Headphones or external speakers not working in Ubuntu

I ran into a nagging issue yesterday when I was trying to use my external speakers with my Ubuntu 8.10 Operating System. The audio for any application just wouldn't play from the external speakers as it would only use the internal laptop speakers to do that. This morning, I tried using my headphones and I faced the same issue. The audio doesn't work for the headphones, it only rendered the audio from the laptop speakers. So I researched a little on the Ubuntu forums and found the solution. So here it is and I hope it helps out anyone else facing a similar problem.

1. Open up the Terminal in Ubuntu under Applications>Accessories>Terminal.

2. Type in the command gnome-volume-control.

3. Click on the Switches tab and check the headphones option.

4. In case you don't see the Headphones option, just click on the preferences button and look for the headphones checkbox, check it and now it should appear in the switches tab.

Now your external speakers or headphones connected with the headphone Jack should start working. =)

Installing and enabling USB devices for Windows XP in Virtualbox on Ubuntu

After countless experiments in Ubuntu to enable USB devices to work with my Windows XP virtual machine inside of virtualbox, I finally discovered the right steps and would like to share them with you. I'll assume that Virtualbox is working for you and that you already have added the vboxusers group. For the steps in this tutorial to work, I would recommend that you use the latest version of Virtualbox which was 1.6 at the time of writing this blog post.

Go to the Preferences > Users and Groups option to find the vboxusers id for your username. Write down the number (you'll need it later on). In my case, the number was 124, in your case it might be different.

Use gedit to edit the following file in order to remove comments and enable a piece of code. Enter the following command in the terminal,

sudo gedit /etc/init.d/mountdevsubfs.sh

After entering the file, uncomment the lines which follow the line Magic to make /proc/bus/usb work. You uncomment by removing the # from the line's beginning but keep the line # Magic ….commented

After saving and closing the file, enter the following command in the terminal,

usbfs /proc/bus/usb usbfs devgid=124, devmode=0666 0 0

The devgid is the number you noted earlier from your vboxusers group id. In my case, it was 124, so that's why I have devgid=124, in your case it might be some other number instead.

Reboot your system.

Open up virtualbox and go to the settings and enable the usb filters for your attached usb devices. (Note that you need to have the usb devices attached in order for them to be visible to the virtualbox usb filter). Also tick the usb controller and the usb 2.0 controller checkboxes and apply the settings.

Start up your virtualbox windows XP installation and you'll notice that it picks up your USB devices. Also note that if Windows XP is using the usb device, then ubuntu will no longer be able to access it until you shutdown virtualbox and exit the virtual machine.

Tags: virtualbox, ubuntu, usb, fix, howto, tutorial

Install ttf Font Files in Ubuntu

If you have downloaded a ttf file and are wondering how to install it in Ubuntu, here is how you do it.

Open up Nautilus (the easiest way is to click Places>Home Folder. In the nav bar, type fonts:/// and press enter. You will be taken directly to the fonts folder. Paste your ttf font in this folder and voila, your new font is ready for use in Ubuntu.

Installing Microsoft Fonts on Ubuntu

You may need Microsoft fonts in order to properly view web pages in your browser or use them in your Office package. In order to do that, open up the terminal and write the following command

$sudo apt-get install msttcorefonts

After completing the installation, log out then log back in.

If you don't want to log out and want to start using the fonts immediately, type the following command.

$sudo fc-cache -fv


Thanks to Carthik for the tip

Java Netbeans Installer on Ubuntu Bug Fix

If you ran into a problem after downloading and installing Netbeans for Ubuntu and seeing that there is no text visible in the installer and neither are any buttons, then you are not alone. I ran into a similar problem earlier today and first I thought it was something related to Java SDK or something but instead it was related to the Ubuntu themes. Just go to System>Preferences>Appearance then go to the Visual Effects tab and select the None radio button. Start the installer again and hopefully the text and buttons will appear. Once you have finished the installation, you can go back to the appearance options and turn on your visual effects again! I hope this helps!

Update: It appears as if Netbeans won't show any text or buttons unless you turn off all the visual effects in the above mentioned visual preferences! =( So each time you run Netbeans, you have to turn off the visual effects.

Virtualbox for Ubuntu - Howto

I have been using this nifty little program with Ubuntu since quite some time now and for OS Virtualization, its really great! In order to install Virtualbox, I will recommend using the Synaptic package manager. Once installed you would also like to add the virtualbox ose-modules (also avaialble through the Synaptic package manager. The next thing is to add your user to vboxusers group. In order to do that in Ubuntu, slick on System>Users and Groups, then click on Manage Groups. Scroll the list all the way down till you reach vboxusers, select it and then click on the Properties button. In the window that opens up, just tick the checkbox or checkboses of the users you want to use with Virtualbox. After following this step and clicking OK, log out and then log in again to make the changes take effect. Finally start up Virtualbox and set up your operating system. In case you don't want to use a CD for your new OS installation and want to use a disk image instead, you should use Acetone for Ubuntu to convert CDs to ISO images. It also helps to convert other format images of CDs to iso format as well.

I will also recommend on checking out the following video for more help regarding installation and usage.

How to Use Virtualbox - Youtube Help Video

Ubuntu 8.04 Problems

I was quite excited about the release of Ubuntu 8.04 and decided to upgrade my current distribution of 7.10 to 8.04. The upgrade process went quite smoothly but once the system restarted, I discovered that my Intel Pro Wireless 3945BG had stopped working and the sound was really trashy as well. (I have a Conexant HD Audio Card in my laptop) Fortunately, I had a dual boot configuration with Windows XP which let me use my internet connection and I looked around for quite a while trying to find some useful solution to making my wireless card connect to the internet, but it was all in vain. Most of the forums pointed to Linux Wireless drivers project which I downloaded and installed inside Ubuntu and followed all the console commands (oh and you need the Linux Headers for kernel version 2.6.24-15-i386 before you do anything). The audio problem was not fixed but the wifi card seemed to get detected after these steps at least. I couldn't fix the audio problem though and before going on the verge of losing my sanity, I decided to install Ubuntu 7.10 once again and everything started working without any hitches!

Lessons Learned: Instead of upgrading your existing Ubuntu Installation straight away, I would recommend you to download and install Virtual Box on your Ubuntu distribution first and use that to first check how the new distro will work out on your hardware. If there seem to be no issues, then you can safely upgrade. Otherwise its not worth the risk, especially if you have a lot of precious data on your hard drive!