Upgraded to 16.04

1.  On upgrading all your PPAs are disabled.  Most just need to be rechecked and they work again but VirtualBox needed it's PPA removed and replaced.  Here's the replacement Command;

wget -q https://www.virtualbox.org/download/oracle_vbox.asc -O- | sudo apt-key add -

I'll post more and make this article better as I fix things.

2.  KeePass updated and you have to IMPORT your old Database to use it.

3.  Nvidia Driver Reinstall

Make GIMP 2.8 Look Like Photoshop

This links to an article on WEB UPD8 which has easy to follow instructions to make GIMP 2.8 look more like Photoshop.

"The tweaks include Photoshop like toolbox icons, keyboard shortcuts, modified dockable dialogs and even a tweaked background color to match Photoshop."

Link to the Article

Installing Google Earth Ubuntu 14.04 - 16.04

So you want to install Google Earth, it's not hard.

Open a Terminal Windows and type;

wget -O google-earth.sh http://drive.noobslab.com/data/apps/google-earth/google-earth.sh

(HIT ENTER)

chmod +x google-earth.sh;sudo ./google-earth.sh

(HIT ENTER)

sudo apt-get install msttcorefonts

(HIT ENTER)

That's it nice and easy.

These instructions came from noobslab.com, a nice Linux Blog. Know that you are running a BASH Script that makes changes to your system.  Please read his COMPLETE article before you execute these commands. http://www.noobslab.com/2016/05/google-earth-for-ubuntulinux-mint-easy.html  

The first command just downloads the script. You can run the first command (download the script) then open it and check it for yourself before you execute the second command which makes it executable and executes it.  The third command installs some Microsoft Fonts that will make Google Earth and other programs (Wine) look better.

Fixing failed Update when using a Launchpad PPA (Geany)

I use the Geany Text Editor as my programing/txt file editor.  I installed it from a Launchpad PPA. When updating I kept getting the error "This requires installing packages from unauthenticated sources".  A quick Google search for this found this fix which worked.

Open a terminal window and type the following three steps;

Step 1.
sudo apt-get update
This will give you your KEYNUMBER that is giving you problems.
your failed KEYNUMBER will look something like 71240B8FB3641876.

Step 2.
sudo apt-key adv --keyserver keyserver.ubuntu.com --recv-keys KEYNUMBER 
Substitute KEYNUMBER with the your failed keys.

Step 3.
sudo apt-get update
click on OK when the Update Window appears.


That's it you should be good to go.  Sorry I fixed mine before I could get screen shots.

Kill All Wine Processes (Command Line)

Sometimes Wine programs crash and leave some processes running making it hard to restart them. Here's a nice command line program that kills ALL Wine processes and reports what it killed.  This command lets me just restart whatever Wine program crashed without doing a reboot of my computer.

wineserver -k; killall -9 wine wineserver; for i in `ps ax|egrep "*\.exe"|grep -v 'egrep'|awk '{print $1 }'`;do kill -9 $i;done

I made this command into a Bash Script so I could use it without having to retype or copy/paste it every time I want to use it.

Here's the video where I found this command and it tells you how to make this command into a Bash Script.

Canon i9900 Printer Working Ubuntu 14.04

I've owned a Canon i9900 printer for a long time.  I've had it since Windows XP was new. It's a great photo printer and can handle large format papers.  When I switched to Ubuntu I still had an XP machine to handle all my printing and after that I used VirtualBox to run XP, then Window 7.  Now with Windows 10 on the VirtualBox it does not support the Canon i9900 so it's time to get it working in Ubuntu 14.04 +.

The short answer is use the CANON BJC8500 DRIVER not the i9900.


To ADD a printer to Ubuntu go to SYSTEM SETTING and click on PRINTERS or use your SEARCH Panel and type in PRINTER.  Once the PRINTERS window opens select ADD.

This will open up the ADD PRINTER dialog window. My Canon i9900 is attached to my network with a small Print Server Box and NOT through USB.  I selected the Find Network Printer option and typed in the IP Address of my Print Server Box (replace the XX.XX with you IP).

Click the FIND Button

After Ubuntu finds your Print Server Box just Click on the FORWARD Button.

Next Select CANON and click the FORWARD Button

Here is the big Secret!!! Select the BJC8500 Driver.  There is a i9900 Driver and a 9900i Driver but they do NOT WORK.  Trust me and Select the BJC8500 Driver.  The only thing you lose is some resolution, it drops to 600x600 but at lest your printer works.

Click the APPLY Button, then print a Test Page to make sure it works.

To show you NOT to pick the i9900, 9900i, 9100i, i9100, 9950i or i9950 Drivers I've scanned in my test prints with the i9900 Driver and one with the BJC8500.  I don't know why the rightly named driver does not work but trust me it doesn't (two weeks time invested in this discovery).

CANON i9900 DRIVER TEST PRINT

Notice the faded colors especially black, the elongated text and ovals instead of circles. Everything runs off the edge of the paper too. 

CANNON BJC8500 DRIVER TEST PRINT

Much better, no fade, good color, true circles and it fits on the page.

I did not try this with the printer plugged directly into a USB port.  You should try the i9900 first before you use my work around.  I would assume that Ubuntu would just FIND your printer if it was plugged directly into USB which would let you skip the NETWORK and IP steps.