Gripes with Kubuntu 10.04

[NoWorries]

I waited until RC1 was released before I installed 10.04 on both my Laptop (ASUS F3Jr with ATI Radeon X2300 video) and my Desktop (32bit). They are networked using NFS. The Laptop is the main computer with Thunderbird and Kontact which can be accessed by ssh from the Desktop. The main problems that I have are:

Laptop (Connected via Wireless to a wireless router):

1. akonadi not connecting to dbus when Kontact is launched on startup and thereby preventing access to contacts. I have followed numerous suggestions which have not worked and now, when I want to access contacts, I issue the console command "akonadictl stop" followed by "akonadictl start".

2. When I connect another display to the Laptop the image shimmers and is totally unusable. I have loaded the latest drivers by following the procedures at https://help.ubuntu.com/community/RadeonHD. (My Desktop has an NVIDIA FX 5200 card and the dual screen works without a problem.)

Desktop (Connected via Ethernet cable to a wireless router) :

1. The processes virtuoso-t and nepomukservices use over 50% CPU initially and then drop back to the 5% range. The System Monitor shows 100% CPU usage but there is no task or list of tasks that show this usage.

2. When connected via nfs to the Laptop the Network History shows about 3MB/s transfer to the Desktop when no applications are being used.

3. When Thunderbird is launched on the Desktop using ssh with automatic login, it is basically unusable because of the CPU and Network activity. After many 10s of minutes the activity dies down and the system is usable.

As the final release is "hours" away, I do not expect these problems to be fixed. Unfortunately, such problems as these will lead to many disgruntled users including myself.

[NoWorries]

Re: Gripes with Kubuntu 10.04

I thought I should give an update on the progress with my Gripes.

My Desktop is now behaving itself and is very responsive after I removed virtuoso-nepomuk. There is now no unaccounted for local network traffic and the CPU usage no longer sits at 100%. I reinstalled virtuoso-nepomuk and there was increased CPU and network traffic but it was nothing like before. In the end, I could not see any reason to keep this package so I removed it.

My Laptop still has the problems listed. There is one more which is in the annoyance category, ie a shutdown or reboot does not complete. A shutdown gives a black screen while a reboot gives the blue kubuntu screen with a white dot cycling through the five dots. My solution is to use the power button. I have not been able to solve this problem by making changes to the files /etc/init.d/halt and /etc/init.d/reboot. If anyone has a solution to this problem, please let me know.

NoWorries

[jglen490]

Re: Gripes with Kubuntu 10.04

I've been playing with the same problem for some time. The following works for me under Karmic, I'm keeping a copy of my /etc/modules file for when I move to Lucid:

# /etc/modules: kernel modules to load at boot time.
#
# This file contains the names of kernel modules that should be loaded
# at boot time, one per line. Lines beginning with "#" are ignored.

lp
visor
# This note is carried over from Kubuntu 7.10
# and now modified for Kubuntu 9.10
# JHG 2-19-08 Tested /etc/init.d/halt and made changes that are
# related to "halt: ... " message on shutdown; incomplete power off.
# This is O.K. Have corrected S90halt and S90reboot to eliminate the "halt: ... "
# notice. Took out the references to "hddown=", not needed, no RAID.
# Took out reboot -i and halt -i since kernel takes care of IDE drives.
#
# JHG 11-20-2009 For Kubuntu 9.10, modified /etc/rc0.d/S90halt to include:
# halt -d -f -i -p -h regardless of any conditions found by the script.
# JHG 1-1-2010 Changed the entry above to read "shutdown -P now"
#  Still having shutdown issues wherein everything stops, but the system
#  does NOT poweroff. Have added "acpi-force" to the kernel and no longer
#  include the apm reference below. Will see how that works.
# apm power_off=1

See the last note in the file.

[NoWorries]

Re: Gripes with Kubuntu 10.04

Hi jglen490,

Thanks for your reply . Unfortunately, there was no change in my system with shutdown except that a brief press of the power switch resulted in the system shutting down after the disc light went off and the screen went black. I was fascinated to note that changes to either /etc/rc0.d/S90halt or /etc/init.d/halt were automatically made to the other file.

