This is the PowerPC FAQ. See also the PowerPC Known Issues page.

Many more general questions have answers at the Community Documentation.

Please help keep this document up-to-date. Editing a wiki is easy, see this page for guidance.

General Questions

Which Macs are compatible with Ubuntu?

All NewWorld Macs should work. This means iMacs, iBooks, blue & white G3s, Lombard G3 PowerBooks and newer. The minimum system requirements are given in the release notes. Users with less RAM or disk space may try Xubuntu or Lubuntu.

What about OldWorld Macs?

All Macs prior to the original iMac are known as OldWorld Macs. You will need a Mac OS 9 install CD to correctly set up Ubuntu on an OldWorld Mac. Read this wiki for more help on installing.

Is Ubuntu supported on PowerPC?

Ubuntu for PowerPC is now a community supported platform (the announcement) so you can nolonger pay Canonical to support your PowerPC machine. This also means that ISO downloads have been moved to the ports section of the Ubuntu sever, and are no longer on most mirrors. In fact, it is often hard to find any reference to PowerPC on the main Ubuntu website or packages.ubuntu.com.

However, PowerPC packages (like for other architectures) are available on launchpad where you can look up the source code, build logs and bugs. Canonical and the wider community still fix PowerPC bugs when they are reported and when they find them. However, releases will not be delayed due to problems which are specific to PowerPC. This means there is occasionally the need for some PowerPC specific workarounds which are detailed below and on the PowerPC Known Issues page.

Is Ubuntu still available on PowerPC?

Yes, see PowerPCDownloads for downloads.

I have an old computer so I should install an old version of Ubuntu, right?

Wrong. You should only install a release that is still receiving updates. It is far more important to install a derivative such as Xubuntu or Lubuntu that is suitable for your machine's specification.

As time passes there is an almost inevitable creep of bloat, but developers also find better and more efficient ways of doing things. You will find that the speed of your system goes up, as well as down, from release to release.

How do I install a derivative?

If a live CD is available in the PowerPCDownloads then you can install from that, otherwise you can install via the mini iso or alternate install CD (see installation section below for instructions).

It is also possible to install different desktop environments alongside each other to try them out (and this would be an alternative to starting from the mini iso). Some instructions which you may find useful are here. For 10.04-11.04 Lubuntu see here, as well as, this post. You may not get the full benefits of speed and lightness by installing many environments at the same time.

What software is available for PowerPC?

Nearly all open-source software is available to download from the Ubuntu repositories, but the amount of proprietary software available for PowerPC linux is limited. You will have the same version of Firefox, LibreOffice, etc as other architectures.

Notable absentees are: Chrome/Chromium, Adobe Flash (although open-source alternatives are available, see below), Wine (however Qemu can be used, see below), ndiswrapper, proprietary video drivers and Dropbox (but, you can use Ubuntu One).

There is a new release available, do I need to upgrade?

No, not if you are happy with your current release and are still receiving updates for it. The current long term support (LTS) release is 10.04 and the desktop edition will continue to receive updates until April 2013. The server edition of 8.04 (LTS) will also be supported until April 2013.

Upgrading is pretty straightforward through the Update Manager, but if you require further info then there are instructions here or in the release notes. This FAQ and the PowerPC Known Issues page is there if you run into any PowerPC specific problems.

How do I install Ubuntu on my Playstation 3?

Check out this link for more information on installing on the PS3.

Installation

How do I get a Mac to boot from CD?

The simplest method is to hold down the 'C' key as you turn the power on. Once you hear the CD drive reading the disk you can release the key.

Do I need the 32 or 64 bit version?

At some point (either when downloading the iso or running the cd) you'll be given a choice between the 32 bit or the 64 bit version. G3s and G4s use the 32 bit version, G5s use the 64 bit (so use the live64 or cli64 option if available).

The iso is too big for a CD, what can I do?

This thread explains how you can reduce the size of an iso. You can also try 'over-burning' if it is only just too big, or write the iso to a DVD. Remember to use the lowest burn speed for writing to cds/dvds. You can also 'burn' an iso to a USB stick, see below.

What about booting the iso over a network or from a hard disk?

Instructions for network or hard disk booting, as well as, other general information about installing on PowerPC can be found in the Official Installation Instructions (some of the information is a little dated). See also this wiki for network booting.

What is the Alternate CD?

The Alternate CD is a text-based installer similar to the debian installer. It can be used when your computer is not able to run the standard Desktop/Live installation CD (for example, if your computer does not meet the live CD minimum RAM requirements or requires configuration after the installation is complete in order to use the desktop). The Alternate CD also allows more advanced installation which is not available with the Standard LiveCD (choose the 'expert' option at the yaboot prompt). There are Alternate CDs for various derivatives, but if one doesn't exist for the derivative you wan't, you can use any Alternate CD and follow the instructions for the mini iso (see below).

The graphical and text insallers ask roughly the same questions so don't be put off by the lack of a GUI. Use Tab and the arrow keys to move between options. The space bar selects an item such as a checkbox. Use Enter to activate choices.

What partitions do I need etc?

Most of the install questions are fairly easy and straighforward. If you don't know the answer to a question, then you can usually go with the default option. This old guide runs through the installation process.

You can let the installer take care of creating the necessary partitions and their sizes. If you want to use the whole disk for Ubuntu (and erase everything currently on the drive) choose the "Guided - use entire disk" option. This will create the following partitions:

• partition 1 - a very small partition which holds the Apple Partition Map

• partition 2 - the bootstrap partition that yaboot (the bootloader) lives on
• partition 3 - the Linux root file system /
• partition 4 - swap space

Note, some computer models do not support booting from big drives and you may need to adjust your partition sizes if you have installed a new hard drive. For example, with early iMac G3s all operating systems must be contained within the first 8GB of a hard drive. This means all new hard drives larger than 8GB must be partitioned with the linux root partition within the first 8GB limit. Once Ubuntu has booted you will be able to access the rest of your new drive. Other computer models may have a 128GB limit.

What do I need to know for dual-booting?

See here, as it has some additional information for you.

Assuming you have the other OS already installed, then the easiest thing to do is shrink an existing partition so that there is free space available on your hard drive. You can then choose the "Use the largest continuous free space" optition when installing Ubuntu. Remember to backup any important data before repartioning.

If you are doing a fresh install of both operating systems, then you can put the yaboot partition as the first bootstrap partition or put the whole of Ubuntu in first place on the disk. The ye olde Official Installation Instructions describe how to do this.

What about installing alongside other linux distros?

If you don't want the opportunity to select between the distros via the Option/Alt key then you just need to create a new / partition for Ubuntu. You can reuse the boostrap and swap partitions you created for your other linux distro(s). Choose the "Manually edit partition table" option to do this.

You will be able to select which linux distro to boot at the second yaboot prompt. Press the Tab key to get your options. The distros will be named according to the partition they are installed on. You can rename them by editing the stanzas in your yaboot.conf.

G4 Dual-processor systems

Multiprocessor support — also called “symmetric multiprocessing” or SMP — is available for PowerPC. Ubuntu provides both SMP and non-SMP kernels.

Some motherboards have more than one processor on them, and some processors have multiple cores. If your computer is like this, then the SMP kernel is for you. Non-SMP kernels will not be able to take advantage of your multiple processors.

The default 32 bit PowerPC Ubuntu kernel image does not support SMP. This should not prevent installation, since the standard, non-SMP kernel should boot on SMP systems; the kernel will simply use the first CPU only. In order to take advantage of dual processors, you'll have to replace the standard Ubuntu kernel with the SMP version. Install the linux-powerpc-smp meta-package.

The 64 bit PowerPC Ubuntu kernel image supports SMP.

I have a G4 iBook or G4 Albook, is there anything I need to know?

If you are using a G4 iBook or G4 AlBook then you need to be warned that the fan may not work using the alternate CD or mini iso (it is the same when installing Debian). I have raised this as a bug, please confirm.

This shouldn't be a problem because it is fairly quick (with my download speed it is around 40 mins to install a cli using the mini iso), but you could run into overheating issues if you decide to do some CPU intensive thing like shrinking a large partition that's going to take ages! So don't do it! Use a live CD or an existing linux/mac install to do this from.

Using the alternate/mini iso it's obviously a good idea to keep a good level of circulation around the *Book, and if you are cautious (sensible?) then during the base installation only you could maybe setup an external fan to blow on the *Book or maybe sit it on something cool (e.g. the freezer things that keep your picnic cool!)?

If you are using a live CD then the command that should make sure you have a working fan is sudo modprobe therm_adt746x . After installing 10.04, you will need to add the therm_adt746x module to the /etc/modules file. See the PowerPC Known Issues page.

Which repositories have PowerPC packages?

If you are having trouble with mirror repositories then you can use the manual option in the alternate/mini CD for setting the mirror.

Change the mirror/hostname to

ports.ubuntu.com

with directory

/ubuntu-ports/

Other mirrors are (please add to the list):

http://mirror.aarnet.edu.au/pub/ubuntu-ports/
http://mirrors.med.harvard.edu/ubuntu-ports/
http://mirror.csclub.uwaterloo.ca/ubuntu-ports/
http://ftp.tu-chemnitz.de/pub/linux/ubuntu-ports/
http://aptproxy.willowgarage.com/ports.ubuntu.com/ubuntu-ports/
http://mirrors.n-ix.net/ubuntu-ports/
http://jp.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu-ports/

How do I install from the mini iso?

The base installation

Use the mini iso or alternate CD to install a simple command line only system. With the mini iso you'll need an ethernet connection so that it can download and install the required packages.

Boot the CD and type "cli" when prompted (G5 users using the alternate CD should use "cli64"). Use the "cli-expert" option if you want a greater level of control.

A few things to be aware of: At the automatic update screen choose the 'No automatic updates' option. If you have a classic Airport wifi card then during the install you may be told you are missing the non-free firmware file "agere_sta_fw.bin". This can be ignored at this stage. The mini iso does appear to hang at one point with a black screen, please give it a couple of minutes as the download should kick in. Also, the screensaver (black screen) does come on during the installation just to confuse you more!

