Ceci est une ancienne révision du document !
Welcome back to another edition of Questions and Answers! In this section we will endeavour to answer your Ubuntu questions. Be sure to add details of the version of your operating system and your hardware. I will try to remove any personally identifiable strings from questions, but it is best not to include things like serial numbers, UUIDs, or IP addresses. If your question does not appear immediately, it is just because there is such a lot, and I do them, first-come-first-served.
Yesterday, a user came in with a problem, the Apple Mac would not connect to bluetooth devices any more. I tested, and, sure enough, it did not connect to her bluetooth headphones. I tried with my phone and it did not connect either. Indicating the headphones were at fault. Just to be sure, I tried my phone, and that worked. However, she connected her phone to the bluetooth headphones and it worked. On top of that, the Mac did not connect to her phone either.
With all the up & down testing, I suddenly became aware of her turning off the bluetooth headphones when I tried to connect to them with my phone. A small movement out of the corner of my eye. She had one of the new Macs with Ventura on it, and I could not click the trackpad either. What a horrible machine! I had to stomp my finger on the trackpad ten times before it clicked once. Since she did all the password typing, I did not type at all. I decided to kill the bluetooth process in the terminal. This is when I felt the horrible crunch of sugar under the keys.
Suddenly everything clicked into place. I moved my phone another 10cm away and it did not detect. I took the headphones over the keyboard and it connected immediately. The user had spilled a sugary drink into the laptop. When queried about it, I was told she received it like that as it was a ‘second hand’ machine. However, checking the asset register, It was a brand new machine. It was “second hand” only because there was a system user on there – the one we used to set up the Mac initially. Sometimes, I wonder what users think about IT people. If something worked for five months then stopped after you spilled your drink into your notebook, you cannot say you got it like that, we are going to find out. Her turning off the bluetooth headset when I tried connecting with my phone, to make it seem like there was some other problem, just proved to me she knew all about said spill.
Just come clean, say I made a boo-boo, and things can move forward. Everyone makes mistakes, but when you intentionally waste my time….
Q: I have a Dell XPS laptop. It has no normal USB slots or DVD Rom or anything, being an Ultrabook. I thought I was smart to write Ubuntu to a mini SD card and set the BIOS to boot from the SD card, as I have this slot. The boot process starts initially, then stops while looking for a USB boot device or DVD Rom. I tried with Exitx and MX linux too, but I have the same result, I’m deducting that I’m doing something wrong. I wrote the mini SD card with a Balena etcher on my Ubuntu 20.04 machine. Windows 10 update broke my microphone and I said enough is enough, but installing Ubuntu is now vexing me too.
A: My solution would be to plug in a USB-C dock and stick the mini SD card in there and boot it. That should satisfy the requirement. I don’t think many people do it your way, thus I think the problem is the installer rather than the port / card / writing method.
Q: Thank you – for I am new in Ubuntu with installing the Pale Moon many blessings are still needed for receiving functional regression. How to safely uninstall ubuntu? Wanted new. Bestow your grace.
A: Next time just send it to me in your native language. To uninstall software on Ubuntu, open the software centre and click on installed. If the software does not appear here and you used apt to install it, simply type: sudo apt remove palemoon.
Q: I'm new to Linux and Ubuntu, trying to get away from Microsoft, etc. What is the safest browser to use? I have heard that it is Brave. I'm new to this and would appreciate some direction. Firefox seems good. Why would I get Brave rather?
A: Browsers are set up very “loosely” by default – to be as compatible as possible. You need to do the tidying yourself. I have heard that there are some that do the work for you “out of the box” for example floorp (https://github.com/Floorp-Projects/Floorp). However, the onus remains squarely on your shoulders.
Q: Hello friends. I installed Ubuntu 22.04 Jammy Jellyfish on my Samsung Laptop. Dual-booting windows 10. After installation, Windows 10 microphone no longer works for the Skype. How can I fix this?
A: It never rains, it POURS!! This is coincidental and has nothing to do with Ubuntu. Windows updates broke your microphone. You can try this: https://windows101tricks.com/microphone-not-working-windows-10/
Q: I have this problem, but with an i9 on Ubuntu. https://superuser.com/questions/1420298/processor-speed-limited-at-0-4-ghz
A: Is speedstep on in the BIOS? Is the CPU set to “performance mode”?
Q: My computer is not old, it is an HP Pavilion Gaming i5 11300H, 8GB RAM, 512GB SSD, GTX 1650, Ubuntu 2004. When I load a video on Opera, it will not play <removed> Twitter.
A: As far as I know, it has to do with google’s widevine DRM, just parse this through a translator of your choice: https://www.comss.ru/page.php?id=6351
Q: How can I get Thunderbird 102.6/7 for Ubuntu 20.04? I'm having an issue with 102.4.2 – My PC is a Lenovo Thinkstation P mini.
A: You can build it yourself, or you can try betterbird (https://www.betterbird.eu/downloads/index.php).
Q: When I install softwarez, it makes the Desktop icon but will not allow it to be used for launching the program; says I don't own it.
A: It probably installed as root. It is an easy fix, use chown. (https://www.thegeekstuff.com/2012/06/chown-examples/)
Q: I wanted to upgrade my python version and I removed the old version with purge. I then intended to install the new version but, after rebooting, the OS seems not to boot. I have asked elsewhere, but always get the same answer. Ubuntu 16.04 is not supported any more. I know it is not, but I can’t upgrade due to custom software.
A: The only way to fix it is to recover from backup, or reinstall. I’d suggest booting into a live environment, copy everything to an external drive reinstall the OS. Once complete, copy the old data over the current data (make sure you use the same username). Once back in, install the Python upgrade first, before removing the old version. Just so you know, I think Python 3.4.0 was the last version for Ubuntu16.04.7. Maybe try a Python virtual environment?
Q: Something extremely weird is going on. I cannot ping https://www.google.com.vn/, but I can ping 8.8.8.8, meaning DNS is broken. I can, however, gladly go there with Firefox. Chrome just presents me with a dinosaur. This is extremely confusing to me. Logically, I should not be able to with any browser, but there it is. Luckily, I have a second laptop to use, the OS is MX Linux as it is only a 2.8GHz machine with a 12-inch screen.
A: You probably have Firefox doing its own DNS with DNS over https? Anyway, try:
sudo dpkg-reconfigure resolvconf
Q: How do people rate shells? For example – https://terminalroot.com/the-13-best-shell-for-your-linux-or-unix/ . Can I have it all on Ubuntu?
A: Usually, rating is in the eye of the beholder, so to speak. What works best for you goes on the top of the list. Yes, you can install the lot and use the chsh command to switch between them. I would recommend doing it in a VM, just to be safe. See: https://www.cyberciti.biz/faq/change-my-default-shell-in-linux-using-chsh/
Q: I set myself up 1 basic Ubuntu VPS. I see with fail2ban the amount of idiots trying to log in. Can I not just blanket ban?
A: It is probably bots and automated attacks. You could try this list: http://www.blocklist.de/en/index.html