Some text based apps use ncurses. When compiling from source and you see an error like:
checking for main in -lncurses... no
configure: error: ncurses library not found !
To install, use:
sudo apt-get install libncurses-dev
Installing Windows 8.1 guest on Linux Mint KVM
On my first attempt booting from the Windows 8.1 DVD to install as a guest in KVM, I got the initial Windows 8 splash screen, the DVD would spin for a few seconds but then spin down, and it would appear to be stuck at the logo screen, never reaching the spinning circle stage below the Windows icon.
There’s numerous posts of Windows 8 hanging at the logo screen, most of the conclusions seemed to be unless you didn’t have an error, just leave it until you get to the language selection dialog. I left mine about 10 minutes and got to the language dialog ok (I don’t remember a bare metal install taking that long before).
For my KVM vm settings, I left everything as defaults, apart from these changes based on numerous other posts on installing Windows 8 and 10 on KVM:
Processor: 1 CPU, and ‘copy host CPU configuration’
Disk: virtio disk bus, raw format, cache mode = node (not default)
Nic: virtio
Video: vga
After selecting ‘Custom install’ the ‘Where do you want to install Windows’ dialog says it could not find any drives. This is where you mount the virtio iso in the dvd for the vm, and then continue.
I hadn’t added a cd drive with the virtio iso to my vm before starting the install, and it looks like Virtual Machine Manager won’t let you add a device while the vm is running. Luckily, following as answer on this post, you can add a device on the fly with this command:
virsh attach-disk vmname /dev/sr0 hdc --type cdromI then loaded the virtio driver from this location on the mounted iso:
Next I got this rather cryptic error message:
"Windows is unable to install to the selected location. Error: 0x80300001."
Apparently this is a common error regardless of whether you’re installing Windows 8 in a VM or not. The quick explanation – unmount the virtio drivers iso, put back the install iso (or actual DVD) and refresh. Select partition (or create one) and continue. See here.
After completing all the prompts during install, success, Windows 8.1 virtualized using KVM on Linux Mint!
Post install, to get the virtio network card drivers install, mount the virtio iso disk, use the Control Panel/Drivers to view devices, pick the network card, then point to the NetKVM dir.
Next challenge, getting better video drivers installed (taking a look at Spice).
Using Grub Customizer to … do what it says
Customizing your Grub2 config by hand is not a trivial task. On a re-purposed desktop over the past couple of months I’ve installed a bunch of different OSes, and my Grub menu on boot is a mess to say the least.
After installing more than one bootable Linux, you also (unless there’s a workaround for this?) end up with each Linux having it’s own grub config (/boot/grub/grub.cfg), although only one (the last installed) will have installed it’s config to your MBR. There’s a good question/answer on this here. In my case I do have two Linux installs, Mint and Kubuntu, so I did have to look at the config of each and work out which was currently installed to the MBR before I started doing any editing of the configs.
Luckily there’s an easier way to customize what OSes you have in your menu, using Grub Customizer – for install and usage see post here.
Part of my mess is having a prior install of Vista, upgraded to Windows 8, and then later upgraded to Windows 10. The boot menu options left behind are now for some reason a mix of all 3, even though only Windows 10 is actually installed and bootable. Plus I have a few Linux distros too:
Switching to View/Show Hidden, you can uncheck the menu entries you don’t want displayed, so that’s an easy fix. There’s plenty more options to configure and customize too, but for simple menu housecleaning, it’s an easier option than attempting to edit the grub config files by hand.
Ubuntu Ctrl-Alt-T Terminal window shortcut
I don’t know why I had never come across this before, but as an incredibly handy shortcut to open a new terminal window, use: Ctrl-Alt-T
This works on Ubuntu and derivatives, like Mint (is this a common Linux shortcut for all distros?)