20 Things to do after installing Ubuntu Linux
Sep 4, 2008 by Anurag Bansal 
106 Comments 
Posted under: Apps & Software, Howto, Reviews, Web & Social
106 Comments Posted under: Apps & Software, Howto, Reviews, Web & Social
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.
Hey, one more thing, this post is the 100th post of 2008.
Hey, one more thing, this post is the 100th post of 2008.
Update # 1 (11/16/08) : 50 Firefox Add-ons list added.
Update # 2 (11/16/08) : This article just appeared on Front Page of Digg.com. Thanks everyone for all those Diggs and comments.
Update # 2 (11/16/08) : This article just appeared on Front Page of Digg.com. Thanks everyone for all those Diggs and comments.
20 things to do after installing Ubuntu…..playing games is not one of them.
This isn’t really a good list. Also the Oxygen icons are far better than the default Ubuntu ones. Ubuntu Tweak helps do a few things that make your life easier. Also installing the real OpenOffice. Google Desktop, Picasa, Google Gadgets, Dropbox, Virtualbox, Adobe Reader and Adobe Air are some great apps.
AHhhhhhhhh! That STUPID annoying Windows Error sound is driving me insane. I can get past the crappy layout but that ridiculous, never ending pinging noise from the ad was too much.
YOUR SITE SUX!!!!
Not a bad list, but…
Buried for being a terribly written article on a horribly designed site.
What ever the crap u install/un-install….you linux guys never forget windows and its applications…
Long live, wine…!!
~ramki
poor english. sounds like a spammer wrote the list. there is no word to describe the site design.
the list is fair. if you’re new to the ubuntu scene, this would be a good list to go by.
if the site theme was a little clearer, had less ads on the sidebar and on link roll-overs, and if the english was not so ‘nigerian spammer’ dialect, i think they’d be on to something.
Ubuntu comes with some broken media player that chokes on half the files and has like 1 or 2 options.
So the first thing to do is to install VLC. Oh, and don’t try to remove the broken default player, doing so makes Ubuntu think that you’re trying to install the entirety of ubuntu because the player is part of the default install.
-golfclap-
Agreed. He missed the point in Miro’s capability as a video RSS aggregator. But for a nice lightweight all-in-one video player, VLC is definitely the way to go.
ubuntu doesn’t come with VLC, and installing it should have been on this list
What about VLC
Or does Ubuntu come with that default these days? It’s been a while for us….
I really wonder at many stupid comments posted above. Many of these comments really don’t give credit to the author for the nice list produced. For the one who posted this article, don’t worry about these arrogant comments which is really spoiling the image of digg. You can try http://www.dzone.com instead. People there really give useful comments unlike some useless ones posted above.
The site still seems a bit “busy” with all the images and sidebar advertising………
Sometimes simple is just better, like a link to an image/screenshot instead of posting the actual image….
What’s wrong with the website? Who doesn’t like baby-poo green on black, with impossible to read fonts?
Sadly, several of the suggestions include mistakes — no need to install restricted-extras AND GStreamer extra codes, for example. Also, he states that choosing extra effects will activate your GPU driver, which it won’t. A for effort. C for execution.
Some of these are no-brainers, like the codecs.. but Yahoo! Zimbra Desktop and multiple VOIP clients… no thanks
Wow – I could not even stand your web “design” more than 6 seconds.
Are you coming from a win-turd background ?
Who needs all these “effects” ?
My eyes would get sore watching that stuff more than 10 sec.
It does not mean I am not missing something by not comparing your list to mine, but this kind of “special effects” pages make me sick.
Goof luck though … with Ubu you are on the right track.
Nice list, I install more or less the same applications on a fresh install. Another interesting utility is ‘startupmanager’ which lets you tweak Grub and boot splash settings and themes.
@Spayder26:
If you read carefully, that’s what it says.
“Provides more aesthetic pleasant set of effects.”
As soon as you select that the first time, it will ask you to enable the propreitary driver.
I think for everyone, the steps should be the same.
Though you can enable you Proprietary video card driver first and then change this setting. In that case, it won’t show that window.
Is there something I am missing here…??
@Alex:
I haven’t used Kubuntu yet. So not sure about the list. But stay tuned…for similar articles on Ubuntu. The procedure should be the same I think.
To everyone:
Please do not execute any command mentioned in the comments (specially Comment # 29). To be on the safer side, I suggest never use any command which includes “rm -rf *”.
If you do, please search well, what it does. It will just wipe your entire system.
Leaving ‘Anonymous’ comments shows the credibility of that comment. That’s why NO MORE ANONYMOUS comments on this blog.
Say with ‘AUTHORITY’ if you wanna say something, else don’t say anything. At least people won’t give bad advice.
I am not an expert, but at least I don’t give wrong advice.
Hope that sounds fair to everyone.
Thanks
Anurag Bansal
# 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.
What's that? That only enables desktop effects stupids!
If you wanna install your propietary drivers, you need use the propietary driver manager.
Thanks for the tips. They’re useful
in ubuntu, launchy, in Kubuntu, exist Katapult
My list. It is for Kubuntu, but still.
