Gutsy Gibbon Live CD mystery solved

On October 21st I posted here about the fact that I couldn’t boot from the recently released Live CD version 7.10 of Ubuntu, the so-called Gutsy Gibbon.  That post attracted more comment than any other ever has on this blog as others reported that they too had encountered the same problem.  One of those who responded was Tomcat–TC since he too was having the problem.  Earlier today, Tomcat–TC reported back that he had found a solution that worked for him, and as the screen shot at the right demonstrates, I have just proven to myself that it works for me too.  For the first time, I was able to boot from the Gutsy Gibbon Live CD on this, my Sony machine.

Previously I had encountered the error message with the Live CD after I selected the default option to load or install Ubuntu.  However, on that initial screen one of the options, evoked by pressing F6, is to modify the command line before executing the boot up command.  Tomcat–TC suggested that I simply add the following parameter all_generic_ide to the boot command line after the words quiet splash and just before the two final dashes.  When you press F6 the cursor is at the end of that line and you can use the arrow keys to move it so that it is positioned after the words quiet splash and make the additional entry.  After doing that, I simply pressed enter and eventually the CD booted up into the Ubuntu environment. 

As you can see if you click on the screen shot above and view a larger version of it, there is an icon on the desktop to install the operating system if you choose.  I decided to do that, but there I encountered another problem.  There are seven steps in that installation before you actually commit to begin the installation.  The first few are designed to identify the language, the time zone and the type of keyboard you are using.  Thereafter, the partitioner is initiated to find the hard drives on the system and provide you the option of specifying where to install the operating system.  All of that went well, except that during the process of examining the installed hard drives it found no existing file system.  Since I didn’t want to kill my Windows XP installation by installing over it, I canceled the installation and will go back to the drawing board. 

I have no idea why this CD doesn’t see the existing file system.  Maybe someone who reads and responds to this post will be able to suggest how I might get it to see my Windows installation.  However, even if they don’t, encountering that problem doesn’t dampen my enthusiasm for having learned the solution to the mystery of how to get the newly released Gutsy Gibbon Live CD to boot on my system nor does it lessen my appreciation to Tomcat–TC for his reporting back the results of his investigation and the resolution to the problem.  

 

Technorati Tags: Linux, Ubuntu, Gutsy Gibbon, Live CD, initramfs problem solved

A new theme

If you are viewing this entry in an RSS reader, come on over to my blog and take a look at the new theme I installed today.  It is called 1BlogTheme and it was created by Javier Garcia.  It has a rich feature set that can be configured from the admin panel in the WordPress installation without having to delve into the mysteries of PHP.  Explore any of those new features that may interest you by clicking on some of the links that surround the post.  You won’t hurt anything by doing so.  If you find you have displayed something (for instance, the list of Bookmark Services) and you can’t get rid of it, just click on the link to Home above and everything will be restored to normal.  If anything seems to be broken for you as you surf around the site, let me know in the comments. 

One feature that attracted me to this theme was the dual sidebar which, as it turns out, can be displayed either at the right or the left, just by changing a setting on the setup page.  I’ve set it to display at the right because a number of my previous blog entries refer to something in the sidebar at the right.  The dual sidebar is, in fact, a triple pane because the main pane of the sidebar extends across the top of the other two columns (panes) of information.  At the moment that main pane displays the information contained in the About section, but any of the panes in the sidebar can be populated with any of the widgets that I might want to display there.

This theme looks more professional to me than my previous theme did.  And anyway I think it was time for me to make a change, if for no other reason than to make it more interesting for me to look at.  I have viewed this theme in IE7, in Firefox, and in Flock 1.0, and all of them seem to display everything about the same way.  Again, I would appreciate a comment from any of you who may use a different browser and see any idiosyncrasies in the new theme.   I can’t guarantee that I can eliminate every unique quirk introduced by different browsers, but I will try to make it as inoffensive as possible.

The Lion at 66

Happy Birthday Dad

Originally uploaded by Dr Reelgood & Co..

On November 7th, Mike and Cheryl and their kids helped me celebrate my 66th birthday with a dinner at their home. Mike captured this official portrait of me posed before an assortment of cheeses and fruit that he had purchased for the occasion. It was a delicious and enjoyable way to celebrate my birthday. He suggested that the caption for the picture should be Dad cuts the cheese on his birthday, but in the end, he labeled it a bit more soberly.