My "great" ubuntu 14.04 LTS totaly crashed after tlp instalation My Dell Inspiron worked like vacuum cleaner with ubuntu 14. Not far I found solution on this forum about tlp power manager that could resolve my problem. But after I tried to use this awesome advise I've got new problem my apt-get just stoped work

➜  ~  sudo apt-get install 4digits
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
You might want to run 'apt-get -f install' to correct these:
The following packages have unmet dependencies:
4digits : Depends: python-glade2 but it is not going to be installed
linux-tools-3.13.0-53 : Depends: linux-tools-common but it is not going to be     installed
E: Unmet dependencies. Try 'apt-get -f install' with no packages (or specify a solution)

I tried to do "apt-get -f install" but it wont work

Preparing to unpack .../linux-tools-common_3.13.0-53.89_all.deb ...
Unpacking linux-tools-common (3.13.0-53.89) ...
dpkg: error processing archive /var/cache/apt/archives/linux-tools-  common_3.13.0-53.89_all.deb (--unpack):
trying to overwrite '/usr/bin/perf', which is also in package linux-   lts- vivid-tools-common 3.19.0-18.18~14.04.1
dpkg-deb: error: subprocess paste was killed by signal (Broken pipe)
Errors were encountered while processing:

/var/cache/apt/archives/linux-tools-common_3.13.0-53.89_all.deb
    E: Sub-process /usr/bin/dpkg returned an error code (1)

After I found a new decision on that forum, they said I just need make

dpkg -r --force-update lts-vivid-tools-common

and after reboot I dont have WiFi and sound anymore. Have I chance restore my installation or that "great" distro might be fix only with reinstallation every time?

I had a similar problem after installing TLP. I solved it by looking for linux-tools-3.13.0-53 in Synaptic and installing it through Synaptic.

You just might need to update the drivers. Go to Dell's website and find the make and model of video and sound card and try to find a driver either;

Find a driver manually online
or
Install the driver through Ubuntu

And, for now, use Ethernet, I guess


How to autorun a ruby script in Ubuntu? How hard can it possibly be to run a ruby script on startup?!

Fairly tough apparently:

I'm using rvm and running ruby 2.3.0.

which ruby returns /home/ubuntu/.rvm/rubies/ruby-2.3.0/bin/ruby
The script location is: /home/redline/sinatra-aggregator/server.rb. I've tried all sorts of chowns and chmods on it, maybe that's got something to do with it.

Server starts. How do I make it run sudo ruby server.rb? Don't even need the sudo.

There's about ten million tutorials on how to do it Using upstart, rc.local or init.d and I don't know what I'm doing because not a single one worked. I even tried crontab.

Currently, my crontab -e looks like this:

@reboot /home/ubuntu/start.sh

/home/ubuntu/start.sh:

/home/ubuntu/.rvm/rubies/ruby-2.3.0/bin/ruby /home/ubuntu/sinatra-aggregator/server.rb >> log.txt

log.txt is always empty, by the way.

I've tried similar setups with rc.local and init.d

Edit:

I tried running the software with nohup, it worked out okay but here's the output of the log:

== Sinatra (v1.4.7) has taken the stage on 3000 for production with backup from Thin
== Sinatra has ended his set (crowd applauds)

    Starting //Blueline Scraper!

Thin web server (v1.6.4 codename Gob Bluth)
Maximum connections set to 1024
Listening on 0.0.0.0:3000, CTRL+C to stop
Stopping ...
Stopping ...
/usr/lib/ruby/1.9.1/rubygems/custom_require.rb:36:in `require': cannot load such file -- sinatra (LoadError)
    from /usr/lib/ruby/1.9.1/rubygems/custom_require.rb:36:in `require'
    from server.rb:2:in `<main>'
ubuntu@ip-172-31-35-95:~/sinatra-aggregator$

I bet you anything it's RVM not providing PATH somehow to the gems that I need as not only they exist on the system but are bundle install'd. Should I use bundle exec in my @reboot directive and if not how do I add $PATH before the script execution?

EDIT:

Tried Michael's solution, didn't work for various reasons explained in comments.

Have you tried this:

cron /home/redline/sinatra-aggregator/server.rb
cron restart

and it might work fine this way.


Firefox installation error in Kubuntu 12.10 I keep getting this error:

Package: /var/cache/apt/archives/firefox_20.0+build1-0ubuntu0.12.10.3_amd64.deb
Error: trying to overwrite '/usr/share/applications/firefox.desktop', which is also in package kubuntu-firefox-installer 12.04ubuntu1

I am only trying to install Firefox as a browser. Interestingly, it will not let me remove the "Firefox Installer" either. Any suggestions?

Thus is an issue with the Kubuntu Firefox installer. The easiest way to fix this is to use Muon package manager to remove the package called kubuntu-firefox-installer.

Then you should be able to install Firefox without a problem. If it still doesn't work, use Muon to install the package firefox-globalmenu.

That took care of my problems.

It worked.

Removing Firefox Installer. In Terminal:

sudo apt-get install kubuntu-firefox-installer

Then type your sudo (your user password) password to install Firefox and Chromium.


Login screen loop in 18.04 Could not get a login screen at first after upgrading from 16.04.
Changed to lightdm and now have a login screen but it seems to be in a loop.
I get a flash of the desktop and then it returns to the login screen This is the same whether I use Ubuntu or Wayland or Unity environment

Any help will be appreciated.

Press Ctrl+Alt+F3 and type this command:

chown $USER:$USER .Xauthority

I'm having the same issue, Dell PC dual-boot with Windows. This has happened shortly after upgrading from Ubuntu 16.04 to 18.04, first time booting into 18.04. I had locked the screen during the update.

Now, if I try to log in, I get the same behavior that the OP describes above.

The suggested fix, here and elsewhere, seems to be unavailable to me. At the login screen, Ctrl-Alt-F1, Ctrl-Alt-F2, and Ctrl-Alt-F3 each have no effect. I am left on the login screen.

I next tried editing the GRUB launch file by editing the linux command to add init=/bin/sh, but then launching gets the message:

/bin/sh: 0: can't access ttty: job control turned off

So I'm stuck. Please advise.

Follow up: My IT department chose to provide me with Hyper-V virtualization on Windows 10 so this is no longer an issue for me.


(Low Level Format?) Encrypted Hidden Partition On USB Disc My USB disc has a hidden encrypted partition. I can't even see it in no software. I tried almost everything in windows. I want to format the whole disc at low level and reuse all the capacity. is there any tool or commands in Linux on how to do it?

Edit: I'm using Ubuntu 16.04
- Gparted does't show the hidden partition. and the exact total cap.

The total capacity of the USB disc is 4GB. but It is showed as a 1GB Drive. and I'm not able to wipe the whole disc including the encrypted partition, since it is not shown anywhere.

I think there should be something like fdisk. i. e. when a file is hidden or password protected, you can't use that part of the drive unless you have the password. but if you format the partition or fdisk the drive and recreate the partition it is gone no matter how it was encrypted.
now in this case I'm looking for a command or software to format this Drive in that low level. to wipe the encrypted part. and reuse the whole disc. but the problem is there is no tool available to determine there's a hidden partition to try and zero it.

