Are Ubuntu LoCo Teams Effective?

Most of the time we, as humans, do what we know, because it is comfortable and we trust it. I have been an LoCo team contact for a long time and served on the Ubuntu LoCo Council as well; I am comfortable with the structure of LoCo teams. I know the people that are involved and they are all highly energized and devoted. Today an article I read on Datamation made me take a step back and ask a few questions.

• Are LoCo teams effective?
• What is the ‘focus’ or ‘purpose’ of LoCo teams? (was the author expecting something from LoCo teams that they are not ‘focused’ on)

For my part i have not really come to any conclusion because I have seen many successful LoCo teams and each had their own way of becoming successful. The purpose of this post is to expose more people in the Ubuntu Community to the question. First let me go over some of the points made in the article.

The first quote defines the ‘audience’ that the author was talking about:

However, for those who have been exposed to Ubuntu Linux at some level, the temptation to give the OS a shot might finally take hold. These individuals are usually more tech-savvy or might be the family tech support person. Assuming the PC is fast enough to support it, Ubuntu suddenly looks like a viable option in these instances.

For my part I would say LoCo teams are well suited for the helping tech savvy users who have heard about Ubuntu explore using the OS. I do not think the Ubuntu LoCo teams can function in a manner similar to an Apple ‘Genius’ or a ‘Geek Squad’ member at Best Buy. This level of support is for the type of user who really needs extensive hand holding; on their schedule not on someone else’s. My mother is a user like this and she bought an iPad because she liked being able to go in to the Apple store and get individual help when she wanted it.

The second quote indicated that the author felt that LoCo teams could have a positive impact on the adoption of Ubuntu.

A more natural approach would be a greater focus on the Ubuntu LoCo teams. These are Ubuntu support groups who volunteer to put on events in their local areas. They help those who need assistance with Ubuntu, along with providing other great benefits.

Here the author describes what he believes to be one function of LoCo teams. One key item is the idea of local areas. In the United States LoCo teams are organized by state and some states cover rather large areas. In large states like New York, Texas, Florida and California the geographic distance makes it possible to have a well established active group in one city and no activity in another. The information on the LoCo Team wiki page shows that the focus may be less on helping people become Ubuntu users and more on assisting Ubuntu users meet other Ubuntu users.

Ever since the birth of computers, enthusiasts and fans around the world have collected together in garages, universities and pubs to talk about their interest, learn from each other and help promote their interest. Combine this with the huge popularity of Ubuntu, and you have the Ubuntu LoCo project.

With the incredible success of Ubuntu around the world, the LoCo project is here to help groups of Ubuntu fans and enthusiasts work together in regional teams to help advocate, promote, translate, develop and otherwise improve Ubuntu. Our worldwide network of LoCo teams is providing a strong backbone to our already vast and extensive Ubuntu community.

I would say advocating and promoting Ubuntu includes making people aware of Ubuntu as an option to OS X or Windows, but does it include activities that would actively help people transition to Ubuntu? My LoCo team has participated in install festivals, but we do not provide ongoing classes for new users.

The author goes further though and gives his experience with looking to his LoCo team for these kinds of events.

With this in mind I went to my own LoCo group page thinking surely there would be lots happening considering how new Ubuntu 12.10 is, right? Sadly, I was mistaken. Upon visiting, I was presented with a static website and crickets.

Washington LoCo Last Edited

Washington LoCo Events

I will admit that having old resources like this does not help. People will be turned away when they do not find recent events or even upcoming events. Also, having a team event scheduled that is 388 miles or seven hours away is not likely to be any better either. While many community events can take place on IRC those events are not likely going to capture the attention of the audience the author is speaking about. For my part I have met very few tech savvy OS X or Windows users who know what IRC is and less who use it. If they do use an on-line text based chat it is of the instant messaging variety.

The author continues by discussing where he sees the LoCo teams as successful.

After poking around the various LoCo resources, I realized why the expertise gap remains between Ubuntu and Windows and how incredibly ineffective the current LoCo setup is. Honestly, I’ve seen local Linux User Groups with better organization than this! While the LoCos do okay with coordinating international events, they remain largely within their own little echo chamber. And last time I checked, that isn’t a great way to get new users on board.

