Eckhard M. Jäger

Now on Jaunty & Dell Studio 17

Friday, 22. May 2009, 20:24:55

I did it, i switched from Ubuntu Hardy and my old Dell Vostro 17 to my new Dell Studio 17 and Ubuntu Jaunty. After i ordered my new laptop i was afraid getting problems with the ATI graphics card. And i was afraid too getting all my own scripts, tricks and apps runing. Here is what is working so far...

Hardware
Getting the ATI graphics card running well (incl. additional displays) was quite simple by using EnvyNG to install the FGLRX drivers, disabling RandR 1.2 and setting up a virtual desktop size at the xorg.conf:
http://ubuntuforums.org/showpost.php?p=7170485&postcount=2

Section "Screen"
Identifier "Default Screen"
Device     "Configured Video Device"
Monitor    "Configured Monitor"
DefaultDepth     24
SubSection "Display"
Virtual   1920 1200
EndSubSection
EndSection

There are still some issues with scaling videos or watch videos in fullscreen. I tried the these options but they didn't fix it:

Section "Device"
Identifier  "Configured Video Device"
Driver      "fglrx"
BusID       "PCI:1:0:0"
Option      "EnableRandR12" "false"
Option      "VideoOverlay" "on"
Option      "OpenGLOverlay" "off"
        Option      "XAANoOffscreenPixmaps" "on"
        Option      "TexturedVideo" "on"
        Option      "Textured2D" "on"
        Option      "UseFastTLS" "1"
        Option      "BackingStore" "on"
EndSection

Another problem is that Skype Voice calls didn't work, but that is more a problem of Skype than the Dell notebook.

Software
Jaunty is quite cool and fast, nearly all works out of the box. But i get some problems with my essential scripts and addons:

The Evince thumbnailer didn't load the PixBuf PSD loader anymore, so there are thumbnails of Photoshop PSD files anymore - can't fix it

The Lorem Ipsum Generator didn't start as a external tool from gEdit or Gimp - it work using command "python2.5 /usr/bin/lorem-ipsum-generator &".
I have to fix my "Lorem Ipsum Helper for Gimp".

The "New from Template" plugin for gEdit didn't work too. I have to check out "th3pr0ph3t" new version that will fix that issue and brings some sweet new features too.

My "Flash SWF Export for GIMP" works well after installing the SWFtools 0.9 Deb package.

The CSSdev for GIMP runs well without any problems, but it is time to integrate all additional features and bugfixes i get in my mailbox from people using it.

At all...
I'm very happy with my nice new Dell Studio 17 and the really fast Ubuntu Jaunty. I discovered a lot of nice details that aren't present in Hardy but i'd like to get back my PSD thumbnailer.

^Webcuts.09 - Internet Film Fest Berlin

Comments

Anonymous # 22. May 2009, 21:37

Vladislav writes:

How about the battery life issues?

area42 # 22. May 2009, 21:41

@Vladislav
I didn't recognized some sort of this issues but i found this workarounds:
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1132653

stevelove # 22. May 2009, 22:53

Those Dell Studio laptops look pretty nice. Congrats!

Anonymous # 2. June 2009, 15:37

Deevad writes:

I created an issue here for the developpers : http://code.google.com/p/gdk-pixbuf-psd/issues/list ; I also do a link to your blog as an illustration.

From my side, I finally got some thumbnails, but with an hazardious manipulation :
I created as usual the gconftool-2 entry from the terminal, but with sudo :
"
sudo gconftool-2 --set /desktop/gnome/thumbnailers/image@x-psd/command -t string "evince-thumbnailer -s %s %u %o"
sudo gconftool-2 --set /desktop/gnome/thumbnailers/image@x-psd/enable -t boolean "True"
"
But nothing happen here ...

I even created the "application" entry.
"
sudo gconftool-2 --set /desktop/gnome/thumbnailers/application@x-psd/command -t string "evince-thumbnailer -s %s %u %o"
sudo gconftool-2 --set /desktop/gnome/thumbnailers/application@x-psd/enable -t boolean "True"
"
But nothing happen here too ...
I tried this one as on the google code website :
"
gdk-pixbuf-query-loaders /usr/lib/gtk-2.0/2.10.0/loaders/libpixbufloader-psd.so | sudo tee /usr/lib/gtk-2.0/2.10.0/loader-files.d/gdk-pixbuf-psd.loaders
"
and when I watched at my
"
sudo gconf-editor
"
in /desktop/gnome/thumbnailers/ the entry was here. Just the "enable" , wasn't. I create the key directly with the frontend gconf-editor.
But , still nothing....
After I installed Gthumb, and I associated Gthumb to the reading of my PSD, cause he was able to open them. When I switched in the embeded thumbnail mode of Gthumb, I realise that's the thumbnails Gthumb generate had influence on Nautilus.
So I open this way all my PSD to get some thumbnails.

All of this to conclude I don't know what was good in my installation, but I have a sort of result. I wanted to share it :)

area42 # 3. June 2009, 20:39

The PSD thumbnail problem seems to base on changes an Evince. So an update GDK PixBuf PSD loader is needed.
I wrote a message to the author (http://my.opera.com/jandudek/about/) about a fix but i didn't get a answer yet

Anonymous # 8. July 2009, 09:15

parker writes:

Did you configure the fingerprint reader?

area42 # 11. July 2009, 15:13

i didn't like, have and use a fingerprint reader, sorry.