Ubuntu 12.04 LTS on the HP ProBook 4720s

Update: Ubuntu 12.10 is out; check how it does on the HP Probook 4720s. Canonical releases just a few days ago Ubuntu 12.04, which according to their roadmap [1] will be supported until 2017. If you have been following this blog or even tried out Ubuntu on your 4720s you know that the ride [2] … Continue reading Ubuntu 12.04 LTS on the HP ProBook 4720s →

Installing a local DNS cache on Ubuntu 11.10

A while ago I noticed that Firebug would report 40-100ms DNS lookups for sites that could not possibly not be in the local DNS. When reloading a page that had just been rendered, the same DNS lookup delays would show up over and over. I could not verify whether it's an issue with my ISP … Continue reading Installing a local DNS cache on Ubuntu 11.10 →

Shortcut icons on Unity desktop

Noteworthy as Unity's turn away from the desktop towards the launcher might be, I'm an old dog and like my screen crowded. The (manual) way to create a new desktop shortcut icon to an application is to create a shortcut file in the Desktop directory, i.e: /home/george/Desktop/Firefox8.desktop And the contents: [Desktop Entry] Encoding=UTF-8 Version=1.0 Name=Firefox … Continue reading Shortcut icons on Unity desktop →

Updating the Galaxy Mini to Android 2.3.3 under Linux

The Samsung Galaxy Mini S5570 comes with Android 2.2 and can easily be updated to Android 2.3 if you are running Windows on your computer and if you get Samsung's fragile Kies application to run. If you have been following this blog you know that any Windows installations reside safely banned inside Virtualboxes so my … Continue reading Updating the Galaxy Mini to Android 2.3.3 under Linux →

Varnish, session_linger and dropped connections

Recently I conducted a load test on my beloved low end Ubuntu 8.04 VPS. The setup consists of a mysql 5.1 DB, a Tomcat 6 webapp, openjdk 6 and Varnish 2.1.2. The load generator was issuing HTTP GET requests through a DSL connection which were supposed to create a decent load on Tomcat. To my … Continue reading Varnish, session_linger and dropped connections →