Amazon.com not only has an outstanding collection of digital downloads in their music section (as covered by Martin in his insightful article “Amazon DRM Free MP3 Store“), they offer a completely cross-platform tool to make this process simple. The Amazon MP3 Downloader is a very simple (as well as required) tool that enables you to purchase music from Amazon.com and use it at your leisure. And since the files are DRM-free, you aren’t limited to putting them on one device and only one device. Instead you can download your music, burn it on to CD, copy it to your device, copy it to your friends device…what have you.

But in order to take advantage of this service, you MUST have the MP3 downloader installed. That’s where this tutorial comes into play. Here you will see how to install and use the Amazon MP3 Downloader on your Linux box.

Getting and installing

Point your browser to the download page and download the proper file for your distribution. As of this writing you have the choice of files for the following distributions:

• Ubuntu 8.10/9.04
• Debian 5
• Fedora 10
• OpenSuSE 11

Yes, Amazon is a bit behind the times, but you can get around this (at least on Ubuntu 9.10). Below you will find the steps to install the Amazon MP3 Downloader on Ubuntu 9.10.

Download the .deb file for Ubuntu.

Open up a terminal window and issue the command (from within the directory the file was saved) sudo dpkg -i amazonmp3.deb.

You will see a bunch of errors that will end with the warning: Errors were encountered while processing: amazonmp3.

• Issue the command sudo synaptic.
• You will get a warning that you have 1 broken package.
• Go to the Edit menu and select Fix Broken Packages.
• Click Apply in the new window.
• Close Synaptic when the packages have been fixed.

Using Amazon MP3 Downloader

There are two ways you can use the downloader. The first is to start up the application by clicking on Internet submenu of the Applications menu. From within this menu click on the Amazon MP3 Downloader entry.

When you first launch it your default web browser will start up with a “congratulations” page informing you that the Downloader will launch the next time you download a song from Amazon.com. You also will get the chance to download a free song. When you click on the button (on Amazon.com) to download a free song you will taken to the Amazon.com login page. Log in and then you will have the chance to download your free song.  Go ahead and download your free song.

What you will download is an .amz file that links to your download. Your browser, by default, will ask you what to do with the file. Go ahead and let the Amazon MP3 Downloader open that file and the download will being.

But where did that file go? The Downloader will, by default, download all files to ~/Music/Amazon MP3/. If you open up that directory (after you download your file) you will see the sub-directory containing your new download.

Figure 1

Another way to use the Downloader is to open up the tool and click the

Configuring the Downloader

There aren’t many options in the Downloader’s preference window.  From within that window you can click the button “Shop Amazon MP3 Store”. This will automatically open your default browser to the store.

In order to configure the tool click on the File menu and then select Preferences. From within this window you can configure the following:

• Download directory.
• Automatically check for updates.
• Proxy settings.

And that’s it. But what more would you need to configure for such a simple tool? The only option I always change, by default, is the Download Directory. I tend to change this to the directory used by my multimedia player so I don’t always have to add the new media to the player when I download something. Of course, in order to have this work you have to have your media player set up to automatically scan for new files.

Final thoughts

If you are a Linux user, and a purchaser of digital music, you should do yourself a favor and give the Amazon MP3 Downloader a try. If for another other reason, all Linux users should give it a go in order to show support for Amazon’s support for Linux.

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Well, there’s a handy tool that will take care of all of that for you. The tool is called APTonCD. What this tool does is create a CD with all of the applications you have installed – basically a portable repository. And, with the same tool, you can restore all of the packages on the CD – all from one convenient GUI.

Features

Choose specific packages on your local machine (or choose all).

Download entire repositories.

Burn CD/DVD from within APTonCD.

Create and restore from same GUI.

Auto-selection of dependencies option.

Easy to use.

Installation

The installation is simple:

1. Open up your Add/Remove Software Application.
2. Enter “aptoncd” in the search bar (no quotes).
3. Mark APTonCD for installation.
4. Click Apply.

Once the installation is complete you can close out the installation tool and get ready to use APTonCD.

Starting and using APTonCD

Figure 1

Once installed APTonCD is found in the Administration sub-menu of the System menu (GNOME desktop). Figure 1 shows the main window for the application. From this window you can either create a new CD or restore from an already existing CD.

To create a new CD click the Create button which will open up another window. In this new window (see Figure 2) the packages will be collected and, eventually, listed out for you. From this listing you can select the packages you want to include on your CD. By default all of the packages are selected.This window will also includ the total size of the completed installation. As you can see (in Figure 2) the total size of my restore CD will be 596 MB (some of the packages are not selected).

Figure 2

If you want to add packages not already on your system you can click the Add drop down and select either Packages or Folder and then navigate to those files/folders. You can also open up Nautilus and drag and drop packages into the APTonCD window.

