Shutter: a feature rich screenshot tool

Shutter is an advanced screen shot taking tool. You can take screen shot of customised snaps of objects in your desktop. You can select particular area or windows of applications visible in Linux Desktop.

Shutter package is available in Ubuntu software repository.
You install shutter either using command Terminal or Synaptic Manager.

Home page of shutter is http://shutter-project.org/

How to add new icon themes for your desktop

If you are not satisfied with existing icon themes available in your default desktop, you can add more beautiful icon themes from Gnome-Look.org

Follow the steps,

Download icon sets from gnome-look.org

Unzip the content and put in .icons folder in your home.

.icons folder is a hidden folder. To see the folder, open file manager View > Show Hidden FIles  

Right Click Desktop and open 'Change Desktop Background' option.

Select Theme  > Customise > Icons

You can find the icon set you put in the .icon folder.
Select it and close the window.

Install VMware player in Ubuntu 10.04

VMware Player is another virtual machine application helpful to run other operating systems inside your host OS.

Download the package from following link, you need to acquire login ID and password to download the application, 

www.vmware.com/products/player/

Installation

Open a terminal from Application > Accessories

type the following commands,

sudo su
sh VM [press tab buttom to auto complete the file name]

After installation VMware Player will appear in Applications > System Tools

Install LAMP server in Ubuntu using one command

Open Applications > Accessories > Terminal


Enter following commands,


sudo su

sudo apt-get install lamp-server^

How to install Virtualbox in Ubuntu properly?

Virtual Box is useful application for installing other operating systems inside your Linux installation without disturbing your hard disc. It is very easy to mange a guest OS using Virtual Box.

I prefer to use Virtual Box PUEL ( Personal Use and Evaluation License) edition. You can download from here,

http://www.virtualbox.org/wiki/Downloads

Choose a suitable version of Virtual Box for your Ubuntu. Download it and install by give a double click on it.

Next step is Open a terminal and give the following command,

sudo su

sudo usermod -a -G vboxusers username

Download and Install VirtualBox Extension Pack from same page.

It help to manage USB 2.0 devices with Virtual Box.

You can start Virtual Box  from Applications > System > Virtual Box

Note: If you get following error message "Virtual box kernel driver not installed" when you try to run Virutal box,

try the following commands.

sudo apt-get install linux-headers-`uname -r`

/etc/init.d/vboxdrv setup  

Conky for your Linux Desktop

Conky is an application which useful for system monitoring and beautify your Linux Desktop.

Please follow the steps to install Conky,

Open  System > Synaptic Package Manager

 Search for conky, select and install.

You can also install through Applications > Ubuntu Software Centre

It will appear in desktop after finish the installation process. 

Change the look and feel of Conky

Open conky configuration file using Applications > Accessories > Terminal

Type the following commands in Terminal,


sudo su
gedit /etc/conky/conky.conf


It will open the configuration file.
The display of Conky depend on script inside the conky.conf file.
Copy and paste the following script in the conky.conf file. Save it.

# Use Xft?
use_xft yes
xftfont DejaVu Sans:size=8
xftalpha 0.8
text_buffer_size 2048

# Update interval in seconds
update_interval 4

# This is the number of times Conky will update before quitting.
# Set to zero to run forever.
total_run_times 0

# Create own window instead of using desktop (required in nautilus)
own_window yes
own_window_transparent yes
own_window_type normal
own_window_hints undecorated,below,sticky,skip_taskbar,skip_pager

# Use double buffering (reduces flicker, may not work for everyone)
double_buffer yes

# Minimum size of text area
minimum_size 180 0
#maximum_width 200

# Draw shades?
draw_shades no

# Draw outlines?
draw_outline no

# Draw borders around text
draw_borders no

# Stippled borders?
stippled_borders 0

# border margins
border_margin 5

# border width
border_width 1

# Default colors and also border colors
default_color white
#default_shade_color black
#default_outline_color grey
own_window_colour grey