I'm wondering if hdparm can do the trick. though I don't know how.

idVendor=090c, idProduct=1000

If you run Ubuntu from the live DVD or an USB Stick, or you have it already somewhere installed, then you will have two options:

You can use a graphical tool "Gparted" - it is a powerful tool but it is not installed by default on Ubuntu.

Installing it in console by typing:

sudo apt-get install gparted

Then run it from the starter menu.

the second way is, to use the integrated graphical Ubuntu Drive Manager called "Disks" which can do almost the same and it might be easier to use. It can be started also from the menu.

But be careful, both tools are powerfull, you might check twice to not format the wrong disk. The internal hard disk is usually called "/dev/sda".

Example output of device information of gparted (menu:view->device information):


Comparison of backup tools This question exists because it has historical significance, but it is not considered a good, on-topic question for this site, so please do not use it as evidence that you can ask similar questions here.  While you are encouraged to help maintain its answers, please understand that "big list" questions are not generally allowed on Ask Ubuntu and will be closed per the help center.

Backup is incredibly important. Obviously there's no best backup tool, but a comparison of the options would be very interesting.

Graphical Interface? Command line?
Incremental backups?
Automatic backups?
Install method: In standard repositories? PPA?

Déjà Dup

Déjà Dup is (from Ubuntu 11.10) installed by default. It is a GNOME tool intended for the casual Desktop user that aims to be a "simple backup tool that hides the complexity of doing backups the Right Way".

It is a front end to duplicity that performs incremental backups, where only changes since the prior backup was made are stored. It has options for encrypted and automated backups. It can backup to local folders, Amazon S3, or any server to which Nautilus can connect.

Integration with Nautilus is superb, allowing for the restoration of files deleted from a directory and for the restoration of an old version of an individual file.

Note that as of February 2016 this project appears to be almost completely ignoring bug reports with only minor triage activity and the last bugfix dates back to 2014, though there are new releases with minor changes.

For the people that don't know, MEGA is a Dropbox alternative, with 50GB of free storage, available for Mac, Windows and Linux, created by Kim Dotcom.

Install

Download the Mega Sync Client for Linux. Open the terminal in the directory you downloaded the deb files, then Copy/Paste the following code: sudo dpkg -i megasync-xUbuntu_14.04_amd64.deb. After that start mega from the Dash, from there one it will start up at login. Also note that the deb file also adds a ppa in your sources list. Meaning future updates, you will get via your Software Updater.

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:otto-kesselgulasch/mega
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install megasync

Features

Here are some features that are touted by Mega:

Secure:

Your data is encrypted end to end. Nobody can intercept it while in storage or in transit.

Flexible:

Sync any folder from your PC to any folder in the cloud. Sync any number of folders in parallel.

Fast:

Take advantage of MEGA's high-powered infrastructure and multi-connection transfers.

Generous:

Store up to 50 GB for free!

Source:

excerpt from:

Mega Sync Client For Linux - EuroBytes

Which I am the author of.

As stated in other file-sharing-service answers, synchronisation is not backup (tldr: risk of synchronising corrupted/deleted files, particularly if no file-versioning available). The key to decrypt the encrypted data at Mega is secured and accessed by your account credentials (kept remotely but encrypted also), so as long as you still have login access/a user you shared the files to can login, the files won't be lost unless synchronised versions are overwritten by bad data.


Why is Skype Startup sound scratchy/grainy? When I start Skype, the Startup sound sounds like that my speakers is going to break any time (kind of like nails scratching a blackboard).

But when I go to /usr/share/skype/sounds to find the startup sound, I opened it and the file doesn't sound anything wrong.

How do I fix this?  It sounds bad no matter how I start it.

The best solution to this problem is to disable the Glitch Free Audio part of Pulse, covered elsewhere

Skype and VLC sounds sizzle/distorted/bad

Modified the permissions of the wav files:

chmod 777 /usr/share/skype/sounds/*

This will make the Skype sounds much better.


Is there a way to prevent alt-tab from raising all windows of an application? I have several gvim windows open and one Firefox window. Using Alt-Tab to switch to Firefox works as expected. Using it to go back to gvim does return focus to the gvim window I wanted to write in, but it also raises all other gvim windows (on the current virtual desktop) above the Firefox window.

Is there a way to reconfigure window switching so that all irrelevant gvim windows are left alone and I am able to switch between Firefox and a selected gvim window only?

I use Ubuntu 11.10 on the machine in question.

You can use another trick to solve your prob minimize all windows that are idle to you. Then on the panel you can click the middle button of the the mouse that would switch between the two windows that are not idle

If you have multiple windows open of a particular program, they will be grouped in single icon when you use Alt+Tab, as shown below. I have 3 LibreOffice Writer windows open, but they are grouped in a single icon:

If you go to the LibreOffice icon and then press Alt+backtick (backtick = , the key above tab), you see the preview of all the windows. You just have to keep pressingAlt+backtick` unless it points to the window you want to open.


Can't remove repository i've tried to install wine-mono 4.7.1  on Lubuntu 17.10

wget http://dl.winehq.org/wine/wine-mono/4.7.1
sudo apt update

Result:

Hit:1 http://bg.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu artful InRelease
Get:2 http://bg.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu artful-updates InRelease [78,6 kB]
Get:3 http://bg.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu artful-backports InRelease [72,2 kB]
Get:4 http://security.ubuntu.com/ubuntu artful-security InRelease [78,6 kB]
Hit:5 http://download.mono-project.com/repo/ubuntu xenial InRelease
Hit:6 http://ppa.launchpad.net/cdemu/ppa/ubuntu artful InRelease
Ign:7 http://dl.winehq.org/wine/wine-mono/4.7.1 artful InRelease
Err:8 http://dl.winehq.org/wine/wine-mono/4.7.1 artful Release
404  Not Found
Hit:9 https://dl.winehq.org/wine-builds/ubuntu artful InRelease
Hit:10 http://deb.playonlinux.com trusty InRelease
Reading package lists... Done
E: The repository 'http://dl.winehq.org/wine/wine-mono/4.7.1 artful Release' does not have a Release file.
N: Updating from such a repository can't be done securely, and is therefore disabled by default.
N: See apt-secure(8) manpage for repository creation and user configuration details.

I look This post

The "sudo add-apt-repository --remove ppa:" command didn't work for me.

Tried manually remove  from /etc/apt/sources.list but access is denied

Is there other way to remove the broken repository

The wget command does not add a ppa in the first place, it simply downloads files over http. The command you posted simply downloads Wine from the internet.

However, if you find you would like to remove a source manually, you can do so by opening /etc/apt/sources.list and removing the line that contains the source.

You can do this using the command sudo nano /etc/apt/sources.list. Sudo is used as you require root privileges to edit the file.

The command to download mono is:

wget https://dl.winehq.org/wine/wine-mono/4.7.1/wine-mono-4.7.1.msi

then you have to run it in the WINE prefix that you want to install mono in.

To correct the sources list, you need root privileges:

sudo nano /etc/apt/sources.list


Unity launcher autohide leaves "ghost" behind? In 12.04 I had the launcher set to autohide, which worked perfectly.

However in 12.10 I am getting a strange "ghost" issue.

Take this screenshot, with me having a maximised google chrome window, mousing over the back button.

