Since I don’t use the GUI much on Fedora Core, I don’t notice anything particularly different than Ubuntu’s.  Gnome looks the same with the difference of the new wallpaper art of a blue star.  There were several other theme pictures considered, but that’s just trivial stuff.  The kernels themselves were found to perform practically the same between Fedora and Ubuntu installs.

Fedora 10 is my last home install for this Linux flavor.  I’m using Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 at work (a 64-bit version with 32G of RAM), so I’m still exposed to Fedora Core Linux, ableit an older version.  It has been a rock solid server OS.  Interestingly enough, my current hosting site is on Fedora Linux exclusively, so I’m not really leaving it behind, at all!

This article was posted on Rudy Amid's Blog:

Trying Out Fedora Core 10

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1. Ubuntu Linux – Very First Impression
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After the installation, I noticed on October 30, they were releasing Ubuntu 8.10.  I should’ve read the Ubuntu home page first, instead of going directly to the download section.   I wished they mentioned a new version was coming on that download page.  Anyway, I made it an opportunity to go through an upgrade process.   Interestingly enough, the upgrade is not that smooth for me:

1. I used the network upgrade via my current 8.04 install.  Going through my 1.2Mbs/385kbps DSL line, it was really slow!  There were over 1180 packages to download.  The estimated completion was 6 days.  I had a good chuckle.
2. Downloading the ISO via HTTP is extremely slow.   I suppose with everyone trying to download it during release day, saturated the bandwidth on the mirror sites.  I went through Bittorrent and got it in less than 20 minutes.
3. I downloaded the Full Install CD, instead of the Alternate CD. When I was using Fedora Core Linux, the upgrade and full install processes can be done via one disc.  I assumed it was the same way with Ubuntu.  Bad assumption.

After spending at least 6 hours tinkering and waiting for the install to finish, I finally got the laptop up and running.  Reading the upgrade page is a good start, but it couldn’t help me avoid these issues.  I’m sure others have better luck with it.  Otherwise, I hope this post helps someone.

This article was posted on Rudy Amid's Blog:

Upgrading to Ubuntu 8.10

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• Meaning of Halal and Kosher.
• 4 out of 5 of us have the Toshiba HD DVD player. With the future of HD-DVD uncertain, the one co-worker who’s holding out may be making the best decision.
• Redhat is peddling me the “subscription” for JBOSS.
• Kids love Guitar Hero. Kids love the Wii too. Xbox360 fanbois like to talk about achievement points.
• Possibility of buying a house in Newport Beach.  Maybe not the ones with an ocean view.
• Skiing.  I haven’t ski’ed in ages.
• Confusing the wrong “Fergie”: Sarah Ferguson the Dutchess of York, and Stacy Ferguson of the Black Eyed Peas.
• One of us said (paraphrasing), “Anyone who married a prince ended up getting fat, unhappy, or divorced.”  Then I quipped, “That’s better than dead.”

This article was posted on Rudy Amid's Blog:

Lunch Bits – Edition 7

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I upgraded the hard drive before, so at least I could preserve my Apache, PHP, and MySQL setup. However, Fedora 7 wouldn’t boot with the new hardware, especially the on-board S-ATA controller on the ASUS motherboard. It would not find the VolGroup00 RAID setup and threw a kernel panic. I used the rescue CD and examined the /mnt/sysimage/etc setup (and a bit of google searching). I couldn’t figure out how to fix it. I even tried to use the Fedora 7 disc to do an “upgrade” over my current setup. But the kernel update won’t happen because I had several kernel patches since the original install.

So my only way out was to do a real upgrade to Fedora Core 8. I downloaded the DVD ISO off bittorrent for 3 hours, ran the upgrade setup, and recompiled PHP/Apache. Now I’m back in business! Phew! Hopefully this setup will be more stable. I’m going to watch that uptime!

This article was posted on Rudy Amid's Blog:

Linux and hardware upgrades

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Hopefully this will buy me another 2+ years of operation.  Strangely enough, I feel pretty good in the new/fresh installation process and results — even though the process was tedious and frustrating at times.  I guess I get the satisfaction in solving problems: the only reason why I will always be a sysadmin!

This article was posted on Rudy Amid's Blog:

Thank God for (semi) Backups!

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Now I read somewhere that I can also boot Ubuntu from a USB drive. However, since I’m looking for a server software replacement, I think I’ll check that out later.

This article was posted on Rudy Amid's Blog:

Ubuntu Linux – Very First Impression

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This article was posted on Rudy Amid's Blog:

Missed Daylight Savings Time on this Server

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