Firefox Backspace Button

For some reason, by default in Ubuntu, pressing the “backspace” key in Firefox doesn’t go back. Fortunately this is easy to fix: -

Open your firefox browser and type the following code into the address bar:

about:config

After that in the filter type:

browser.backspace_action

and change it’s value to “0″.

Fonts in Ubuntu 8.10

By default in Ubuntu 8.10 the fonts aren’t great. To fix this, first install the Microsoft Truetype fonts: -

sudo apt-get install msttcorefonts

Then install the Segoe UI font

cd ~
wget http://www.fileden.com/files/2008/2/9/1749988/segoe_ui.zip
mkdir .fonts
cd .fonts
unzip ../segoe_ui.zip

For a great Monospace font, take a look at Inconsolata : -

cd ~/.fonts
wget http://www.levien.com/type/myfonts/Inconsolata.otf

In Gnome, the fonts are changed via “System->Preferences->Appearance” under the Fonts tab – you can then change the default to “segoe_ui”, and the monospace to “Inconsolata”.

Finally, change the rendering to “Subpixel Smoothing”.

Everything should now look much better.

Ubuntu 8.10 Under VirtualBox

Ubuntu 8.10 works great under Sun’s Virtual Box. To get everything working perfectly, you need to install “Guest Additions”. This is done by selecting “Install Guest Additions” from the VirtualBox Menu, and then entering the following into a terminal: -

sudo /media/cdrom/VBoxLinuxAdditions-x86.run

This installs better mouse & video drivers and enables things like automatic resolution changing, and better mouse control.

For some reason, my xorg.conf file wasn’t updated properly though – the following lines should be present in /etc/X11/xorg.conf : -

Section “InputDevice”
Identifier “Configured Mouse”
Driver “vboxmouse”
Option “CorePointer”
EndSection

Section “Device”
Identifier “Configured Video Device”
Driver “vboxvideo”
EndSection

Linux Media Centres

I’m toying with the idea of creating a Media Centre PC running Linux. Here are the main contendors for Linux Media Centres that I can find.

• Boxee
• MythTV
• Freevo
• Elisa
• Geexbox
• Linuxmce