Once you have selected all of your packages you might want to go to the Edit menu and select “Auto-select Dependencies” to ensure all dependencies are met on your CD. Now it’s time to burn. When you’re ready click the Burn button which will open up a Disc Properties window (see Figure 3). In this new window you select your medium, the destination for the image file, a file name, and whether or not you want to create a meta-package. The meta-package is one package that

Figure 3

includes all packages on the CD as dependencies. This makes restoration very simple in that all APTonCD has to do is select one package to install.

When you click Apply APTonCD will begin to create the .iso image that you will then burn onto disk using your favorite CD burning software.

When the iso has been created a new window will open asking if you want to burn the CD/DVD. This window will allow you to select that application you want to burn with. If you chose you can click No and burn the CD/DVD later. I have found the burn portion of the APTonCD to be a bit flaky, so I just always burn by open up K3B and burning the image.

Restoring

I would like to say that APTonCD can easily handle the installation of your packages with a simple click of a button. It can not. What APTon CD does is create portable repositories. So you can use the APTonCD restore option to basically add your CD repository for installation.  I have found, however, the best way to install the entirety of the packages is with the tried and true command line. This allows you to quickly get all of your packages installed with a couple of easy commands. What you will want to do is this:

1. Insert your CD/DVD created by APTonCD.
2. Open up a command line.
3. Change to the directory where you CD is located with the command cd /media/cdrom (Note: Your CD might be located in a different directory).
4. Change into the packages directory with the command cd packages.
5. Issue the command sudo dpkg -i *deb which will install all packages on the CD.
6. After the installation is complete you MIGHT have to use Syanptic in the event their are broken packages.

Close out the command prompt and check your Applications menu, you should be good to go.

Final thoughts

I hope that the developers of APTonCD will some day make it much easier to restore from the GUI. But even with the inconvenience of having to use the command line for quick restoration, APTonCD is a very handy tool.

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This web interface can be used to browse, search and download files from newsgroups. It supports nzb files which can be imported and exported. Other features include making use of multiple connections to a newsgroups server if that is supported by the server, using encryption if it is supported, downloading newsgroups headers, schedule updates of newsgroups, preview nfo and jpg files and smarty template support.

A few things are not supported yet like being able to upload to newsgroups or reading posts in non alt.binaries newsgroups. The web interface works with many popular newsgroups providers including Giganews, Astraweb and Newszilla.

The program itself has to be installed on a computer system running Linux, preferably a web server. Installation support is provided for Debian and Ubuntu with installation on other Linux distributions being similar.

Download to your debian-based (e.g. Debian or Ubuntu) linux PC.
Doubleclick on the file to install, or alternatively run:

Then go to http://localhost/urd/ and follow the installation instructions.

Usenet Resource Downloader could be an interesting application for users who want to download or browse newsgroups through a web interface.

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The wifi-wiz interface is easy to use and can save your networks so that reconnecting is simple. This is a boon for anyone who has had issues getting wifi working on a Debian-based laptop.

Getting and Installing

Installing wifi-wiz is simple. Download the compressed .deb file from the creators’ site. Once the file is on your machine open up a terminal window, change into the directory where the file was saved, issue the command:

tar xvf wifi-wiz.tar

and then issue the command (as root):

dpkg -i wifi-wiz.deb

which will install the package.

Running wifi-wiz

Once Wifi-wiz is installed you wan start the application with the command wifi-wiz. NOTE: You will have to have root privileges in order run the software.

Wifi-wiz Main Window

When wifi-wiz starts you will see a very simple, easy to navigate window where all of the action takes place.

The first thing you should do is click on the Scan button which will scan the area for wireless networks. When the scan is finished all you have to do is select the network you want to connect to, configure that network (with which protocol you will connect, what wireless security type, the security key for the network, and if you want to set the DNS servers. Once you have the settings for your network done all you have to do is click Connect and your laptop will quickly connect to the configured access point.

Saved Networks

Once you have a network saved in Wifi-wiz you can click on the manage tab to change any configurations necessary. From this tab you can also delete a network and disconnect from a network.

Settings

From the settings tab there is an important setting you can take care of. If you want to run the wifi-wiz daemon at boot you can set this option here. You can also set the interval between connection checks for the daemon. Once you make any changes to your connection properties make sure you click the Save Network button.

Final Thoughts

I have used many wireless device managers on Linux. I have also tried a number of wireless device managers on this particular laptop. The one manager for debian systems that works with the most consistency is Wifi-wiz. It’s simple to use, reliable, and (in some cases – such as Elive) is the only option that works.

If you are looking for a good wireless manager for Debian download Wifi-wiz and give it a go. And, if you’re up to the task, create an rpm from the deb so this application can be used on more distributions.

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Naturally the second reason is far more important than the first. But either way, you might very well be driven to keep your machine on the exact time. To that end you can either constantly monitor the time on your machine (manually changing it when necessary) or you can set up NTP to handle your time corrections for you.

