My first step this time around after restoring files was to install the network-related applications. I needed to get back online quickly with being able to talk to people, connect to clients’ VPNs, and hit websites.
Series Navigation:
This is a continuation of my previous post (restoring files) on my install of Ubuntu 14.04. In this post, I’ll go through configuring and installing things related to networking. You can see the complete lists of posts on Ubuntu 14.04 on my main install page.
This is my second post in setting up my Ubuntu 13.10 install. I am working to reinstall my laptop from scratch, and I have grouped all of my notes for my Internet-related programs in this post: email, browsers, VPN, etc.
A while back, I typed up my research on Skype, and I forgot to publish it. My more recent installations on my current laptop haven’t required as much tinkering to get it to work. Still this article might help someone, and I already had it put together. So, here it goes…
While installing my new laptop, I noticed that Skype was a featured item in the Software Center. So, here’s my new installation steps for Skype…
I kind of let my blog reading get behind, and low and behold, I missed a Skype update. Skype has a new version that improves many of the problems that I was having with it. My video even worked after this. I have had a few Skype calls that worked as well. I haven’t noticed it just stopping responding either. Yea Skype!
So, if you use Skype, hit this download link and update your Skype:
Skype is a communication essential for my system because I have co-workers who use it. There are plenty of alternatives to Skype, but none of them interact with other Skypers.
Although there are no desktop alternatives, there is one online tool that you can use — http://imo.im. It is a great alternative, but it is not integrated with your desktop.
Currently, Skype works for the most part. I have trouble with it crashing periodically. The crashes seem to coincide with changing networks. For example, if I connect and disconnect from a VPN, I find I am offline even though the icon is green. I am not sure if I just notice it then or if the connection change triggers it. The worst part is that I can’t tell that it has crashed until I try to Skype someone and it says it can’t send the message.
So, here’s what I went through to install Skype…
I found a couple of good instructions for installing Skype from their repository. The advantage is that it should keep it up to date assuming Skype publishes updates to the repository.
The repo file I got from here, and I just uploaded it so that I could use wget to install rather than gedit as the other instructions use. Maybe someday I can build an RPM to make it even easier.
Install Steps:
su -c "wget -P /etc/yum.repos.d/ http://digitaleagle.net/fedorastuff/skype.repo" su -c "yum install skype"
Unfortunately, this didn’t work for my 64bit system:
Running Transaction Installing : skype-2.1.0.81-fc10.i586 1/1 Installed: skype.i586 0:2.1.0.81-fc10 Complete! [skp@pecan ~]$ locate skype [skp@pecan ~]$ which skype /usr/bin/skype [skp@pecan ~]$ ls -l `which skype > ` -rwxr-xr-x. 1 root root 18621060 Jan 18 2010 /usr/bin/skype [skp@pecan ~]$ /usr/bin/skype bash: /usr/bin/skype: /lib/ld-linux.so.2: bad ELF interpreter: No such file or directory
So, I installed the dependencies mentioned in this thread:
yum install alsa-lib.i686 dbus-libs.i686 e2fsprogs-libs.i686 expat.i686 fontconfig.i686 freetype.i686 glib2.i686 glibc.i686 keyutils-libs.i686 krb5-libs.i686 libcap.i686 libgcc.i686 libICE.i686 libpng.i686 libselinux.i686 libSM.i686 libstdc++.i686 libX11.i686 libXau.i686 libxcb.i686 libXcursor.i686 libXdmcp.i686 libXext.i686 libXfixes.i686 libXi.i686 libXinerama.i686 libXrandr.i686 libXrender.i686 libXScrnSaver.i686 libXv.i686 openssl.i686 qt.i686 qt-x11.i686 zlib.i686
Then, that finally worked!
References:
Seems like it has been a while since we have seen a new version of Skype, but last week, my update manager offered me a new version! The biggest advantage to me is the improved voice and video quality. Unfortunately, I haven’t had much of an opportunity to try the voice and video recently. Skype access is another new feature, but since I have Android tethering, I probably won’t have any need for it.
You can read more details from the blog post.
Here are the new features advertised on the main page:
