Gregg's Nearly Interminable Adventures in Linux Land

[Gregg Bell]

Originally Posted by eschwartz

Syncing itself is simple, certain tools that do it are not.

rsync is a tool for people who write scripts. You may feel a lot more comfortable with e.g. cronopete, or BackInTime which is powered by rsync under the hood.


Everything depends on how comfortable you are relying on a certain level of security... but I would advise storing all files in one cloud storage provider, and including that folder in a snapshotted backup program like cronopete or anything else on the list I linked before.

Chielfy, the backups are there to save you if you accidentally delete something and don't notice for a while, or files get corrupted.
Cloud Storage will sync the corrupted version to everywhere!
It happens.


Someone who is very careful about his data should make doubly or triply redundant backups. Not everyone is careful, and very often they escape accidental disaster. Sometimes things happen.

Thanks eschwartz. That sounds like a reasonable plan. So if I run these two commands:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:rastersoft-gmail/cronopetedev
sudo apt-get update

I can then download Cronopete from the Ubuntu Software Center?

[eschwartz]

Exactly.

[Gregg Bell]

Originally Posted by eschwartz

Exactly.

Thanks!

[Gregg Bell]

Originally Posted by eschwartz

Exactly.

Okay, I used your link to get Dropbox, but when I went to install (screenshot 23) the Debian 32 bit it took me to Dropbox from the Ubuntu Software Center, and I was like, Yuck!

Wouldn't I be better off doing the terminal installation? But what is "Headless Install"? And those instructions look really complicated at the bottom.

Am I better off just getting it from the Ubuntu Software Center? And if the terminal installation is better can you kind of guide me thru it? Like that Python download is just for controlling Dropbox from the terminal, right? I wouldn't want that.

And (screenshot 24) why is it saying 'Put files in your dropbox folder' is "complete." I haven't done anything about putting files in there. And I want to just add one file to test it anyway.

Sorry to "drop" all this on you, but it's confusing. Thanks.

[Glorfindel]

You might as well install from the Software Center, the application is the same either way.

[Gregg Bell]

Originally Posted by Glorfindel

You might as well install from the Software Center, the application is the same either way.

Thanks Glorfindel. That's what I'll do then.

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by Gregg Bell

Thanks Glorfindel. That's what I'll do then.

I don't understand why installing from the Software Center is a "Yuck". The Software Center is a GUI front end to the install process, and fetches from the Ubuntu repositories. Ubuntu tries to keep them up to date.

I have seen occasional complaints about the speed with which the repositories are updated, and the fact that the absolute latest code may not be in them, but it's not a surprise. Canonical offers paid support on Ubuntu, and wants to vet updates and make sure that it can support them before adding them to the official repo. I have various PPAs added to the list Ubuntu will search for deb files because I run some bleeding edge versions that won't be in the official repositories, like Firefox nightlies.

If it's an official stable release, it's likely to be in the Ubuntu repositories, and that's where Software Center will get it. The only reason for a CLI install will be to install something not in the repositories, but nothing you do should require it.
______
Dennis

[Glorfindel]

As far as I can tell it is considered much much easier and faster to install from the CLI by all the linux power users. And I see their point, but for people who are newish to linux the Software Center is much easier to use.

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by Glorfindel

As far as I can tell it is considered much much easier and faster to install from the CLI by all the linux power users. And I see their point, but for people who are newish to linux the Software Center is much easier to use.

I use apt-get from the command line on occasion, and the Synaptic GUI front end more often.

But a CLI install requires you to know what you are after. Software Center and Synaptic make it easier to browse when you are looking for something in a particular area and what to find out what's available that might meet your needs.
______
Dennis

[Dngrsone]

I've seen a few instances of incompatibility when using all three... dependencies get muddied up and such.

For me, it depends on what I want-- if I need the latest version, then I'll use apt-get. If I'm just looking for a program/utility for something, then I'll look through the Software Center first.

Synaptic is a last-ditch thing-- if I need to fix a dependency or use a specific version.

[eschwartz]

As I recall, Dropbox is not in the repositories, only the File Browser Integration is.

And dropbox-nautilus will bootstrap the same cli install on the Dropbox website.

Of course, any way you slice it, the cli install installs the GUI as well. And since it installs per-user, it updates on its own and not through the Software Center.

Personally, I fixed that. There is no reason for Dropbox to install an extra copy of itself to my home folder, not when I already installed it to /opt (Arch Linux has an AUR package) so I made a ~/.dropbox-dist folder and chmodded it to 000 so dropbox cannot write to it. Now the system package is used, plus I can control the version.
I won't update either, not until they unbundle Qt/Gtk. (I forget which they switched to, but they stopped depending on the system version, equaling massive bloat, and disk space is a concern of mine. Plus it is a dickish move.)
[/end rant]

[Gregg Bell]

I don't know. The times I've installed stuff in the command line have usually been other people advising me to and it's just always worked out so well. That and Calibre telling you not to install from the USC. And it IS very slow doing anything there. But hey, I'm all for it now that you guys are talking.

