Laptop Systems

Overview

NOTE: This page is for more recently installed Laptop systems running LINUX,which @ajlennon has installed software on as per discussions with @jackiepease. We also have a range of installed PC systems, mostly to operate workshop machinery, It would be good to harmonise the two install procedures but for now ise this page for newer systems and mainly the laptops, and for prior systems see here

Background on Laptops donated to DoES

• They are mainly Lenovo Ideapad 305's (x4) with a G50 (x2)
• All existing data is to be wiped
• Ubuntu 20.04 LTS is to be installed
• Standard user "doesuser" and standard DoES password across all laptops
• Autologin to desktop for ease of use

Required Software (as of 31/05/21)

@JackiePease has provided a list of software to be installed as a starting point (based on what people ask for)

• Universal GCode Sender
• Drawing Bot v3
• Inkscape (latest)
• Inkstitch (installs as Inkscape extension)
• AYAB (All Yarns Are Beautiful)
• Arduino IDE
• Word Processing / Spreadsheet support (LibreOffice)
• Firefox / Chrome
• Zoom

[Edit: (AJL) This is quite time consuming so I am not intending myself to do another round of installs in the near future. However additonal wanted software can be noted on this issue and we can extend the installation procedure noted below then either myself or somebody else with time can add in the extras]

Various dependencies are needed for the above. I have all added some scripting to ensure the above can be run from icons on the desktop

Installation procedure

Set BIOS in laptops to non-secure mode, reset state of any "secure keys" Insert installation media. I used a Ubuntu 20.04 LTS USB stick as booting from USB is supported Power On and repeatedly click FN-F12 to enter the boot order menu and choose the USB stick Boot Ubuntu to the graphical UI and follow the standard Ubuntu installation procedure

NB. Standard Ubuntu options for

• UK language & keyboard
• Hostname does-laptop-X where X is laptop ID
• User "doesuser", Password the usual "b...."
• Erase anything on disk and reinstall
• Allow non-opensource packages to be installed
• Automatic login

Once installed ensure everything is up to date so:

Open a terminal

$ sudo apt update $ sudo apt upgrade -y

Then install some basics

$ sudo apt install terminator gnome-tweaks magic-wormhole default-jre

There is an archive I created of downloads of software from the above list. It's currently stored on the DoES GitLab repo

https://gitlab.com/DoESLiverpool/PC-Installation-Files/-/blob/master/Downloads-DoES-Install-20210518.tgz

If you can't access this talk to a DoES Director, or organiser for access

Download this Downloads-DoES-Install-20210518.tgz or there may be a more recent one. Unpack this

$ cd ~ $ tar xzvf Downloads-DoES-Install-20210518.tgz

This will put a set of files into the ~/Downloads folder. Copy across shortcuts to the desktop with

$ cd ~/Downloads $ cp Desktop/* ~/Desktop

Then work through installing the applications that need special treatment

Inkstitch (plugin for Inkscape)

You will need to run Inkscape once first... (via the shortcut on the desktop - right click on the "Inkscape" shortcut and "allow launching" to be able to run it. See below)

$ cd ~/.config/inkscape/extensions $ unzip ~/Downloads/inkstitch-v2.0.0-linux-en_US.zip

Arduino

$ cd arduino-1.8.15

$ sudo ./install.sh

AYAB

$ sudo apt-get install python3-pip python3-dev python3-virtualenv python3-gi $ sudo usermod -a -G tty doesuser $ sudo usermod -a -G dialout doesuser $ cd ayab-desktop $ sudo apt install libjpeg8-dev zlib1g-dev $ pip3 install -r requirements.txt

Chrome

$ sudo dpkg -i google-chrome-stable_current_amd64.deb

Zoom

$ sudo dpkg -i zoom_amd64.deb

This will fail - then

$ sudo apt-get install -f

Finishing

Go to the desktop and right click on all the shortcut files to run the relevant applications to test.

On some of them you might need to right click to select "Allow Launching"

You might have two copies of Arduino launcher, if so remove one

You can right click and remove unneeded favourites from the left hand bar.