12.04 Frustration. Where are my drives?

[Engineeringtech]

I'm a novice Ubuntu user. Last machine I owned with Ubuntu, ran 9.04. That looked, and acted a lot like Windows.

I just installed Ubuntu 12.04LTS on another machine. VERY frustrating. Booted to a background picture with no icons, no application menus, no shutdown menu. Tried a hard restart. Still NOTHING! I finally right clicked the desktop, found system settings, and was able to pick a different display resolution. Now I could see the clock, speaker volume, and shutdown menu. But no pulldowns for applications, and no drive icons! Took me another hour before I realized I could shove my mouse cursor HARD left, (and I mean HARD), and something that looks like the "launcher" from old Mac Power PC's pops out. A few applications there, but no drives, terminal, user or administrative settings. Ubuntu 9.04 used to put drive partitions on the desktop. If I inserted a CD or DVD to be read, played, or burned it showed on the desktop. Ditto any thumb drive. Maybe I'm not smart enough to run Ubuntu!

Anyway, I can browse the internet, but as I said, no drive partitions, DVD writers, or thumb drives appear on the desktop, or in the "launcher". How do I get them on the desktop? (There appears to be no room in the launcher.)

I found a posting that said I could open the terminal, type "sudo lshw" and my password, to view installed hardware. I finally found the terminal by double clicking the "dash" icon, and searching for the terminal. I ran the command, and the internal hard drive and both DVD writers appear on the list. So they're there.

[darkod]

Depending what disks/partitions do you expect to see. And earlier versions of ubuntu only showed usb sticks/hdds on the desktop, not the internal ones.

In the Unity launcher as the left, one of the top icons is your Home icon. That open the file browser, Nautilus, which like in the previous versions, will show you all ntfs partitions in the left side of the window (in the Devices part).

As for linux partitions, they are all within Filesystem, except the ones mounted at /media which also show in the Devices part in Nautilus.

All of this should be visible on your desktop. If you have resolution/video issues, parts of the screen might be hidden, otherwise all should show by default.

Another tip, you can search for any program/application in the dashboard that open by clicking the Uubntu logo icon in Unity, and also you can open the dashboard by hitting the super key on the keyboard (the windows logo).

PS. If I'm not mistaken, usb sticks/hdds do show in Unity also, just not on the desktop like earlier. But since you can see Unity on your desktop, it's almost the same. After you plug in the stick there will be a new icon in Unity for it, and usually the content is automatically opened by default without even clicking this icon.

[Engineeringtech]

Depending what disks/partitions do you expect to see.? And earlier versions of ubuntu only showed usb sticks/hdds on the desktop, not the internal ones. Ubuntu 9.04 had a pulldown menu at the top of the screen which showed all my drive partitions (NTFS, FAT, etc.) , the Linux file system, floppy drive, etc. When clicked on them, they would mount on the desktop for instant, easy access. If I right clicked them, I could dismount them.

In the Unity launcher as the left, one of the top icons is your Home icon. That open the file browser, Nautilus, which like in the previous versions, will show you all ntfs partitions in the left side of the window (in the Devices part). When I open the home folder in the unity launcher it shows only the empty folders it created for my login ID. Sure, I can back through the menu to get to the Linux file system, but there are no DVD or CDROM's, or USB drives in the "media" folder. I can find my NTFS data partition, but I don't want to hunt for my partitions, USB drives or CDROMS every time I boot up. And doing so, opens a bunch of windows on the desktop, and leaves them there.

As for linux partitions, they are all within Filesystem, except the ones mounted at /media which also show in the Devices part in Nautilus. See above.

All of this should be visible on your desktop. If you have resolution/video issues, parts of the screen might be hidden, otherwise all should show by default. I got the resolution issue fixed.

Another tip, you can search for any program/application in the dashboard that open by clicking the Uubntu logo icon in Unity, and also you can open the dashboard by hitting the super key on the keyboard (the windows logo). I figured out how to search for an application from the "dash" window, but what if I don't know what the names are for the applications that were installed?

PS. If I'm not mistaken, usb sticks/hdds do show in Unity also, just not on the desktop like earlier. But since you can see Unity on your desktop, it's almost the same. After you plug in the stick there will be a new icon in Unity for it, and usually the content is automatically opened by default without even clicking this icon. I can put USB drives into any USB port and they don't appear in the unity launcher.

Bye the way, is there a way to expand the unity lanucher or reduce the size of the icons within it to make more room?

[darkod]

I don't know if we are talking about the same thing, but this is what I see when I open Home (see attachment). You can clearly see all ntfs and linux partitions on the left in the Devices section. Only one click on any partition mounts it and opens it at the same time.

I would hardly call that hunting.

If on the other hand, you are talking about auto-mounting ntfs partitions at boot, that's a different procedure and it also depends where you want it to show.

As for searching for programs in Dash, it works with parts of names too. Almost all programs would be called the same, it's not like you need to have some special information. If you installed Google Chrome and want to look for it, just type 'chrome' and all programs that contain chrome will show up.

For programs that you frequently use you can dock them into Unity so the icon will be always there and you can open it with one click.