See the PowerPC Known Issues page about a problem with the 11.10 mini iso.

Install Ubuntu, Lubuntu, Xubuntu, Kubuntu, etc

For 10.04, 10.10 and 11.04 Lubuntu see this post.

After installing the base installation and logging in enter the following simple commands:

sudo apt-get update
sudo tasksel

Select the derivative of ubuntu you want from the list that appears.

If the tasksel command doesn't work then check the PowerPC Known Issues page. An alternative way to install the desktop is to install the appropriate 'meta' package. Unlike the tasksel command this will give a description of what the problem is. For Xubuntu you would type:

sudo apt-get install xubuntu-desktop
sudo apt-get dist-upgrade

When you have rebooted (the command is sudo reboot) you can tidy up the installation by entering the following commands in a terminal:

sudo apt-get autoremove
sudo apt-get autoclean
sudo apt-get clean

How do I boot from a USB drive?

There is a lot of confusion about booting from a USB device on a PowerPC machine. Here is what Apple have to say. So if your model was introduced after August 1999 then there is a good chance you will be able to boot from USB.

To copy an iso to a USB stick

First, find out the device name of the USB device. For example, look in the ubuntu disk utility program to find it out. Mine is /dev/sdb

Then use the 'dd' command to copy the iso to disk. WARNING!! This will erase your USB stick so only do this if it hasn't got anything important on it! To return the USB stick to 'normal', you'll need to repartition and reformat it at the end! Also, double check you have the device name correct as you don't want to erase a hard drive or anything like that by mistake! The dd command will do its thing even if you have the device mounted. The command you want will be something like this:

sudo dd if=~/Downloads/ubuntu.iso of=/dev/sdb

where ~/Downloads/ubuntu.iso is the path of the iso file and /dev/sdb is the USB device. Please be very careful using this command as sdb will be a hard drive on some machines.

Contrary to what you may have read elsewhere, it is possible to copy the iso from an intel machine running Ubuntu/linux. The dd command just copies raw data afterall. However, if you are having problems you could try adjusting some of the settings of the dd command? For example, set bs=512 or bs=4096? See the dd manual.

If you want to copy the iso to USB from Mac OS X then the instructions to do so are here. These comments suggest it can be done, although it maybe a little temperamental.

An alternative to using dd is given in this thread.

Booting

Make sure you have the USB device connected before turning on the computer.

If you've copied an iso using the dd command then it is likely you will have to boot through openfirmware. However, if you have used the alternative method or have installed to USB then you can try restarting the machine whilst holding the Option key. You should be able to choose your USB device to boot from. If you don't see your USB device (or if it won't boot from it) then try holding down simultaneously Command-Option-Shift-Delete during start-up. This will bypass the internal hard drive and boot from an external drive or CD. If you want to force a particular SCSI device use cmd-opt-shift-delete-# where # = SCSI ID number.

If those don't work, restart the machine into openfirmware (hold down Command-Option-o-f while turning on). To boot the USB device type one of the following commands (please add to the list if you use something different)

boot usb0/disk@1:2,\\yaboot 
boot usb1/disk@1:2,\\yaboot
boot usb1/disk:2,\\yaboot
boot usb-2a/disk@1:2,\\yaboot
boot ud:2,\\yaboot

It can be very tricky to find the openfirmware path to yaboot. I think it is easier just to try each of the example paths one by one until it boots, but if these don't work you can use the openfirmware commands dev / ls and devalias (and/or dev usb0 ls etc) to try and work out what the path should be. If you can't see your usb device/files from openfirmware then you won't be able to boot from the device. More tips on booting from openfirmware are given on this page and this thread, but use the word yaboot instead of tbxi.

I have given more information about booting from USB on this page. There are some troubleshooting tips if you are trying to boot an 'alternate' iso.

Installing to USB

If you want to install a system onto a USB device (and boot from it permanently instead of a hard drive), then it is likely the automatic configuration of your yaboot.conf will fail and consequently the system will not automatically boot. To solve this you may need to manually specify an ofboot argument in your yaboot.conf file. See below for more advice on this and the troubleshooting section for how to do this.

Yaboot Configuration

The file /etc/yaboot.conf can be edited to change the booting behavior of your PowerPC Linux machine.

Edit the file with root privileges:

sudo nano /etc/yaboot.conf

After editing and saving the file, you must run this to write changes to the boot partition:

sudo ybin -v

To have more boot menu options include these lines in your yaboot.conf:

enablecdboot
enableofboot
enablenetboot

To have yaboot default to booting to OS X include this line in your yaboot.conf:

defaultos=macosx

To change the colors of the yaboot screen include these lines below. Alter as desired. These settings below create a color screen similar to the OS X open firmware colors.

fgcolor=black
bgcolor=white

A typical yaboot.conf taken from a linux only natty installation is here.

On some installations (e.g. onto a usb drive or with the new ata controller drivers in 11.10?) you may have to use the ofboot argument to specify the openfirmware path to the boot partition. Gentoo have an excellent quick guide to manually editing the yaboot.conf file which some people may find useful. It contains advice on the ofboot argument, as well as, adding a root delay.

You can also look at the yaboot.conf manual by typing the command

man yaboot.conf

The more wordy Debian guide is here. This gives instructions on how to boot the system from openfirmware. See also the troubleshooting section below for how to use a Ubuntu CD to boot your installed system or manuallly edit your yaboot.conf.

Configure graphics

Shouldn't it just work out the box nowadays?

In an ideal world, yes, of course. For many machines it does.

However, if you get a blank screen on boot, or if your picture is not displayed correctly then you will have to make some adjustments. You may also like to experiment with your graphics setup to increase performance or enable a certain feature.

Unfortunately, there are quite a few problems with essentially the same symptom - a blank screen. So it is a case of trial and error to see what works. There are broadly two approaches to solving the blank screen: adding a yaboot parameter and setting up an xorg.conf file.

The yaboot parameter could be seen as the "quick fix" approach, good to get something at least on the screen (e.g. a command line login or a simple graphics setup), but often you may need to make it permanent too. An xorg.conf file gives greater control of your graphics setup and is used, for example, to adjust a bad resolution or when you can't get beyond a command line login. Increasingly, an xorg.conf file is not needed in new versions of Ubuntu with many machines.

Note, Ubuntu evolves with every new release and yaboot parameters you may need for one release may not be required for the next release. To take advantage of improvements you should retest your graphics setup after an upgrade.

What yaboot parameters should I use for graphics problems?

The first two yaboot parameters to try are video=ofonly (use only the openfirmware framebuffer - offb) and nosplash (disables on *some* computers the Ubuntu splash screen i.e. the word Ubuntu with the four dots). You add them after whatever you normally type at the second yaboot prompt. It is best to try all yaboot parameters separately first, but if you want to try them together, and you normally type Linux then you would type at the second yaboot prompt:

Linux nosplash video=ofonly 

If these don't work, you can try further boot parameters, but these will depend on what graphics card you have. If you don't know what you have, you can look up your computer at Apple or Everymac.

Modern open-source radeon and nouveau (nVidia cards) video drivers rely on Kernel Mode Setting (KMS). KMS supposedly provides an improved graphical boot with less flickering, a built-in framebuffer console, seamless switching from the console to Xorg, and other features. To achieve this, KMS moves the responsibility for selecting and setting up the graphics mode from the Xorg to the kernel.

KMS can be problematic, however, so you can test if your computer will boot correctly without it. For nVidia cards use the yaboot parameter nouveau.modeset=0 to disable KMS. Please note, PPC ubuntu does not use grub/grub2 so disregard any instructions in the links relating to grub menus. For radeon cards use radeon.modeset=0 . See question below for more information about radeon settings.

KMS conflicts with legacy framebuffer drivers (such as, radeonfb, nvidiafb, rivafb), so you should disable these if you want to try KMS. nvidiafb and rivafb which are the old framebuffers for nvidia cards are not 'complied in' to recent ubuntu kernels (and their modules are blacklisted) so they shouldn't cause a problem. radeonfb, aty128fb, and atyfb are, however, 'compiled in' to 10.04 and 10.10 kernels. radeonfb will stop radeon KMS working so you should disable it with the yaboot parameter video=radeonfb:off .

To force a nouveau mode (e.g. to enable a dvi connector and disable a non-existent tv out) see the bottom of this link. This may solve problems with some nVidia cards? Gentoo have more on phantom outputs with nouveau, see here.

You can force the mode of framebuffers aty128fb (ATI Rage 128 cards) and atyfb (Mach 64 and Rage cards) too, for example: video=aty128fb:1024x768-24@75 . See the bottom of this link. The official guide suggests a different way, see the bottom of this page. I struggled to find information on vmodes/cmodes, so I'm not sure if that is old fashioned (something to do with MacOS?), but there is quite a good guide here. You will probably have to perform extra steps to use these framebuffers in 11.04 and 11.10. See question below.

You can additionally try video=offb:off. This will disable the openfirmware framebuffer and is used when offb conflicts with another framebuffer (see log files syslog/dmesg in directory /var/log/). If no other framebuffer is available at boot time then you may get a frozen or blank screen until the Xorg server starts.

For background information on framebuffers see here, but again you'll have to filter out any details relating to grub as PowerPC does not use this. It describes adding nofb to the kernel line and you could try this as a yaboot parameter too? It also gives some information about the command fbset. This allows you to show or change framebuffer settings from the console.

It is also worth opening the yaboot.conf file to see if the installer has added any graphics parameters.

Note, yaboot parameters don't always work with the live cds, but you will still be able to install using the alternate or mini cds. If you do install from a live cd and you've used a yaboot parameter then that parameter should be automatically passed onto the install.

How do I make a yaboot parameter permanent?

