Contributor TheFinePrint - Ubuntu brainstorm

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Contributor TheFinePrint on the System category

Wildcards in Hosts file

Written by Guest2010 the 16 May 10 at 13:57. Global category: System. New

Many of us are blocking websites via the Hosts file, because it is easy, fast and does not use much CPU power unlike websiteblocking proxies.

11
votes

1
votes

See the 11 comments or propose a solution (latest comment the 28 Mar 13 at 15:36) >>

Use Ksplice for rebootless kernel patching

Written by Auzy the 24 Apr 08 at 15:58. Global category: System. New

Ksplice is a mechanism which allows us to let us to apply minor patches to the kernel, such as security updates, without requiring a reboot. (note, not full-on kernel upgrades)

http://web.mit.edu/ksplice/
http://blogs.zdnet.com/open-source/?p=2333

We should ensure that ksplice is easy to use, and properly managed on APT

44
votes

22
votes

58
votes

Solution #3: Use kernel extension, but Canonical should provide updates (by default)

Written by jv13613 the 12 Oct 10 at 23:01.

Instead of Ksplice, Inc. providing updates, have Canonical provide them. (Ksplice does not provide server kernel updates for free. Canonical may be able to provide them for free.) The ksplice software will still be used, but not the update service from Ksplice Inc. The software and service by Canonical will be installed by default.

234
votes

See the 11 comments or propose a solution (latest comment the 6 Mar 12 at 20:27) >>

Restore laptop brightness on system boot

Written by sobi3ch the 11 Feb 10 at 07:44. Global category: System. Not an idea

Now if I boot my laptop, i have 100% brightness and each time I need to reduce this value to my preferred set. I think that system could remember my choice.

580
votes

304
votes

169
votes

2
votes

See the 7 comments or propose a solution (latest comment the 23 Aug 11 at 08:50) >>

Ubuntu doesn't handle power management well enough

Written by romu the 10 May 10 at 14:54. Global category: System. In development

From its birth to now, Ubuntu have made great progress around areas like startup time, features, ease of use. We can now say Ubuntu is able to compete with W7 & OSX on some domains, ease of use is one of them for instance.

And the upcoming Gnome 3 will bring some advances features which other OSes have not, great!

But from now, most of computers are laptops, supposed to be used on battery. And, in this concern, it is clear Ubuntu is far from being as energy efficient as the other OS market leaders. This could also be included in the more general need to decrease our energy consumption.

So, we must fix Ubuntu power management.

Developer comments

Developer Response from Amit Kucheria:

http://idlethread.blogspot.com/2010/12/prolonging-battery-life-on-your.html

554
votes

Selected solution (#1): it's time to declare "power management" as Ubuntu release goal

Written by romu the 10 May 10 at 14:54.

In the past few years, it has been decided to give headlines to Ubuntu release. For instance, 10.04 brings a dramatically reduced startup time. 11.04 will bring Gnome 3 by default...

So it would be interesting to give a major goal for, let say, 12.04 about power management. For instance, we could say 12.04 will bring 90% of the W7 performances regarding power management. And 13.04 will be more efficent than W7.

Giving some "far" milestones is important to let engineers the time to really optimize Ubuntu components. Only results matter.

Note: don't give release numbers here too much importance, there are just here to illustrate the idea.

306
votes

395
votes

Selected solution (#3): Help user prolong battery life in the long run

Written by dreamr the 12 May 10 at 15:06.

These days laptops mostly run on lithium-ion batteries. They don't suffer from memory effect, so they can be recharged anytime without ill effects. However, they can lose their capacity pretty quick, sometimes halving their capacity after just one year. I've destroyed three laptop batteries myself like that. Now I've learned a bit more about them because I got a job working with them.

Although you can maximize the runtime by optimizing how much power/current the laptop uses, it won't help make your battery "live" longer. How you use your battery affects it more. You can actually kill your battery pretty quick if you constantly keep it plugged in the wall and recharge only couple percents every now and then.

Not many laptops let software control how the battery recharges, but if that is not available, the OS could at least give user suggestions to when to un-plug or plug-in the power. Not just give a note when the battery has just reached 100% or is nearing critical. If software control can be done, it would actually beneficial for lithium-ion batteries to stay around 60-80% instead of 100%. This of course needs to be user controlled for situations when 100% is really needed.

214
votes

Selected solution (#4): Manage new power supply features

Written by romu the 12 May 10 at 15:51.

This solution comes after the excellent one suggested by Dreamr.

On new Dell computers the power supply can charge or not the laptop, it is a user command provided by a Dell utility. So you can run your laptop plugged but without permanently charging the battery so without compromizing its life time.

I guess (and hope, but I don't really know) other manufacturers have such advanced power supply features. So it would be great that Ubuntu manage them.