As well as this, I also get another ghosting issue when I have the panel set with an opacity, whereby whatever is in approximately the middle left of the screen gets mirrored up to to panel, but only when I move/switch to a window.

But that one is not so annoying as the autohide bug, how can I fix that?

That happened to me too. Since I have an nvidia card I enabled proprietary drivers and now it works.

To do this, open the Software Sources via the Dash (or through System Settings) and hit the Additional Drivers tab.

If autohide doesn't work that means it simply doesn't work. I have to press Meta key to see it.

just get back to 12.04 as it more stable and fast . if you want 12.10 wait for few mouth until they fix issues.Save your time and nerves.Its jupiterbroadcasting studio advice very interesting http://www.jupiterbroadcasting.com/25971/ubuntu-12-10-review-las-s24e01/


Why are upgradable packages not upgraded? Executing sudo apt update ended with

Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
2 packages can be upgraded. Run 'apt list --upgradable' to see them.

Executing apt list --upgradable gave me

Listing... Done
onionshare/bionic,bionic 2.2.ppa1-1 all [upgradable from: 2.1-1]
ring-all/unknown 20190927.2.c2af011~dfsg1-1 amd64 [upgradable from: 20190629.2.c07ef23~dfsg1-1]

But executing sudo apt upgrade does not upgrade the upgradable packages:

Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
Calculating upgrade... Done
0 upgraded, 0 newly installed, 0 to remove and 0 not upgraded.

Why is that? Unmet dependencies possibly?
Can I (manually) upgrade the listed packages, and if so: how?

Update: See this pastebin for a full transcript.

You can run the command line below for upgrade all upgradable packages and their dependencies:

  sudo apt-get dist-upgrade

I suggest running:
sudo apt-get upgrade

This worked for me. It will tell you how many packages it upgraded, how many new ones were installed, how many were deleted, and how many were not upgraded (kept back).
I had packages that were kept back, so after reading this post, which provides multiple solutions, I ran the following to install the packages that were kept back:
sudo apt-get --with-new-pkgs upgrade

This will also include which packages are no longer needed and could be removed. Per the output's instructions, I ran the following to remove them:
sudo apt autoremove

Lastly I ran the first code again, just to make sure all was clear and would get the output "0 upgraded, 0 newly installed, 0 to remove and 0 not upgraded."


Reducing a scanned pdf file size I need to compress a scanned PDF file from 1.5 MB to under 600 KB. I've tried a number of Ghostscript solutions given on other threads but they seem to compress it all the way down to just 2.2 KB and all the content is lost. Can someone provide a solution?

You may experiment with the convert input.pdf -resample 85% output.pdf command example.

Reference: http://www.imagemagick.org/script/convert.php#usage

Depending on the quality of the original, the results may not be very good.

It would be helpful to see what options you tried with Ghostscript because normally that should work better than ImageMagick.

You can also try pdfjam. To install

sudo apt-get install pdfjam

Then try variants of these commands

pdfjam --scale 0.5 your.pdf

or try the --papersize flag. Run pdfjam --help for a full list of options.


boot loader installed on usb pendrive I desktop with pre-installed Win 7
I have  install 12.04 along side Windows on different partitions of my disk with my usb pendrive.

Ubuntu installed successfully and working fine,and win 7 also working fine. but when i am booting the system where boot menu not appearing, automatically login to win 7.

when i am trying to boot with usb pen drive it showing boot menu (grub),
in the boot menu if i am selecting Ubuntu it login to Ubuntu normally.
without pendrive it is not login to ubuntu.

how to solve this problem. without reinstalling the os.

please help me for this

You need to install "grub" bootloader to your harddrive, not to your USB pen drive.

After this step, you will be able to choose which operating system to boot, you won't need the usb stick anymore to use ubuntu.

Step 1:
Identify your hard disk device entry -> one of /dev/sda, /dev/sdb, etc.
Usually, it is /dev/sda.
If you are not sure, check at the command line (Terminal):

sudo fdisk -l

In the output, first line is important as you'll recognize the size of your hard disk.
If you have the usb stick too, you will have /dev/sda with any partitions like /dev/sda1, /dev/sda2, etc AND /dev/sdb -> your usb stick:

Disk /dev/sda: 160.0 GB, 160041885696 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 19457 cylinders, total 312581808 sectors
Units = sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x000e26f3

   Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System
/dev/sda1            2048    40962047    20480000   83  Linux
/dev/sda2        40962048   275718143   117378048    5  Linux swap / Solaris

Disk /dev/sdb: 500.1 GB, 500107861504 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 60801 cylinders, total 976773167 sectors
         ......and other stuff ..........

Step 2:
Install grub

sudo grub-install /dev/sda

Holà! I believe -if I'm understood well- the pendrive has only a link to Boot/vmlinuz and
if present, the pendrive does the exact link  or nothing if it's absent…
Seems to me, the link could be copyied on hard disk.
Courage!


How to add a GPG key to the apt sources keyring? Ubuntu Doc page says this:

It is advisable that you add the Opera GPG key.
wget -qO - http://deb.opera.com/archive.key | sudo apt-key add -

Where do I add that?
I want to take the advice but I don't know what part of software center to add gpg keys to.

This a a one line command to enter in terminal. See
What is a terminal and how do I open and use it?

To use it, you would paste the entire command in the terminal (remember to use https):

wget -qO - https://deb.opera.com/archive.key | sudo apt-key add -

But of course, it is daunting just copying and pasting commands without knowing what they are doing, and having no instructions on how to undo their actions, so here is a basic breakdown of the commands:

wget downloads something from a server. See wget manual for Ubuntu 16.04.
| is a pipline, which takes the output of one command and runs it into the input of another
apt-key add adds a package key

So it basically downloads the key and then adds it in one command.

I tested the command and it should work.

Now to verify that it worked, run this command (from this answer):

apt-key list

This will list the keys added and the key from Opera should be listed on the bottom like this:

pub   1024D/30C18A2B 2012-10-29 [expires: 2014-10-29]
uid                  Opera Software Archive Automatic Signing Key 2013 <packager@opera.com>
sub   4096g/C528FCA9 2012-10-29 [expires: 2014-10-29]

The linked answer also shows that you can remove the key if needed, using:

sudo apt-key del 30C18A2B

with 30C18A2B being the key-id from the list.

After performing that command, and setting up the sources exactly like in your screen-shot, do:

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install opera

(note there are some random warnings, but nothing that affects the install or software center operations)

And for the removal (just in case): What is the correct way to completely remove an application?

So in summary:

Add repository

Add key with apt-key
Install in terminal with apt-get
Search in dash

Another way where you just have an .asc key, you download the .asc key and add it to the keyring.

For instance -

curl -L https://packages.riot.im/debian/repo-key.asc | sudo apt-key add -


New instalation of LAMP on ubuntu 16.04 (Permission denied) Just finish install ubuntu 16.04. After finish a fresh install of LAMP I got Error: Permission denied when try create a simple .php file to save into the localhost.

I have a idea but I can't figure out how to fix it.

As describe in many tutorials - install LAMP as SUDO...
However, it's obvious I will have not access to this folder since I'm user "abc"

My steps:
1. sudo apt-get update
2. sudo apt-get install apache2
3. sudo apt-get install mysql-server
4. sudo mysql_secure_installation

I can see the  Apache2 Ubuntu Default Page "Works"

Did I install wrong or I just need grant access as root for myself as user?