To make a yaboot parameter permanent or remove a parameter from an installation, use the command

sudo nano /etc/yaboot.conf

and change the 'append' lines in the file. Add the desired parameter into the quotes, or remove the word splash if you want to disable the splash screen. Every parameter inside the quotes should be separated by a space. Save (ctrl+o) and exit (ctrl+x), then type the command

sudo ybin -v

to copy the file across to the boot partition.

How do I configuring an xorg.conf file?

If you have a distorted picture, a poor resolution, poor colours or can't boot past a command line login then you may need to setup an xorg.conf file....

For a more comprehensive guide have a look here or the xorg.conf manual.

The information below this point only applies if you have installed a GUI/desktop.

To setup an xorg.file you may find it more convenient (for example, if your picture is bad or black) to boot into single user mode. At the second yaboot prompt type (in Debian use Linux 1):

Linux single

If this doesn't work then you may need to combine it with one or more of the other yaboot parameters above. This will boot into a menu (or take you straight to a root prompt). Choose 'continue boot' to take you into a command line login or you can choose one of the root options at the bottom of the menu list (in which case you can remove the word sudo from the commands you type).

Sample xorg.files for various machines can be found here. These can sometimes save you reading the documentation, but some of them are not the best setup (that's me being polite!). Download the file using the wget command at the bottom of the appropriate page. Then move it using the command "sudo mv file_name /etc/X11/xorg.conf" where file_name will be something like "ibook2.txt". Reboot using "sudo reboot".

It is not hard though to setup your own xorg.conf file, and if you have an external monitor then I would recommend you do so. Some instructions for setting up an xorg.conf and detecting your monitor resolutions are below:

Get to a console, for example via single user mode. Then type:

sudo Xorg -configure
sudo mv xorg.conf.new /etc/X11/xorg.conf
sudo nano /etc/X11/xorg.conf

Note the capital 'X' in "sudo Xorg -configure" and "X11". Also, you can probably ignore any errors from the command, such as "number of created screens does not match number of detected devices", as it will still generate an xorg.conf file. It just means you will have to delete some sections of the xorg.conf.

At this point you may be freaking out a bit because it does look complicated when you are new to this sort of thing! However, once you overcome your panic and approach it more with a “can do” attitude you’ll see it is not so hard.

An xorg.conf file is composed of a number of sections which may be present in any order. Each section has the form:

Section "SectionName"
     SectionEntry
     ...
EndSection

To solve graphics problems we are mainly interested in the "Monitor", "Device" and "Screen" sections. Assuming you have a standard single monitor setup, then you probably only want 1 of each of these sections so you may have to delete some sections if it gives you two (natty did this to me). If this is the case, examine the two “Device” sections and look at the Driver section entry. If you have an Apple computer then the section you want to keep will have radeon, ati, r128, nouveau or nv written in the Driver entry (what is written depends on your graphics card). There are no proprietary (non-free) drivers for ppc. Above the Driver entry will be the Identifier entry. This is a unique name given to the graphics device and will probably be something like “Card0”.

Note, if you are using the yaboot parameter "nouveau.modeset=0" then you want "nv" written in the Driver entry instead of "nouveau". Ammend the xorg.conf accordingly. "nv" is the old driver for nvidia cards.

The "Monitor" and "Screen" sections also have Identifier entries. The "Screen" section has entries to reference the "Monitor" and "Device" sections as it's purpose is to bind the monitor to a graphics card. You want to keep the "Screen" section that references the identifier of the "Device" section that you are keeping. It will probably work out that you are keeping the sections "Card0", "Monitor0" and "Screen0".

The highest level section is the "ServerLayout" section. When you delete sections you will have to change the "ServerLayout" section to reflect any changes. A shortened xorg.conf using r128 may look something like the one below. For clarity, the font, module and input device sections have been deleted which you can also safely do. Note, the lines starting # are comments and don't do anything.

Section "ServerLayout"
     Identifier     "X.org Configured"
     Screen         "Screen0"
EndSection

Section "Monitor"
     Identifier   "Monitor0"
     VendorName   "Monitor Vendor"
     ModelName    "Monitor Model"
EndSection

Section "Device"
     ### Available Driver options are:-
     ### Values: <i>: integer, <f>: float, <bool>: "True"/"False",
     ### <string>: "String", <freq>: "<f> Hz/kHz/MHz",
     ### <percent>: "<f>%"
     ### [arg]: arg optional
     #Option     "NoAccel"               # [<bool>]
     #Option     "SWcursor"              # [<bool>]
     #Option     "Dac6Bit"               # [<bool>]
     #Option     "Dac8Bit"               # [<bool>]
     #Option     "DMAForXv"              # [<bool>]
     #Option     "ForcePCIMode"          # [<bool>]
     #Option     "CCEPIOMode"            # [<bool>]
     #Option     "CCENoSecurity"         # [<bool>]
     #Option     "CCEusecTimeout"        # <i>
     #Option     "AGPMode"               # <i>
     #Option     "AGPSize"               # <i>
     #Option     "RingSize"              # <i>
     #Option     "BufferSize"            # <i>
     #Option     "EnablePageFlip"        # [<bool>]
     #Option     "Display"               # <str>
     #Option     "PanelWidth"            # <i>
     #Option     "PanelHeight"           # <i>
     #Option     "ProgramFPRegs"         # [<bool>]
     #Option     "UseFBDev"              # [<bool>]
     #Option     "VideoKey"              # <i>
     #Option     "ShowCache"             # [<bool>]
     #Option     "VGAAccess"             # [<bool>]

     Identifier  "Card0"
     Driver      "r128"
     BusID       "PCI:0:16:0"
EndSection

Section "Screen"
     Identifier "Screen0"
     Device     "Card0"
     Monitor    "Monitor0"

     SubSection "Display"
          Viewport   0 0
          Depth     1
     EndSubSection
     SubSection "Display"
          Viewport   0 0
          Depth     4
     EndSubSection
     SubSection "Display"
          Viewport   0 0
          Depth     8
     EndSubSection
     SubSection "Display"
          Viewport   0 0
          Depth     15
     EndSubSection
     SubSection "Display"
          Viewport   0 0
          Depth     16
     EndSubSection
     SubSection "Display"
          Viewport   0 0
          Depth     24
     EndSubSection
EndSection

Save, exit and restart the xorg server (for example, via rebooting: type the command sudo reboot) to see if it is working. You may have to do some more alterations, but these will change depending on your symptons and the xorg log (type "nano /var/log/Xorg.0.log" to look at it). Use the markers to quickly trace problems in the log:

[QUOTE] Markers: (--) probed, (**) from config file, (==) default setting, (++) from command line, (!!) notice, (II) informational, (WW) warning, (EE) error, (NI) not implemented, (??) unknown. [/QUOTE]

A description of some errors can be found here. There are a lot of warning messages at the start so it may be easier to start at the bottom of the log and work up. Messages about fonts can just be ignored. Don't worry about an "Invalid ROM contents", "Failed to read PCI ROM!", or "Video BIOS not found!" message, they sound scary, but are normal (although there is probably a setting you can tweak to turn them off).

If you get the error '(EE) Failed to load module "nv" (module does not exist, 0)', then you need to install the package xserver-xorg-video-nv. In 11.10 you may have to compile it as it is not in the repository. Compile instructions are in this post. Please try using the newer "nouveau" driver first.

If you see the following combination of errors

(EE) Unable to find a valid framebuffer device
(EE) R128(0): Failed to open framebuffer device, consult warnings and/or errors above for possible reasons
...
(EE) Screen(s) found, but none have a usable configuration.

then it is likely you are using the openfirmware framebuffer with a ATI Rage 128 card. You should specify the correct framebuffer with a yaboot parameter (e.g. video=aty128fb) or disable the openfirmware framebuffer. See question above. If you are using 11.04 or 11.10 then you will have to load the aty128fb kernel module first (see question below). You may still have to make changes to your monitor section (see below). An alternative "fix" for the framebuffer error can be done through the xorg.conf, although it has been commented that this solution is inferior. The alternate fix is to set "UseFBDev" "False" and possibly also "NoInt10" "True" :

Section "Device"
     Identifier "Card0"
     Driver "r128"
     BusID "PCI:0:16:0"

     Option "UseFBDev" "False"
     Option "NoInt10" "True"           #you can also put this is the Screen section
EndSection

If your resolutions have been incorrectly detected (out of range message in the Xorg.0.log or displays incorrectly on the monitor), then you can use the cvt command to find your monitor setting for the resolution you want. You can then add a modeline into the "Monitor" section using the output from the cvt command. You can add as many resolutions/modelines as you like.

e.g. typing the following command for the resolution 800x600:

cvt 800 600

gives the following output on my iBook:

# 800x600 59.86 Hz (CVT 0.48M3) hsync: 37.35 kHz; pclk: 38.25 MHz 
Modeline "800x600_60.00" 38.25 800 832 912 1024 600 603 607 624 -hsync +vsync

Make a note of the modeline, open the xorg.conf again and copy the modeline into whatever "Monitor" section you have (add/uncomment the preferred mode bit if you want to set that): e.g.