1.StarDict
2.Wine
3.FireFox
4.Krita
5.Rar, 7z
6.Krusader
7.KDiff3
8.SuperKaramba
9.compiz-kde + ccsm
10.Dvju viewer
11.Mplayer
12.aMule
13.additional codecs for Kaffeine && for Amarok
14.mc
15.lm-sensors
16.hddtemp
If yo are familiar enough I would love to see a similar Kubuntu list.
what about cheese and virtualbox?
also, maybe you could put something in there about upgrading to openoffice.org 3.0, since i’m pretty sure 8.10 doesn’t come with it by default.
great guide.
Are you serious on no.1?! Is eyecandy really the most important thing for you? Or perhaps the only thing you can do with Ubuntu is show off your funky desktop with no functionality what-so-ever. You wanna know why so few people commented? Well… there’s at least one such ‘article’ per week on digg… I guess that they see how useless it is and leave quickly.
Way to be a duesch
Songbird 0.7? You know that v1.0 came out a week or two ago, right?
Didn’t knew about Gizmo, looks very damn promising and i’m looking to try it out, but i can’t manage to get a 64bit architecture binary for (k)ubuntu :/
Here is another overview of FOSS software, Ubuntu and other OS: http://hellebaard.nl/en/software
What’s wrong with the word “anyway”? “Anyways” is what they say in West Virginia and other hillbilly places. Are you a hillbilly? Or a hillbilly wannabe?
You’re “sure you would definitely have some mp3 and all”? Is this English? I can’t read any more.
don’t be a jerk
Thanks for the list. I think VLC worth a mention too.
yc
Samba is hardly easy to setup or use for new and inexperienced user……..I think it’s only fair if you would add a link to some tutorials for that.
Thank you.
Good article! I would like to point out, though, that you don’t necessarily have to separate /home into another partition (although that IS probably the best practice). You can simply choose not to format your root partition when you re-install Ubuntu, or when you freshly install the next version. See here: http://www.dslreports.com/forum/r21346507-
You should think about telling people how to do the things you mention. Or at least link to other pages that do tell them, much like you did with google earth.
Interesting list. I think you focus too much on prorietary downloads, which is in general something to be avoided, whenever possible.
About your site though…it almost killed my computer. You don’t need this many scripts running on your site. My music literally skipped for about a second from the load this site put on the processor. And I’m running adblock. I should go install noscript just for your site.
Normally I wouldn&t comment, but reading the comments…
Thanks;) Useful post!
hamachi is one of my first installs.. gotta have my private virtual network to my computers back home!
i also couldn’t live without virtualbox
How about medibuntu for media codecs?
What about GNOME Do?
No there is a way to do it after you have installed Ubuntu as well. Search Ubuntuforums.org to get that how-to. It is very well described there.
Sorry, I don’t have the link right now. But I can post it later on.
But at the same time it doesn’t take much time to even re-install if you want to, to create a separate Home as well.
Hope it helps.
Cheers
Anurag Bansal
Great tips. I’ll be sure to use some of these.
For beginners like me: your MUCH appreciated tip of having “separate partition” like HOME for example is a bit unclear. If I installed Ubuntu already; do I have to reinstall and Create this HOME or what ?
I really enjoyed your article it was an eye opener for someone like me who JUST got in !!!
Other useful applications are:
Googlizer – highlight any word/phrase, click on Googlizer and firefox will open in a new tab with the search results.
Liferea – RSS reader, a no fuss reader
Device Manager – very handy to check on your computer devices
DeVeDe – make your own DVD’s
k9copy and/or dvd::rip – backup your DVD’s
VLC – media player
K3b – disc burner
ConvertAll – handy unit converter, weights, length, area, volume etc, hundreds of units.
Thanks a lot for your addition to the list.
You are absolutely right. If you start compiling, there will be numerous applications you can install on *nix.
I am really thankful for everyone digging this post.
I am feeling happy that this post has just appeared on Front page of Digg.
Cheers
You forgot some of the other core programs for a complete 'nix setup (or they're preinstalled with the 'buntu suites, I'm a Gentoo guy
). Them being:
Dia – Visio-like clone for 'nix
Blender – Free 3D modelling program with easy support for render farms
GIMP – Photoshop on 'nix
XChat – good IRC client
Also, don't forget you can install *anything* that's for 'nix even if it's not in your package manager. Every 'nix person should read up on how to compile from source, I had no idea what I was missing until i learned the all important
"make config && make && make install" line.
UBuntu totally rocks! Escellent tips!
Jess
http://www.privacy.mx.tc
Thanks for the list Anurag.
On number 5, try instead to install RedHats fonts that match those from MS.
sudo aptitude install ttf-liberation
Then go to Firefox settings and change default font to Serif(it replace Times New Roman from MS). You also get Sans(replace Arial) and Mono(replace Courier New).
Oh thanks a lot my friend.
Cheers..
man, simply excellent list!
it’s really a wonder why anyone hasn’t dugg this yet.
dugg! ^_^
@naseeh:
Thanks…
Happy that you found it useful.
About people commenting on posts: Depends on people, some appreciate what other do, some don’t. Some find it useful, but don’t like to add anything to it. And some people read and just leave.
It is really surprising to see that one of my latest article got around 5000 visits in a day but I got just 2 comments on it.
But anyways, I appreciate your comment.
Cheers
Anurag Bansal
thank you for the nice tips… i’m surprise no one else has commented..
and congrats on your 100th post!