Making a Time Machine server with Ubuntu

I recently got a MacBook Pro and wanted to use it's Time Machine functionality. The only large hard drive I had was  in my desktop computer dual booting Windows 7 and Ubuntu - so I decided to add an AFP server to Ubuntu to make it act like a Time Machine server.

I originally tried using NFS and Samba, but the setup procedure turned out to be too complicated and neither of them worked out in the end, for some reason (but I'm sure it could be done). I stumbled across netatalk which includes an AFP (apple file sharing protocol) server. I then followed the tutorial here, to set it up.

However, some things to note:

The tutorial is a year old and the latest version of netatalk has not been uploaded to the ubuntu repositories, so you need to get the latest sources from the netatalk website and compile them yourself (the latest version has Time Machine support).

You can follow the tutorial through, like I did, and just update to the latest netatalk when you've completed the tutorial. Simply download the latest netatalk sources, do a ./configure, make, sudo make install and reconfigure the netatalk configuration files. Make sure to add the "tm" option to the configuration files. I posted a comment on that site, so just search the page for the user "solarwind" to see my comment about that.

Ubuntu 9.04 Released!

Ubuntu 9.04 Released today!

Kubuntu 9.04 RC

I just gave Kubuntu 9.04 RC a try - installed it on my old Dell Inspiron 6000 laptop. Works very well (KDE4.2). It was flawless and did everything I needed. Unfortunately, KDE login/logout is still a bit slow compared to Gnome, but this will improve with time. 9.04 final release is due in two days.

EXT4 is FAST

I decided to reinstall ArchLinux on my 4 year old Dell Inspiron 6000 laptop today. For the record, the specs of my laptop are as follows:

• CPU: Intel Pentium M 750 @ 1.86 GHz
• RAM: 1 GB DDR2 dual channel
• Screen: 15.4” 1680x1050 resolution

I decided to install a default ArchLinux install using the EXT4 filesystem. I kept most of the options default but installed a few extra packages such as GNU dev tools as well as wireless drivers. As far as partitioning is concerned, I used 4 partitions (/, /home, /boot, swap), all EXT4 except for SWAP. I installed from the 2009.2 USB images. The install completed very quickly – partly because I installed from a USB memory stick as opposed to a CD/FTP and because the filesystem was EXT4.

The installation completed successfully and I rebooted. I pulled out a stopwatch and started the timer just as I hit the enter button on the GRUB ArchLinux menu item. After exactly 10 seconds, I was fully booted into a BASH shell. EXT4 is extremely fast. My previous install took around 16 – 20 seconds to boot into a minimal BASH shell.

Can’t wait to setup a desktop environment and see how long it takes to get into it. In comparison, my windows XP (I’m dual-booting) boot time is around 25 seconds to get into the desktop. It takes at least 18 seconds to boot to the graphical login.

EXT4 is truly fast. Hopefully Ubuntu 9.04 will have EXT4 as an option. For those of you considering installing EXT4 – go for it. It’s fast, stable, and there are/will be a lot of useful tools for it including online defrag.

My KDE 4.2 Screenshot

KDE 4.2 (release) on Arch Linux using the Perfection Plasma theme. Wallpaper: Chicago at Night