You hard drive has heads that read the surface of the platters, and excessive head parking in Ubuntu Linux and its variants is not uncommon – especially on laptops running on battery power. Luckily for you, a simple command or two can narrow the problem down. First, go ahead and open up a terminal. Then, run the following command to set your disk drive’s power management to “off”:

sudo hdparm -B 255 /dev/sda

Note that if your laptop has multiple hard drives, then you will have to run the command once for each of them [sda, sdb, etc.]

Listen carefully (not to me, to your laptop!), has the clicking stopped? If so, then your problem is the head parking.

If not, well it still may be, re-run the command but use “254″ in place of “255″ since some drives do not respond to the latter:

sudo hdparm -B 254 /dev/sda

Great, if either one of these commands clears up your annoying clicking, then you can be pretty certain that you know what’s causing it and your hard drive is probably O.K. If not, go ahead and make that full back up, then head on over to Amazon and get yourself a new hard drive.

Unfortunately, even if the head parking is the problem… you still have the problem, because the command you just used to fix it isn’t permanent. You could devise some way to run the command every start-up, but, even then, you still wouldn’t be out of the woods.

Whenever you unplug or plug in your laptop Ubuntu runs a little script that can be found here: /usr/lib/pm-utils/power.d/95hdparm-apm and it will continue to wreak havoc on your hard drives heads.

Don’t fret just yet, you can override that script rather easily – simply by creating another (empty) script with the same name in /etc/pm/power.d/:

sudo touch /etc/pm/power.d/95hdparm-apm

That should do the trick nicely. At least, it will stop the power-saving head parking “feature” from becoming unreasonable. (It actually keeps the value at 254, the least aggressive setting, rather than disabling head parking completely. In most cases it is all you need.)

*** To completely disable the feature, you need to edit one last file located at /etc/hdparm.conf by adding the following to the very end of the file:

/dev/sda {
        apm = 255
        apm_battery = 255
}

Enjoy your more quiet hard disk!

Simply go to a terminal and run the following commands, one after the other:

wget -O run.py http://www.alsa-project.org/hda-analyzer.py

sudo python run.py

The first command will download a small python script from the ALSA Project, and the second command will run said script. This script actually downloads the latest copy of the tool that you need to get your sound working. (So be sure to stay connected to the internet.)

You’ll get a nice GUI, in which you should first click “Node[0x1b] PIN“. Then, under EAPD, click the box next to EAPD. Go ahead and exit the application by clicking the “x” in the top right corner.

You’ll then be asked if you wish to revert settings. Simply click “no”.

Almost done, just go ahead and reboot your machine. You should then be able to enjoy audio from your internal speakers.

OpenOffice.org and the LibreOffice branch both suffer from an apparent restriction – the color palette appears to be severely limited. By default, you’re given a small palette of ~106 colors for everything from highlighting and borders to fill and font coloring.

Luckily, adding a custom color is no big deal – it just happens to be buried deep within the UI. So, color up your palette by following the steps below:

From within any program (Calc, Writer, etc.) in either office suite, go ahead and click Tools > Options in the top menu bar.

Go ahead and open the top left navigation element (actually, it is usually already open for you) and then click the child element Colors.

Enter in a name for your custom color where it says “Name” and then proceed to enter the RGB or CMYK values to the right. Once you see the color that you want in the lower color box, click the Add button.

You can add whichever colors you’d like this way – just make sure they have unique names or you’ll get an error. Colors added here will be available throughout the entire office suite.

[Deleting custom colors is also straightforward from here, simply select any color you want to delete from the drop-down menu and then click on Delete.]

nginx is an extremely efficient and robust http server capable of putting limited resources to much greater use than most other http servers, including the popular Apache http server. nginx, like gpEasy, is ideal for extracting speed and cutting down overhead for small to mid-sized websites in shared hosting environments.

Coupling the two technologies seems like a great idea - unfortunately configuring nginx so that gpEasy works properly is not well documented and riddled with roadblocks for those unfamiliar with nginx’s rewrite rules. nginx’s “try_files” directive seemed like an ideal solution, but never did work correctly in my tests. So, without further ado, here is what you need to know to get gpEasy working with nginx:

1. First, you should edit the index.php file in gpEasy’s root directory. Uncomment the line that mentions “gp_indexphp”, so that your file looks likes this:

   //define('gpdebug',true);
   define('gp_indexphp',false);
   //define('gptesting',true);
   require_once('./include/main.php');
   

   This tells gpEasy to use permalinks without “index.php” appearing in the URL.

2. Next, you need to edit the appropriate nginx site configuration file so that is has a conditional rewrite rule like the one below:

   location /gpeasy/ {
   
   	index   index.php index.htm index.html;
   
   		if (!-e $request_filename){
   			rewrite ^(.+)$ /gpeasy/index.php?$1 last;
   		}
   
   }
   

   (Note that if your gpEasy installation is in your site’s root directory, then you’ll replace “/gpeasy/” with “/” throughout the block above.)

3. Lastly, restart nginx and proceed with the installation of gpEasy.

If you run into problems, or even if everything goes as planned, please leave a comment letting me know.

Under Windows, Firefox, unlike Internet Explorer, gives you an option for how you want to handle mailto links. The problem is, by default, you are only given options for two services: yahoo and gmail.

If you’d like to use another service, you’ll have to add it manually. This, as it turns out, is no big deal. The steps below will show you how to add Hotmail as an option for mailto links in Firefox:

Open another tab or window, and in the address bar type: about:config. In the screen that appears, click the button acknowledging that you’ll “be careful”.