I can see this perspective given that the author found the resources he mentioned and then found Ubuntu Hours on loco.ubuntu.com. I would also agree that I think the LoCo teams do a great job of coordinating international events such as Open Week or Developer Week. In order to really evaluate the the question of the effectiveness of the LoCo teams you have to first answer the question of what the purpose of LoCo team is. I believe as a community we have to avoid asking the author why he is not building a team in his area; while that ethos is part of the Open Source Way I do not think that will extend to the large audience of users we all hope Ubuntu will find. I also think this is a valid question that has been floating around in the Ubuntu community for the last several cycles as we eye crossing the chasm:

• Who Will Help Us Cross The Chasm? – Randall Ross
• Ubuntu Community Lexicon, Part 3 – Randall Ross
• Four Years And The Chasm – Jono Bacon
• Crossing the Chasm – Wikipedia article on what Crossing the Chasm means

Is Ubuntu ready to cross the chasm? Are Ubuntu LoCo teams effective in helping to reach the audience that helps Ubuntu cross the chasm? Are Ubuntu LoCo teams supposed to be focused on reaching that audience? As a community it is healthy to take a step back and ask questions like these from time to time. I am still thinking about this and I hope you will too.

Ubuntu Server Wake on Lan over Wireless

Recently I cascaded a desktop to my eldest daughter and in turn got her old desktop to use as a server. I strongly dislike noise so I wanted to use this server in the basement of my house. I also wanted to be able to suspend the server when I am not using it. The only hurdle was the fact that I have no Ethernet in my basement. In order to use wireless and still be able to do wake on lan I made use of an Asus Wireless-G Access Point (WL-330GE) in client mode. This allows the server to make use of its Ethernet connection, but the communication will go wireless from the Asus WL-330GE.  The Asus is currently old technology and I would suggest using the new ASUS 802.11b/g/n Portable Wireless Router (WL-330N) if you needed to buy a unit now. Both of these devices are traditionally used as travel routers and offer several modes including a wireless bridge.

The program you need to use to send wake on lan signals is ‘etherwake’.  To install etherwake do the following command in a terminal window.

sudo apt-get install etherwake

After the etherwake is installed you send Wake on Lan packets with the following command:

waekonlan ##:##:##:##:##:##

Where the you replace the ## with the mac address of the target computer. The target machine must have Wake on Lan enabled in BIOS in order for this to work. For me Etherwake and the ASUS travel router worked perfectly to get the desired outcome.

System76 Gazelle Professional: Wrap-up

In previous posts I covered many aspects of the Gazelle Professional laptop from System76. This post will talk about what I feel could be improved and what options I am considering to augment the experience. Here are the key points that were previously covered:

• LCD quality of the 95% gamut matte screen is outstanding. The brightness, contrast, viewing angle and color gamut are outstanding
• The panel is on part with what Lenovo uses in the W520/530 laptops and better than what is used the Lenovo X1 Carbon
• The heat issue that has been raised on the forums is real, but nothing to worry about

While the technical specs are outstanding and the value is incredible , the single biggest reason to get the Gazelle Professional laptop is the customer service and support that comes standard from System76. They are an outstanding dedicated group of people.

Suggestions:
While I am quite happy with my purchase there are some things I would like to see in the future. As a note one must keep in mind that System76 has to work with an ODM to get these features so some of them may not be possible.

• A longer lasting battery standard or as an option. The 48Wh battery could be improved on by using a 62Wh 6 cell battery which I believe Clevo offers. Even better would be an optional 108Wh 9 cell battery.
• Offering an improved DVD drive option or Blueray.
• Offer an optical bay option that is easily switchable like the T and W series laptops from Lenovo
• Offer a USB 3.0 hub as an accessory option

Options worth considering:
These are the options I would consider if ordering a Gazelle Professional now.

• SSD drive + caddy case (I may still order these and just use an external DVD drive (this would be an easy decision if the optical bay was easier to switch)
• An extra power adapter so I have one dedicated to my desk and another for my laptop bag. Right now I will have to unplug it by crawling under my desk.
• I am considering the purchase of a USB 3.0 hub. This will allow me to make better use of external USB 3.0 devices.

HD Wallpaper
I also like the idea of having a wallpaper that shows off the fantastic lcd panel. I made a simple one, but this does not really show off the panel.

Gazelle Wallpaper

Lenovo: X1 Carbon

I recently made a decision to purchase a System76 Gazelle Professional over either a Lenovo T530 or a Lenovo X1 Carbon. The glowing reviews the X1 Carbon was getting in the media had me wondering about my decision. Today I was lucky enough to get a demo unit of the X1 Carbon and had time to try Ubuntu on it.