Any help is well appreciate.

You need to learn about the UNIX permission system and how to use chmod.

As a quick fix you could try

sudo chmod -R +rw /var/www/

This will add read and write permissons for all users to all the files (Recursively) in the folder /var/www (which I assume is the place you want to put your PHP files), but be careful when you do this stuff, you can mess up your system!

Alternatively, you could copy the files as root:

sudo cp ~/Documents/somefile.php /var/www

or create a file as root:

sudo gedit /var/www/somefile.php

Make sure you understand how the permission system of Ubuntu works as soon as possible if you are doing this for work rather than just for fun.


GUI app to Convert PDF files to ODT The PDF utilities from the poppler-utils packages include many tools to deal with PDF files, one of them is pdftotext.

pdftotext can be used to convert PDF files to ODT.

I want the same result using GUI application not command line. What could I use?!

You can try Calibre, which is a GUI for managing and converting ebooks. Also capable of converting to docx.

Try online tools...

Some of them are:

http://www.zamzar.com/convert/pdf-to-odt/

https://online2pdf.com/convert-odt-to-pdf

They also has other conversions available

Regards...


How do I change the font or the font size in the TTY (console)? I am using Ubuntu 12.04. Recently, the font size for all of my TTYs became much larger.
How can I change the font size back to the default?

To adjust the font/font-size used for the TTY, run sudo dpkg-reconfigure console-setup, which will guide you through the steps to choose a font and font-size:

Choose the default UTF-8, and press Tab to go highlight OK and then press Enter to go to the next step. (You can press it again and highlight Cancel to go back.)

Choose the default Combined - Latin, ... option ("Latin" includes the English alphabet) and proceed to step 3:

Select the font - be sure to read the notes above on the visual effect different fonts can have:

Select the font size:

Now you will exit console-setup; as the displayed message says, the new settings will be effective after reboot. To apply immediately, open a TTY and run setupcon.

Using GRUB_GFXPAYLOAD_LINUX
First, install xrandr and run it:
$ sudo apt-get install xrandr
$ xrandr

The available screen modes are listed.
Now, edit /etc/default/grub:
$ sudo nano /etc/default/grub

Assuming a previously unedited file, make the following changes:
The variable GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT should contain at least nomodeset, perhaps in addition to quiet and splash on desktop systems.
GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="nomodeset"

On server systems, uncomment GRUB_TERMINAL=console to see more messages passing during boot before entering in the graphics console.
Leave this line as a comment:
#GRUB_GFXMODE=640x480

At the end of the file, add a line:
GRUB_GFXPAYLOAD_LINUX=1280x1024x16

or replace the value by any other (comma separated) mode(s) that is(are) supported by your hardware. The values text, keep, auto, vga and ask should also work.
Finally, after saving the edited /etc/default/grub with Ctrl+O and exiting it with Ctrl+X, issue the following commands:
$ sudo update-grub
$ sudo reboot

This answer will also work to decrease the resolution and/or refresh rate or frame buffer frequency on down-clocked systems. CRT monitors typically show flickering stripes when the refresh frequency is too high.


How do I install Adobe Acrobat Reader from the repository? How do I install Adobe Acrobat Reader in Ubuntu 14.04 using a Trusty apt repository?

This is NOT a duplicate of How do I install Adobe Acrobat Reader deb package downloaded from Adobe website?. In Synaptic > Repositories > Other software I enabled "Canonical Partners", but I still cannot install acroread as it is not available on my 64-bit system.

Here's the output from the console:

root@liv-inspiron:/home/liv# apt-get install acroread
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
E: Unable to locate package acroread
root@liv-inspiron:/home/liv# apt-get install acroread:i386
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
E: Unable to locate package acroread

It's a bit more manual to install Adobe Acrobat Reader in Ubuntu 14.04, but it's not hard.

Open a terminal.

Type:

cd ~/Downloads && wget -c http://ardownload.adobe.com/pub/adobe/reader/unix/9.x/9.5.5/enu/AdbeRdr9.5.5-1_i386linux_enu.deb

That downloads the DEB file from Adobe and puts it into your Downloads folder.
Next type:

sudo dpkg -i AdbeRdr9.5.5-1_i386linux_enu.deb

That will install Adobe Acrobat Reader.

If you are on a 64 Bit machine, you may need to add the missing libraries that Nim mentioned:

sudo apt-get install libgtk2.0-0:i386 libnss3-1d:i386 libnspr4-0d:i386 lib32nss-mdns libxml2:i386 libxslt1.1:i386 libstdc++6:i386

If you want Acrobat Reader as your default application for PDF's, then type:

mimeopen -d *.pdf

It will display a list of programs (it displayed 3 for me). Select the number that has Acrobat Reader. It will open Acrobat Reader and say it can't open '*.pdf'. Ignore that error and close Adobe Reader. You should be set now.

UPDATE:

For 18.04, the i386 files get installed this way:

sudo apt-get install libgtk2.0-0:i386 libnss3:i386 libnspr4:i386 libnss-mdns libxml2:i386 libxslt1.1:i386 libstdc++6:i386

How I finally installed Acrobat Reader on Ubuntu 14.04 on a 64 Bit machine:

I downloaded .deb version from adobe.com;
Install the package using gedbi;
Install the libraries:

sudo apt-get install libgtk2.0-0:i386 libnss3-1d:i386 libnspr4-0d:i386 lib32nss-mdns libxml2:i386 libxslt1.1:i386 libstdc++6:i386

Done!


Error : Running add-apt repository ppa: I am using Ubuntu 16.04 and I'm running this command:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:paolorotolo/android-studio

and I'm getting this error:

I've even tried reinstalling ca-certificates, but after that the same error occurs.

sudo apt-get install --reinstall ca-certificates

I was able to add it using the command above. The error message indicates that the host where the repository is stored is not resolvable by your DNS server. But I think that's probably a red-herring. Deleting the ca-certificates and then reinstalling them should work;

rm -rf /usr/share/ca-certificates

apt-get --reinstall install ca-certificates


How can I make NetworkManager ignore my wireless card? I do not want NetworkManager to list or manipulate my wireless card. Can I hide its interface from NetworkManager somehow?

I have tried adding this in /etc/network/interfaces,

iface wlan0 inet static
    address 192.168.1.101
    netmask 255.255.255.0
    gateway 192.168.1.1
    wireless-essid Synaptotagmin
    pre-up wpa_supplicant -B -i wlan0 -c /etc/wpa_supplicant.conf
    post-down killall -q wpa_supplicant

and this in /etc/NetworkManager/nm-system-settings.conf,

[main]
plugins=ifupdown,keyfile

[ifupdown]
managed=false

[keyfile]
unmanaged-devices=/org/freedesktop/Hal/devices/net_00_19_e0_57_86_af

but NetworkManager Applet still lists and allows me to connect to wireless networks.

According to Gnome Wiki, the syntax in /etc/NetworkManager/NetworkManager.conf (in older versions it was /etc/NetworkManager/nm-system-settings.conf) is different than what I'd read Arch Linux Wiki. It should be:

[main]
plugins=ifupdown,keyfile

[ifupdown]
managed=false

[keyfile]
unmanaged-devices=mac:00:19:e0:57:86:af

This configuration makes NetworkManager oblivious to the existence of my wireless card, but still allows me to control it using other methods.