# Text alignment, other possible values are commented
#alignment top_left
alignment top_right
#alignment bottom_left
#alignment bottom_right

# Gap between borders of screen and text
# same thing as passing -x at command line
gap_x 35
gap_y 35

# Subtract file system buffers from used memory?
no_buffers yes

# set to yes if you want all text to be in uppercase
uppercase no

# number of cpu samples to average
# set to 1 to disable averaging
cpu_avg_samples 2

# number of net samples to average
# set to 1 to disable averaging
net_avg_samples 2

# Force UTF8? note that UTF8 support required XFT
override_utf8_locale yes

# Add spaces to keep things from moving about?  This only affects certain objects.
use_spacer none

TEXT
SYSTEM ${hr 2}
#${alignc 17}${font Arial Black:size=16}omns${font}
#${alignc}smile, breathe and go slowly
${voffset 2}${font OpenLogos:size=16}u${font}   Kernel:  ${alignr}${kernel}
${font StyleBats:size=16}A${font}   CPU1: ${cpu cpu1}% ${alignr}${cpubar cpu1 8,60}
${font StyleBats:size=16}A${font}   CPU2: ${cpu cpu2}% ${alignr}${cpubar cpu2 8,60}
${font StyleBats:size=16}g${font}   RAM: $memperc% ${alignr}${membar 8,60}
${font StyleBats:size=16}j${font}   SWAP: $swapperc% ${alignr}${swapbar 8,60}
#${font Webdings:size=16}~${font}  Battery: ${battery_percent BAT0}% ${alignr}${battery_bar 8,60 BAT0}
${font StyleBats:size=16}q${font}   Uptime: ${alignr}${uptime}

DATE ${hr 2}
${alignc 17}${font Arial Black:size=16}${time %H:%M}${font}
${alignc}${time %A %d %B %Y}

HD ${hr 2}
${voffset 4}${font Pie charts for maps:size=14}7${font}   ${voffset -5}Root:
${voffset 4}${fs_used /}/${fs_size /} ${alignr}${fs_bar 8,60 /}
${font Pie charts for maps:size=14}7${font}   ${voffset -5}Home:
${voffset 4}${fs_used /home}/${fs_size /home} ${alignr}${fs_bar 8,60 /home}

NETWORK ${hr 2}
${if_existing /proc/net/route wlan0}
${voffset -6}${font PizzaDude Bullets:size=14}O${font}   Up: ${upspeed wlan0} kb/s ${alignr}${upspeedgraph wlan0 8,60 BEBEBE BEBEBE}
${voffset 4}${font PizzaDude Bullets:size=14}U${font}   Down: ${downspeed wlan0} kb/s ${alignr}${downspeedgraph wlan0 8,60 BEBEBE BEBEBE}
${voffset 4}${font PizzaDude Bullets:size=14}N${font}   Upload: ${alignr}${totalup wlan0}
${voffset 4}${font PizzaDude Bullets:size=14}T${font}   Download: ${alignr}${totaldown wlan0}
${voffset 4}${font PizzaDude Bullets:size=14}Z${font}   Signal: ${wireless_link_qual wlan0}% ${alignr}${wireless_link_bar 8,60 wlan0}
${voffset 4}${font PizzaDude Bullets:size=14}a${font}   Local Ip: ${alignr}${addr wlan0}
${else}${if_existing /proc/net/route eth0}
${voffset -6}${font PizzaDude Bullets:size=14}O${font}   Up: ${upspeed eth0} kb/s ${alignr}${upspeedgraph eth0 8,60 789E2D A7CC5C}
${voffset 4}${font PizzaDude Bullets:size=14}U${font}   Down: ${downspeed eth0} kb/s ${alignr}${downspeedgraph eth0 8,60 789E2D A7CC5C}
${voffset 4}${font PizzaDude Bullets:size=14}N${font}   Upload: ${alignr}${totalup eth0}
${voffset 4}${font PizzaDude Bullets:size=14}T${font}   Download: ${alignr}${totaldown eth0}
${voffset 4}${font PizzaDude Bullets:size=14}a${font}   Local Ip: ${alignr}${addr eth0}
${endif}${else}${if_existing /proc/net/route eth1}
${voffset -6}${font PizzaDude Bullets:size=14}O${font}   Up: ${upspeed eth1} kb/s ${alignr}${upspeedgraph eth1 8,60 789E2D A7CC5C}
${voffset 4}${font PizzaDude Bullets:size=14}U${font}   Down: ${downspeed eth1} kb/s ${alignr}${downspeedgraph eth1 8,60 789E2D A7CC5C}
${voffset 4}${font PizzaDude Bullets:size=14}N${font}   Upload: ${alignr}${totalup eth1}
${voffset 4}${font PizzaDude Bullets:size=14}T${font}   Download: ${alignr}${totaldown eth1}
${voffset 4}${font PizzaDude Bullets:size=14}a${font}   Local Ip: ${alignr}${addr eth1}
${endif}${else}
${font PizzaDude Bullets:size=14}4${font}   Network Unavailable
${endif}