Section "Monitor"
     Identifier "Monitor0"
     VendorName "Monitor Vendor"
     ModelName "Monitor Model"

     Modeline "800x600_60.00" 38.25 800 832 912 1024 600 603 607 624 -hsync +vsync
     #Option "PreferredMode" "800x600_60.00"
EndSection

You will get different numbers when you run the cvt command as modelines are monitor specific. The "800x600_60.00" is the identifier/name of the mode. You must use this exactly whenever you refer to the mode in the xorg.conf (for example in the "Screen" section). You often see people shorten the name to "800x600" in which case it overrides the built-in mode. For example:

     Modeline "1024x768"   63.50  1024 1072 1176 1328  768 771 775 798 -hsync +vsync
     Modeline "800x600"   38.25 800 832 912 1024 600 603 607 624 -hsync +vsync
     Modeline "640x480"   23.75  640 664 720 800  480 483 487 500 -hsync +vsync
     Option "PreferredMode" "1024x768"

You may also have to adjust your "Screen" section, but hopefully the resolution(s) should be picked up automatically and you won't have to do this. An example "Screen" section where modes have been explicitly stated is below:

Section "Screen"
     Identifier "Screen0"
     Device     "Card0"
     Monitor    "Monitor0"

     DefaultDepth 24

     # 1024x760 will be the default mode because it is first in the list. 
     # The modes will apply to all colour depths because a 'Depth' entry has not been specified. 
     SubSection "Display"
          Viewport  0 0
          Modes     "1024x760" "800x600" "640x480"
     EndSubSection
EndSection

You can also select the mode using the xrandr command (e.g. xrandr --output LVDS --mode 800x600_60.00). To find the current mode use the command "xrandr --current" and a * will indicate the current mode. If you are using KMS then you may find that your preferred mode has been ignored. If this is the case, set the mode name so that it overrides the built-in mode. For more information on how to use the xrandr command see here.

An alternative to adding modelines is to specify VertRefresh and HorizSync values for your monitor. You should find values for VertRefresh/HorizSync in the handbook that came with your monitor. You can also find them out using the ddcprobe command. To use this you will have to install a package first with the command sudo apt-get install xresprobe . Then type sudo ddcprobe . The monitor range is shown at the bottom of the output. For example:

...
monitorrange: 58-62, 75-117
...

The first pair (58-62 in this example) is your HorizSync rate and the second pair is your VertRefresh (75-117) rate. The Monitor section using these values would look like this:

Section "Monitor" 
     Identifier "Monitor0"
     VendorName "Monitor Vendor"
     ModelName "Monitor Model"

     HorizSync 58-62 
     VertRefresh 75-117
EndSection 

If you have a G3 iMac then the values you get from the ddcprobe command are likely to be too restrictive. Use the values 58-62 and 75-117 instead.

If you see repeated "insufficient memory for mode" messages on the resolutions you want in the Xorg.0.log then try adding a DefaultDepth 16 line to the Screen section. This will also enable DRI on some low memory graphics cards. However, in the past DRI/AIGLX has caused instabilaties with some cards.

People have previously disabled DRI with an r128 card by adding Disable "dri" to the Modules section or purposefully setting a high resolution/colour depth combination. For example:

Section "Module"
     Disable "dri"
EndSection

However, without DRI, both 3D effects and applications will be software-rendered, which will be slow. If you don't require desktop effects (for example, you are using Lubuntu), but would like hardware accelerated applications then an alternative maybe to disable AIGLX and/or the composite extension as outlined at the bottom of this Fedora page:

Section "ServerFlags"
     Option  "AIGLX" "off"
EndSection

Section "Extensions"
     Option "Composite" "Disable"
EndSection

Gentoo recommend setting the option ForcePCIMode if you are having freezing problems with DRI.

If you have configured your own xorg.conf then you'll have a full list of Device options you can tweak for your card. Look at the xorg.conf files people have used in the past for ideas on what to change. Before you make any alteration to your Device section, check the relevant manual for your card because the option may not relate to your error/problem. Not all options are documented in the manuals:

• http://manpages.ubuntu.com/manpages/natty/en/man4/ati.4.html

  http://manpages.ubuntu.com/manpages/natty/en/man4/radeon.4.html

  http://manpages.ubuntu.com/manpages/natty/en/man4/r128.4.html

  http://manpages.ubuntu.com/manpages/natty/en/man4/nouveau.4.html

  http://manpages.ubuntu.com/manpages/natty/en/man4/nv.4.html

How do I load a kernel module?

In modern versions of ubuntu, most framebuffers are blacklisted in the file /etc/modprobe/blacklist-framebuffer.conf. Therefore, if the framebuffer you want has been compiled as a module (instead of 'complied in' to the kernel) it will not be automatically loaded. To make ubuntu load the module open the file /etc/modules with the command sudo nano /etc/modules and add the name of your framebuffer on a new line. To make the module available early in the boot process (preferred for a framebuffer), add the name also to the file /etc/initramfs-tools/modules. Use the command

sudo nano /etc/initramfs-tools/modules

to open the file, add the name on a new line, save and then, importantly, run the command

sudo update-initramfs -u

Reboot (sudo reboot) for the changes to take effect.

How do I test my 3D graphics acceleration?

Following a reboot, you can test your graphics acceleration with the commands glxinfo and glxgears -info. You'll probably have to install the mesa-utils package first:

sudo apt-get install mesa-utils

See this answer for how to interpret the results.

If you have a multi-user setup then you may need to add the following section to your xorg.conf:

Section "DRI"
     Mode 0666
EndSection

Use the command

LIBGL_DEBUG=verbose glxinfo

to test if the section is needed. See this wiki for information on this, as well as, more troubleshooting tips. It has a good section on how to interpret Xorg.0.log messages.

If you are using 10.04 or 10.10 then turn on Desktop Effects through the System > Preferences > Appearance > Visual Effects menu. In 11.10 try the 'Ubuntu' session rather than the 'Ubuntu 2D' session (you change this at the login screen).

If you are using Xubuntu then turning on the Composite feature will give you effects like transparency and shadows. To enable these go to: Applications -> Settings -> XFCE Settings Manager. Then run: Window Manager Tweaks - Compositor (tab) and Enable. You can set the opacity of the Terminal through it's Preferences menu item.

I also use the gl ant spotlight screensaver to test my xorg.conf settings, but it is very unstable so don't use that everyday if you use your computer for serious work. It almost always freezes the computer when I select the preview button so I set the activation time to its lowest setting to test the screensaver.

There is no 3D hardware acceleration with the driver 'nv' (see here) and so you should try the newer 'nouveau' driver if you want this. If you can't get the version of nouveau that is in the ubuntu repositories working then there is a tutorial to compile the latest nouveau driver here. You'll have to adjust some of the instructions for PowerPC.

If you have a radeon card then see below which has some more advice on improving performance.

Note, future releases of mesa will drop support for Mach64 and r128 cards, although it is hoped future releases of ubuntu will contain some sort of mesa-old-drivers package.

Are there any radeon tweaks I can do?

To get the best out of my radeon card (see RadeonDriver and ATIRadeon) I make a few alterations. With 10.04 and 10.10 I turn off KMS (Kernel Mode Setting) by using the radeon.modeset=0 boot parameter (see above). If I don't do this then I have poor video playback (a strange vertical pixelation) and get low values in glxgears (you see "Software Rasterizer" written when running the command glxgears -info).

You can force a radeonfb mode by using, for example, the yaboot parameters:

Linux radeon.modeset=0 video=radeonfb:1024x768-24@60

Forcing a mode may also fix splash problems?

If you want to experiment with KMS you should turn it on with the radeon.modeset=1 boot parameter. In 10.04 and 10.10 you will also have to disable the radeonfb framebuffer:

Linux radeon.modeset=1 radeonfb:off

Archlinux provide some more information on KMS with a radeon card, see their wiki. Note, the KMS radeon framebuffer will be listed in logs as radeondrmfb.

If you experience choppy scrolling in firefox (can occur when you turn off KMS) then it is worth experimenting with the AccelMethod option in the device section of your xorg.conf file (see above). Under 10.04 and 10.10 I set this to "EXA" to fix the choppy scrolling. However, under Xubuntu 11.04 I need to set it to "XAA". EXA uses less processor power but under 11.04 especially there are a lot of rendering errors. It maybe worth investigating upgrading/downgrading drivers or checking out what framebuffers you have loaded (see above) if you are bothered about this.

I also set the GARTSize option to "16" (half my graphics memory) because the default 8 causes silly colours (a blue tint) with the gl screensavers.

There are a lot of 'wonder' xorg.conf files knocking around the internet that claim to have the secret formula to fantastic 3d performance. I've only found two things that make a big difference. The first is to reduce the colour depth (for example put DefaultDepth 16 into the screen section), but I prefer a greater colour depth so I don't do this. The second is to turn on HyperZ. This isn't done in xorg.conf, but in a ".drirc" file in your home folder. Install Driconf from the software centre/synaptic so that you can turn it on using the applet. I have no idea what this actually does, only it makes the numbers go up in glxgears!

You may also like to enable the ClockGating and DynamicPM settings as they reduce heat output and increase battery life.

There are many many web pages which offer extra help (for example, see the links and information on the old compiz ati hardware page), but - like for all linux - you will have to assess if the information is still relevant and valid.

Multimedia

Video codecs and DVD playback

See the community documentation RestrictedFormats and FreeFormats for background information.

There are packages that cannot be included into Ubuntu for legal reasons (copyright, license, patent, etc). It is easy to install these however, this is how:

Open the terminal and type

sudo apt-get install ubuntu-restricted-extras

This will download a whole load of stuff (around 100MB) including codecs, Mircrosoft fonts, gnash (flash support), and openjdk (java). A license aggreement screen pops up for the MS fonts which you will need to accept (press the TAB key if you are having a hard time selecting the OK option).

To play encrypted DVDs you need to dowload a file from Medibuntu (Multimedia, Entertainment & Distractions In Ubuntu). You can nolonger add Medibuntu as a repository on PowerPC, but you can still download the files individually. Click on the link http://packages.medibuntu.org/pool/free/libd/libdvdcss/libdvdcss2_1.2.10-0.2medibuntu1_powerpc.deb and select open with GDebi to install.

If you are still having problems with DVDs then check out the "Setting DVD Region Codes" section of the PlayingDVDs wiki. This is what I had to do to get my DVD drive to work. When I ran regionset the 'type' showed up as NONE and I had to set the region to make it show SET.

More codecs can be downloaded from Medibuntu. The file is pretty old so I'm not sure what it adds that ubuntu-restricted-extras doesn't, but you can install it by clicking http://packages.medibuntu.org/pool/non-free/p/ppc-codecs/ppc-codecs_20071007-0medibuntu1_powerpc.deb and select open with GDebi. 10.04 users should follow the advice in this thread.

