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1500 questions
357
votes
37 answers
How can I improve Ubuntu overall system performance?
What are your tips for improving overall system performance on ubuntu? Inspired by this question I realized that some default settings may be rather conservative on Ubuntu and that it's possible to tweak it with little or no risk if you wish to make…
Decio Lira
- 7,866
356
votes
7 answers
Boot drops to a (initramfs) prompts/busybox
I am running an HP pavilion dv6000 dual boot win7 and Ubuntu 12.04. (well, up until today). After a reboot, the boot process drops to the BusyBox shell and I end up at the prompt:
BusyBox v1.18.5 (Ubuntu 1:1.18.5-1ubuntu4) built-in shell…
dpm
- 3,561
353
votes
13 answers
How to format a USB flash drive?
In Windows there is a straightforward "Format" option in a flash drive's right-click pop-up menu. Where's that in Ubuntu?
Ivan
- 57,065
353
votes
7 answers
How to make ZSH the default shell?
I am trying to set ZSH as my default shell, however it keeps reverting back to bash.
I have tried this code:
sudo chsh -s $(which zsh)
I've also tried:
sudo chsh -s /bin/zsh
Also tried these commands without sudo. Any ideas on what else I need…
Tom
- 3,899
348
votes
14 answers
How can I adjust the mouse scroll speed?
This question has been asked many times with no answer. I've used my basic Google skills and haven't come across a fix. This is system wide. My mouse simply scrolls too fast.
I'm new to ubuntu and linux in general. Would switching styles or…
Unisucs
- 3,481
346
votes
13 answers
How can I monitor the memory usage?
I have used top to see the memory usage at the moment. But I would like to monitor the memory usage over a period of time. E.g start monitoring and then execute a few commands, and final stop the monitoring and see how much memory that have been…
Jonas
- 8,217
346
votes
6 answers
345
votes
8 answers
What is the safest way to clean up /boot partition?
I have 200 MB assigned for the /boot partition. Whenever I try to update the kernel, I receive an error message that basically states /boot is full.
What can I do to cleanup /boot and remove/backup the older kernels?
koba101
- 3,453
- 3
- 13
- 4
343
votes
38 answers
Comparison of backup tools
This question exists because it has historical significance, but it is not considered a good, on-topic question for this site, so please do not use it as evidence that you can ask similar questions here. While you are encouraged to help maintain…
8128
- 28,740
342
votes
7 answers
What is a process, and why doesn't it get killed?
The chrome browser was not responsive and I tried to kill it, but instead of disappearing the process had at its right, and didn't get killed:
What is for a process and why it doesn't it get killed?
Eduard Florinescu
- 8,047
340
votes
14 answers
"(CRON) info (No MTA installed, discarding output)" error in the syslog
I have a fresh install of Ubuntu 12.04.1 LTS an a number of servers.
I have not added any cron jobs or edited my crontab on those servers, however, at around the same time for each machine, I get a 75% CPU spike and the following info in my syslog…
sungiant
- 3,515
339
votes
3 answers
Run adduser non-interactively
I'd like to use the adduser command to add a user (with disabled password) via a shell script.
By default, adduser prompts you for various values (e.g., Full Name). Is there any way to submit these values via command line? Or will I need to useradd…
Lorin Hochstein
- 5,405
339
votes
9 answers
Are PPAs safe to add to my system and what are some "red flags" to watch out for?
I see a lot of interesting programs out there that can only be obtained by adding a "PPA" to the system but, if I'm understanding correctly, we should stay within the official "repositories" for adding software to our system.
Is there any way for a…
Rob
- 12,820
337
votes
15 answers
How to backup settings and list of installed packages
If I want to make a backup of everything I have done since the fresh install of Ubuntu, what are the possible options? What all should I backup? I want to get all the settings that I changed, all the packages I installed, etc.
n1kh1lp
- 3,471
337
votes
4 answers
Where is the user crontab stored?
Since upgrading my user's crontab has been wiped out. This is not the first time this has happened this year and it's a pain restoring it each time.
I'd like to be able to back up the crontab for my user but for that I need to know where it's…
Oli
- 293,335