Ceci est une ancienne révision du document !
Just to give a bit of background: I have always been interested in operating systems. I started out computing with a Unitron Apple 2E copy and from that went to a Mac Classic and then an SE30. I decided then to buy a Windows laptop and settled on a Fujitsu with a 15.6” screen. This came with Windows XP Home Edition. It turned out to be a really good machine for running virtual machines [VMs] and it was at this stage I got interested in Linux. I think the early ones I tried were Redhat and Mandrake. I replaced the FJ with a mid 2009 Macbook Pro [MBP] with the fast processor, 4GB of RAM, and a 256GB HDD. Later, I upgraded the RAM to 8GB and the hard disk to a 1TB HDD. I needed space because of an addiction to digital photography. When SSDs came down in price a bit, I removed the optical drive and put in a 256GB SSD in an optical caddy.
At seven and a half years of age, that's the status now. It's still a really good machine.
However, Brexit's effect on the pound, and the recent Apple price rises, got me thinking. I know computers were expensive in the past, but in this day and age, should you have to spend a lot of money on an up-to-date laptop?
Another factor was weight. I do a lot of travelling, and usually leave the MBP behind and use an iPad on the road.
However, the iPad is not really satisfactory as a travel laptop!
There are possible Windows and MacOS machines out there that would do the job, but they all cost a lot of money.
So suddenly I thought… what about an 11” Chromebook weighing less than 1.5kg? A bit of reading online suggested that I should look at getting something with 4GB of RAM, and a 16/32GB eMMC or SSD, if I wanted to run Linux.
It was pretty obvious that Chrome OS might be a little restrictive offline.
But… there were a number of threads about booting the Chromebook into Developer Mode and loading your favourite version of Ubuntu Linux.
So consequently I am typing this offline on a Chromebook in LibreOffice Writer.
How come?
Well, I tracked down this bit of software called Crouton.
Once open in Developer Mode with Crouton Integration in the Chrome OS quiver, you can go ahead and load a number of flavours of Ubuntu. Many of them are based on 12.04 LTS, but Trusty 14.04 LTS works brilliantly on this machine – an HP 11” Chromebook G5.
To load LXDE, I used the following command:
sudo sh ~/Downloads/crouton -r trusty -t lxde,xiwi
Don't forget xiwi. You need it for the dual operating system window system to function properly.
My current favourite Ubuntu flavour is Ubuntu MATE, but Unity, KDE, XFCE and LXDE are all possible with Crouton. You can go directly to all but Ubuntu MATE.
In the case of MATE, you need to load one of the light distros first – either XCFE or LXDE.
I tried both, but found the cursor sluggish with XCFE.
So I took the LXDE path.
Once you have this loaded and configured you can follow this advice - https://medium.com/power-user/ubuntu-mate-on-a-chromebook-with-crouton-2cebd167382#.5matx4fzp- to load Ubuntu MATE.
When you get to the end of the process, you need to make sure that the startmate script you have downloaded is edited to make the reference to xfce into one to lxde and then to MATE.
Copy the startmate script to the /usr/local/bin directory, and make it executable…
sudo chmod +x /usr/local/bin/startmate
The result is that I have a Chromebook that runs Chrome OS and Ubuntu MATE together. This machine cost £217.
You get 100GB of cloud storage from Google, and, if you need more online storage, you can look at OneDrive and/or DropBox.
NB… The first time I used the startmate script, both LXDE and MATE booted. This led to some confusion as everything seemed to be very sluggish.
However, once all was shut down, and I reran startmate [sudo startmate], all ran perfectly.
I am going to try to remove the LXDE desktop completely to reduce the MATE load to a minimum, hoping not to mess up everything else. If I do, I will give Unity a go before reloading Ubuntu MATE.
I am running Edubuntu on the MBP from a memory stick and it has the Unity DE. I have always found Unity intriguing but a little frustrating. I find it difficult to know what apps are available. Recently I found Classical Indicator which makes Unity much more friendly.
Cleaning the system and returning to standard verified Chromebook mode is just a matter of leaving Developer Mode once you have backed up anything you have created.
The return to normal mode returns the machine to its initial status, minus your work. It doesn't affect any extensions you have loaded. They reload automatically.
If everything is saved to the cloud, you don't have to worry!