit or 64-bit version. There are few alternatives, you can download it via FTP or torrent if you like that more.

On Kubuntu.org you have option to download only Wubi (~1.5Mb) and start install Kubuntu with it, but then it will download all the data (installation disc) from Internet. So, if you don’t have a good bandwith Internet I don’t recommend this.

Start installing

After you downloaded your Kubuntu installation disc, you can burn it on CD or if you have a virtual drive mount in it. Now you have to run Wubi.exe (find on CD or through Windows Autoplay) which is in root of CD. A window will appear with Kubuntu CD menu and three option, you chose the second one from there Install inside Windows. After that it’ll appear a window which looks something like next picture.

wubi-installer.org

Now you have to configure some options before you start you Kubuntu installation through Wubi installer. Chose your Installation Drive (it can be any partition which can Windows access), but it has minimum 12GB free space. Installation size is worth to set bigger if you want to install a bunch of programs and stuff, if you don’t you can leave on 8GB. Desktop Environment will be Kubuntu in our case. Set Language, Username and Password, click on Install and here it goes! It will copy some files and after that will ask to restart your system, and finish with whole installation after setting up more stuff (when installation finishes don’t forget to remove your install CD from drive).

After next restart you’ll see a boot menu which gives you option to chose which OS to start Windows or Kubuntu. You can now run your new Kubuntu OS :)

My Experience

I’m using Kubuntu like this for about 2-3 weeks, and have to say I’m satisfied with it. Only I have to say there were few difficulties during the install.

My first attempt was with Kubuntu 9.10, but after entering in it there was no wireless connection on notebook (Dell Inspiron 1525). I checked it, it recognized that I have wireless card, but I could not manage it or to connect on my home network. I didn’t have choice so I connected with LAN cable, and make all the updates/bug fixes for Kubuntu. After finished update and restart I was able to handle my WLAN connections.

One more thing to pay attention is sound. If you don’t have any it’s worthy to check your KMix and run alsamixer from console. Be sure that is in alsamixer everything turned on (volume is on top and it’s not MM – muted). With ‘M’ key you can change the values where you find it is MM.

For more detailed installation process and informations about Wubi visit wubi-installer.org.

Picture from robertbasic.com

Few days ago my friend Robert Bašić has posted his review of a book named “Zend Framework 1.8 Web Application Development” on his blog. Here is a short quote from that review:

The book starts off with a basic application (yep, “Hello world!”), explains the bootstrapping, configuring, working with action controllers, views and handling errors… The second chapter continues with explaining the MVC architecture, the front controller, router, dispatcher… It even has a nice flowchart about the whole dispatch process, great stuff.

It’s a not too long, but a well written and informative review. So, if you’re interested in whole review and what’s Robert saying about the book, I recommend you to visit his blog and read his nice post!

VirtualBox is an open source virtualization product for home and enterprise use. It gives you the power to work on some other OS than you’re running (Windows, Linux, Macintosh and Solaris as hosts), and it supports a great number of guest operating systems.

How to clone?

Let’s suppose you setup you guest OS, installed some applications, made updates, and now you wish to backup it if something goes wrong. The easiest solution will be to find directory where is your vdi file and copy it somewhere as backup, but that isn’t the good solution. You have to clone it!

There are few solutions how to do it, this one is when the host is a Windows OS. Run command prompt and enter the directory where is your VirtualBox applications installed (usually program files) and than execute a command.

C:\Program Files\Sun\VirtualBox>VBoxManager.exe clonevdi "source" "destination"

Suppose your vdi image is located on D: drive under directory VBox and named ubuntu910 and you want to make a vdi image clone named bckup_ubuntu910 on D: drive. That will look like this:

C:\Program Files\Sun\VirtualBox>VBoxManager.exe clonevdi "d:/VBox/ubuntu910.vdi" "d:/bckup_ubuntu910.vdi"

After execution of command you’ll see a percentage number of cloning status in command prompt, when it reaches 100% your vdi clone is ready. Clone has got new UUID (Universal Unique Identifier), so there will be no conflict if you decide to use both (original and the cloned one).

How to create Firefox profile?

I won’t make a full descriptions of steps how to do it, I rather redirect you to some places where I also got knowledge about this. Just shortly, after you created your new Firefox profile you can make a shortcut for it, only what you have to do is to add few parameters in the target field. In my case it looked like the following line.

"C:\Program Files\Mozilla Firefox\firefox.exe" -P WebDev -no-remote

As you can suppose from the line above, my new profile name was “WebDev” before which is a parameter “-P” which means profile, so we call profile named “WebDev” and “-no-remote” parameter is which enables to run multiple profiles!

For further read I suggest to visit following links which explains in more details how goes the profile creation part and all together.

• Born Geek – Firefox Tutorial
• How to Geek – Use Multiple Firefox Profiles at the Same Time

I think this is very handy, how about you?