Just create a .sh file containing killall -q wpa_supplicant and execute it using cron when you log in.


tracker-store and tracker-miner-fs eating up my CPU on every startup Whenever I start my laptop the process tracker-store and tracker-miner-fs eats up my CPU between 30-40% for 10-15 minutes. I am on ubuntu 12.04.

What does these processes do? How to get rid of  processes?

Scripting solution to disable it permanently on Ubuntu 16.04

As mention in the comments, files mention in this post no longer exist in 16.04. You can use the following script (source):

echo -e "\nHidden=true\n" | sudo tee --append /etc/xdg/autostart/tracker-extract.desktop /etc/xdg/autostart/tracker-miner-apps.desktop /etc/xdg/autostart/tracker-miner-fs.desktop /etc/xdg/autostart/tracker-miner-user-guides.desktop /etc/xdg/autostart/tracker-store.desktop > /dev/null

gsettings set org.freedesktop.Tracker.Miner.Files crawling-interval -2  # Default: -1
gsettings set org.freedesktop.Tracker.Miner.Files enable-monitors false # Default: true

tracker reset --hard

These are confirmed bugs on Launchpad: 911981, 925948, 1063255.

What does these processes do?

  Tracker is a synergy of technologies that are designed to provide a
  highly sophisticated, innovative and integrated desktop.

  Tracker provides the following:

  Indexer for desktop search (for more details see this spec : https://wiki.ubuntu.com/IntegratedDesktopSearch)
  Tag database for doing keyword tagging of any object
  Extensible metadata database for apps like gedit and rhythmbox which need to add custom metadata to files
  Database for first class objects allows using tracker's database for storage and implementation of First Class Objects and the Gnome 3.0
  Model.

How to get rid of processes?

  Disabling tracker for globally (for all users)

  Edit /etc/xdg/autostart/trackerd.desktop file with root privileges (sudo -i gedit /etc/xdg/autostart/trackerd.desktop)
  Add Hidden=true to the end of the file
  Do the same for /etc/xdg/autostart/tracker-applet.desktop if you want

  Disabling tracker for your user only

  Enter the directory ~/.config/autostart, create it if it does not exist
  Create a file named trackerd.desktop
  Paste the following into the file, save and exit:

[Desktop Entry]
Encoding=UTF-8
Name=Tracker
Hidden=true

Source: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Tracker

Answers above didn't help me. I've finally found a solution:
Running miner with high verbosity:
/usr/libexec/tracker-miner-fs -v 3
allowed me to pinpoint what's wrong - it was a directory with a very large number of files (around 1 million - proceduraly generated as a side effect of some project). Removing this mess fixed the issue.


nvidia drivers on 20.04 headless server I'm installing Nvidia driver 450 on a 20.04 brand new server with no desktop environment (which I do not want to have).
(Context: final goal is to install cuda toolkit via Tensorflow Docker, and drivers are the only thing outta container).
When it comes to apt install, turns out that both nvidia-driver-450/nvidia-driver-450-server packages will carry a huge load of gnome-related stuff.
So I'm wondering if nvidia-headless-450/nvidia-headless-450-server will suffice. Asking for both brokes apt, so my questions are

what's the -server suffixed variant supposed to do? Official guide doesn't clarify much.
is the headless metapackage containing the actual driver?

Thanks to ubfan1, question is almost a duplicate.
headless metapackage installed perfectly, although it decreased the terminal resolution btw.


Is Gnome keyring safe? I've always read keyring like Gnome-keyring is safe way to save credentials. I don't understand it. If I open my Gnome-keyring in my Ubuntu Desktop, I can right click any entry and click show password and it will show the password :O. My point is if I can do it anyone who can access my computer can do it. I can't keep my computer attended every second and sometimes I can forget to lock the computer.

I've set option to unlock keyring automatically at login. Without that I've to type keyring password every time the keyring has to be accessed. So its either type the keyring password or type the asked password. Now if I really have to type I'd prefer to eliminate the middle man and type the asked password.

So my question is, am I thinking/taking/doing this keyring thing in wrong way? Or is it the way it is? If its the way it is, how is it safe?

There is no special trick here; you are just responsible for keeping your desktop session locked when you are not sitting in front of your computer. Otherwise people walking by could do anything to your computer, even if you are not using a keyring of any kind, including installing a secret password-sniffing program!

Get in the habit of locking your screen whenever you get up for any reason. Do it even when you are sure you are alone so it becomes rote. This is quicker if you configure a keyboard shortcut like Ctrl+Alt+L for it (launch Keyboard --> Shortcuts --> System --> Lock screen). It would be nice if the Power control panel allowed you to lock the screen when a laptop lid is closed, but this does not seem to be an option.

And in case you forget, configure the screen to lock after a few minutes of inactivity (rather than going into a screensaver): Screen > Lock.

The keyring uses weak encryption, yeah, weak. A simple password to unlock all your passwords? That's a joke in term of security. But it's easy to use, so a lot of people like it.

The common Joe or Alice (family, friends, co-workers) will not be able to decrypt it easily. If you want to protect your passwords against them, well. Keyring is safe.

Now, if someone with a degree in math, encryption, or a hacker is decided to get your passwords they will do it after a few days or weeks (or months if they are really unlucky).

And if the IRS gets you computer, well they can get a hand on the strong servers to get your passwords in a matter of minutes. Same for:

FBI
CIA
NSA
Mossad
ASIS
RAW
DGSE
FSB
BND
MSS
MI-6
ISI

So, is it safe? Well, it depends upon you and your needs.


how to use default lxde theme instead of lubuntu-theme? I have install Lubuntu 12.10. I really didn't like the lubuntu-theme.
Its very confusing to distinguish whats there on task bar.
Therefore, I wanted the theme like fedora lxde or default-lxde theme.

Please provide me the step to install/use default-lxde theme, as it is dark and edgy.

You should Install the Vanilla lxde:

sudo apt-get install lxde


How to detach modal dialogs from main window? Popup dialogs attached to window title and not movable Not sure of the terminology here, but most of my popup dialogs (see screenshot below) are attached to the window title and cannot be moved. If the parent window is moved, the popup moves with it. Is there a way to get rid of this and have all popup dialogs be opened as movable windows?

Ubuntu 17.10+ with GNOME Shell

Ubuntu 11.10 with Cinnamon

I found a much easier solution. Actually you can configure it with the GNOME Tweaks (previously known as "GNOME Tweak Tool"):

Just disable "Attached modal dialogs" under "Windows".

I found a link with a way to fix this, this method is outdated in newer releases and gsettings should be used instead.

In GNOME 3 the default modal dialog behavior is to attach the window so both the back and front window will be firmly attached together and dragging one of them will move even the other window, like if they became a single window.

This behavior can be changed to restore the old way the modal dialogs were treated in the previous GNOME releases. To detach the modal dialogs from the main window you will just need to execute the following command (in a single line) inside a terminal window:
gconftool-2 --set /desktop/gnome/shell/windows/attach_modal_dialogs false --type bool

To attach the modal dialogs to the parent window you could execute:
gconftool-2 --set /desktop/gnome/shell/windows/attach_modal_dialogs true --type bool

After issuing one of the previous commands you'll need to restart the GNOME Shell by logout the current session


Remove note about sudo that appears when opening the terminal Whenever I open the terminal,

To run a command as administrator (user "root"), use "sudo <command>".
See "man sudo_root" for details.

appears before the terminal. How do I get that to go away?

