the initial configs

I just finished my first Linux post, but I wanted to get this stuff out before it was forgotten. Technical details...

I installed with the wrong hostname. I used olly when I should've used sifl. Tsk tsk. Anyway, I knew there was a way to change my hostname. I also knew that the bare hostname command wouldn't be permanent. I googled and found that, on Ubuntu at least, all I needed was to edit /etc/hostname and "restart" the "service." This was done by issuing the command

/etc/init.d/hostname.sh start

There really isn't a service. Not that I can see, at least. And nothing happens if you attempt to "stop" it. That script just seems to set the HOSTNAME environment variable. It's called automagically on startup through the S02hostname.sh service file listed in my /etc/rc#.d directories. Odd thing though: once I changed it, I couldn't launch new terminals in X. I'm not sure I could launch any new applications, actually. Strange, dontcha think? Well, a short robot fixed it. That would be a "reboot" to all of you not speaking e-craziness right now. An X restart probably would have as well.

And VNC. There is nothing called VNC here. I decided that "Remote Desktop" was layman for VNC, so I enabled that under the Preference menu. After opening a port on my router/firewall, I was able to connect from work. I was not, however, able to see anything. I even asked cep (over IM) if my computer seemed to be functioning correctly. It was, so I was baffled. Upon returning home this evening, I realized that a request prompt was waiting for me. "Do you want to allow remote desktop access from this address?" or something similar. Yes. Yes, I do. The remedy was unchecking "Ask you for confirmation" in the Remote Desktop preferences dialog. Pretty simple and easily tested. Slow though. Hopefully that won't be an issue.