Installing and configuring NTP is actually quite easy. It will, however, require the use of the command line. With that in mind, lets’ get busy.

Installing

You could open up your Add/Remove Software utility, do a search for “ntp” (no quotes) and install the matching results. Or you can open up a terminal window and install ntp with one of the following commands (remember, you will need either root access or sudo):

• apt-get install ntp
• yum install ntp
  
• urpmi ntp

One of the above commands will install the ntp daemon and the configuration file /etc/ntp.conf.

Before you fire up the daemon you will need to take a look at the /etc/ntp.conf to make sure you have the ntp servers you want to use configured.

Configuring

Most likely your NTP installation will already have a configuration file that is ready to go. My Debian-based NTP install had such a .conf file. All I had to do was start the daemon. But you might have special needs or your install might not have been as complete.

The section of the ntp.conf that you will want to take a look at is the server section. Each line in this section is set up like so:

server IP_ADDRESS OPTION(S)

Where IP_ADDRESS is the actual address of the server you want to use and OPTION(S) is/are the option(s) you want to use.

There are two options that you might want to use for every server. These are:

iburst: This option is used when the configured server is unreachable. When your machine can not contact its NTP server it will send out bursts of eight packets (instead of just one).

dynamic: This option allows a server to be configured even if the server is not reachable during configuration. This option assumes that at some point the server will be reachable.

If you look at my /etc/ntp.conf file you will see the following in the server section:

server 0.debian.pool.ntp.org iburst dynamic
server 1.debian.pool.ntp.org iburst dynamic
server 2.debian.pool.ntp.org iburst dynamic
server 3.debian.pool.ntp.org iburst dynamic

If you are not sure what servers to use visit the official NTP organization NTP.org to find a list of trusted servers.

Starting the Daemon

Once you have everything up and running go back to the root terminal and issue the command:

/etc/init.d/ntp start

or

/etc/rc.d/init.d/ntp start

which will start the ntp daemon. NTP will now slowly start to adjust the time on your server. But don’t worry, it makes the adjustment slowly. First the daemon waits for at least ten packets of information before trusting a source.

Now test to make sure your installation is working by issuing the following command:

ntpq -p

which should give you a listing like:
remote refid st t when poll reach delay offset jitter =========================================================
+point2.adamants 64.202.112.75 2 u 44 64 377 75.955 -7.045 2.992
*station.mars.or 209.81.9.7 2 u 10 64 377 75.477 -1.144 0.977
-www.broadbandja 64.34.180.101 3 u 56 64 377 72.764 3.766 0.977
+pxe.lax-noc.com 209.81.9.7 2 u 25 64 377 65.686 -7.753 2.539

If you see zeros for the values you know ntp is not connecting. As you can see above my setup is connecting.

Final thoughts

NTP is an easy way to ensure your servers or your desktop is always using the correct time. In mission-critical machines, this can be quite important. Employing NTP will give you the security of knowing your machine’s right “on time”.

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Why do applications like Synaptic exist? Simple. Unlike Microsoft Windows where you have to search site after site for applications, or must purchase the boxed goods, Linux likes to have everything in one place. With tools like synaptic Add/Remove Software actually helps you by keeping a vast software repository in one, easy to use, location. That location is helped with GUI front-ends like Synaptic.

In this article you are going to learn how to add the Debian multimedia repository so you can install packages like Acroread. Naturally this is Linux so there is more than one way to conquer this task. But since we want to show just how easy it can be – we want to avoid the command line completely.

Synaptic Main Window

Before we get to the action I will tell you the actual repository that we are going to add is debian-multimedia.org.

The first step is to fire up Synaptic. You will need root (or sudo) access to do this. You can find Synaptic in the Applications menu under Administration. The menu entry will most likely be labeled Add/Remove Software.

When you fire it up you will see the main Synaptic window. From this window you will need to go to the Settings menu and then select the Repository entry.

When the new window opens you will click the New button to start entering a new repository.

Adding a new repository is very simple.

Adding a Repository

When you click the New button all you will see is a new line has been added. Take a close look at the image to the right. You can see each repository requires the following information:

URL: The actually address of the repository.

Distribution: This is the release name of the distribution you are using or the name of the repository you are adding.

Sections: This is the various sections of the repository you want to add. Not all repositories will have a section.

For our acroreader repository you will enter the following:

• URL: http://www.debian-multimedia.org
• Distribution: lenny (this will depend upon the release and the distribution you are using)
• Sections: main

Once you have added the above click OK and the repository will be added.

Now you have to reload your package information. click Reload to update the package information. You might get an error regarding the new repository GPG key. In the case of the Debian Multimedia repository you only need to click on this link and have Gdebi automatically install the key for you.