How do I get faster Java?

If you want faster Java than openjdk then there is IBM Java. You have to register to download, but all you have to give is an email address so nothing too taxing. There are old deb packages in medibuntu.

You could also try Java Virtual Machines such as Cacao and JamVM. The author of JamVM says of PowerPC "for many years my main platform, so this is well tested. Built and tested on G3 and G4 systems". In 11.04 and 11.10 there is a package available for other architectures (so the source code is readily available), but I believe it doesn't exist for PowerPC (bug)? See http://jamvm.sourceforge.net/ and http://draenog.blogspot.com/2011/02/...epository.html for more information:

[QUOTE] The easiest way to test the port is to build JamVM, and copy the libjvm.so file into an existing IcedTea/OpenJDK installation. After cloning the git repository, do: ./autogen.sh --with-java-runtime-library=openjdk This will generate the autoconf/automake files and configure JamVM to build support for OpenJDK. Then do make, make install as usual. This will put libjvm.so into /usr/local/jamvm/lib. This can then be copied onto an existing IcedTea installation (or a copy of one), e.g. on x86_64 (as root): cd /usr/lib/jvm cp -r java-6-openjdk jamvm-openjdk cp /usr/local/jamvm/lib/libjvm.so jamvm-openjdk/jre/lib/amd64/server [/QUOTE]

For Cacao see here. "The package provides an alternative runtime using the Cacao VM and the Cacao Just In Time Compiler (JIT). This is a somewhat faster alternative than the Zero port on architectures like alpha, armel, m68k, mips, mipsel, powerpc and s390."

See the file /usr/lib/jvm/java-6-openjdk/docs/README.Debian and the other documents in that directory for information about how to use the alternative virtual machines. Note, the IcedTea Firefox plugin will use the default VM (which you can set). Technical detail about the IcedTea plugin can be found here. If you don't use the IcedTea plugin frequently then you can disable it for security. You can do this through the Firefox menus or there are Firefox extensions you can use to automate this.

Some general stuff about Java in Ubuntu can be found here. Note, there is no Oracle/Sun java for PowerPC linux.

Flash, Flash video, Gnash and Lightspark

There is no Adobe Flash for PowerPC. There are, however, two open source flash players still under development: gnash and lightspark.

Note, swfdec is nolonger under development.

From the Software Centre/Synaptic/Terminal install "Gnash SWF viewer" and "browser-plugin-gnash" (or "mozilla-plugin-gnash" depending on your ubuntu version). Lightspark (and it's firefox plugin browser-plugin-lightspark) is the latest flash player (see http://lightspark.github.com/ and http://allievi.sssup.it/techblog/ ). Lightspark uses advanced OpenGL techniques that requires good support from video drivers. It will work best in newer versions of Ubuntu (and with Kernel Mode Setting?). Lightspark also uses pulseaudio as it's default audio backend. Pulseaudio is not installed on a default Lubuntu installation, so if you want sound you will have to install it (or compile a version of lightspark with alsa as the audio backend?). You can install gnash and lightspark alongside each other since lightspark likes to 'fallback' onto gnash to play old swf files, but don't enable both the gnash firefox plugin and the lightspark plugin at the same time.

You may want install a browser extension that blocks flash content on websites because gnash CPU usage is high even for simple adverts. I hate my laptop fan coming on so I try to run my iBook as cool as possible at all times. Even if you haven't got gnash installed you may like the extension Ablock Plus. However, don't go over the top by installing many similar extensions as it will just slow your browser down.

If you want to experiment with gnash in 11.10 (particularly if you are running other architectures with the adobe plugin) then you may have to run the command sudo update-alternatives --config mozilla-flashplugin and select the "/usr/lib/gnash/libgnashplugin.so" option. Lightspark does not appear in the list because it goes under the name of "flash-mozilla.so". Run update-alternatives --query flash-mozilla.so to check. This allows you to easily switch plugins in Firefox (goto Tools > Add-ons > Plugins and enable/disable plugins as required), but it means Lightspark will not be picked up in Midori (which handles plugins in a completely random way it seems to me) . However, as far as I can tell Lightspark does not work with Midori anyway because it uses Webkit and not Gecko. Gnash works with Midori, or to put it more precisely, adverts work, but strangely videos don't work even when they work in firefox with gnash.

If you want to do debugging run the browser from the terminal. You can set the verbosity of gnash through right clicking on a flash object in the browser and selecting the Edit > Preferences menu entry. Use firefox -verbose to see the messages from the lightspark plugin. See http://sourceforge.net/apps/trac/lightspark/wiki/Troubleshooting . To test the lightspark standalone player use the commands:

wget http://www.adobe.com/content/dotcom/en/devnet/flash/samples/drawing_1/_jcr_content/articlecontentAdobe/generic/file.res/1_coordinates[1].swf
lightspark 1_coordinates[1].swf

You should see a disk spinning that you can move around with your mouse. It is the least impressive demonstration ever!

This thread offers more advice on watching YouTube, Vimeo, etc http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1709156 . I like the firefox extension FlashVideoReplacer (https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/flashvideoreplacer/) since it allows you to watch YouTube videos 'normally'. Others may prefer minitube or Totem.

Another way to watch YouTube etc is by using html 5 (http://www.youtube.com/html5). This works quite well for videos coded in H.264. You'll need Midori or Epiphany browsers for H.264, but for YouTube most videos are delivered in WebM (unless you spoof it, see below). WebM can be played in Firefox 4 and beyond, Opera, Midori and Epiphany, but for me the playback is choppy (similar to gnash), although I think Firefox may improve with every new release. Vimeo uses H.264 to deliver html5 video clips.

To download and watch BBC Iplayer programmes there is get-iplayer.

I've also recently started watching/listening to streams by finding the rtmp address used by the flash application. This YouTube video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8PuUnQCS7DQ describes how to use wireshark to do this, but there are other ways which you can find by doing a search. I find wireshark quite addictive and find myself trying to crack the rtmp address even if I don't have to! You can download a stream using rtmpdump, or pipe the output to a media player, but gnome-mplayer will also accept the rtmp addresss directly in the 'Open location' menu item.

You can also change the user agent string of your browser so that you are delivered non-flash content. There is a firefox extension to do this https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/user-agent-switcher/, but it is probably best to use Midori to spoof an iPad/iPhone since they use H.264 to play video clips and Firefox cannot play H.264. Midori works really well on some news web sites and allows you to watch video clips that would be otherwise unwatchable. In Midori goto Edit > Preferences > Identify as > Custom... Copy and paste one of the following strings in:

Mozilla/5.0 (iPad; U; CPU OS 3_2 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/531.21.10 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/4.0.4 Mobile/7B334b Safari/531.21.10

Mozilla/5.0 (iPad; U; CPU OS 4_3_1 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/533.17.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.0.2 Mobile/8G4 Safari/6533.18.5

Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 3_1_2 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/528.18 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/4.0 Mobile/7D11 Safari/528.16

Remember there is plenty of choice out there. Don't get hung up on the website that you can't use, but instead support the websites you can access. If you want GoogleEarth then try http://www.bing.com/maps/ as a substitute. There are ways of using Google Street View on PowerPC, see http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1896625 .

Multimedia browser plugin

I couldn't get gecko-mediaplayer in Lubuntu to work with Firefox 5 so I installed totem instead. Gecko-mediaplayer is a plugin that allows Firefox to play videos and audio using gnome-mplayer. Totem is another mediaplayer with its own firefox plugin (it is the default player on normal Ubuntu). Gnome-mplayer is the better at playing DVDs and usually has lower CPU usage when playing videos, but occasionally Totem can do something that gnome-mplayer can't. Totem can play YouTube videos directly and there are country specific plugins for it that allow you to watch TV shows (you will have to do a search for these and install them).

To install Totem movie player in Lubuntu type at a terminal sudo apt-get --no-install-recommends install totem gstreamer0.10-alsa totem-plugins gnome-codec-install . If you want to replace gecko-mediaplayer with the Totem firefox plugin then type sudo apt-get remove gecko-mediaplayer followed by sudo apt-get --no-install-recommends install totem-mozilla .

The uber minimalist way to watch media is using the command line program mplayer. You can downloaded the file first or pass an url to mplayer. You can even use this without a GUI! To play music the cool people use MPD http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Music_Player_Daemon . MPC is a simple command line client for this, although you can use a web browser or mobile phone too!

Realplayer

RealPlayer requires a couple of packages from Ubuntu. Please do this first:

sudo apt-get install libstdc++5 libstdc++5-3.3-dev

If you get an error which says "E: Couldn't find package libstdc++5", try the following:

For Lucid, download the package from the Debian Lenny repositories or via this link:

http://packages.debian.org/lenny/powerpc/libstdc++5/download

In the terminal, navigate to its location (maybe cd ~/Downloads) and issue the following command:

sudo dpkg -i libstdc++5

Now, download RealPlayer 10.0.5 for PowerPC Linux here: https://player.helixcommunity.org/2005/downloads/

Look for the "RealPlayer 10.0.5 Gold 06/24/2005" "Installer link (experimental)" for Linux-ppc, about halfway down the page on the right.

Download the file. It will probably download to your Desktop.

Open a terminal, and change your location to the Desktop:

cd Desktop

and enter.

Now type the following and press enter to make the installer executable. [Alternatively, you can right click on the file, and go to Properties>Permissions> Check 'Execute' box.]

chmod +x realplay-10.0.5.756-linux-2.2-libc6-gcc32-powerpc.bin

Then to run the installer, type this in the terminal:

sudo ./realplay-10.0.5.756-linux-2.2-libc6-gcc32-powerpc.bin

and hit enter.

When it asks for the install directory, type /opt/RealPlayer

When it ask about configuring system wide links: hit enter. Defaults are fine.

Type realplay in a terminal and RealPlayer will start.

Drivers and Hardware

Will my wireless work?

Airport Classic

The original Airport wireless cards are supposed to work straight out of the box. However, due to this bug you may require a workaround to use Network Manager:

A similar method is here.

