Terminal does not have history and not showing path?

What happen when a new user's terminal (xterm, lxterminal etc):

1. does not display any path (only show $>)
2. does not support Up key for recall previous command?

It is because the new user is using /bin/sh instead of /bin/bash. To solve this, simply do sudo chsh, then key in /bin/bash when prompted to choose an option.

Restart the terminal then you should be able to get all the features back.

The root cause for this is nothing is specified when the user is being created using command line. Be sure to specify to use /bin/bash to avoid this.

[Ubuntu] Wireless stop working after upgrade

If wireless fail to work after upgrade, be sure to use lspci | grep network to look for your wireless device and include this info when you post online for help.

If you're using Broadcom BCM4312 (full name: "Broadcom Corporation BCM4312 802.11b/g LP-PHY (rev 01)") same as mine, then you probably could easily fix by installing the following:

sudo apt-get install firmware-b43-installer b43-fwcutter

or try another one if the above doesn't work:

sudo apt-get install broadcom-sta-common

You're adviced to reboot your system, but before that you may try:

1. off & on your wireless device, it may work straight away without system reboot.
2. run command modprobe b43

If you choose to reboot and the wireless device doesn't start, try modprobe b43. To autoload the device at startup, edit /etc/modules, add "b43" to the list. That should load it during startup.

Good luck!

[Ubuntu] Lubuntu or Xubuntu?

I like the Unity environment in Ubuntu 12.10, but it tends to run too slow on my aging Acer Aspire 4720z laptop. So should I go for Xubuntu (XFCE 4.1) or Lubuntu (LXDE), the two famous desktop environment?

I searched online and got a very useful article with a very thoughtful chart for comparison, thanks Arindam Sen for his great article:
http://mylinuxexplore.blogspot.com/2012/10/ubuntu-1210-vs-kubuntu-1210-vs-xubuntu.html

I started with XFCE and very quickly I dropped it off and switch to Lubuntu. Why? The keyboard shortcut doesn't seems to work no matter how many times I have configured and save it. So I gave it up just because of this? YES! To have the keyboard shortcut work probably is very crucial. And there are a few small issues like system crashes (unknown reason), despite not very severe but I want to focus on work rather than solving system problems.

Switching to Lubuntu is very welcoming, and things are pretty good except for the keyboard shortcut setup. It's such a shame that Lubuntu doesn't even have a GUI to configure custom keyboard shortcut. Luckily there are Obkey (which can be found on Google Code), and the brilliant xbindkeys.

To get xbindkeys works straight-away is not as clear cut for first time user. But after a while everything seems to work alright. I would discuss further in my next post on the use of xbindkeys, a possible bug that found by me during the setup, as well as how to setup keyboard shortcuts in Lubuntu without any GUI.

Stay tuned!

[Fedora] Mounting a network shared folder under LXDE X11 Desktop

Switching from Xfce to LXDE has made me unable to access my network shared folder. The reason is using Nautilus in Xfce will automatically mount the network folder. But in LXDE, the network folder is not mounted by default, and I need to mount it using command line.

The bad thing is as a novice user, command line doesn't work as smooth. Luckily there is a tools namely "Gigolo" to simplify the procedure. It is located under Application Menu > System Tools > Gigolo. In some case it does not come with LXDE installation, then one would need to manually install it, yum install gigolo.x86_64.

Open up Gigolo we can see a connect button, press it and set the following:

• Service type = Windows Share
• Server = your server hostname / IP address
• Share = the shared folder you would like to mount
• Domain = this can be left blank
• Username = username to access the server

Once enter / connect is pressed, there could be a pop up dialog (single line field) asking for password. For some reason entering password doesn't get rid of this dialog. Simply close it, then there will be another dialog box pop up, this time with two text field - Domain & Password. Simply ignore the Domain field and key in password. Voila! The network folder is now mounted.