For changing Unity icons size, and other things, you can use compizconfig-settings-manager. You can install it with apt-get or another way if you prefer to. There is a short reference here and I'm sure you can find loads more on google:
http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/change-settings-ubuntu-unity-compizconfig-settings-manager/

[Engineeringtech]

I don't know if we are talking about the same thing, but this is what I see when I open Home (see attachment). You can clearly see all ntfs and linux partitions on the left in the Devices section. Only one click on any partition mounts it and opens it at the same time. Not on my machine. That's why I'm asking the questions. .

I would hardly call that hunting. If I have to back through six levels of folders, it's what I call a "hunt".

If on the other hand, you are talking about auto-mounting ntfs partitions at boot, that's a different procedure and it also depends where you want it to show. Automounting would be nice too.

As for searching for programs in Dash, it works with parts of names too. Almost all programs would be called the same, it's not like you need to have some special information. If you installed Google Chrome and want to look for it, just type 'chrome' and all programs that contain chrome will show up. Excuse me, but every Linux version installs different applications, doesn't it? And look at this from the viewpoint of a new user. WHAT is he searching for? What are the first three letters? How do I know what tools are available? There were pulldown menus for system tools, utilities, etc. in Ubuntu 9.04. Even in Windows there are pulldown menus full of available tools.

For programs that you frequently use you can dock them into Unity so the icon will be always there and you can open it with one click. Can you put drives into the launcher? If so, how?

For changing Unity icons size, and other things, you can use compizconfig-settings-manager. You can install it with apt-get or another way if you prefer to. There is a short reference here and I'm sure you can find loads more on google:
http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/change-settings-ubuntu-unity-compizconfig-settings-manager/ Ok, there is a perfect example.... How is a new user going to know that they should search for "compizconfig-settings-manager" tp change an icon size? And how do you "apt-get" it?

Sorry if it sounds like all I am doing is complaining, but I'm still looking for answers why my drive partitions, DVD writers, thumbdrives and external Firewire drives don't appear on the desktop, in the launcher, or a pulldown menu somewhere convenient. Seems to me that the old 9.04 interface was far superior, in that you could get to things so much faster. I'm getting kind of old and losing my memory. Seems counter productive that there's a graphical interface, but you have to open a terminal and type a bunch of wierd commands to get the interface to behave.

[coffeecat]

First. I've restored the red text to black for your own text in your post. Red could be interpreted as shouting. From the forum Code of Conduct (http://ubuntuforums.org/index.php?page=policy):


Use color and font properties for highlighting portions of your text, and not for all of the text in your post. Please use the default font color and properties unless you need to highlight or draw attention to a part of your post. ALL CAPS is interpreted as screaming. Funky non-uniform font size/color is difficult for those who are visually impaired. If you are having problems with reading the font, please adjust your browser.

But to your issues:


I can put USB drives into any USB port and they don't appear in the unity launcher.

Then there is a problem with USB mounting in your system that needs to be investigated. USB drives appear in the launcher in every single Ubuntu system with Unity that I have installed


Bye the way, is there a way to expand the unity lanucher or reduce the size of the icons within it to make more room?

In 12.04 or 12.10, simply right-click on the desktop -> Change Desktop background, and change the launcher icon size there.


Seems counter productive that there's a graphical interface, but you have to open a terminal and type a bunch of wierd commands to get the interface to behave.

You don't. I never have to use the terminal to adjust the Unity settings. Have a look at the first link in my sig for a general guide to using the Unity interface in 12.04.

[Engineeringtech]

First. I've restored the red text to black for your own text in your post. Red could be interpreted as shouting. From the forum Code of Conduct (http://ubuntuforums.org/index.php?page=policy):

Hard to believe anyone could interpret red as shouting. Everywhere else I have posted, ALL CAPS are considered shouting. I only used red so you could easily find my responses.

Incidentally, the Code of Conduct only says that some people may not see certain colors. It SUGGESTS using colors to highlight responses.



Use color and font properties for highlighting portions of your text, and not for all of the text in your post. Please use the default font color and properties unless you need to highlight or draw attention to a part of your post. ALL CAPS is interpreted as screaming. Funky non-uniform font size/color is difficult for those who are visually impaired. If you are having problems with reading the font, please adjust your browser.




But to your issues:


Then there is a problem with USB mounting in your system that needs to be investigated. USB drives appear in the launcher in every single Ubuntu system with Unity that I have installed
Duh! Sorry, but why do you think I am here? I am here seeking answers.[/COLOR] [COLOR=SeaGreen]How do I get USB mounting to work? Worked fine before I upgraded. I'm not seeing either of my CD Drives, or any of my HD partitions in the launcher either.


In 12.04 or 12.10, simply right-click on the desktop -> Change Desktop background, and change the launcher icon size there.

Sorry, been there, done that.... Selected Change Desktop Background. It brings up a bunch of icons. I have double clicked every one. Found no tools to change launcher icon size.

You don't. I never have to use the terminal to adjust the Unity settings. Have a look at the first link in my sig for a general guide to using the Unity interface in 12.04.

See above.

[Engineeringtech]

I've marked this thread "SOLVED". My solution is to go back to using Windows. My reasons? I listed them in another thread which I also marked "SOLVED" today. My comments probably will upset some forum members, but it is the truth.

Over the past few years, I had opened multiple threads about this problem, taking the discussion in different directions in the hope that a solution could finally be located. Some of the threads I started went "dead". People stopped contributing. I understand that. I got busy with health issues and work and got frustrated about not making any progress. I stopped replying. I hope people will forgive me for that.

Thanks to everyone who tried to help me.