Now, in the text box alongside “Filter:” type in gecko, and then double-click the first result that reads “gecko.handlerService.allowRegisterFromDifferentHost” so that it is set to “true” on the right.

Close the about:config window or tab and open a fresh one. From there copy and paste the following into the address bar, then hit the enter key:

javascript:window.navigator.registerProtocolHandler("mailto","http://hotmail.msn.com/secure/start?action=compose&to=%s",'Hotmail")

Firefox will ask for confirmation, so go ahead and click the button that reads “Add Application”.

That’s all there is to it. Now mailto links will give you the option to use Hotmail.

If you’re getting an error that “Windows failed to start” while trying to install 64bit Windows 7 on a Virtualbox machine with an Ubuntu host, then you’ll appreciate the following fix.

Go ahead and open Virtualbox. Right-click the virtual machine that you intend use for the Windows 7 installation. Then click “settings”.

In the settings box that appears, click “System”.

Now, check the box that reads “Enable IO APIC” and then click “OK”. At this point, you should be able to boot up the virtual machine without seeing the error message.

However, you may get a new error… that windows cannot install to your disk. In that case, you’ll need to change the type of controller your virtual machine uses for the virtual disk.

So, select “Storage” from the options on the left and, if you see that your virtual disk is attached to an SATA controller, remove it.

Now select the IDE controller and attach the virtual disk to it using the button directly to the right.

Now you can launch your virtual machine and proceed with your Windows 7 installation.

Changing the listening port is simple enough, though you’ll have to alter your registry (at your own risk, of course):

First you need to start the registry editor. You can click the “Start” button, then “Run” (If you do not have a “Run” shortcut, you can hold down the Windows Key and hit the “R” key at the same time.)

Type “regedit” in the run box, and then hit “ok”.

Navigate to the registry key:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\TerminalServer\WinStations\RDP-Tcp\PortNumber

With the “PortNumber” key highlighted, go to Edit > Modify.

Select the option box for “Decimal” and insert the desired port number. Then hit “ok”.

Go ahead and restart for good measure. Remember, now you must suffix the machine url with the port when connecting remotely. (machine-name-or-ip:new-port-number)

Also, Windows XP is pictured above, but the method is the same for Windows Vista and Windows 7.

Reflowing is a simple enough process in theory, you simply have to heat the solder up enough to allow it to re-bead, and then cool it off again. In practice this normally requires the disassembly of the entire laptop and using a heat gun on the gpu. Alternative methods include literally baking the motherboard and gpu in an oven at 385°F for 8 minutes, or, possibly even more startlingly, wrapping the machine in a blanket.

The latter alternative is the one that I recommend if you lack the desire or know-how to take apart your entire machine. I’ve tested it, and it actually does work. Of course, if you do it on your machine, you do so at your own risk…

Basically, the process involves only four broad steps:

1. Remove the battery and hard drive. Battery removal is simple enough, and hard-drive removal only requires loosening two Philips-head screws.
2. Plug the laptop in, turn it on, close the screen, flip it upside down and wrap it up tightly in a thick blanket or two.
3. After an hour and a half or so, unplug the laptop from the wall, unwrap the blanket, and allow it to cool for an hour or so.
4. Reinstall the hard drive and battery. Turn right-side up.

If all goes well and your gpu is still good, then when you turn your laptop back on it should boot right up. Now, seriously consider investing in a laptop cooler to help prevent your machine from overheating again.

To get your touchpad to work:

1. After you log in and are on the gnome desktop, press alt + f2 (hold the alt key, and press the f2 key at the top of the keyboard).
2. Copy and paste, or type, the following command into the box that appears:

gconftool --type bool --set /desktop/gnome/peripherals/touchpad/touchpad_enabled true

That’s it! Now your on-screen mouse pointer should move when you move your finger on the touchpad.

To prevent the problem from occurring again, you need to:

1. Press alt + f2.
2. Copy and paste, or type, the following command into the box that appears:

gconftool-2 --type string --set /apps/gnome_settings_daemon/keybindings/touchpad ""

This allows the gnome-settings daemon to ignore your touchpad lock button, which should prevent the mouse and keyboard lockups. Your mouse should still lock when the button is pressed, but it should also unlock properly when pressed again.

If the last command actually breaks your mouse lock feature (it shouldn’t), then you can enter the following command to revert it:

gconftool-2 --type string --set /apps/gnome_settings_daemon/keybindings/touchpad XF86TouchpadToggle

This has been tested on HP dv8t and dv6000 lapotops, but may work for others. Please leave a comment with your model number and indicate if the fix worked for you.

If you continually get an error message such as:

“ERROR: File not found!”

and/or

“ERROR: Could not install files for Windows 2000 / XP / Vista! Installation aborted.”

while trying to install guest additions in a Sun VirtualBox Windows XP Guest, you may have a registry problem. In this case, uninstalling guest additions completely and attempting a reinstall will not help. Some or all of the features afforded by guest additions may not function properly, especially seamless mode.

The issue stems from a bug in Windows XP/2000 where new hardware cannot properly be detected if the “RunOnce” key is missing in the registry beneath: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion

To fix the problem:

1. Navigate to Start > Run and enter “regedit”.
2. Then find: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion
3. With “CurrentVersion” selected, go to the Edit menu and click New > Key
4. Name the key “RunOnce”, and leave everything else at defaults.

NOTE: The new “RunOnce” key should appear underneath the “CurrentVersion” key.

After you’ve added the key, reboot your virtual machine and reinstall guest additions. Everything should go as expected.