How about installing new hardware AFTER system installation?

[mmealman]

Eric Feliksik Wrote: 
> Ubuntu is great, and it only becomes better. Hardware support is 
> increasing, and most cases all hardware is detected automatically.
> 
> But what are the mechanisms to install hardware after installing the 
> Ubuntu system? I believe plugging in a usb-mouse while X.org is running
> 
> will not make it work - last time I did it at my girlfriends computer I
> 
> didn't know how to get it to work without editing the config file.
> 
> Is this changed? Or is there being worked on this to change, and let 
> added hardware automatically detected while X.org is running? How about
> 
> new soundcards, videocards, etcetera? (ok, let's not switch videocards
> 
> while X is running - but you get the point ;-) )
> 
> Thanks in advance for your replies,
> 
> 

This isn't an Ubuntu issue so much as a Linux configuration issue.
First off, Linux can respond better than say Windows when it comes to
changing hardware around. All the hardware support in the kernel is
handled by modules and the kernel will pretty much load the proper
module when you change the hardware around.

But let's say you swap where your HDs are in your drive bay. That will
swap the drive letters and cause your fstab file to be wrong. Your
sound card should work pretty much automatically and so should your
mouse if the mouse protocol being used it compatible to your last one.

In fact when I upgraded my mouse to a Mx510 Ubuntu picked it right
up(didn't even need to reboot), but under windows I had to boot
multiple times, uninstall drivers, etc to get it to work.

So to answer your question, if the hardware is supported by the Linux
kernel you can unplug, replug, swap, and so on to your heart's content
and Linux will happily load the needed module. But if the hardware
requires a different config from your old hardware, you'll need to
tweak. This won't easily change until the hardware in question starts
to use pretty much the same type of configs(like today most mice are
the same and sound cards config the same way too pretty much).


-- 
mmealman