[afnog] UBUNTU 10.!10 headaches!

Tue Apr 10 14:47:38 UTC 2012

On 4/10/12 2:33 AM, Yasini Kilima wrote:
> O.K I will make it when I go back home as the machine is at home
> 

Hello Yasini - I wanted to make a few observations as you go through
this process:

* What Frank suggests is definitely needed to help troubleshoot. In
addition, if you can open a terminal window and type:

$ sudo tail -f /var/log/messages

and then insert the USB drive you should see some messages appear. Copy
and paste those in to your email to the group as well. These are the
dmesg messages Frank noted. To end the "tail" command press CTRL-C.

* If you are using Ubuntu version 10.04 USB sticks _do not_ automount in
Ubuntu Server versions. You can read the Ubuntu Documentation about how
to automount USB drives and how to do this manually, how to
troubleshoot, etc. here:

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Mount/USB

Definitely read this page. It is one reason why I recommend you use
Ubuntu 11.10 vs. 8.04 or 10.04 in your case.

* I would not recommend going back to Ubuntu 8.04. This is not a
supported version of Ubuntu. This means that there will no longer be
security updates for this version of the operating system and your box
will become less and less secure over time. In addition, newer hardware
will not be supported by version 8.04 and newer version of programs
(Firefox, Thunderbird, etc.) may not run reliably.

* There are two distinct branches to the Ubuntu environment - Server and
Desktop. Ubuntu 10.04 LTS is a server version. You can add the Desktop
components on to this, and it generally works just fine, but if you are
running Ubuntu as your Desktop, then I would recommend sticking with
Ubuntu Desktop versions.

* Current version for Desktop is 11.10. I know that the initial Desktop
interface is not liked by many (this is called Unity and it's quite
controversial). To install the standard Gnome Desktop in Ubuntu (what
you are used to) for Ubuntu 11.10 you can follow the suggestion here:

http://tombuntu.com/index.php/2011/09/11/install-the-classic-desktop-in-ubuntu-11-10/

It looks quite simple really.

If you go to:

http://www.google.com/ncr

and type in "how to remove unity from ubuntu 11.10" you will see
multiple ways to do this. Try the one I list above first as it's the
simplest and should work.

In general, I would recommend using a relatively new version of Ubuntu.
Ubuntu 10.04 LTS will remain supported for quite a bit longer, but it is
not likely to see many new end-user features. This is because it is a
server-based version of Ubuntu and the Ubuntu project attempts to
maintain server versions in a more conservative fashion (I know, some of
my peers on this list will be chuckling at this).

As you are seeing, Server Versions are not end-user friendly. I.E.,
things like automount of USB sticks are not done by default. This is on
purpose to help protect the server from potential problems with software
on external media. The mentality behind how the Server and  Desktop
versions of Linux distributions are quite distinct.

* If after reading the USB mounting guide I pointed out above you still
have problems, then...

* Be sure you try using other USB ports on your PC if you have more than
one. In some cases you may be seeing hardware problems with one USB port
vs. another.

* If you have another USB sick you can try and see if it shows up? That
would be a good troubleshooting item.

Best of luck!

Cheers,
	- Hervey Allen

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Frank Habicht [mailto:geier at geier.ne.tz]
> Sent: Tuesday, April 10, 2012 9:20 AM
> To: Yasini Kilima
> Cc: afnog
> Subject: Re: [afnog] UBUNTU 10.!10 headaches!
> 
> On 4/10/2012 9:11 AM, Yasini Kilima wrote:
>> Hello Patrick,
>>
>> 1. The USB stick is 2.0 and it doesn't matter what you insert provided
>> it is a USB stick I tried several but surprisingly a USB mass storage
>> works fine, USB Camera works fine, USB Card reader works fine
>>
>> 2. The format on the USB is FAT16 as usual
>>
>> 3. Version of Ubuntu, actually I don't know what you mean but I used
>> Ubuntu 10.10 if this is correct for the question
>>
>> 4. I installed on an hp dc5000 desktop with 512MB RAM 2.8GHZ processor
>> and stand alone
>>
>> 5. I will try this command "mount /dev/sdb1 /mnt"  I expected it should mount automatically. The strange thing is the USB drive will show up in /dev but doesn't mount and so you cannot see its contents.
> 
> Hi Yasini,
> 
> if the mount does not work, please send the output of fdisk -l /dev/sdb
> 
> maybe also 'dmesg' can show something after inserting the USB.
> 
> 
> Frank
> 
-- 
Hervey Allen      Network Startup Resource Center
hervey at nsrc.org   http://nsrc.org/ : http://facebook.com/nsrc.org
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