If the firmware file /lib/firmware/agere_sta_fw.bin is moved out of the firmware folder or renamed then the airport card uses it's own flashed firmware and it seems this is not affected by the bug. To work with WPA it has to be v9.42 or greater. Therefore, you may have to do a firmware upgrade for your card from within an Apple OS to use this workaround. Also, note for WPA you must set the algorithm to TKIP (the earliest algorithm and usually the default) instead of AES (the newest).

To rename the file type at a terminal:

sudo mv /lib/firmware/agere_sta_fw.bin /lib/firmware/agere_sta_fw.bin.bak

Then restart the computer a couple of times, checking if you have gained wireless. Following a reboot, you can find the version of flashed firmware by typing at a terminal:

dmesg | grep airport

If this workaround doesn't work then read the other checks below, or try installing wicd. For wicd you will have to rename the file back first:

sudo mv /lib/firmware/agere_sta_fw.bin.bak /lib/firmware/agere_sta_fw.bin

For the technically minded, you can find further information (see the known issues section) about airport classic here.

Airport Extreme

If you have an airport extreme card then you need to download the firmware (note, you need to be plugged into an Ethernet cable to do this):

8.04, 10.04 and 10.10 users should type

sudo apt-get install b43-fwcutter

in the terminal and then go to Preferences > Additional drivers and select the Broadcom b43 driver. The command will download the appropriate firmware file for you card.

In 11.04 the command you need has changed and there are two variations. Most 11.04 and 11.10 users should open the terminal and type

sudo apt-get install firmware-b43-installer

However, if you have a legacy card then you will need the command

sudo apt-get install firmware-b43legacy-installer

You can determine what kind of card you have with the help of this wiki.

Unplug your ethernet cable and you should now see your wireless networks (or after a reboot).

Further information about airport extreme can be found here.

A note about Airport Extreme and G-only routers

Once Airport Extreme is activated through the fwcutter method, it will only be broadcasting at 802.11b, or 11Mbps. This probably will cause problems when trying to connect to a router that is G-only. Often, this is a simple fix:

1) Log in to your router through a browser. (See your router's documentation for specific info. For example, for some Linksys routers, go to "192.168.1.1" in your browser and, leaving the username field blank, enter the default password "admin" to access the router's configuration panel.)

2) Find the option where you specify the Network Type, Wireless Network Mode, etc. - it should be an option that has "G-only" or something similar selected.

3) Change the network mode to "Mixed" or "B and G" or something similar.

4) Save your router settings and try to connect again. Hopefully everything will work!

What to check if you don't have wifi

Right click on the network applet icon (right click is F12 on my machine because I only have one button on my trackpad) and tick 'Enable Networking', 'Enable Wireless' and 'Enable Notifications'.

Check you have the correct user settings: Go to System -> Administration -> Users and Groups -> Advanced Settings -> User Privileges Make sure "Connect to wireless and ethernet networks" is ticked. This will add your user to the netdev group. You will need to reboot for this to take effect. Note, it is not always necessary to join the netdev group.

Make the connection available to all users

When you connect to your network you'll be asked to enter a password for the default keyring. I always seem to get in a mess with these, but I think the recommended thing is to enter your account password for this so you don't keep having to enter it. I now make the connection available to all users to get around this. Click on the network applet icon and select 'Edit Connections...'. Go to the Wireless tab and select your network from the list. Click "Edit...". Enter your Ubuntu user account password if prompted. Make sure "Connect automatically" and "Available to all users" are ticked. Click Apply and then Close.

If in the future you need to delete the keyring this is how: Open File Manager, click 'View' and select 'Show Hidden'. Double-click on .gnome2 and then keyrings. Delete the appropriate file.

Install wicd

If you don't have wireless still or you are losing connections repeatedly then try installing wicd. At a terminal type the following commands (note, you need to be plugged into an Ethernet cable):

sudo aptitude install wicd
sudo aptitude remove network-manager

You will get some message about network-manager-gnome that it asks if you want to remove too. You should reply yes to this. If you are asked to join the netdev group you should do this.

Next, open up wicd which should be in your applications area, find your network, click properties and enter the password in. Click connect.

Still no wireless? Then reboot without the Ethernet cable connected. It may be a cliché, but turning it off and on again does work sometimes

If you think the wicd applet icon is ruining the look of your desktop then it can be removed. System > Preferences > Startup Applications. Untick the wicd applet.

The above has been taken from this thread.

Command line use

If you want to use wireless/wifi without starting X then see this wiki.

How do I get a working battery indicator?

If the battery status is not displayed correctly then open up the terminal and type* :

gksudo leafpad /etc/modules

Add the line

pmu_battery

Save and it should work on reboot.

* If you have installed Ubuntu you will have to replace the word leafpad with the word gedit. If you have installed a version of Xubuntu before 11.10 then you will have to replace leafpad with mousepad.

How do I change the volume of the mac startup chime?

See this thread.

Bluetooth Keyboard and Mouse

See this thread for help with a bluetooth keyboard and mouse:

http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=224673

If you use bluetooth then please provide more details or a more recent link.

How do I control trackpad behaviour?

To change how a trackpad behaves see the Synaptics Touchpad community documentation.

You can also use the program GSynaptics, edit your xorg.conf file (see graphics section above) or install powerprefs (see information about suspend) to set your configuration on startup. Another option could be to create a script which runs the commands you want at startup.

Use the command

xinput list

to find out if you have a Synaptics or ADB mouse touchpad as this will determine your options.

With an ADB mouse touchpad you can use the command trackpad. For example:

To enable tap, run:

sudo trackpad tap

To disable tap, run:

sudo trackpad notap

See

man trackpad

for more details.

Mouseemu is the daemon that emulates right and middle click and can also block the trackpad when typing. You must prefix the mouseemu and showkey commands with sudo. To change the default settings you can edit the /etc/defaults/mouseemu file.

Right-click is set to F12 by default. On some boots my 'fn' key seems to be set on, in which case I need to press 'fn' + F12. When this occurs, it also stops me switching to a console e.g. via ctrl+alt+F1 etc.

Sharing a printer with OS X

OS X can print directly to a Linux cups printer. There is no need to mess with samba or create users. See the community documentation on Network Printing.

Keyboard backlight

For the light sensor and keyboard controls to work properly, the system must load the kernel module i2c-dev before starting pbbuttonsd. Since pbbuttonsd is probably already started, but unable to control the backlight without i2c-dev loaded, perform the following steps:

sudo modprobe i2c-dev
sudo /etc/init.d/pbbuttonsd restart

Note, that while pbbuttonsd has a reload mechanism (so that it doesn't have to be stopped and started, as is done by restart), this is not sufficient; the restart is truly required.

To make this change permanent, add the following line on file /etc/modules:

i2c-dev

Ho do I power on automatically after a power failure?

See this thread.

Power preferences/suspend

In Lubuntu 10.04 - 11.04, if you are trying to change the power preferences then open the terminal and type "gnome-power-preferences". You can change the settings so that the power icon is displayed at all times and then you can access the preferences from there.

In lucid and maverick you may have to install powerprefs (a graphical frontend to pbbuttonsd) to enable suspend when you close the lid. It doesn't setup a menu item automatically, but you can start it from the terminal by just typing "powerprefs" (for some options you might need to load it with root privileges: "gksudo powerprefs"). You may have to adjust your gnome power preferences settings so they don't clash. There is no guarantee that suspend or hibernate will work or be reliable!

To get suspend working with a radeon card in Natty and Oneiric you may have to compile a new kernel (see https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/linux/+bug/779110 ), although I wonder if this is actually necessary? Radeonfb should already be compiled as a module so it just needs to be loaded (see graphics section above)? Suspend should be available with KMS, but does it work with ppc radeon KMS??? The ArchLinux guys wrote something about suspend http://www.archlinuxppc.org/news/10/ . How to debug suspend can be found here https://wiki.ubuntu.com/DebuggingKernelSuspend . See http://lists.debian.org/debian-powerpc/2011/04/msg00092.html for more info on pbbuttonsd.

Suspending may mute sound channels or disable your wifi.

How can I use powernowd for CPU frequency scaling?

CPU scaling reduces the processor speed when the computer is idle or not doing a lot. It saves battery power and reduces heat so you won't have the fan coming on so much. However, the 'ondemand' kernel governor for processor scaling does not work with G3 and G4 processors because a sensible value for the transition latency (the time taken to switch between processor speeds) has not been set in the kernel. To overcome this, I use the powernowd package to perform the same function as the ondemand governor on my G4.

Unfortunately, powernowd has been removed from 11.04 because somebody deemed it to be redundant. So it is a package that we have to manually download and install with the two commands:

wget -P/tmp http://ports.ubuntu.com/ubuntu-ports/pool/universe/p/powernowd/powernowd_1.00-1ubuntu5_powerpc.deb
sudo dpkg -i /tmp/powernowd_1.00-1ubuntu5_powerpc.deb

Then all you have to do is disable the ondemand governor being turned on by using the command sudo update-rc.d ondemand disable . I have found the extra instructions you'll find on the PowerPC Known Issues page unnecessary. Finally, the file /etc/default/powernowd contains the startup options which you may like to adjust (if you know what you are doing because you don't want to set the polling interval too small). More information about powernowd can be found here.

Reboot. You may check for success by adding the CPU Frequency Monitor Applet to your panel.

Note, processor scaling is not available in linux for all PowerPC processors. Also, you may have to reinstall powernowd after an upgrade as it is likely to be automatically uninstalled.

How can I help PowerPC Ubuntu?

I 'stole' (based) most of the following from the sticky thread on the Ubuntu Studio forum!

Hopefully you're now enjoying your new PowerPC Ubuntu system. Maybe you've stopped to think "I wonder how all these wonderful tools came to be... ...who packaged them... ...why these ones... ...what makes ubuntu such a success?" Well, the answer to all these questions is the same: the development community. Having a large group of individuals to help build Ubuntu creates a network of checks and balances, not to mention lighter work for everyone.

