Tag: linux

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My experience with AMD decTOP computer running on Android

I’ve the opportunity to test out a decTOP computer at my workplace today. decTOP was originally produced as a low-cost computer to allow people from emerging countries to access the internet.

Originally, decTOP (formerly PIC) was shipped with Microsoft Windows CE and Internet Explorer 6.0, but recent release changes the BIOS behavior of decTOP, that’s allow it to boot from USB devices (flash drive and external DVD-drive).

This has led me to do few experiments with the decTOP computer. I’ve tried installing it with Ubuntu, then Windows XP, and finally Android.

and I found Android runs nicely on the decTOP without any modifications. The downside is, that currently only Android 1.6 is available for installing on x86 machine.

What happened to Ubuntu?
Apparently I ran into some difficulties in installing Ubuntu on decTOP. With LiveCD image, it is obvious that the 128MB SODIMM ram is not enough to load the desktop interface, let alone installing it. I tried the server edition and it succeeds, but the point is to run a usable Linux desktop out from decTOP machine, and I think Android do shine in this area.

Android drawback?
One drawback though, Android won’t let you save the downloaded *.apk on the remaining harddisk space, you got to use USB stick for that.

android on dectop
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Play Dune 2 Natively on Linux with Dune Legacy

Good news to old time gamers, now you can play Dune 2 on Linux operating system natively (without dosbox or other emulator) with Dune Legacy project. For the uninitiated, (to my best knowledge), Dune 2 is the first RTS game for DOS (by Westwood, then acquired by EA Games) that spawn several other popular games in the genre such as C&C, Red Alert, Red Alert 2, etc.

Youtube video of Dune Legacy :

The Ubuntu binary (playable under Lucid Lynx) is available from – http://www.myway.de/richieland/dunelegacy_0.96_i386.deb and http://www.myway.de/richieland/dunelegacy_0.96_amd64.deb

Naturally you would need the original data files and maps to play Dune Legacy natively on Linux. Binaries for other operating systems (Windows, Mac OS X) are also available from the Dune Legacy Project website.

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3 ways to get Linux release information from bash terminal

Let’s say you’ve manage to get yourself into a GNU/Linux bash terminal. What can you do in order to determine its distro and release information? Listed here are the three methods to get release information of a running GNU/Linux box.

lsb_release method
You can type “lsb_release -a”

Cat /etc/proc/release method

/etc/*release and /etc/*issue method
Alternatively, you could try typing “cat /etc/*release” or “cat /etc/*issue”.

Cat /etc/proc/release method

/proc/version method
If else fails, you could always try the “cat /proc/version” method to see where the kernel came from.

Cat /etc/proc/release method

Hope this would help!

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Mozilla Fennec 1.9.2 builds for Android

Mozilla Fennec, a Gecko-based mobile browser from Mozilla is now available for Android, where you can download the latest build from the trunk from : Mozilla-Central trunk Android/.

Be careful as the code can be considered still in the alpha-stage, where memory leaks are bound to happen alongside with occasional buggy browsing experience.

It requires Android 2.0 and was only tested on Motorola Droid and Nexus One. The application must also be installed on the device’s internal memory (not on SD card).

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How to get 1280×1024 res on Philips 190S LCD monitor with Ubuntu 10.04 (Lucid)

Thanks to my pal Amet (9W2AZV), I manage to get my self a cheapish 19″ LCD monitor for one of my computers. The trouble is, Ubuntu is only able to give 1024×768 (or lower) resolution on this monitor, which is a shame because of its display size. The problem is related to Ubuntu failing to recognize the monitor capability and thus unable to assign appropriate values necessary to obtain the optimum monitor resolution.

Philips 190s monitor settings

After a couple of hours googling, I found several websites which list correct settings for Philips 190s.

What you need to do is to create (or edit) the “/etc/X11/xorg.conf” file as root and modifies the “Monitor” and “Screen” section details inside the xorg.conf files. Here is the example of my xorg.conf Philips 190S settings

After that, save the file and restart X server.

A word of caution: Changing xorg.conf is risky. I only tested this solution on my computer which runs on Ubuntu 10.04 (Lucid Lynx) and Ubuntu 9.10 (Karmic Koala) operating system. Be warned, your mileage may vary.

Reference:
1 – my xorg.conf for Philips 190S config