LCD
On the surface it would seem the easy part of the decision is do I want power and ports, or slim and sleek. I, however, was torn between the two alternatives. The single most important factor to me in picking a laptop is getting a quality display. The X1 Carbon does not suffer from the terrible 1366×768 displays that plague most laptops, but it is not up to the quality standards in the Gazelle Professional. The colors are slightly muted and I could see visible dots when certain colors were displayed. I did like the fifteen step brightness offered on the X1 Carbon. The Gazelle Professional seems to only allow four steps which makes it tougher to adjust to ‘just the right’ brightness.

Special Buttons
The special function buttons such as the wireless toggle, brightness adjustment, volume, mute, play and pause buttons all worked out of the box. This has been my typical experience with Lenovo Thinpad products.

Other Notes
The keyboard was absolutely wonderful on the X! Carbon, good feedback and excellent feel. I was able to activate two finger scrolling and two finger clicks were equivalent to the right mouse button. Idle temperatures were in the 34C range, but when I started using the computer to do work the temperatures were between 44C and 52C. The unit I had to test used the Intel Core i5-3427U which is a dual core process with hyper threading. The unit did not automatically mount my SD card nor my USB flash drive, but I was able to mount them both manually.

In the end the laptop was a very solid and compelling ultrabook. If you are a person who values slim and sultry in your laptops this would be an excellent choice for an Ubuntu user. While it will not measure up to a performance unit like the Gazelle Professional, it is much better than most of the other ultrabooks on the market and the hardware was supported out of the box for Ubuntu. I ran System Testing and submitted the results so hopefully the results will show up on the web soon.

X1 Carbon Running Ubuntu – Front View

 

System76 Gazelle Professional: Customer Service

When evaluating a laptop one always need to be concerned with the level and quality of customer service, but this is something of a foreign concept for many Linux users in the United States as most vendors offer no support for Ubuntu or any other distribution of Linux. With a main stream vendor most Linux users would have to reinstall Windows in order to troubleshoot suspected hardware issues and there would be no chance of troubleshooting a driver or software issue. In the case of System76, Ubuntu is what they support so there is no need to reinstall Windows to get help.

Many Linux users consider themselves very knowledgeable and able to handle problems on their own, but that process still takes time.

I got to experience, first hand, the excellent customer service and dedication of the System76 support team this past weekend. I started to experience boot time issues resulting (image below). Issues are always worrisome, but when you have them on a brand new computer it is even more emotional.

Unable to boot

This first screen made me think there were issues with the hard drive, but subsequent tests showed the drive to be healthy. Other screens were encountered and an occasional boot to low graphics mode as well. I was starting to dread the thought I had received faulty hardware. For me that was a very stressful thought. If I had purchased a Dell, Lenovo or HP I would have been on my own trying to determine if this was a hardware or software issue. That would have been time consuming as well as stressful. I would have lost precious time with my family and been distracted at work.

With System76 I was simply able to put in a support request via the web and got a quick response. When I asked a question during support hours the responses were an extremely quick five minutes. Other questions were answered quickly as well. Here are some of the responses I got from the System76 team.

We consider it our complete responsibility to ensure your machine operates correctly and as such we pay for shipping when a repair is necessary. I don’t think that’s the case here. I think we can get you fixed in a flash anyway…. just have to confirm a couple things.

Carl Richell

Shortly after this response from Carl I got the following update in my ticket:

I’m attaching a lightdm.conf that I’m going to want you to install on your system. To accomplish this, save the attached file to your home folder and then perform the following commands

sudo mv /etc/init/lightdm.conf /etc/lightdm.bak

sudo mv ~/lightdm.conf /etc/init/

Neither command is going to produce any output except for challenging you for your password as part of it being ran as sudo.

The first actually makes a backup of the file. The second actually moves the attached file you saved into your home folder into /etc/init

Once done you’ll want to reboot.

Mark

The instructions were clear and easy to follow and best of all they solved the issue. I have not had a problem booting since. While I still experienced a high level of stress it was quickly relieved by the competent support from the System76 team. Had this been any other vendor I would not have such a good experience.

System76 Gazelle Professional: the lcd

One of the main reasons I decide to get the Gazelle Professional was the ability to get a 1920×1080 screen. I have never had a laptop screen lower than 1680×1050 (my Lenovo T500) so I am just not able to deal with the 1366×768 screens that are prevalent on most consumer level laptops. I also strongly dislike glossy screens so I selected the 95% gamut matte finish.