PROCESSES ${hr 2}
NAME $alignr PID    CPU
${top name 1} $alignr ${top pid 1} ${top cpu 1}
${top name 2} $alignr ${top pid 2} ${top cpu 2}
${top name 3} $alignr ${top pid 3} ${top cpu 3}
${top name 4} $alignr ${top pid 4} ${top cpu 4}
${top name 5} $alignr ${top pid 5} ${top cpu 5}
${top name 6} $alignr ${top pid 6} ${top cpu 6}
${top name 7} $alignr ${top pid 7} ${top cpu 7}
${top name 8} $alignr ${top pid 8} ${top cpu 8}

Download and install following fonts,

openlogos 

stylebats

Make conky autostart at booting.

System > Preferences > Startup Applications

Add the entry for conky there.

Restart the system.

More Ubuntu based distros

Most of the people are familiar with Ubuntu Linux. But, many people want more customizations in Ubuntu for their requirements.
Customizations in look and feel, applications and more device drivers is needed.
Some people want a fast Ubuntu for the laptop and low resource PC. Lack of know how and good Internet speed prevent common users to customize their Ubuntu. I found many Ubuntu based customized distros suitable to cater your requirements. These Ubuntu based distributions are ready to use, no need to install additional multimedia codecs and applications.

Linux Mint

Mature Ubuntu based Linux. Available with Gnome, KDE, XFCE, LXDE, Open Box desktop. There is an application available with Linux Mint to install your Wireless driver. Multimedia codecs and Flash preloaded.

PinguyOS

The GUI is customised well using Conky and Docky. Many useful applications filled with PinguyOS. Torrent is available for fast downloading.

Ultimateedition

Many useful applications prepacked with this Ubuntu based OS.
Available with Gnome, XFCE and LXDE  desktop.

Element OS

Element OS is a 32 bit Xubuntu based distro for home theatre PCs.


Bodhi 

Bodhi is a super fast Linux using Enlightenment lightweight Desktop.
Enlightenment need only minimum resources to run, so it can alive your old PC.

Zorin OS
This Ubuntu based distro is suitable for new comers to Linux.

Dream Linux
Very user friendly and fast linux based on Debian.

Linux is a garden, various distros are flowers in the garden. Free Software culture encourage creativity and diversity.

Docky for your desktop

Docky is a short cut bar in Linux Desktop. You can quickly launch applications from Docky.  You can try to install it in your Ubuntu.

Open  System > Synaptic Package Manager

 Search for docky, select and install.

You can also install through Applications > Ubuntu Software Centre

It will appear in desktop after finish the installation process.

You can open control center for Dock customization. There, you can increase the size of the icons. You can also create another new dock in the same window.
After creating second dock, you have to add Docklets to be display in Dock 2. I selected Book Marks. Book Marks can act as shortcut to many folders in Home folder.