36
votes

Selected solution (#5): Make an applicative to reduce CPU resources

Written by sandrex the 22 May 10 at 22:22.

Some users have powerfull laptops, but at several sessions they know that they are not going to use all resources.

This applicative (optional to download) would benchmark the commom activities and reduce the max % cpu usage in order to give good performance with low consumption against that litlle better performance using all resources.

29
votes

Selected solution (#6): downvoltage core and downclock graphicschips

Written by mxsteini the 25 May 10 at 14:41.

Must laptop-CPUs can with reduced core-voltage. There is a good project: http://linux-phc.org.
Although lower the graphiccard-clock.
This two points will reduce the power by not reducing the performance.
They although reduce the temperature which means:
less fan (more silence)
less battery-current (longer lifetime)
cool keyboard

What we need is script (there is one) which individual measure the minimum core-voltage and graphic-speed.

19
votes

251
votes

See the 12 comments or propose a solution (latest comment the 14 Dec 10 at 11:59) >>

Update Notifier is Less Informative

Written by zalluth the 26 Oct 10 at 11:30. Related project: Update manager. New

When Ubuntu checking updates or downloading them in the background, update notifier just show package manager is running. So, I don't know whether it is checking updates or downloading them.

206
votes

Solution #1: Add Some Informative Message

Written by zalluth the 26 Oct 10 at 11:30.

Honestly, I'm using Windows beside my Ubuntu. When it is downloading updates, the update icon in notification area show such this message on mouse over (downloading updates 10%). I think, adding some informative message in update notifier will make it more informative. Exp:
- Checking updates 1/50
- Downloading security updates 10%
- Downloading backport updates 10%
- Downloading updates 10%
- Etc.. and everything is up to you all... Thanks

70
votes

Solution #2: Add Button to Interrupt Running Update in the Background

Written by zalluth the 26 Oct 10 at 11:37.

When checking updates or downloading them is running in the background, I need sometimes to stop it for some reason, exp: installing some other program manually.... In that case, I cannot stop this, and Synaptic or Update Manager says something like "**** locked ***" without giving me a working solution... So it maybe very helpful to add a contextual menu on mouse over above update notifier to stop checking updates or downloading updates that run in the background.... Thanks..Sorry for my bad English...

46
votes

Solution #3: Allow user to throttle bandwidth

Written by Jon Monreal the 7 Nov 10 at 15:50.

In addition to above solutions, allow the user to choose how much bandwidth update manager can use. This would allow those with a sufficiently fast connection to do things such as watch a video and get the updates at the same time, instead of having to pause the updates completely in order to watch the video.

This would, of course, be optional.

See the 2 comments or propose a solution (latest comment the 26 Oct 10 at 15:35) >>

Not everyone use floppies

Written by imorteck the 2 Jun 10 at 13:38. Global category: System. Not an idea

I really don't think it makes any sense having a system showing the 'floppy' icon in a computer which doesn't even have a floppy drive.

97
votes

See the 11 comments or propose a solution (latest comment the 8 Jun 10 at 04:13) >>

Protect package/system upgrades from power outage

Written by 10110111 the 24 Mar 10 at 13:46. Related project: Update manager. New

Currently, if a package/the system is being upgraded, loss of power can bring the system to non-booting state because of half-upgraded/half-installed packages (especially the system ones).

165
votes

Solution #1: Make backups before upgrading package

Written by 10110111 the 24 Mar 10 at 13:46.

Before upgrading the package, the package manager should make backups of the package AND its dependencies (i.e. move them to backup directory) and mark the system as 'not completed update'. Then, if the system crashes/loses power/etc., ramdisk will see that 'not completed update' mark and will offer to restore it from backup.
After successful upgrade, sync() should be done, and the system marked as updated.

-63
votes

62
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Solution #3: Make snapshot on filesystem level

Written by dino the 25 Mar 10 at 07:58.

Saving the packages as backup still might end into a unbootable system. Install scripts may be get aborted while running leaving files corrupted behind - with no way to detect which files.

With a snapshot of the whole filesystem, at no time during the backup the system becomes into an unbootable state.

This does not take as much space as its sounds, if the snapshot is handled incremental.

Technical solutions:
* btrfs does have good snapshot support buildin
* LVM
* ...

Pro:
* much more robust
* fast
* less diskspace for backup needed

Con:
* only works well if /home is on another partition

[...]

(otherwise userdata will be reset as well)
* does not work out-of-the-box with ext3/4

Taking the snapshot this way is really fast! Also this does NOT take up diskspace. Only the changes done while upgrading takes diskspace.

For more information check:
http://blogs.igalia.com/aperez/2008/06/more-btrfs-goodness-snapshots/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copy-on-write

45
votes

Solution #4: Use logging to allow recovery on restart

Written by ChrisB the 27 Mar 10 at 13:39.