Now, once the repositories have reloaded, Acroread will show up in a search in Synaptic. You have sucessfully installed a new repository in Synaptic.

Final Thoughts

It is not often that you will have to add repositories to Synaptic. But there will be the occasion when that special application you want is not included in your current set /etc/apt/sourses.list file. Now you know you can add to that file with little to no trouble.

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There was once a plugin for Beryl that worked with this. But since Beryl became Compiz, the developer of the screencast plugin found migrating to Compiz too difficult. Work ceased on that plugin. So I tried a bevy  of applications until I managed to get gtk-recordMyDesktop to work.

Installing the app

Installing the app was simple. Since Elive Compiz is a Debian based operating system it was just a matter of issuing the command (as root):

apt-get install gtk-recordmydesktop

Once the application was installed I found it in the Video menu of the E17 Applications menu.

You can also install gtk-recordmydesktop by doing a search for it in your Add/Remove Software utility.

Running the app

Main Window

When you open up gtk-recordmydesktop the main window will open. As you can see (in the image to the left) the window immediately begins grabbing your root desktop window.

What you do from here is select the window you want to grab. When you click the “Select Window” button your cursor will turn into a fat “+” symbol when your cursor hovers over the window displaying the screen. What you want to do is click and drag that cursor over the section of the desktop you want to record. If you want to record the entire desktop you select the entire desktop.

Once you’ve done that you click “Record” and the gtk-recordmydesktop window will minimize. In the case of Elive Compiz it will minimize to a small red dot at the bottom left of your screen. This small red dot is what you click when you are finished recording.

Problems

When I created a video of Elive Compiz, with the default settings, the playback was so bad it

Advanced Settings

wasn’t viewable. The defaults settings could grab all of the 3D effects. In order to get this to work I had to configure two options. To get to this options click the Advanced button from the main window. A new window will open (as shown in the image to the right) where you configure all advanced settings. Click on the Performance tab. There are two settings to change. The first setting is the Frames Per Second. The highest you can set this is 50, so max that baby out.

The next setting is the “Full shots at every frame”. You need to enable this in order to capture any 3D effects. It should be auto-enabled when any compositing is use. In my case this did not happen.

Once you have made these changes, click the Advanced button again to get rid of the settings window. Now when you record your Compiz-enabled desktop you should have decent output.

Output

The output of gtk-recordmydesktop is Ogg Vorbis Video (ogv). If you need to convert that format you can use a command-line tool like ffmpeg to covert to mpg like so:

ffmpeg -i input_filename.ogv ouput_filename.mpg

The quality of the ogv format is going to be much better than the mpg format when converted. There are ffmpeg settings you can tweak to try to raise the quality of your output. Play around with that to see how you can eek out the best quality. To get a peek at what both gtk-recordmydesktop and Elive Compiz can do, check out the sample video link I created below.

elive_compiz_small1

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So, first off, I wanna welcome our new linux guru jack, really enjoyed your posts so far.

Which brings me to writing this one. For years I’ve been using varying versions of Windows as a so-called power-user, starting off with Windows 3.11 and hitting every single OS Microsoft has thrown at us since then. And of course, I have some resentments of my own regarding the redmonds and their – seemingly inferior – products. But I learned it to be that way, and that’s not easily cast aside.

Come as it may, some years ago I first took a peek into the world of UNIX, and some of its more popular offsprings, namely the Debian, SUSE and – much later – Ubuntu distributions. I never kept one for too long, though.

So, after reading jacks post about the differences between Windows and Linux, I started to wonder again why I didn’t manage to stay on, say, Ubuntu, which is in my biased and narrow-minded opinion by far the most suitable distribution for migrators.

After giving it some thought, it came down to the fact that I wasn’t able to do things on Linux the way I know them. Everything I tried ended up in me, digging the appropriate distribution’s forum and Google for a how-to or the solution to a more specific problem. While this seems indeed narrow-minded, like ‘how can he expect to know everything from the start and that everything works out-of-the-box’, it’s the way it is. Most of us spend 6-8 hours asleep, 8-10 hours at work and maybe have a family on top of that. No coffee or a single meal included. Do the math. I for myself cannot afford to put hours after hours into my OS to make things work that never were a problem before – mounting an external USB-drive, setting up or mounting (samba) shares to interact with my necessary Windows-clients. I’m not denying it that it is my lack of in-depth knowledge of Linux or UNIX in general that causes this, and neither that it bugs me from time to time I’m unable to pull it off, but that’s just how it is.

I always said cynically “I’m trying Linux again once they reach final”, and I’m still sticking to that, predicting that the one Linux distro that manages to really implement the “easy as Windows”-feeling will succeed in getting the folks to migrate. It will probably succeed in getting me migrated, but right now, I’m putting my knowledge into my Windows-OS for an extra punch of productivity denied to me by the otherness of Linux.

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