I have no idea why anyone would want to do a File System ChecK on a license but I have seen fsck used in this manner so I do too Seriously though, how many people really care about the license they are using?

"... they were afraid to run fsck for several months". That little sentence fragment was part of a support email I received this week. I've heard similar things in the past. The fear is that fsck will "make things worse".

If you have been using Ubuntu for a while, you probably know that after 30 boots Ubuntu runs a check on the hard disk. This “Fsck” check slows down booting a lot. AutoFsck runs the check on shutdown instead, and asks you if it is a good time first. If the occasional slow boot is a problem for you, AutoFsck is perfect.

Ever want to boot up your Ubuntu Linux system really quick to look something up? Sure, I think we all do that from time to time. Hate it when you get the forced file system check because you’ve booted up 30 times? I do.

Here's a little mystery for you. Imagine you have three files on a Windows machine called: HTML_File.htm, PDF_File.pdf and Text_File.txt. Windows will have no problem opening the appropriate program when you double-click them because of those three-letter extensions. If however you drop the extensions or mix them up, you'll have problems. Now copy the three files to a Linux machine.

FSlint is a simple yet very easy to use utility to find and clean various forms of lint on a filesystem. i.e., unwanted or problematic cruft in your files or file names. For example, one form of lint it finds is duplicate files. FSlint operates in both GUI and Command Line mode and the GUI is very straight forward to use especially there isn’t much of hidden menu options

So I have a laptop that I've been upgrading since Hardy (currently on Karmic Alpha) that I would like to boot faster. It has probably accumulated a lot of crufty daemons along the way that probably aren't being pre-loaded into memory. I picked up this tidbit from the fast boot expert. Add profile to your kernel command-line (at the grub prompt, press Esc e and then edit the line).

I have a portable USB drive that has an ext3 Linux partition and a FAT Windows partition. The drive is a bit flaky due, I'm pretty sure, inadequate power from the USB connection. My solution in the next few paragraphs is less than ideal, and I've since found a better way to make my drive work.

There are some out there who would like for you to believe that Linux is unsafe. What better way to instill fear than to form doubt in your mind about a system’s abilities to protect your data?