May 26, 2010, 1:36 pm
By default when you install ubuntu server and try to mount an ntfs file system you will only be able to mount it as a read only file system.
For example - I have attached a hard disk with a standard windows installation on device 1 (sdb) on my computer.
root@server:/dev$ ls
block disk input loop3 mem pktcdvd ram1 ram2 ram9 sda2 shm tty tty14 tty20 tty27 tty33 tty4 tty46 tty52 tty59 tty8 usbdev1.1_ep00 vcs1 vcsa1 zero
bus ecryptfs kmem loop4 net port ram10 ram3 random sda5 snapshot tty0 tty15 tty21 tty28 tty34 tty40 tty47 tty53 tty6 tty9 usbdev1.1_ep81 vcs2 vcsa2
cdrom fd kmsg loop5 network_latency ppp ram11 ram4 rtc sdb sndstat tty1 tty16 tty22 tty29 tty35 tty41 tty48 tty54 tty60 ttyS0 usbdev1.2_ep00 vcs3 vcsa3
char full log loop6 network_throughput psaux ram12 ram5 rtc0 sdb1 sr0 tty10 tty17 tty23 tty3 tty36 tty42 tty49 tty55 tty61 ttyS1 usbdev1.2_ep81 vcs4 vcsa4
console fuse loop0 loop7 null ptmx ram13 ram6 scd0 sg0 stderr tty11 tty18 tty24 tty30 tty37 tty43 tty5 tty56 tty62 ttyS2 usbmon0 vcs5 vcsa5
core hpet loop1 lp0 oldmem pts ram14 ram7 sda sg1 stdin tty12 tty19 tty25 tty31 tty38 tty44 tty50 tty57 tty63 ttyS3 usbmon1 vcs6 vcsa6
cpu_dma_latency initctl loop2 mapper parport0 ram0 ram15 ram8 sda1 sg2 stdout tty13 tty2 tty26 tty32 tty39 tty45 tty51 tty58 tty7 urandom vcs vcsa xconsole
root@server:/dev$ mount
/dev/sda1 on / type ext3 (rw,relatime,errors=remount-ro)
tmpfs on /lib/init/rw type tmpfs (rw,nosuid,mode=0755)
proc on /proc type proc (rw,noexec,nosuid,nodev)
sysfs on /sys type sysfs (rw,noexec,nosuid,nodev)
varrun on /var/run type tmpfs (rw,nosuid,mode=0755)
varlock on /var/lock type tmpfs (rw,noexec,nosuid,nodev,mode=1777)
udev on /dev type tmpfs (rw,mode=0755)
tmpfs on /dev/shm type tmpfs (rw,nosuid,nodev)
devpts on /dev/pts type devpts (rw,noexec,nosuid,gid=5,mode=620)
fusectl on /sys/fs/fuse/connections type fusectl (rw)
securityfs on /sys/kernel/security type securityfs (rw)
root@server:~# mkdir /mnt/ntfs
root@server:~# mount /dev/sdb1 /mnt/ntfs/
root@server:~# cd /mnt/ntfs
root@server:/mnt/ntfs# ls
AUTOEXEC.BAT boot.ini CONFIG.SYS Documents and Settings hiberfil.sys IO.SYS MSDOS.SYS NTDETECT.COM ntldr pagefile.sys Program Files RECYCLER sysprep_dat System Volume Information WINDOWS
root@server:/mnt/ntfs# touch hello.txt
touch: cannot touch `hello.txt': Read-only file system
To fix this problem all you have to do is install the ntfs-3g drivers on your machine - on ubuntu you can do that by using apt-get install - after that your file system mounts as read-write.
root@server:/mnt# sudo apt-get install ntfs-3g
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
The following extra packages will be installed:
fuse-utils libfuse2 libntfs-3g49
The following NEW packages will be installed:
...
root@server:/mnt# mount /dev/sdb1 /mnt/ntfs/
The disk contains an unclean file system (0, 0).
The file system wasn't safely closed on Windows. Fixing.
root@server:/mnt# cd /mnt/ntfs
root@server:/mnt/ntfs# ls
AUTOEXEC.BAT boot.ini CONFIG.SYS Documents and Settings hiberfil.sys IO.SYS MSDOS.SYS NTDETECT.COM ntldr pagefile.sys Program Files RECYCLER sysprep_dat System Volume Information WINDOWS
root@server:/mnt/ntfs# touch hello.txt
root@server:/mnt/ntfs# vim hello.txt
root@server:/mnt/ntfs# exit
December 13, 2008, 6:40 pm
I finally got the time to figure this one out. It’s not that hard. Wordpress by default uses phpmailer for sending and getting emails via POP3. PHPMailer can either use php mail() function (default) or SMTP and is essentially an abstraction around POP3 and SMTP protocols.
The version that shipped with my version of wordpress 2.0.x was using an older version of phpmailer and does not support TLS/SSL. SSL is supported, however, by phpmailer 2.3, the current version - so this is what you do:
- Download the latest version of PHP mailer
- Pay special attention to 3 files - class.phpmailer.php, class.pop3.php and class.smtp.php
- The 3 files listed in (2) above are stored in the {wordpress intall dir}/wp-includes dir as class-phpmailer.php, class-pop3.php and class-smtp.php respectively (please note that the period (.) is replaced with a dash (-))
- Copy the downloaded class. files to the wp-includes folder as the class- files (sudo cp {phpmailer dir}/class.phpmailer.php {wordpress install dir}/wp-includes/class-phpmailer.php
- Repeat step 4 for the pop3 and the smtp class as well
- Next open the file {wordpress install dir}/wp-includes/class-phpmailer.php and make the following changes - a. update the $port to have a defaulat value of 465 not 25, update the $host to have a default value of “smtp.gmail.com”, update the $SMTPSecure to “ssl”, update $SMTPAuth to “true” and then the $Username and $Password fields
- Now edit the {wordpress install dir}/wp-includes/pluggable.php, navigate to the function ‘wp_mail’ change the line $phpmailer->IsMail() to $phpmailer->IsSMTP()
That’s it.
Now when someone registers on your website or when someone adds a comment - you should get your emails via gmail. Happy blogging.
September 26, 2008, 12:42 am
First off I am not a systems administrator. I am just a poor guy who had to read through 100 blog pages to get this working. I hope this helps other people - I will certainly take a look here again.

OK I have finally got this one right.Ever since I got my dell inspiron 1525 I have been itching to get ubuntu installed on it. The laptop came with windows vista professional installed and I first started by trying to install the dual boot directly via the hardy CD. The backup parition interfered with the installation and the resize of the partition failed half way, making my entire vista installation useless. It was aweful getting vista set up on this machine again. I had to install every single driver (yes even the display).
I formatted the entire disk and tried to run the ubuntu installer again, again without luck the resizing just got stuck. I was worried that I would have to insall vista again (OH no) - but luckily vista booted this time - nothing chkdsk could not fix. I figured this was never going to work - so I will enumerate the steps I took to get everything working right.
- Go to vista->computer->manage and then open the disk management
- Right click and resize the volume to a smaller size, this will then leave you with unformatted space
- Reboot and boot into the ubuntu installer, accept all defaults till you reach the partition selector
- The default option will be to install it by resizing the sda1 (or whatever parition vista is installed on). Another option would be to install on entire disk. Don’t choose them. You could either go into custom and create a custom swap, partition from the free space OR you could use the “largest continuous space” which is what I chose
- Let ubuntu install Continue reading ‘Installing dual boot vista / ubuntu 8 on a dell inspiron1525 with 1395 wireless card’ »