I tested the monitor using the tools at: http://www.lagom.nl/lcd-test/  Here are the standout results:

White saturation was highly dependent on the angle of the screen. At some angled I lost the squares in 253 and 254 and at others I could see the squares in all zones.

http://www.lagom.nl/lcd-test/white.php

Response time is excellent.

http://www.lagom.nl/lcd-test/response_time.php#response_time_gif

The Contrast ratio tool resulted in 677:1 contrast ratio; though I was not able to control my camera to the amount required for a more accurate measurement.

http://www.lagom.nl/lcd-test/contrast-view.php?id=5489

I also ran my Lenovo T500 and the W520 through the tests as well. The W520 has a 1920×1080 screen and the T500 has a 1680×1050 screen). I older non-LED screen on the T500 was not on par with the System76 or the W520; though to be honest I was a bit surprised how well it did on the tests. Overall I would give a slight advantage to the System76 screen against the W520 from Lenovo. Considering the well respected reputation Lenovo has that says a great deal to me.

I also find the viewing angle of the TN panel to be excellent (see below for pictures)

Gazelle Professional Viewing Angle Image 1

Gazelle Professional Viewing Angle Image 2

Gazelle Professional Viewing Angle Image 3

The viewing angle is very good for a TN panel. (keep in mind I was in a dimly lit room at night with a point and shoot camera) The most interesting part of the test was the two System76 ads that I saw rotated through the test site. (see one example below).

I summary the 95% gamut 1920×1080 TN panel on the Gazelle Professional will not disappoint. I am very pleased with it.

System76 Gazelle Professional: lm-sensors

This is the third post about my new System76 Gazelle Professional. I am continuing to look at the heat issue. I decided to install lm-sensors and run that on all three laptops. Here are the results.

Lenovo T500
acpitz-virtual-0
Adapter: Virtual device
temp1:        +39.0°C  (crit = +127.0°C)
temp2:        +35.0°C  (crit = +100.0°C)

thinkpad-isa-0000
Adapter: ISA adapter
fan1:        2752 RPM
temp1:        +39.0°C
temp2:        +39.0°C
temp3:        +35.0°C
temp4:         -1.0°C
temp5:        +50.0°C
temp6:            N/A
temp7:        +33.0°C
temp8:            N/A
temp9:        +37.0°C
temp10:       +42.0°C
temp11:       +45.0°C
temp12:           N/A
temp13:           N/A
temp14:           N/A
temp15:           N/A
temp16:           N/A

coretemp-isa-0000
Adapter: ISA adapter
Core 0:       +32.0°C  (high = +105.0°C, crit = +105.0°C)
Core 1:       +36.0°C  (high = +105.0°C, crit = +105.0°C)

Lenovo W520
acpitz-virtual-0
Adapter: Virtual device
temp1:        +36.0°C  (crit = +99.0°C)

thinkpad-isa-0000
Adapter: ISA adapter
fan1:        1982 RPM

coretemp-isa-0000
Adapter: ISA adapter
Physical id 0:  +38.0°C  (high = +86.0°C, crit = +100.0°C)
Core 0:         +36.0°C  (high = +86.0°C, crit = +100.0°C)
Core 1:         +34.0°C  (high = +86.0°C, crit = +100.0°C)
Core 2:         +37.0°C  (high = +86.0°C, crit = +100.0°C)
Core 3:         +31.0°C  (high = +86.0°C, crit = +100.0°C)

System76 Gazelle Professional
System76
acpitz-virtual-0
Adapter: Virtual device
temp1:        +52.0°C  (crit = +120.0°C)

coretemp-isa-0000
Adapter: ISA adapter
Physical id 0:  +54.0°C  (high = +87.0°C, crit = +105.0°C)
Core 0:         +54.0°C  (high = +87.0°C, crit = +105.0°C)
Core 1:         +53.0°C  (high = +87.0°C, crit = +105.0°C)
Core 2:         +50.0°C  (high = +87.0°C, crit = +105.0°C)
Core 3:         +49.0°C  (high = +87.0°C, crit = +105.0°C)

Once again the the System76 is running hotter than the Lenovo machines.

System76 Gazelle Professional: Going a bit deeper

This is a continuation from yesterday’s post on the System76 Gazelle. I have now spent about 2 hours with my new Gazelle Professional today and wanted to report on the one issue most discussed on the Ubuntu forum for System76; the heat issue. Some users have commented that the left palm rest gets warm and others have said they did not see the issue. The second most discussed issue is battery life and I did a little bit of work on that as well.

Methodology:

• Took temperature readings every five minutes for 60 minutes using the Smart Data readings (note: this is not reading the core temperature)
• Took a battery life reading at 5 minutes and 60 minutes
• Did not allow any of the three laptops to turn off the monitor (set to go off every 5 minutes – so I moved the mouse)
• All three laptops we on battery power with no AC power attached
• Both Lenovo laptops had Adaptive Thermal Management set to Balanced on battery

Here are the findings.