After my initial system installation, shutdown and rebooted was successful but this changed after unsuccessful changes to resolve the akonadi problems. I am starting to consider reinstalling 10.04 next week to see what happens.

On another gripe of mine, I have found a way around the shimmering in a display connected to my laptop. If the display is connected on startup, the shimmering is present when the display is configured using system settings. If, the display is connected after the system is booted, the display does not shimmer after using display setup in system settings. My impression is that this is not a display driver problem but is a kernel/KDE problem. It would be great if the system could be booted with the display connected and not have to go through setting it up each time.

NoWorries

[jglen490]

Re: Gripes with Kubuntu 10.04

I'm sure there's an answer somewhere!!

The files /etc/rc0.d/S90halt and /etc/init.d/halt are actually one in the same. Ah, the magic of links!!

Try undoing whatever mods you made to /etc/rc0.d/S90halt or /etc/init.d/halt, and then add the "acpi-force" entry to the kernel boot line. You may get an actual shutdown without intervention. Power management is normally handled by acpi, but in my case the kernel thought that with the age of my BIOS, it should ignore loading acpi. Once I figured out the changing the shutdown or halt was no longer working and the "apm" entry in /etc/modules was no longer doing what I needed it to do, I tried forcing acpi. It worked, at least in Karmic. Haven't upgraded to Lucid, yet, but I will soon. WQe'll see what happens with acpi and poweroff after that!!

[NoWorries]

Re: Gripes with Kubuntu 10.04

Hi jglen490,

I added the acpi-force by using the "e" option in the grub menu and put acpi-force at the end of the line starting with: linux /boot/vmlinuz..... I assume this is the way I should do this. Sorry to say that this did not solve my problem. Still had to use the power button to turn the Laptop off.

NoWorries

[maestrobwh1]

Re: Gripes with Kubuntu 10.04

Where is SystemSettings >> Advanced >> Policykit Authorizations?!

[AirportEngineer69]

Re: Gripes with Kubuntu 10.04

I just don't seem to learn. This is the second time Kubuntu has done an automatic upgrade on my main desktop workstation.

Once again I have no way to configure my digitizer tablet to work as a digitizer. It is imperative that I be able to work in digitizer mode. Who makes these decisions to cripple or kill existing tools that work?

Once again my NFS connection to my Linux server has been broken. Why?

Is it so hard to preserve configuration files in upgrades that upgrades have to break things?

If upgrades break things, why are there no warnings during upgrade installation?

If I can't find answers for my problems with less than 8 hours of research, I expect I'll move on to Windows 7. At least it works and answers to basic questions are readily available.

I barely get all of the bugs out of my Kubuntu workstation and updates or upgrades break it. I'm learning to hate Linux thanks to Kubuntu.

[NoWorries]

Re: Gripes with Kubuntu 10.04

Sorry to hear that you are having so many problems. I have never trusted an automatic update as I have assumed that this for a stand alone desktop.

I have a separate home partition on both my computers and before and upgrade, I store in this area the files: exports, fstab, hosts. hosts.allow, hosts.deny. From a standard installation, I have found it necessary to install nfs-kernel-server and nfs-common. Also, as I want to use ssh, I have had to install ssh and openssh-server. I recommend that you check the contents of these files on your system to see if they have the right values.

[NoWorries]

Re: Gripes with Kubuntu 10.04

I have now returned from being away and would like to report that after re-installing my system and all the updates including KDE 4.4.4, my list of gripes only has one left. Well done to those doing all the development !!! The solution to my problem with errors from akonadi when Kontact was started were solved from implementing the approach used by Batty in http://kubuntuforums.net/forums/inde...pic=3111092.15

The outstanding problem is when I have a second monitor connected. On my desktop, which has an NVIDIA card, all works well and I can boot the system with the monitor connected. For my laptop, which has an ATI Radeon X2300, I can only connect the second monitor after the system is booted using System Settings>Display. If I have the second monitor connected on startup, it is not automatically connected and the display size is not set to the "Auto" values . When I use System Settings>Display to set the "Auto" values, the second monitor becomes active unfortunately the display shimmers as shown in the attached image.

I hope the ATI problems are solved soon.