If your computer loses power during an upgrade, when its restarted this should be detected by checking the logs. The problem should then be rectified by re-installing half installed packages and completing the upgrade process.

This should all happen behind the scenes in the boot process to provide minimum disturbance to the user.

-14
votes

3
votes

See the 6 comments or propose a solution (latest comment the 7 Apr 10 at 08:14) >>

cups-pdf enhancement

Written by blue1 the 24 Mar 10 at 20:17. Global category: System. New

Ubuntu printing can be improved through smarter usage and available functionality.

It would definitely save time for those people that are using the internet a lot for research purposes and they have to print a lot of what they see to refer back onto it for a later time.

A person saves time and stress with not having to retype the same thing over and over again. As time passes by over countless years, this does sum up to quite some significant time for those hardcore researchers, readers, lawyers, technical people who need to have reference back when they lose internet to solve some difficult sophisticated problems in which you must refer back because there are so many elements to it, academics, archivers, people interested in their finance, and historians or even regular people who just want a little bit more convenience and less monotony. It sums up to even more, when you consider all of the millions of Linux users out there, which is growing with time.

It takes time to highlight that output.pdf and erase the "output" and replacing it with the title you want to name the printout. It is one step lower in efficiency.

If you are printing out a lot of things with similar titles like with a keyword/tag in it like "physics" or "news", you don't have to delete the stuff that comes after it, like for example, "physics concept 1a.pdf" or "physics problem 2b.pdf". It is repetitive and you have to actually manually highlight and delete "concept 1a" and then replace it with "problem 2b", instead of just inserting into blank space "concept 2a", rather than the extraneous step of highlighting and deleting.

I like it the same style as it is now with its "theme" and "looks", so it does not need to look like a totally different thing, like a print window with your favorite color or a fancy background image like the desktop uses scenery wallpapers. That is optional, but if people want more, then it is perfectly okay to do that just for aesthetics and making it look prettier, livelier, and different for some.

It's all about customization and options and this is what I believe can give Ubuntu a more pleasing look and advantage over using Windows 7. With Windows, it would either print out the same title as the web page by default if you don't manually rename it, or if you do change it, the printed pdf is corrupted and it doesn't print everything right.

[....]

5
votes

Solution #1: What pops up as default

Written by blue1 the 24 Mar 10 at 20:17.

Have it as an option of what pops up in the cups-pdf/ pdf/printer ink printing. Instead of "output", have it be able to show a blank entry like, ".pdf"
If people want the "output.pdf" to keep showing, they get to keep that option. It would be better if somebody could choose what comes up as the default "?.pdf" for the '?' with a string of text they type in.

5
votes

Solution #2: Full URL option

Written by blue1 the 25 Mar 10 at 16:52.

Another option (checkbox option) that should be available alongside those mentioned is that cups should allow the full url in the printed pdf, to be shown at the top or make it so it's fully shown at least because much of the time, the url isn't completely printed when it's long. It doesn't matter if the font of the url is
very small. As long as it is readable with the eyes and able to be copied, it is fine.

22
votes

7
votes

Solution #4: Simplicity

Written by blue1 the 25 Mar 10 at 17:47.

It should be given as an option for people to not have to worry about this sophisticated customization and just have the simple version of cups if they want. Many people prefer simplicity. It makes some people think too much with that stuff. Ubuntu users are diverse. That is important to know.

Have advanced mode and simple mode. Simple mode is the same thing that was previously used, or right now as of March 25, 2010, the current version of cups-pdf.

2
votes

3
votes

Solution #6: Copy and cut text functionality

Written by blue1 the 25 Mar 10 at 18:48.

If you copy a certain text from anywhere on the computer, that allows you to copy and cut, by using copy or cut with your mouse or alternative keystroke "ctrl + c" or "ctrl + x", it is automatically concatenated to the end of the string after the default string for the name of the print job file, when you press "ctrl + p".

If you copy twice or 1,023 times in row or etc., the most recent copy/cut is the string to be used.

So if I copy from an arbitrary web page, using highlighting and right mouse click, "About Web History: Basics", then that string is inserted at the end of what would normally be "output.pdf", making it "outputAbout Web History: Basics.pdf".

Some people might want to change the problem about the spacing issues, so allow the user to have the default print job file name be "output .pdf" or
"output .ps" and etc.

Some people might mess up, so give the option to reverse the "mistake" of attaching that copied string at the end. Put a check box for that allowing them to disable this function of attaching the most current copied/cut item.

Unchecking this check box would just automatically take that string off the file name in the text box for the name of the print file, immediately. If you recheck the box, it won't remember what you had last copied or cut. So the cut and pasted string is now empty or void.

[...]

