Ubuntu Linux - Articles - Zimbio

20 Things to do after installing Ubuntu Linux

Sun, 17 Nov 2008 22:49:37 GMT

posted by lamenews

Generally, in any operating system when you first install it fresh, you don’t get all the goodies. You have to install and download various applications and install them to make it suitable for your personal taste and requirement. Same is the case with Ubuntu as well. Unlike Windows, you have email client (Evolution) and an office suite (OpenOffice.org) by default loaded when you first install it. (Microsoft wants you to buy them separately and install it. But that’s a different debatable topic.)

In fact you are better off with default Ubuntu installation without a need for further customization and installation. However if you are like me, you want even more, more and more…

So I have prepared a list of applications and plugins I need to install after I fresh install Ubuntu.

Tip: If you don’t want to install every application you loaded on Ubuntu everytime you upgrade or reinstall Ubuntu, create a SEPARATE partition for HOME. Having a separate HOME partition makes your life lot easier going forward, believe me.

I have prepared the below list based on my personal choice and requirement, your taste and requirements might vary. But the below mentioned applications are Best in Class for Ubuntu loving people. And you may at least want to try them once. Here is a step by step list for my Ubuntu customization:

Go to Applications -> Add/Remove Programs. From the drop down on right, select All available applications. Now select the following applications’ checkbox from the list:

Advanced CCSM: To enable eyecandy effects such as shown below and much more than that. You will forget Vista I am sure once you use it. You may even get different wallpapers on different desktops. How to get different wallpapers on each workspace. Check out this post.
Avant Windows Navigator (AWN): This will give you a dock same as in Mac. See the image with bottom deck of icons on desktop.
Gstreamer Extra Plugins: Gstreamer plugins are required for media playback and all. Because I am sure you would definitely have some mp3 and all. This is for providing the system rquired codecs.
Ubuntu Restricted Extras: These extras will provide you many plugins and add-ons required for Mozilla Firefox and other applications to run smoothly. Extras include Java, Flash player, Browser media plugins and lot of other things. Check description for complete list while installing.
MS Core fonts: You won’t find Times New Roman and other Microsoft propreitary fonts in Ubuntu. So this plugin will install those fonts on your Ubuntu machine.
Mozilla Thunderbird: If you are a great fan of Thunderbird email client, then install this application for your email client. Else you can use Evolution -the default email client in Ubuntu.
Lightning: If you installed Thunderbird, then you will definitely need to install Lightning which adds a calendar to Thunderbird. (Thunderbird by itself lacks Calendar functionality.)
Firefox Add-on: I am sure you need to install lots of Firefox add-ons. I am writing another post to cover that topic separately. Here are the 50 Firefox add-ons you should DEFINITELY use.
gtkRecordMyDesktop: This one is good if you want to create a quick tutorial of some application or something else running on your machine. This application catures everything you are doing on your screen. It’s a good application for bloggers like me.
Scribus: Scribus is good for those who want to create Newsletter, Magazine and similar looking material. It is a Desktop Publishing tool which has got a cool set of features.
Samba: If you have more than one computer in your house, you would definitely wanna make a Home network or at least wanna share files between the two. Samba enables you to do that easily.
Yahoo! Zimbra Desktop: Zimbra is a new one in the list of applications to be installed on Ubuntu. It is another email client which has got cool features and makes you able to read your Yahoo and other emails with ease. Zimbra has got everything you will need from a Desktop email client. For complete features, read this post.
Miro: Miro is a video player which can play any video file and best of all you can save Youtube videos. To install the latest Miro, follow the instructions mentioned on Miro webpage.

Quick tip:
Add “deb http://ftp.osuosl.org/pub/pculture.org/miro/linux/repositories/ubuntu hardy/” (without quotes) to the Third Party repositories. Reload and install miro by searching in Synaptic.
Wine: Wine enables you to run most of the Windows applications on Ubuntu. Install it as mentioned on WineHQ site.

Quick Tip:

Open Terminal-> Copy and paste “wget -q http://wine.budgetdedicated.com/apt/387EE263.gpg -O- | sudo apt-key add -” to add key.
Copy and paste “sudo wget http://wine.budgetdedicated.com/apt/sources.list.d/hardy.list -O /etc/apt/sources.list.d/winehq.list”
Type “sudo apt-get update”.
Type “sudo aptitude install Wine”
Google Earth: You don’t need any detail for it. Go and install Google earth as mentioned in this post.
Skype: Download the latest Skype and install by double-clicking on it. Follow the prompts on screen.
Gizmo Project: If you don’t like Skype, you might want to try Gizmo which is another application for internet based calls.
Linux Back-port Modules: This is for those having issues with Wi-fi LED light not lighting while Wi-fi is in use. Just search for Linux Back-port Modules and install it through Synaptic. After you restart your system, wi-fi LED will lit.
Songbird: Songbird is a open source alternative for iTunes and Windows Media Player with very cool features and customization possibilities. Install Songbird 0.7 as mentioned in my other post.
Go to System ->Preferences ->Appearance ->Visual Effects and select Extra. That will activate your Video card driver. In my case it is NVIDIA. The changes will take place after you restart.

Finally restart your machine just to make sure everything is working properly. BTW, if you happen to install any Linux kernel update, you will have to restart anyways. If you want you might want to remove the older kernels to save some space and some clutter from the booting menu.

