So here we start. Hardy has in fact the easiest and most accessible install of all the ubuntu versions so far. I have had no diffeculty in performing it completely on my own. Of course there are very good tutorials and walkthroughs available on the net. I did follow them and also invented my own methods for making the system run flawlessly. I had to reinstall my hardy quite a few number of times since I am new to linux. I must warn you in advance that the sequence of events and commands must be followed exactly as they appear here, else the whole system may become unusable and a total reinstall may be required. According to my method, right after installing hardy, the first thing that needs to be done is to make suitable changes in the system so that orca will speak while performing administrative functions. This process is one of the trickiest and I had to reformat my system at least twice coz of some wrong sequence of commands. Please also note that unlike windows small and capital letters do make a difference. You must type the commands exactly as it is.
Here I would also like to mention that ubuntu now has an option to install under windows. However, I have installed it by booting the system in linux that is the traditional way of doing things.
The steps for installing ubuntu hardy and enabling system administration with orca are as follows:
1.insert the cd containing hardy and restart the system. You can download the image from
http://www.ubuntu.com and burnn it on to a cd
2.After waiting for about 5 seconds, press enter. (by doing so you are choosing english as your language)
3.press down arrow once for choosing install. press f5for accessibility, 3 for screen reader and press enter twice to confirm your choice.
4.Depending on the system configuration, orca will start speaking in about 5 mins and you will be presented with the installation screen.
5.Proceed with the installation by pressing the 'forward' button. This can be achieved by pressing alt+f.
6.You should now land on the location combo box. In case this box is not properly focused, use tab/shift+tab. Select your location and press alt+f.
7.Now you will be presented with the keyboard selection combo boxes. If you are using the normal US keyboard, simply press alt+f for moving to the next dialogue box or make suitable changes and proceed. You will hear the message “starting up the partitioner”.
8.You may hear the repeat of the previous dialogue box but don't get confused and wait for some more time. In case you don't have unalocated space on your hard disk you can safely use the first option of the partitioner dialogue box i.e. Guided/resized. This will use the available space on your hard disk even if it is on an NTFS partition. If you have unalocated space or plan to delete a free NTFS/fat32 partition, you can use the manual configuration option.
9.The next 3 Steps are meant for those who partition their hard disk manually. Select the unalocated space. Use the nevigation keys in order to move in the dialogue box. It's a good practice to define 3 partitions. a. Your home partition where your files and configurations can be stored. You can retrieve the data on this partition in case you have to go for a reinstall. b. Second partition is where linux system will be installed. c. The swap partition.
10.Select the free unalocated space, press tab and press spaceBar on edit button. Press tab, enter the amount of space in mbs you wish to assign to the partition. Now press tab and select the type of partition. Orca may probably not speak the content in this combo box at first. In case of the first two partitions mentioned above, simply pressing home key will choose ext3 which is what we want. Now press tab twice and select the mount point. For the first partition select /home. For the second select only slash. Please note that only one partition can be created at one time. Repeat the process properly for different partitions. After selecting the mount point, tab twice to reach the 'ok' button and press enter. It should take about 2 mins for the partition table with newly created partitions to appear.
11.After creating the first two partitions mentioned above, create the swap partition which should be about 1.5 times of your computer ram. The procedure is similar as mentioned above. Select swap as the mount point.
12.After creating the partitions, pres alt+f to continue to the next step.
13.Fill in your full name, user name and password in appropriate fields and your computer name. Press the forward button.
14.If you have windows on your system ubuntu will give you option to import your account. If you don't require it press the forward button or alt+f.
15.You will now see the list of partitions that will be formatted. Confirm and press forward button.
16.It will take about 20-25 minutes for the system to complete the installation process. At the end, press the restart button in order to restart the system. . Orca will keep providing speech during the entire process.
17.After the restart, you will hear the log in sound enter userName and press enter. Key in your password and press enter. The system will be ready and orca will be speaking automatically.
Enabling system administration with orca
This part is quite tricky and due care must be taken to type the commands as it is. Please note again that small and capital letters do matter.
After loging into the system open the terminal window by either pressing alt+f1 (start menu) down arrow to accessories, right arrow and then t for terminal. Or
press alt+f2 for run command and type 'gnome-terminal'. Then type the following commands in order to enable system administration with orca:
creating orbitrc file in the root folder
1.sudo su – root. #Enter password and pres return key.
2.cat> ~/.orbitrc << EOF
3.ORBIIOPIPv4=1
4.ORBIIOPUNIX=0
5.EOF
adding commands to the sudoers file.
Ideally /etc/sudoers file should be edited using the visudo command. However, I did not find it very workable. So here is the alternate method which has some risks. If you forget even 1 step it will make your system dysfunctional. The steps are as follows:
in the terminal window if you are logged in as root, you do not need sudo in the beginning of every command.
$cd /etc
$sudo chmod 777 sudoers < <
Now look for the phraise 'eng_reset', move to the end of the line and press enter. Now add the following line:
Defaults env_keep+="GTK_MODULES"
press ctrl+s to save the file, alt+f4 to close the same.
You will again be in the terminal window from where you left. Now type
$sudo chHmod 440 sudoers **<
Your system is now ready for use and you can perform administrative tasks like synaptic package manager, user-admin etc with orca speaking all the time.