A cut string, is only used once for a print job, by which the next print job's "inserted text" you make, under the condition that you do not cut/copy again, is simply void and you would only have the default text name for print file.

A copied string is able to be used over and over again as long as it is not replaced.

If you "use up" the cut string for something else, like pasting it into a word document or etc, it is not used for print job. There would be a void for the "inserted text" for the current print file name if you immediately try to print at that moment.

8
votes

7
votes

Solution #8: Differences in web browsers to be taken into account

Written by blue1 the 25 Mar 10 at 21:35.

This is kind of interesting to note.

What currently shows up in your print menu for the print file name, depends on which web browser you use.

Google chrome for Linux, shows "output.pdf" each time you start up a print job. Firefox 3.5.8 for Ubuntu canonical 1.0 shows ".pdf" each time. Opera Version 10.10 for Linux, prints in a unique way also. It saves the previous print file's name.

Google chrome seems to print a lot faster, like instantaneously, something that would take 5 seconds on Firefox.

I think Opera prints out at a comparable speed to Firefox. It seems faster, but sometimes it won't print on some things and you have to mess around with it and reload or close the window and restart, if the print job froze.

One must realize that this has a lot to do with the web browser as well as the system.

5
votes

Solution #9: Special characters and their exclusion

Written by blue1 the 25 Mar 10 at 21:56.

There is definitely an issue with printing files with names that contain certain characters in them. For example, using the character '/' is not allowed as it will not even print the file out.

Have it as a check box option, to exclude these chars from being allowed inside the text box, for the name of the print file.

I know that some chars are not good for transferring the print file to another medium. If a print file has a char such as '|' in it, it is not able to be transferred to a USB memory, so that you can take it somewhere else to read it or print it later, like at school.

If you try to insert a text into the text box, all of the bad chars are replaced by an empty void. For example, if you type in or cut/copy and paste "printjob/86.pdf", inside the text box, it becomes "printjob 86.pdf" or it could be "printjob_86.pdf".

Make it so that you can "replace" the undesirable char or even "phrase", with another "char" or "phrase". This might require a filter. So every time you attempt to insert '/', something else is typed instead, like '_' or "end" or etc. This would be defaulted at your customization.

You can choose to exclude bad, undesirable, and unneeded chars or phrases as desired.

14
votes

Solution #10: Limit to the string length of the text inserted

Written by blue1 the 25 Mar 10 at 22:01.

There should be an option to give a limit to the name of the print file because, I think there is an actual limit to file names depending on which system you are using it on. Try to make it compatible with every OS that is currently out and in the most usage, as a valid file name.

Reference of max file name length for commonly used filesystems:
ext3-255 bytes
ext4 - 226 bytes
NTFS for Windows 7/XP/Vista- 226 characters
Joliet ("CDFS")- 64 Unicode characters
ISO 9660:1999- Unknown (207?)
UDF- 255 bytes

3
votes

See the 2 comments or propose a solution (latest comment the 25 Mar 10 at 16:36) >>

Auto-solving problems in synaptic, when "no space left on device"

Written by darkham the 24 Feb 10 at 11:35. Related project: Synaptic package manager. New

When a distracted user try to install packages in synaptic, with less space than needed, and it end during packeges installation, isn't properly easy fix synaptic, for a newbie.

161
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77
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296
votes

29
votes

11
votes

2
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Solution #6: As with # 5, but do it automatically.

Written by isantop the 9 Apr 10 at 05:06.

Many users would see the words "package cache" and flip a lid. It would be better to check the cache size, and if it is too big, automatically remove packages from the cache in order from oldest to youngest to make room.

Or, check the date, and only allow packages newer than X days old to remain on the system, unless purged manually by the user.

See the 3 comments or propose a solution (latest comment the 23 Mar 10 at 21:25) >>

All-in-one hard drive management tool

Written by mydoghasworms the 11 Feb 10 at 06:35. Global category: System. New

Currently you have to use different applications to access the following functionality:
1. Partition management (e.g. GParted)
2. Mount management (e.g. PySDM)
3. LVM management (e.g. system-config-lvm).
4. RAID management
It would be great to have a single application that could handle all these tasks.

541
votes

-157
votes

117
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0
votes

Solution #4: Create a container "Disk tools"

Written by jonas_ohrn the 16 Apr 10 at 12:11.

I think the only problem is that the tools are separated and/or not installed by default (Gparted).
The solution is a common starting point where you can go to, and optionally install the specific tool(s) from there.
Palimpsest might be this starting point but people are used to the current scope so adding all kinds of tools might lead to they are not discovered.

For example; Gparted should be listed there as a "partition tool" which can be started or installed by clicking "install" much in the same way NTP was installed when you selected "automatic" in the time setting dialog.

See the 7 comments or propose a solution (latest comment the 24 Feb 10 at 13:39) >>

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