These commands work on Ubuntu Linux 9.04 Jaunty (with Adobe’s flash plugin) and Google Chrome (NOT chromium!) as of July 26, 2009 or so:
$ sudo mkdir /opt/google/chrome/plugins
$ cd /opt/google/chrome/plugins
$ sudo ln -s /usr/lib/adobe-flashplugin/libflashplayer.so libflashplayer.so
Then you have to manually start chrome with this command switch (or edit the menu properties).
$ google-chrome --enable-plugins &
Tada!
As a long time Linux user, I was disheartened to find getting a reasonable level of performance would be so much work. And would defy the old saw that Linux runs great in less memory than Windows.
This is a q&e summary of my experiences with Ubuntu 9.04 (Jaunty Jackalope) Desktop, and the various performance related issues that have dogged me to this day. Actually, some of these problems date back to 8.04, and were radically more pronounced on 8.10 which was almost unusable for me. Ubuntu Desktop 8.10 sucked OUT LOUD. At least from a Desktop performance perspective.
Update 2009-12-30: I have belatedly upgraded to 9.10, and my first, early impressions are that it is much improved. Probably due to improvements in the Intel video code.
Update 2010-02-12: Bit the bullet and upgraded to 4G RAM and nVidia graphics. Life is good now. The lesson seems to be that 1G is not enough for full time Ubuntu usage.
“Open Source” is one of those buzzwords that probably doesn’t matter much to most people. But its our bread and butter. We use Open Source products to run our servers. We use it to build and manage websites. We use it for hosting, marketing campaigns, and internal business applications. And its not just us. Much of the Internet is built with Open Source products. Google for instance, is built on Linux, an “Open Source” operating system. Its worked out OK for those guys. And Apache, an Open Source web server, has been the #1 web server on the planet since 1996 (based on Netcraft web surveys), despite Microsoft really working to flex its muscles in the server realm. Apache has succeeded because the Apache Foundation produces a first rate product, that is fast, featureful and robust. Firefox, the web browser, is something that possibly resonates with more people. Its Open Source too.
OK, Open Source matters to us, but why should it matter to our clients? Read more…