Ironically when I downloaded the Debian file this time (from Dropbox) it downloaded an actual file, rather than taking me to the USC like it did last time.

So I just installed it with my Debian Installer. It went great.

Next Linux question: Now I've got Copy and Dropbox. Can I put my Dropbox folder in my Copy folder? That way I could start with a file in Dropbox and it will be in both Dropbox's and Copy's cloud and my computer.

Next next question: A friend told me I should lose the clouds and use Unison. Agree? Disagree? Use all three?

[Gregg Bell]

This one's a 'take a shot at it' at best. (I don't think anybody knows what's going on. I put this in the Sony forum and nobody touched it (and there were similar posts like mine)). So any ideas (esp. about how to proceed) would be appreciated.(I actually enjoy this little Sony very much.)

I only had three books on the ereader. Anyway, I hooked the ereader up to the computer with a usb cord. (I'm using Linux as my OS.) I mounted the ereader. I opened the folder to where the other ebooks were and pasted the new one. I unmounted the ereader. I uplugged the ereader from the usb cord.

The ereader had the revolving wheel going in the middle showing that it was downloading (I forget exactly what it said--it might have been a different term). I waited and waited for it to stop--but it didn't.

I'd had a similar problem with a different PRS 300 putting a book on there via Calibre. (It got permanently stuck in the downloading mode and I had to return it.) So I figured, here we go again.

I plugged the ereader into the AC adapter and did a few re-sets but to no avail. Then after about twenty minutes it stopped downloading.

I checked the ereader. It was different/funky-looking. First of all it showed I had 728 books. And the the three books that had been there were gone. The new book was broken up into files or something. I am able to read it, but obviously something went very wrong.

Any idea as to what might have happened?

And I'm a little gun-shy of dealing with it now. (I really like it!) So any suggestions as to what to do now? Delete the book from the ereader? Do something different in the sideloading process? Use Calibre to put other books on there? Those sort of things.

[avantman42]

Originally Posted by Gregg Bell

I don't know. The times I've installed stuff in the command line have usually been other people advising me to and it's just always worked out so well. That and Calibre telling you not to install from the USC. And it IS very slow doing anything there. But hey, I'm all for it now that you guys are talking.

The Ubuntu Software Centre, apt-get, and Synaptic all use the same repositories, they're just different user interfaces. I install from one of those unless there's a good reason not to, because then I get updates automatically.

Calibre is one of the few programs I install separately, because it's updated so often that the repositories can't keep up

Originally Posted by Gregg Bell

Next next question: A friend told me I should lose the clouds and use Unison. Agree? Disagree? Use all three?

I use Unison, and it works well. I also use Dropbox and Copy.

To use Unison, you'd need somewhere to synchronise your files to, like a NAS or an external hard drive. Whether or not you should depends on what the advantages/disadvantages are for you. Did your friend say why you should use Unison instead of Dropbox and/or Copy?

[Dngrsone]

Originally Posted by Gregg Bell

This one's a 'take a shot at it' at best. (I don't think anybody knows what's going on. I put this in the Sony forum and nobody touched it (and there were similar posts like mine)). So any ideas (esp. about how to proceed) would be appreciated.(I actually enjoy this little Sony very much.)

I only had three books on the ereader. Anyway, I hooked the ereader up to the computer with a usb cord. (I'm using Linux as my OS.) I mounted the ereader. I opened the folder to where the other ebooks were and pasted the new one. I unmounted the ereader. I uplugged the ereader from the usb cord.

The ereader had the revolving wheel going in the middle showing that it was downloading (I forget exactly what it said--it might have been a different term). I waited and waited for it to stop--but it didn't.

I'd had a similar problem with a different PRS 300 putting a book on there via Calibre. (It got permanently stuck in the downloading mode and I had to return it.) So I figured, here we go again.

I plugged the ereader into the AC adapter and did a few re-sets but to no avail. Then after about twenty minutes it stopped downloading.

I checked the ereader. It was different/funky-looking. First of all it showed I had 728 books. And the the three books that had been there were gone. The new book was broken up into files or something. I am able to read it, but obviously something went very wrong.

Any idea as to what might have happened?

And I'm a little gun-shy of dealing with it now. (I really like it!) So any suggestions as to what to do now? Delete the book from the ereader? Do something different in the sideloading process? Use Calibre to put other books on there? Those sort of things.

It sounds like the ereader wasn't done transferring (or the umount was not completed) when you disconnected it. I wouldn't discount a driver issue, though, especially with Linux and a lesser-known device.