xfce and ubuntuone

I do like Ubuntu Netbook Remix’s UI. However with 10.04 it’s just gone so unstable for me.

• After login when system prompts for keyring secret, UNR environment crashes and drops to gnome. I have to relogin if I need UNR env.
• After I removed a few packages it could not just start gnome panel causing a great inconvenience. I guess this is due to Evolution integration with latest Ubuntu. Mail client I like and use is Thunderbird. I cant switch to Evolution.
• Initially after 10.04 release it was damn slow to respond, so had to do some work around to get it to acceptable speed.

Considering all that I decided to switch to Xfce. It just worked like charm. But now I also use (and like :) ) UbuntuOne service for my backup. UbuntuOne is not integrated for XFCE. Also you cant do everything from UbuntuOne’s cli.

u1sdtool -q; killall ubuntuone-login; u1sdtool -c # configuration
u1sdtool --create-folder ~/my_data # add folders you want to be synced
u1sdtool --list-folders
u1sdtool --current-transfers

For more details you might want to check Ubuntu One wiki .

Configuring your ubuntu for faster internet access

While there is a lot already written here my quick howto

$ sudo bash
# apt-get install dnsmasq squid
# echo "listen-address=127.0.0.1" >> /etc/dnsmasq.conf
# echo "no-dhcp-interface=" >> /etc/dnsmasq.conf
# vi /etc/dhcp3/dhclient.conf 
# # ^ uncomment line #prepend domain-name-servers 127.0.0.1;
# vi /etc/resolv.conf  # Add nameserver 127.0.0.1 
# /etc/init.d/dnsmasq restart
# vi /etc/squid/squid.conf 

http_port 3128
visible_hostname localhost

acl all src 0.0.0.0/0.0.0.0

cache_effective_user proxy
cache_effective_group proxy

http_access allow all
icp_access allow all

positive_dns_ttl 1 month
negative_dns_ttl 1 minute
httpd_accel_port 80
httpd_accel_with_proxy on
httpd_accel_uses_host_header on

cache_dir ufs /cache 400 16 256
cache_store_log none         


# mkdir /cache # I have this dir on reizerfs partition
# chown proxy.proxy /cache

# /etc/init.d/squid restart

Configure your browser to use 127.0.0.1:8080.
Also read detailed dnsmasq setup article http://ubuntu.wordpress.com/2006/08/02/local-dns-cache-for-faster-browsing/