Category: Linux-Ubuntu

After endless Googling on this problem I noticed that other people had had similar issues with processor overload with YouTube videos. It appears to be relatively rare. But not unknown. I <think> I’ve found a fix. Or more like – A work-round. So if this helps you then great! But this is strictly WYSIWYG.

Let me start off by saying that this is an unsatisfactory fix. I hate it. It appears to work, but I am unhappy with it as it “gets round” the problem rather than solving it. But beggars can’t be choosers…

So, you want to transfer some files from your phone to your Ubuntu PC. But you are getting Bluetooth file Transfer Problems and nothing is getting downloaded to your PC. You have ensured Bluetooth is on. You checked that your phone is registered with Ubuntu. But still the damn thing won’t let you transfer files to your laptop from your phone.

Nothing drives you more mad than buying some new music and then having to struggle to get it to play. This hit me when Rhythmbox was missing new music files I had added to my Music folder on my Ubuntu 18.04 system. I checked the preferences in Rhythmbox and even though the “watch my library” box was ticked, I got no updates.

I had a small image that an artist asked me to blow up to A4 size so they could use it as an aid when painting a portrait. I was using Gimp and print centering was vital to get it all in.

I had a few problems getting my in-built microphone to work when using Audacity to record voice.

It all came down to a matter of settings.

If you install Opera on Ubuntu 18.04 (or 16.04) it all works – except for video playback. When you first install Opera (or upgrade Ubuntu) You (or at least I) get this:

Here’s my notes on mounting a USB drive that for some reason fails to mount automatically on Ubuntu.

This would be the case if you plugged in the usb stick and it has not appeared in the “places” tag in the menu bar.

Open a terminal. If you are running in the Gnome GUI you can do this with crtl-alt-t but use whatever method you like.

These are my personal notes on enabling/disabling auto start of Mysql and Apache2 on boot (or other services for that matter). Also on how to start/stop these services after boot. The notes are as they are. I hope you find them useful.

All this is done through a terminal. Open one from the Gnome GUI with:

Ctrl-Alt-t

Want to see what memory is fitted to your laptop or PC? Or if your machine has any vacant memory slots? Or maybe just to see what the speed and type of memory you already have and where it is?

Open a console with ctrl-alt-t

Just in case anyone else does this or has a similar problem here’s how I managed to end up with a readonly filesystem and how I (eventually) fixed it.

Here’s my personal notes on resetting the root password for a MySql or MariaDB database running on Ubuntu Linux. Maybe it’s useful to you too.

I assume the machine is running a gnome desktop manager.

Open a terminal with ctrl-alt-t or do whatever you need to open a terminal.

Here’s my personal notes (wordpressed up) on reducing video file size using tools on an Ubuntu Linux Distro.

Last post (here) I showed how to change the format of video files from (say) mp4 to (say) mpg. That’s all fine for converting files. But what if you want to crush down your mp4 or mpg file and make it smaller?

(** NOTE: avconv was discontinued after Ubuntu 16.04 so this may not be helpful if you are running a later version. New post soon)

Here are my notes on how to convert video files between mp4 and other file types on Ubuntu. Especially between mp4 and mpg but avi and wmv can be used too.

There are a number of GUI converters in Linux but I’ve always found the command line converters the best. In fact most of the GUI solutions are just front ends on these command line driven converters. GUI tool winff isn’t bad but using command line tools (either avconf and ffmpeg) give you more options.

Here’s my personal notes on restoring a Ubuntu (or other linux distro) wifi connection that has gone missing. Maybe they’ll be useful to you too.

Sometimes when Ubuntu comes out of suspend or even after booting from power-on the wifi connection disappears. Usually the little triangular wedge on the task bar is empty. Usually this is easy to fix.