Virginia Tech Linux & UNIX Users’ Group

Hey everyone,

We know that our web site has been having availability problems as of late, and at the time of this writing, our forums are still down. These issues are due to some problems that VT Hosting has been dealing with on a wide variety of organizational sites. We currently have no ETA for full service restoration, and while the web site and the Wiki are up at the moment, they might very well be up and down over the next few days.

In the mean time, for any immediate problems or concerns, please feel free to use e-mail (I am president @ vtluug.org). And we apologize for any inconvenience.

-Sean

This is just a quick little message letting everyone know that our Wiki is officially open to the public. You can find the link off to the right under the forums.

I encourage everyone to contribute! The page you’ll probably want to get familiar with is the Library page. It is a community editable page where you can add links to articles/howtos/guides that you have created on the wiki. Feel free to create new categories as you need them.

Also, the Meetings page holds all the details about upcoming and past meetings, sorted by date for easy reference. These pages are community editable as well, if you would like to see something discussed at a meeting.. add it to the agenda on the meeting page!

We’ll see you tomorrow at the Meeting!

Even though we are nearing the end of yet another semester here at Virginia Tech, we have saved some of the best presentations for last. To start with, the Linux & UNIX Users’ Group will be proud to host Professor Bukvic of the Music department here to do a presentation on Linux Audio (in a professional multimedia environment). The event details are as follows:

Date: Tuesday, November 13th, starting at 7:30 PM
Location: Downtown Studio (directions)
Primary Topics: Linux Audio, JACK, DISIS

It should be a great presentation, so we hope to see you there.

Additionally, we are fortunate enough to have another guest speaker to do another presentation for us at the end of November. We will be hosting Dr. Harry Foxwell of Sun Microsystems to discuss Sun’s OpenSolaris project, on Tuesday, November 27th, starting at 7:30 PM in the Graduate Life Center (formerly Donaldson Brown Hotel & Conference Center) Auditorium. More details will be forthcoming as we get closer to the date of the presentation, but this is quite possibly the largest Linux & UNIX Users’ Group event in quite a few years. We look forward to having a large turnout, so please be sure to let anyone interested in Solaris, OpenSolaris, or any of the amazing technologies Sun has created (such as DTrace and ZFS) about the presentation, and come on out yourselves. We hope to see you all there.

I am sure most of you know by now that the latest release of Ubuntu was released.

So you might be asking what’s new?

Well here is the low-down.

• Compiz-Fusion will be shipped, and enabled by default.
• A GUI app titled “Screen & Graphics” to configure the X11 server. (Found under System/Preferences)
• Dual Screen users rejoice!
• Fast user switching
• Tracker (beagle/google desktop alternative) enabled by default.
• Various Security Tool enhancements (AppArmor)
• Automatic Printer Detection/Handling

If you do not have Ubuntu 7.04 installed (Feisty Fawn) then check out this decent installation guide. If you already have it installed Ubuntu has some pretty good upgrade advice, check out their Gutsy Upgrades page. Also if you are having any problems or want to see requirements for the installation check out the Release Notes.

Of course the VTLUUG will be available to help anyone in the New River Valley area through the process of installation and upgrading. Stop by our forums, and make a request for help!

Update: Wired Review - Ubuntu’s New ‘Gutsy Gibbon’ Brings Linux Out of the Jungle

Hey everyone,

Thanks to all who came out for the Crash Course tonight, along with my apologies for not being able to present everything within the given time frame. That said, the slides from tonight’s presentation are available in both PDF and PowerPoint form at:

http://www.vtluug.org.vt.edu/files/users/elbles

We’re looking forward to seeing everyone who couldn’t make it tonight tomorrow night!