Ubuntu 14.04 - window buttons to the right

Read this.

https://askubuntu.com/a/451330

sudo add-apt-repository universe
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install gnome-session-flashback

log out, and select gnome flashback as the Desktop

now run this

gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.wm.preferences button-layout 'menu:minimize,maximize,close' 

a bit more saner :)

Changing Ubuntu 14.04 scroll bar colors

Install  gnome-tweak-tool, this will sort out Firefox etc.

$ sudo apt-get install gnome-tweak-tool

Next fix GTK 3.0

Make sure you pick the right theme :)  current as of June 2015

$ sudo gedit /usr/share/themes/Ambiance/gtk-3.0/gtk-widgets.css

Add the stepper buttons

/* search for the stepper and change the size */

-GtkRange-stepper-size: 20;   /* was 13 */

/* enable the stepper */

/*************
 * scrollbar *
 *************/
.scrollbar,
.scrollbar.vertical {
    -GtkScrollbar-has-backward-stepper: 1;   /* 1 = enable */
    -GtkScrollbar-has-forward-stepper: 1;
    -GtkRange-slider-width: 20;   /* change width, was 13 */




/* change the colors */

/* VERTICAL */

.scrollbar.slider,
.scrollbar.slider:hover,
.scrollbar.button,
.scrollbar.slider.vertical,
.scrollbar.slider.vertical:hover,
.scrollbar.button.vertical {
    border-width: 1px;
    border-style: solid;
    border-color: shade (@bg_color, 0.86);
    background-image: -gtk-gradient (linear, left top, right top,
                                     from (shade (#00BFFF, 1.08)),   /* was @button_bg_color */
                                     color-stop (0.5, #00BFFF),      /* was @button_bg_color */
                                     to (shade (#00BFFF, 0.94)));    /* was @button_bg_color */



/* HORIZONTAL */

.scrollbar.slider.horizontal,
.scrollbar.slider.horizontal:hover,
.scrollbar.button.horizontal {
    background-image: -gtk-gradient (linear, left top, left bottom,
                                     from (shade (#00BFFF, 1.08)),    /* was @button_bg_color */
                                     color-stop (0.5, #00BFFF),       /* was @button_bg_color */
                                     to (shade (#00BFFF, 0.94)));     /* was @button_bg_color */

Linux root disk resize with raid, ext4 and grub2

There are lots of decent how-to pages on the 'net;

• http://www.howtoforge.com/how-to-resize-raid-partitions-shrink-and-grow-software-raid
• http://michael-prokop.at/blog/2006/09/09/raid5-online-resizing-with-linux/
• https://raid.wiki.kernel.org/index.php/Growing  <----- This is the best one.

And here are my notes;

• Make sure you add a small <5MB partition for the boot loader as these are the boot disks
  
  # gdisk -l /dev/sdc
  GPT fdisk (gdisk) version 0.5.1
  
  Partition table scan:
    MBR: protective
    BSD: not present
    APM: not present
    GPT: present
  
  Found valid GPT with protective MBR; using GPT.
  Disk /dev/sdc: 1953525168 sectors, 931.5 GiB
  Disk identifier (GUID): 1213CECB-D072-12C2-4846-60804FA91405
  Partition table holds up to 128 entries
  First usable sector is 34, last usable sector is 1953525134
  Total free space is 0 sectors (0 bytes)
  
  Number  Start (sector)    End (sector)  Size       Code  Name
     1              34            6144   3.0 MiB     EF02  BIOS boot partition
     2            6145      1953525134   931.5 GiB   FD00  Linux RAID
  
  
• Set the grub_bios flag on the small partition
  
  sudo parted /dev/sdc set <partition_number> bios_grub on
  
• Once you have swapped out the disks each time, re-sync-ed and grown the raid.
  Boot via a rescue disk and fsck the raid metadevice and then resize the filesystem.
  
  e2fsck -f /dev/md0
  
  resize2fs /dev/md0
  
  mkdir /tmp/a
  mount /tmp/a /dev/md0
  df -h
  
•  Reboot and you are done.
  
  # df -h | egrep "md|Filesys"
  Filesystem            Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
  /dev/md0              917G  8.0G  863G   1% /
  /dev/md2              1.8T  456G  1.3T  27% /data

Resync on the old disks

md0 : active raid1 sdd1[2] sdc1[0]
      74920896 blocks [2/1] [U_]
      [>....................]  recovery =  2.6% (2012992/74920896) finish=41.5min speed=29240K/sec

Resync on the new

md0 : active raid1 sdd2[1] sdc2[0]
      976759424 blocks [2/2] [UU]
      [=>...................]  resync =  8.1% (79639488/976759424) finish=181.6min speed=82296K/sec

Some what faster - and a hell of a lot quieter.

Adding a 4 port RS232 serial pci card to ubuntu

I bought a 4 port RS232 serial card for my box, the supplier said it was Linux supported.

Though as you can see before it wasn't that clear cut, some fiddling was needed - pretty much like how most devices needed setting in the old Linux days...  before user friendly linux distros.

It said it has Sun1040 chips???  Does that mean anything to anyone?  LOL  As you can see below Linux thinks it is "LSI Logic / Symbios Logic" so not Sun 1040...

Look for the card...

root@ubuntu:~# lspci