Once you run a sudo command, the file ~/.sudo_as_admin_successful will be created and the warning will go away. So either run a sudo command, such as sudo apt-get update or create the ~/.sudo_as_admin_successful file manually:

touch ~/.sudo_as_admin_successful

If you want the warning back for whatever reason, remove ~/.sudo_as_admin_successful:

rm ~/.sudo_as_admin_successful

This should not happen, unless you did not yet run any command using sudo (sudo echo "hello" should be enough).

If you did run a command using sudo and you don't see the file ~/.sudo_as_admin_successful, then you are probably hit by this bug.


How to install and configure Wine? I am looking for a step by step instruction to guide me in the ways of installing, configuring and debugging many of the issues new users have when dealing with Wine in Ubuntu.

What is the recommended way of installing Wine, some of the key issues that it has and how to solve them?

If I have a specific problem with an App in Wine, how do I go about solving it? What are the recommended steps to ensure that I can fix a problem related to an app I wish to use?

If you want to use the latest development/staging version of Wine, please make sure to follow the guide in the Official WineHQ Guide for Ubuntu, basically covering:

If you are using a 64-bit Architecture, then enable 32-bit for better compatibility

sudo dpkg --add-architecture i386

Add the Wine Key, Wine Repository & Update Repositories

wget -nc https://dl.winehq.org/wine-builds/winehq.key
sudo apt-key add winehq.key

We would add the repository like this (lsb_release -sc will automatically fetch the codename):

sudo apt-add-repository "deb https://dl.winehq.org/wine-builds/ubuntu/ $(lsb_release -sc) main"
sudo apt update

Then install the version of Wine you wish to use:

Based on Wine Development (Stable) (eg: 4.0)

sudo apt install --install-recommends winehq-stable

Based on Wine Development (Testing Stage) (eg: 4.1)

sudo apt install --install-recommends wine-devel winehq-devel

Based on Wine-Staging (Bleeding Edge) (eg: 4.1.1)

sudo apt install --install-recommends wine-staging winehq-staging

Lastly run

WINEARCH=win32 winecfg

in the terminal to make sure it configures Wine correctly (In that order). You will also need to install winetricks (Another configuration package, really helpful for installing Windows components like .NET Framework and other needed libraries). So after this, please do:

sudo apt install winetricks

Video Demostration showing Wine 1.9.X in Action - Wine 1.9.X Performance

1. Differences between Wine Stable, Development & Staging versions

Stable versions offer less bugs with better stability and receive updates every 3-6 months after release.

Development version is the next stable version in development and receives updates every 2 weeks.

Staging version is the same as Development Version but includes all patches and enhancements from Wine-Staging

The decision to stick with the stable version (Even number versions: 1.0, 1.2, 1.4...) or with the unstable versions (Odd number versions: 1.1, 1.3, 1.5...) is up to the user, the main difference is compatibility and performance which are both enhanced in the Development version. You get the latest fixes it offers, and also become a tester that can help in the development cycle.

2. Installing the Recommended Stable Wine version (from PPA)

In the terminal type the following to add the Wine PPA, update repositories, and install latest Wine & Winetricks version:

wget -nc https://dl.winehq.org/wine-builds/Release.key && sudo apt-key add Release.key && sudo apt-add-repository -y https://dl.winehq.org/wine-builds/ubuntu/ && sudo apt update && sudo apt install wine-devel winehq-devel winetricks

or you could include the Wine 32-Bit Arch (Better support) and configuring winecfg (This should only be applied to new installations since it will move the existing Wine installation to a folder called winebck):

sudo dpkg --add-architecture i386 && wget -nc https://dl.winehq.org/wine-builds/Release.key && sudo apt-key add Release.key && sudo apt-add-repository -y https://dl.winehq.org/wine-builds/ubuntu/ && sudo apt update && sudo apt install wine-devel winehq-devel winetricks && export WINEARCH=win32 && winecfg

3. How to know which components an application needs

To find out what components an app needs, look in the Wine Application Database. It lists if the application is usable, what components it needs and how to install them.

4. How to install additional components, DLLS and Libraries to Wine

To have a working and enhanced Wine environment for your games and apps, I suggest you use winetricks to install additional components which offer better compatibility with games. To have a better working system do the following here is an example for HL/HL2 (Non-Steam. For the Steam Version go here: How can I install Steam? . Know that Half-Life and HL2 are natively supported in Ubuntu):

To play HL/HL2 you need the Wine PPA as mentioned above. After opening winecfg at least once on the terminal, open winetricks by running winetricks --gui then follow this steps:

Select Select the default wineprefix

Select Install a windows DLL or component

Install all that I have marked (and any additional you need). This covers many apps:

Right click the installer for HL/HL2 and select Open with Wine. Both games should work perfectly. This applies to apps in general and depending on the app you will need to install more or less components.

You can also install each component in terminal by adding the name of the component after the winetricks command:

winetricks vcrun2010 - Will install vcrun2010 using winetricks

winetricks xna40 - Will install xna40

5. Troubleshooting a Wine App

Sometimes, when running an App one or several of the following can actions can happen:

Frozen App
Wine opens a Blue window for a moment and then closes it
Nothing appears to happen
Inside the Wine window everything is Black in the start or at some point
DLL, Video card or Component not recognized

For most of this problems there are solutions. Here are the recommended steps for you to start troubleshooting your way into a Wine app:

Always visit the Wine App Site to see what other testers have done to make the App work. For example here is me testing Dead Island: Riptide which I gave it a Bronze since after the selecting the character the whole game went to a Black screen. What I did to test out what was happening was to go to the terminal and run the game from there. In the terminal some of the errors suggested I was missing a vital piece for the game to work. After reading the error output and doing what it suggested (Replacing a corrupted DLL) I could install a component the game needed and the game worked perfectly.
Knowing what the game needs is crucial to getting the game working correctly. Setting the winecfg options and OS environment is only a small part. This is only creating the environment for the app. You need to add other functionality like DirectX, XNA, .NET Framework and more that the app might need in order to work. These are key components for some apps. Without them, even if some apps work correctly, others will not. Making sure you have all of this components gives you a higher chance of complying with what an app needs.
As you can see from my Dead Island test I added several winetricks packages and also installed 3 packages the games comes with (DirectX, Windows Media Format and Microsoft Visual C++ 2010). With this I managed to guarantee that the game would start and be playable.
Some apps are only created for certain Windows versions as seen with Dungeon Keeper. To specify a particular Windows Version for a particular app you can open winecfg navigate to Applications and select Add Application, then search for the applications executable file and click on Open. Now select the application from the list and then change the Windows Version for it. This way, only this application will have an specific version of Windows assigned to it, instead of globally changing the Windows version for all apps.
Changing the Windows version globally can affect apps that were installed with a different Windows version. For example, Installing Terraria in a Windows XP environment and then changing it after playing to Windows 7 will give you one of two errors, one, not finding the saved games and two not running the app.
Running an app to diagnose what the problem can be done through the terminal which is the best way by far to know what the app is doing or needing. The app can tell you information like:

What missing DLL it needs to run (mscore.dll, steam_api.dll)
What missing component it needs to run (XNA, DirectX, .NET...)
If the problem is you are using a 64 Bit environment instead of a 32 Bit
If you need to add a parameter for the app to run

For missing DLLs I suggest using dll-files to download specific DLLs missing that are needed for the APP. Normally you can paste this DLLs inside the game folder or in the Windows/System32 folder (Or both) and that should solve the problem. For missing components use winetricks.
When troubleshooting an App, always run the app in an emulated Desktop Window. Open winecfg go to Graphics and enable Emulate a Virtual Desktop. Then set the resolution for it. This way, if the app freezes, hijacks the keyboard and/or mouse focus, at least you have a way to eliminate the app instead of having it fullscreen where you have few choices:

For freezing scenarios of an app at fullscreen I suggest activating the "Kill X" feature that is found in the Keyboard Layout Window which can save you several seconds of time when trying to get out of a frozen Wine app:

Another technique of getting out of a frozen state is either opening a terminal and type wineserver -k or killing the X server. To do this firs configure it by running sudo dpkg-reconfigure keyboard-configuration and on the last option there that talks about killing X, say "YES". This will enable the CTRL+ALT+BACKSPACE combination.
Remember that if an app needs a minimum or recommended hardware requirement in Windows, it will also need the same on Linux. If the app needs 512 MB of RAM and a 2.0 Ghz CPU, it will need the same on Linux using Wine.
Sometimes you will come across an app in an ISO or any other Image format that you can not manage to open or install. Ubuntu comes with several tools to open this files but the best one I have tried so far is CDEMU which covers several types of images that bring Multi-Sector or Protected format. This is the closest you will get to something similar to DAEMON Tools. Cases like The Sims 3, Simcity 2000 and others can only be opened and installed using this app. More info in Apps capable of mounting/unmounting CD/DVD Images with multi-sector or protected format
For cases where an specific app is not running, showing graphical glitches, black screen or not running with full graphics I actually recommend reading one of the following links that applies to the end user for video support:

Nvidia Users - How do I install the Nvidia drivers?

Hybrid - Is a NVIDIA GeForce with Optimus Technology supported by Ubuntu?

Ati - What is the correct way to install proprietary ATI Catalyst Video Drivers (fglrx) directly from AMD?

Apart from checking the above, if you have the correct drivers I would also add that you need to check if your video card has OpenGL support. For this I would first install mesa-utils if not yet installed:

sudo apt-get install mesa-utils

to test for OpenGL support. Simply run a check to see if you have OpenGL support:

glxinfo|grep 'direct rendering'

which should say Yes if you do have support. Another alternative would be:

/usr/lib/nux/unity_support_test -p

Lastly, you can run glxgears to give you an idea of how your video card renders and its FPS for the render. Another very important point is to run the application from the terminal as in wine AppName.exe, this way it will show what the problem is.
If the Unity Launcher is not hiding itself when running a Wine app or is moving the app to the right you can do one of 2 things:

Hold the ALT key and click and drag the Wine to the Left
In the appearance option select "Auto-Hide The Launcher" and set the sensitivity to a level you like. This way the launcher will hide when the mouse leaves it's area.

Shader Model 3.0 is not recognized in Wine (Including Steam games)

There are games that require Shader Models and output an error similar to Required OpenGL extension GL_EXT_texture_compression_s3tc. To fix this simply type the following in the terminal:

sudo apt-get install libtxc-dxtn-s2tc0
( note in recent version of Ubuntu libtxc-dxtn-s2tc0 is not longer needed )

Wine has come a LONG way from the days where newer games could not be played. It has gotten to a point where playing in Ubuntu is effortless. Wine has even some support for SM4.0 and DirectX 10/11 on Wine 1.6. If the problem persists it means that either your video card does not support this or you are missing the correct libraries.

Another reason that Wine might not detect Shader Model is because it might be set to Disabled in the Winetricks. Open the Dash and type winetricks. Select your wineprefix then Change Settings. Then look for the glsl=enabled option and select it. This should solve the Shader Model issue. Cases like the game Limbo are solved this way.

6. How do I open multiple Wine apps without them using the same Window (Overlapping)

You can setup multiple Wine windows by adjusting some Wine parameters before starting each individual Wine program. The fastest way is to open the terminal where the executable of the app you want to run exists. Let us assume it is the Wow.exe app. Then simply type the following:

wine explorer /desktop=WOW,1024x768 "Wow.exe" -opengl -console

This would open the Wow.exe executable with a Window titled "WOW", a resolution of 1024x768 for that specific Window and it would apply the parameters -opengl and -console to the Wow executable. Now assuming you have the game installed somewhere else, you would the following change:

wine explorer /desktop=WOW,1024x768 "/media/cyrex/fun/wow/Wow.exe" -opengl -console

This executes Wow.exe assuming it resides in the folder wow inside a partition called fun in your /media/USER folder. The output should be similar to this when running for example 4 apps:

There is a more easier way to accomplish this. The idea is to create a Desktop shortcut by right clicking on the Desktop and selecting New Document --> Empty Document. This should create an "Untitled Document" file on your desktop. Now open the file and paste in it the following:

[Desktop Entry]
Type=Application

Now save it and rename the file to the application you want to open but at the end add ".desktop". It will turn into an "Executable Windows Icon". Now right click the Icon again and go to Properties --> Permissions --> Activate Allow executing file as program. Now go to the Basic Tab and insert the information you need to execute that wine app. The end result should be something like this:

7. Does having Ubuntu 64 bit influence Wine

Yes, having Ubuntu 64 Bit will also set Wine as 64 bit. This will create several problems for many Windows apps that only work on 32 Bit, for example not being able to install several of the .NET Frameworks since they will only work on the 32-Bit version, which will result in the user not being able to run many Windows applications. To solve this you need to do the following after having succesfully installed the PPA version as I mentioned above. Immediately afer installing the PPA wine package and before opening winecfg open the terminal (Make sure you are at your home folder by typing cd ~) and type the following:

rm -fr ~/.wine
export WINEARCH=win32
export WINEPREFIX="/home/USER/.wine"
winecfg

Change USER with your user account. For example in My case, that line would read export WINEPREFIX="/home/cyrex/.wine"

With this method you have changed the Wine architecture to 32 bit and on the moment you open Winecfg, it will configure all the Windows versions available to 32 Bit.

8. Alternatives to Wine PPA

PlayOnLinux (PoL)

Although you can actually install and configure everything you need with Wine alone and it's complementing apps (winetricks, regedit, explorer) using PoL can save you some trouble and time when installing an application. With PoL you can find a list of apps that you can select and install in it's database:

and by simply selecting to install you achieve the following benefits:

Creating an independent container which holds the app installed, a specific Wine version for the app installed (In some cases, a specific Wine version works better for a specific app than the current Wine version).
Automatically installing any additional DLL and Components the app needs to function correctly.
Adding the appropriate registry keys the app needs
Create an independent way of running multiples apps without them overlapping each other with Windows version changes, regedit changed, specific Wine versions, etc..