Lenovo W520 (Intel Core i7-2720QM)
Battery: 8:36
5 minutes – HD Temp:  28/82
10 minutes – HD Temp: 28/82
15 minutes – HD Temp: 28/82
20 minutes – HD Temp: 28/82
35 minutes – HD Temp: 28/82
40 minutes – HD Temp: 28/82
45 minutes – HD Temp: 28/82
50 minutes – HD Temp: 28/82
55 minutes – HD Temp: 28/82
Battery: 8:02
Rate 11.3 W

Lenovo T500 (Intel Core2Duo T9600)
Battery: 3:21 (3 year old battery)
5 minutes – HD Temp:  25/77
10 minutes – HD Temp: 27/81
15 minutes – HD Temp: 28/82
20 minutes – HD Temp: 29/84
35 minutes – HD Temp: 30/86
40 minutes – HD Temp: 30/86
45 minutes – HD Temp: 31/88
50 minutes – HD Temp: 31/88
55 minutes – HD Temp: 30/86
Battery: 2:36
Rate 19.6 W

System 76 Gazelle Professional (Intel Core i7 3720QM)
Battery: 2:11
5 minutes – HD Temp:  29/84
10 minutes – HD Temp: 33/91
15 minutes – HD Temp: 34/93
20 minutes – HD Temp: 36/97
35 minutes – HD Temp: 37/99
40 minutes – HD Temp: 38/100
45 minutes – HD Temp: 38/100
50 minutes – HD Temp: 39/102
55 minutes – HD Temp: 39/102
60 minutes – HD Temp: 39/102
Battery: 1:35
Rate 17.9 W

The conclusion from this one hour test is the System76 runs roughly 20 degrees Fahrenheit hotter than the W520 and 16 degrees Fahrenheit hotter than the T500. The left palm rest does get warm. I am a curious person so I wanted to get a bit of a look under the hood.

Gazelle Professional heatsink.

System76 Heat Cooling System

System76 Cooling System Fins

System76 Hard Drive Bay

I do not have a good picture of the Lenovo cooling system, but the first noticeable difference is that it uses a side exhaust vent and rear intake vent which avoids restricted airflow issues that bottom intakes have. The other issue is the Lenovo does not use a long heat bar to move heat away; the processor is in the corner of the laptops where the intake and exhaust vents are.

One last note… while using the System76 to post this the hard drive temperature rose to 44C / 111F. at the same time I had the Lenovo playing a really long video and the temperature only rose to 33C / 91 F.

In summary the cooling system on the System76 is not as well designed as those in either the Lenovo T500 or W520

System76 Gazelle Professional

The System76 Gazelle Professional I ordered has arrived; here are my first quick impressions.

• The screen (matte 95% gamut) is incredible. It looks way better than the screen on my T500 (1600×900) and on-par with my W520 (1920×1080) laptop from work. The new System76 at 25% brightness looks slightly brighter than the T500.
• There is a slight heat difference on the left hand side of the palm rest, but nothing I would complain about
• The case appears to be very solid (it is plastic). I would say it has bit more keyboard flex than the T500 and W520, but the build quality is actually pretty close. I grade it above the HP and Dell laptops I have seen in the last two years.
• The T500 and W520 produce more noise (at least to my ears)

Unfortunately I had several meetings today after work so my time with the new machine has been limited, but the initial grade is an A. I will write more over the next few days.

Western Digital MyBook Live

As many of my G+ followers know I have been struggling to decide between an HP Micro Server (N40L) or a NAS (either QNAP or Synology). I recently decided to wait on that decision and get an interim answer using a gift card I received for x-mas. I purchased the Western Digital MyBook Live 2TB. This drive’s only connection is via a gigabit Ethernet adapter. While this device will not take the place of a NAS or even a custom built Micro Server it is much, much less expensive.

The great thing about the device is that it runs Debian.

I have not gotten so far as to tweak any of the settings, but knowing the OS underneath the hood should be of some help. I was able to transfer my .flac and .ogg song libraries to the device and then play them from my local computers. The Twonky media server did not work with Banshee nor Rhythmbox. Though it did work, for pictures and movies, to my Google TV and Samsung TV.

In the end I am quite pleased with spending $159 to get 2TB of disk space available to multiple computers on my network. The device makes a very slight bit of noise, but nothing that bothers me (unlike most servers).