GNU/Linux is a community effort, and because of this, we all hope that you too will get involved. Who me? Yes, You.

You may hold the common misconception that because you don't know how to program, you're no good to the development community, but nothing could be further from the truth. No matter what your level of expertise with Ubuntu you can lend a hand. Furthermore, in the field of PowerPC Ubuntu, we NEED your help.

Every level of Ubuntu user can help the communiy in some way. Here's a few examples (please don't feel limited to these suggestions) just to get you started:

1. The Absolute Beginner (you're just finding your way around, learning, and noticing the layout):

• Stick around the forums and answer any questions you can (just reading the posts will help educate yourself)
• Even absolute beginners can help edit the community documentation. Many of the directions here suffer from a lack of eyes, leading to unclear instructions - if you find some please tell someone or even edit it for the better yourself.

2. The Novice User (this isn't the first version of ubuntu you've used, you're able to get most work done that you need to):

• Document, document, document; head on over to the community docs and start editing for the better (many sections of these documents need substantial work and we'd love all the help you can offer)

• Report bugs you find (actual bugs such as missing packages, not your configuration issues) at http://launchpad.net (this is the official bug tracker and development portal for ubuntu). See http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1011078 .

3. The Advanced User (given any howto and a terminal you can fix almost anything)

• Install a copy of the development release on another partition and report bugs/issues etc...

• Regularly test ISO builds. See https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Testing/ISO/Procedures .

• Document, document, document!

4. The Hacker (you've compiled a kernel for yourself, don't need any directions for most system modifications, and generally prefer to use the terminal)

• See 'The Advanced User' points.
• Join a dev mailing list and introduce yourself
• Log into irc.freenode.net and join some development channels.

• Learn to package software http://developer.ubuntu.com/packaging/html/

• Comment on bugs at http://launchpad.net

Troubleshooting

Is there a list of known issues?

Yes, see the PowerPC Known Issues page. This holds any release specific workarounds. Please add to the list, but note this is not a substitute for proper bug reporting or a page to moan and complain!

The CD won't boot

Firstly, make sure you have downloaded a PowerPC iso. Since PowerPC is not mentioned at all on the main Ubuntu site it is a common mistake for people to try and use the i386 CD!

There are two PowerPC versions of the minimal CDs: the 32 bit and 64 bit versions. Have you chosen correctly? For the alternate and desktop CDs you will choose what type of kernel to boot at the yaboot prompt. If you have a G5 are you using the 64 bit version?

Have you tried running the commands 'md5sum' and 'sha1sum' to see if the checksums are correct? These will make sure the iso has downloaded correctly. Have you burned the CD at the lowest possible speed? See this wiki for instructions.

This old guide describes how to boot the CD if your mac does not react to the 'C' key.

Ubuntu boots to a command line, hangs during boot, or blank screen etc.

This is a massively daunting problem when you are new to linux/ubuntu. The key is not to panic, but take a methodical approach.

Do a quick check of your hardware! Make sure that your video cables are plugged in correctly and also try them in different sockets! Ubuntu may be outputting on a different port to that which you normally use.

If you are trying a Lubuntu live/desktop CD and are at a command line prompt then first check out the Lubuntu release notes as this is a known problem. Login as "ubuntu" then issue "startx".

As strange as it may seem, on some computers (not all) if the date is set far back in the past (because of a flat internal battery) then you may get a blank screen. You can use yaboot parameters to temporarily overcome this (and let the computer pickup the time from the network), but the best permanent solution maybe to buy a replacement battery? More feedback is needed on this. My iBook with a radeon card has no problem with being back in the 1970s!

Check the PowerPC Known Issues page as the new Unity interface can give poor colours/distortion in both 11.04 and 11.10.

A comprehensive guide to configuring graphics is given in the section above. You may have to use a yaboot parameter and/or configure an xorg.conf file to get your computer to boot fully.

Why do I keep being told my password is wrong?

If you launch an application which requires root privileges (such as synaptic) and it keeps telling you that the password is incorrect then this is what to do: Open the terminal and type gksu-properties . Change the authentication mode to 'sudo'. It should now work.

Why am I told my ethernet connection is un-managed?

If Network Manager reports that your ethernet (wired) connection is un-managed, or you don't see the Network Manager applet icon at all, or your boot time is excessively slow then use the first fix on this page.

Why do I keep having to enter commands, can I not do it through a GUI?

There probably is a GUI option, but that often changes from release to release and can differ between Ubuntu/Xubuntu/Lubuntu/Kubuntu. If you are new to linux then typing commands may seem unnatural and scary, but they allow instructions to be written with a greater level of precision and speed. Most of the commands given below can just be cut and pasted into the terminal. Press the Enter/Return key to execute the command.

The command line text editor used in this guide is 'nano'. The different *ubuntus use different graphical text editors. Where these have been used in commands you will have to modify the command. If you have installed Ubuntu you will have to replace the word leafpad with the word gedit. If you have installed a version of Xubuntu before 11.10 then you will have to replace leafpad with mousepad.

I've installed Ubuntu, but now I can't boot my other linux distros?

Following the ubuntu base installation, if you find you suddenly can't boot existing linux distributions (such as Debian), then you may have to alter your yaboot.conf. I had to do this as detailed in this post (although your setup/numbers will be obviously different). To open yaboot.conf type "gksudo leafpad /etc/yaboot.conf". When you've made and saved your changes use the command "sudo ybin -v" to copy it across to the boot partition. Use the command "sudo blkid" to print the details/attributes of your partitions.

Where is my Caps Lock light?

If you don't have a trackpad, but would like your Caps Lock light back, then remove mouseemu with the command sudo apt-get remove mouseemu .

How do I adjust my fan limits?

If you need to adjust the fan limits, then this method may work (I have never tried this however). Make sure you are using the correct module for your computer first. Some modules are detailed here.

Why do I have no sound?

Sound should work 'out of the box' on the vast majority of machines. However, if you can't hear any sound then first check your channel volumes and mute settings. In Lubuntu, use alsamixer (from a terminal) or gnome-alsamixer to do this http://lubuntu.net/blog/lubuntu-screencast-alsamixer. The letter m toggles mute in alsamixer.

If this doesn't solve the problem then you may have to investigate the kernel modules used by your sound card. Check the various system logs or use the commands "lsmod" or "lspci -k" to see what is being loaded. Older Macs should use snd-powermac, whilst newer Macs use a combination of snd-aoa, snd-aoa-fabric-layout, snd-aoa-soundbus, snd-aoa-soundbus-i2c, snd-aoa-onyx, snd-aoa-tas and snd-aoa-toonie. See http://alsa.opensrc.org/Aoa or http://johannes.sipsolutions.net/Projects/snd-aoa for greater detail.

Occasionally, the automatic setup does not work correctly and you may have to modprobe some modules. To automatically 'modprobe' a module on startup you should include it in the /etc/modules file. Open the file using the command "gksudo leafpad /etc/modules" and add either "snd-powermac" or "snd-aoa" etc on a new line (see http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=650588).

To get sound working on a Powermac G4 Digital Audio (which should use snd-powermac) you may have to blacklist some modules (see https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Loadable_Modules and http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=166624). See http://lists.debian.org/debian-power.../msg00063.html for additional advice. Open/create the file /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist.local.conf (the command is "gksudo leafpad /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist.local.conf") and add

blacklist snd-aoa
blacklist snd-aoa-fabric-layout
blacklist snd-aoa-soundbus
blacklist snd-aoa-i2sbus
blacklist snd-aoa-codec-tas

Why is the software centre or update manager so slow?

Lubuntu does not use the Ubuntu Software Centre by default. I used to think it was because the software centre was just slow on old machines, but I've found it actually works really well when the apt-xapian-index package is not installed. To remove the package:

sudo apt-get purge apt-xapian-index

This will, however, disable the quick search feature in Synaptic. Normally, Lubuntu doesn't have this feature, see here.

To install the Ubuntu Software Centre in Lubuntu type

sudo apt-get install --no-install-recommends software-center

When using the Ubuntu Software Centre in Lubuntu you have to be a bit careful so that you don't drag in anything that will spoil your lightweight distribution (such as pulse audio, although it is not the end of the world if you do). This is probably why the Lubuntu developers try and encourage people to use Synaptic as it is easier to see exactly what is being installed.

See the official Lubuntu FAQ for information about the Lubuntu Software Center that you can install via the Lubuntu ppa.

CD/DVD not mounted

If you insert a disk, nothing happens, nothing gets mounted then see this thread. There is more info about this bug on the PowerPC Known Issues page.

My fonts are blurred, what can I do?

If you think that fonts are blurred or not being displayed correctly then your monitor may not have the standard RGB sub pixel order. There is an option to change this. In standard Ubuntu goto System > Preferences > Appearance > Fonts > Details. You can also do it via an xorg.conf (see above).

I have a 404 error when updating, why is that?

Upon an upgrade if you get a message such as "E: Some index files could not be downloaded, they will be ignored, or old files will be used instead." or a 404 error, then check your sources.list file. For 11.04 it should look like this.

How do I boot into single user mode?

To boot into single user mode type this at the second yaboot prompt:

Linux single

If this doesn't work then you may need to combine it with one or more of the yaboot parameters described in the graphics section above.

I've lost yaboot, what can I do?

See the relevant section of this this page.

If something goes catastrophically wrong with your boot partition, then don't panic because you should always be able to use a Ubuntu cd (mini, alternate, or live) to boot your installed system. Run the cd to the yaboot prompt. Instead of entering 'live' or whatever, use the openfirmware path to the kernel image. Some examples for the current and old kernel paths on partition 3 are below:

hd:3,/boot/vmlinux root=/dev/sda3 initrd=hd:3,/boot/initrd.img ro

hd:3,/boot/vmlinux.old root=/dev/hda3 initrd=hd:3,/boot/initrd.img.old ro

The files vmlinux, vmlinux.old, initrd.img and initrd.img.old are links to other files. If you know those exact filenames (or another kernel image) you could use those too.