Over to you:

Now tell me if your selection of application on Ubuntu is different from mine.? If yes, then what applications you would suggest me to try. Or simply if the post was helpful for new Ubuntu users.

Invaded by Linux Desktop

Sun, 17 Nov 2008 02:22:00 GMT

posted by gwendogould

Internet Café Invaded by Linux Desktop

A while ago, I was in an Internet café at a tiny mall here in Bohol for a quick check at my Email. The place has around 40-50 desktop computers with decent tech specs and with LCD monitors. I’ve been there before and have noticed that most of their machines ran in Windows, while a few ran in Mac OS X. Linux was nowhere to be found.

But today is different. I saw a monitor displaying brownish desktop wallpaper that made me smile. Yes, it’s definitely Ubuntu. I later found out that they have installed Ubuntu in about 10 of their PC’s.

I then picked a computer to use, and of course selected a Linux one. To start using the PC, you have to insert (like a jukebox) a 5-peso coin that would be good for 10 minutes.

I learned that they are using Ubuntu "Hardy Heron" with the still buggy Beta version of Firefox 3, so I hope their technicians will do an update as soon as possible. Anyway, I think Hardy is pretty much stable with their hardware, and there were no other major annoyances that I have encountered. I just hope a lot of people will notice how speedy Linux is compared to Windows.

Read more: http://www.junauza.com/

Ubuntu to get prettier than OS X?

Thu, 14 Nov 2008 19:12:00 GMT

posted by thebigklosowski
Word on the street is that Ubuntu is going to get prettified in the near future.

Well, maybe not that prettified.

From the original article:

When Mark Shuttleworth, the man behind Canonical/Ubuntu, made the comment that Ubuntu should be prettier than Apple OSX in near term I got excited - the man was absolutely right. It doesn’t matter how customizable and operating is, or how good can you make it look with some effort if it does look bad out of the box. The out-of-the-box experience is the key to reach the average users, and if that is not aesthetically pleasing a lot of effort is needed to win the user back. Interestingly Ubuntu with their orange/brown themes and very basic Gnome looks is possibly the worst looking distribution out of the major players. So here comes release 8.10, the Intrepid Ibex - a first step to the direction of making Ubuntu look good? We’ll see about that…
....
Unfortunately the Ubuntu Intrepid Ibex does not live up to it’s name. It lacks any ground braking changes, innovation in design or brave new approaches on the visuals and usability.

One of my biggest complaints with Linux is the lack of a truly streamlined desktop experience. Each developer takes their own route for user interface and "prettification". This mean inconsistent menus, strange window behaviors, and even conflicting theming options that seeming to fight each other for control. I'm not a n00b, I've been running Linux for over 8 years now.

The real problem is, to impose usability standards on applications goes against the open-source grain of exploration and creativity in problem solving. There is no Steve Jobs to force developers into doing it in any particular way, and developers don't want that either. End users are another story.

I'd also argue that "pretty" is not vital to an OS, but usable is. Therein lies the rub for me. Until Linux runs Photoshop natively, it's usability as a desktop for me is dimished. Also, OS X has the pretty interface and the BSD based functionality to make it a daily driver operating system.

That being said, all of my servers are some flavor of linux.

So for now, I'd say embrace Linux for what it is - a user-friendly distribution with serious horsepower under the hood for power users. If you haven't tried it, and you are a Windows user, you should. Immediately. For OS X users, your mileage may vary.

Setting Up ProFTPd + TLS On Ubuntu 8.10 (Intrepid Ibex)

Sun, 17 Nov 2008 16:45:00 GMT

posted by yogindar

FTP is a very insecure protocol because all passwords and all data are transferred in clear text. By using TLS, the whole communication can be encrypted, thus making FTP much more secure. This article explains how to set up ProFTPd with TLS on an Ubuntu 8.10 server.

Ubuntu Linux Hack - How to Install Fresh Copy of Ubuntu without Losing your Current Program Settings!

Wed, 13 Nov 2008 08:42:32 GMT

posted by zedomax

If you are a hard-core Ubuntu/Linux supporter like me, you will need to learn how to save your programs when you install a fresh copy of Ubuntu.

Here’s how to do it:

Configuration

Keeping your configuration intact is pretty straight forward and obvious. Just backup your /home folder onto an external drive or whatever. Make sure you also grab the hidden files, don’t do my mistake!
Applications

Now for the current applications. Basically we just need to make a full list of the installed apps.
sudo dpkg –get-selections > /home/user/package.selections

Of course don’t forget to backup package.selections on the external hard-drive. Also you should backup your /etc/apt/sources.list file since you probably have some extra sources listed over there. Now you can go about your business and do a fresh install.
Restore

Once your done with the fresh install, copy the file package.selections into your home. Then copy your sources.list file into /etc/apt/ and update it to match your current distro (e.g Gutsy –> Intrepid) you can use CTRL + H in gedit for that. Then do a “sudo apt-get update” ,and finally invoke:
sudo dpkg –set-selections /home/package.selections && apt-get dselect-upgrade

apt-get will now start downloading all your apps, this will take some time depending on the number of apps you have installed.

Once that’s done, just copy your backup-ed /home over the current /home (again don’t forget hidden folders).

Log out and log back in to your shiny new fresh install!

source

Brought to you by: Zedomax.com

Ubuntu Linux Hack - How to Install Fresh Copy of Ubuntu without Losing your Current Program Settings!