Alternatively, you can manually edit your yaboot.conf from a live CD. First mount your installed root partition. For example

sudo mount /dev/sda3 /mnt

Then edit your yaboot.conf:

sudo nano /mnt/etc/yaboot.conf

Then run the mkofboot/ybin commands, but specify the yaboot.conf to use

sudo ybin --config /mnt/etc/yaboot.conf -v

Please consult the mkofboot/ybin manual pages so that you know what these commands do:

man ybin
man mkofboot

You can also use the rescue option with the Alternate and mini CDs to reconfigure your yaboot.conf.

Ho do I reset the PRAM/PMU?

Resetting a computer's PRAM or PMU can fix a number of symptoms. If you can't boot a CD, your battery level is not correct, or you have video issues then resetting the PRAM/PMU may help. You should use this as a last resort and you may loose yaboot temporarily if you dual boot.

Advanced

Do I need a virus checker/firewall?

Many would consider Ubuntu to be secure ‘out of the box’ due, in part, to the often quoted (but perhaps misleading) statement “Ubuntu comes with no open ports”. This is rather a simplified view and is challenged in the evolving security wiki (aimed at people new to Linux) here https://wiki.ubuntu.com/BasicSecurity , with further information in the sticky threads on the Security Discussion forum http://ubuntuforums.org/forumdisplay.php?f=338 . For more information about the security design decisions made by the Ubuntu Security Team see https://wiki.ubuntu.com/SecurityTeam/FAQ .

The wiki and sticky threads describe how you can enhance the security of Ubuntu above the default installation, although they take a rather paranoid view of security that I would imagine far exceeds that used everyday by most Ubuntu, Mac and Windows users. Nevertheless, it is worth reading the information as security is probably something that many Linux users can be complacent about. However, as you increase the security of your system the ease of use decreases, so you need to find a balance that you personally are happy with. For example, the idea of running NoScript may not sound appealing, but maybe there are features that you can turn on that don’t effect your web browsing experience? As I describe above, I disable the icedtea Java plugin completely without any loss of function to me. Note, Java is not the same as the similarly sounding javascript.

My own view is that if you are new to Linux then I would suggest getting to know Linux/Ubuntu before tackling any extra security features. Ubuntu can have a steep learning curve as it is. Many risks can be mitigated with common sense.

Keep the system updated via the Update Manager. Only install/run software that you need and only install software from secure and trusted sources (e.g. the Ubuntu repositories). Whilst a person/website may provide a package or executable with good intentions, can you be sure their server has not been hacked and the binary swapped for something malicious?

If you are running ssh or vnc, possibly as part of a server setup, then you do need to learn to secure them properly.

One of the main reasons I am keen to stick with *ubuntu is because they provide secure repositories with full traceability. Source code and build logs for every package are available in Ubuntu through https://launchpad.net/ubuntu .

How do I compile a package?

To compile packages see this thread. You may also like to read about backporting and apt pinning.

Can I install grub2?

Install grub2 if you have run out of things to play with http://lists.debian.org/debian-powerpc/2011/04/msg00001.html .

What about an x86 emulator?

sudo apt-get install qemu

The Qemu project is an open source CPU emulator, which can run under PowerPC Linux. It is possible to emulate x86 hardware and install Windows, or other operating systems. Windows emulation on PowerPC will run very slow, due to the very nature of what it has to do (translate x86 code to PowerPC). However, older versions of Windows (such as Win98SE) run OK in Qemu on PowerPC.

See Installation/QemuEmulator.

What is Mac-On-Linux?

Note, Mac-On-Linux has not been updated for some time. Does it work in new versions of Ubuntu? Please ammend if you know the answer.

Mac on Linux will let you boot up the OS X partition of a dual boot system, inside Linux. It is also possible to create disc images, the same as with Virtualbox or VMware. It is not software-emulated, so the actual speed is very fast. MOL currently only works on pre-G5 processors, though ppc64 support is near completion.

The provided Ubuntu packages may work fine, but if not, it is recommended you fetch the latest mol directly from the sourceforge project and install following the included documentation:

svn co http://mac-on-linux.svn.sourceforge.net/svnroot/mac-on-linux/trunk mac-on-linux

Read more about MOL in Ubuntu here, though these notes are somewhat dated.

How can I configure and compile my own kernel under PowerPC Linux?

See also the community documentation on compiling a kernel and the notes in the official documentation on kernel baking and SMP hardware support. You may also like to look at the Gentoo PowerPC notes on configuring the kernel and the Gentoo PowerPC FAQ.

Note: Several threads give alternative methods:

• http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=453497

• http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1868664

• http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1498559

How to compile your own kernel. Useful to enable a low-latency kernel for audio work, or to have a recent kernel from kernel.org to attempt to reproduce bugs that may need to be fixed upstream. This process will leave you with kernel .debs to install.

1. Install the development tools needed, if you haven't already:

 sudo apt-get install build-essential ncurses-base ncurses-dev fakeroot kernel-package

2. Fetch a kernel from http://www.kernel.org (there's a big blue arrow link at the top right of the page to get the latest stable kernel) and save it to your home directory.

3. Unpack the kernel sources:

 tar -xvjf linux-[version].tar.bz2

4. Change to that new directory

 cd linux-[version]/

5. Now time to make a default kernel configuration. For G5 machines, type:

•  make g5_defconfig

For all other macs, including G3 and G4 machines, type:

•  make pmac32_defconfig

For the PS3, type:

•  make ps3_defconfig

6. When that is done, type

make menuconfig

And now navigate around to enable other options that you may need. (Ex: wireless drivers, tvcards, low-latency kernel, etc.) If you don't enable what you need, you won't have it! Press space bar once to enable support as a module <M>. This is generally desired over built-in modules <*> in most cases. If you forget something, you can always go back to this step later and recompile your kernel.

Suggestions for a low-latency audio kernel:

 Kernel Options -> Timer Frequency -> 1000 Hz

 Kernel Options -> Preemption Model -> (X) Preemptible Kernel (Low-Latency Desktop)

Wireless support:

 Networking -> Wireless -> enable all IEEE 802.11 options as <M> module

Airport and Airport Extreme support:

 Device Drivers -> Network device support -> Wireless LAN -> <M> Broadcom 43xx wireless support (mac80211 stack)

 Device Drivers -> Network device support -> Wireless LAN -> <M> Broadcom 43xx-legacy wireless support (mac80211 stack)

as well as enabling other wireless drivers as needed. If unsure of your wifi chipset, just enable all wireless drivers in this section.

When you are finished, keep hitting ESC to exit and say 'Yes' you want to save.

7. Now type

 fakeroot make-kpkg clean

then start compiling:

 fakeroot make-kpkg --initrd --revision=ppc32 kernel_image kernel_headers modules_image

specifying whatever revision designation you wish (ppc32, ppc64, ps3, etc). This will take a long time to compile, probably at least an hour with a 1GHz processor. This is a good time to go make coffee.

8. When it has finished compiling, just install the debs:

 cd ..
 sudo dpkg -i <name of the kernel deb files such as linux-headers-2.6.x linux-image-2.6.x>

And now you are done! Reboot into your new kernel.

Installing the deb will automatically configure your machine to default to that new kernel. If desired, you can further edit the yaboot.conf file to specify default boot options.

---

9. [optional] Editing yaboot.conf to specify kernel boot options. WARNING: You must write yaboot changes to disk with ybin before rebooting. See final steps at end.

 sudo nano /etc/yaboot.conf

One important tip: you must create a line in your yaboot.conf that says

default=imagename

to specify a default kernel image for your machine to boot. Otherwise yaboot will choose the first image listed as default.

To double check your exact image name, simply look in /boot for your kernel image.

ls /boot

Here is an example yaboot.conf with an entry for a 2.6.19.7 kernel image added:

## yaboot.conf generated by the Ubuntu installer
##
## run: "man yaboot.conf" for details. Do not make changes until you have!!
## see also: /usr/share/doc/yaboot/examples for example configurations.
##
## For a dual-boot menu, add one or more of:
## bsd=/dev/hdaX, macos=/dev/hdaY, macosx=/dev/hdaZ

boot=/dev/sda2
device=/ht@0,f2000000/pci@5/k2-sata-root@c/k2-sata@0/disk@0:
partition=3
root=/dev/sda3
timeout=100
install=/usr/lib/yaboot/yaboot
magicboot=/usr/lib/yaboot/ofboot
enablecdboot
enableofboot
enablenetboot
macosx=/dev/sda5
#defaultos=macosx
fgcolor=black
bgcolor=white

default=2.6.19.7

image=/boot/vmlinux
        label=Linux
        read-only
        initrd=/boot/initrd.img
        append="quiet splash"

image=/boot/vmlinux.old
        label=old
        read-only
        initrd=/boot/initrd.img.old
        append="quiet splash"

image=/boot/vmlinux-2.6.19.7
        label=2.6.19.7
        read-only
        initrd=/boot/initrd.img-2.6.19.7
        append="quiet splash"

10. Control-X and hit [Y] to save. Now write changes to the boot partition:

sudo ybin -v

11. Reboot and you will boot into your new kernel.

Where can I get more help?

Forums:

• Apple PPC users (read-only archive)

• Apple users

Live assistance from others users is available with IRC via irc.freenode.net on #ubuntu-powerpc

French documentation is here.

The Ubuntu release notes are here.

The Ubuntu community documentation can be found here. The offical documentation is here.

The various derivatives also have their own documentation. For example, the official Lubuntu FAQ (including, for example, how to enable autologin in Lubuntu) is here. The Lubuntu homepage has a lot of good screencasts that show you how to to customize Lubuntu. There is also the Lubuntu One Stop Thread.

The Debian PowerPC mailing list is here. This is an excellent place to look for information about new changes to the kernel.