Of course, it is important to know that PoL works side by side with Wine and it needs Wine to work correctly (It is based on it). In many cases, an app might not work with PoL but will work with the default Wine configurations I have mentioned in this guide. So if you find the app you want to use in PoL, great. But if you don't find it, remember you always have the alternative to using the default Wine to install and configure the app.

The benefits of installing the app using Wine and installing it using PoL is that with Wine, you can access and execute the App using the DASH, like in the images below:

(Terraria)

(Dead Space & Dead Island)

CodeWeavers CrossOver (CC)

CC is very similar to PoL on how to install and configure apps. The main difference is that CC offers official support. They even have their own CodeWeavers Database which holds more than 10.000+ apps. Not only that but they have a ranking system similar to the one in Wine's AppDB. They have also contributed to the development of Wine some of which you can see in their Support.

DosBox (DB)

DB is to MS-DOS apps as Wine is to Windows apps. With DB you can run MS-DOS apps in your system. Simply install the dosbox package and you are done. Running an app is as simple as going to the folder where the app resides and executing the following:

dosbox ./

This will open the current folder as a drive letter on the DB environment.

You can also mount a folder by doing the following after opening DB:

mount x: /Absolute/Path/To/Folder/Of/App

For example

mount c: /home/cyrex/Desktop/Dune2

Will create the C: Drive letter which contains the Dune2 folder. So if I simply execute dune2.exe I get the following:

9. What are some special parameters and tips I can use with Wine

There are a couple, for example:

COMMANDS

wine --version - Shows the version of wine

wineserver -k - Kills all wine versions for the specific user. This is useful if your Wine app is frozen, took the whole screen and does not let you use Ubuntu, has the mouse or keyboard focused on it and other Wine issues that might appear with some apps.

wine explorer - Will open an explorer similar to the Windows Explorer

wine explorer /desktop=X,Y - Creates a virtual desktop where X is the name of the Desktop Window and Y is the resolution of the Window. For example: wine explorer /desktop=WOW,1024x768 Wow.exe

regedit - Will open the regedit version of Wine similar to the Windows one.

wine uninstaller - Will open the Add & Remove of Wine similar to the one in Windows. Here you will be able not only see which apps you have install and uninstall them, but also be able to install new apps if you wish.

winetricks - Will open the winetricks app to install missing Libraries, DLLS and Components essential for the correct functionality of many Windows apps.

winecfg - Will open the Wine Configuration where you can set Video, Sound and Windows version.

wine ipconfig - Shows you the IP that Wine can see. Similar to ipconfig.

wine netstat - Shows you the IP/Port connections made. Similar to netstat.

wine start - Sets the working directory for the executable. This option helps in cases where the executable only works from the same folder and not from a full path. An example is if you wanted to run a .bat file or simply execute a command from another folder (eg: Parent folder), you would do something like this, assuming we are not in the same folder as MetroLL.exe:

 `wine start /d "C:\\Program Files\\GMT-MAX.ORG\\Metro Last Light" MetroLL.exe`

This would do two things, it will first set the directory to the Metro Last Light folder and then it would run the MetroLL.exe mentioned at the end. This is similar as running the executable from the same folder but it has the advantage of running the app from any other place. The thing to know here is that:

Wine does not like Unix paths, so you need to separate folders with \\ instead of \
You need to use an absolute path. You need to start from C:\\ to make sure the executable will always work as it should.
If the executable is outside the C: drive, then add the corresponding letter. For example, to execute a Windows binary outside of Wine, you would use the Z:\\ letter since Z: normally points to the Linux system's root directory.
If in doubt ask the command for help with the /? parameter, (eg: wine start /?)

export WINEPREFIX - This variable is used to change the Wine Prefix to another location. For example if you wish to merge PoL and Wine (Not recommended since PoL has multiple Prefixes) you can do the following:

   `export WINEPREFIX="/home/USER/.PlayOnLinux/wineprefix/PREFIX"`

Where PREFIX is the one you want to merge with Wine. You would have to run winecfg again.

TIPS

When dealing with a folder tha has spaces (eg: World of Warcraft), you can execute the Wow.exe file by adding the \ symbol in front of every space, this escapes the symbol. The end result would be something like "World\ of\ Warcraft\Wow.exe". If you do not want to add this escape symbols to your line of code, simply double quote the entire link, so it looks like:

wine explorer /desktop=WOW,1024x768 "/media/cyrex/My Partition/World of Warcraft/Wow.exe" -opengl -console

as you can see, there are 2 folders with spaces in them, "My Partition" and "World of Warcraft", but since I quoted the whole string, the need to include escape characters is not needed. If you wished to use the Wine Path (eg: C:/) then all slashes would be a double slash (eg: "C:\Program Files\App").
Parameters that are applied to an app should always be OUTSIDE the quoted strings. Using the example above, we can see -opengl and -console outside the quotes.
When dealing with apps that take hold of you mouse and/or keyboard, you can use wineserver -k to kill the app, or simply opening the App in Windows mode or setting the Windows mode with the wine explorer /desktop parameter will save you from having this mouse/keyboard problems.

10. Stability, Performance and App Support Wine offers to end users

APP SUPPORT

I have tried Wine since 2005 and seen how the developing process in Wine under Ubuntu has been quickly catching up to the latest games.

Before Wine 1.2 came out around 2012, it was difficult to get many apps working on Wine, but after Wine 1.2 came out it was a totally different result. Even more so after 1.4 came out in 2012, 1.6 in 2013 and then 1.8 in 2015. Many cases started to appear where they would work out of the box. Cases like Deep Space 2 which is/was one of the latest games I could play at that moment and which I tested 3 days after it was released. Alice in Wonderland (The new one I mean), The Sims 3, World of Warcraft, Amnesia and others. Even Skyrim could be played. These are games that demand powerful graphics and you can play them with little to no additional setups other than the normal install provided above.

To know what games you can play on Wine I recommend visiting the Wine App Database: http://appdb.winehq.org/ which holds more than 10K+. This includes information about their performance & stability and it helps in knowing if a game is playable.

The Wine App Database also offers a Ranking which determines what games can be played with less issues, if any. When you see this ranks, you have an idea if the App will work or not. Mind that you need to also take into consideration what hardware and Wine version the tester shows on the Wine Database. The rankings are as follow:

Platinum Rank - Means you have an almost 100% chance the app will work out of the box.

Gold Rank - Means you might find yourself doing a little bit of configuring but it will work out at the end.

Silver Rank - Means that the app will run, but might have graphical, sound or control issues.

Bronze Rank - Means the app will not work correctly.

Garbage Rank - Means the app still does not work and probably will not even install. The only way you could make it work would be when Superman starts eating kryptonian cereal in the morning.

For reference, a couple of years ago the amount of Platinum games was less than 50. In 2012 you could find More than 1.5K games out of which almost 200 were in the Latest Titles. Today there are more than 6K+ Games of which 4K+ are Platinum. The more people that participate in testing Wine apps, the better. Main reason I always recommend using the PPA from Wine.

PERFORMANCE

For performance information see Gaming performance difference between Windows and Ubuntu

11. How to Uninstall Wine

Uninstalling Wine can be done in 2 ways depending on your needs. If you only need to "Reset" Wine to the default values, you can simply delete the .wine folder and then create it again by running winecfg. If you have apps on the .wine folder that you wish to backup, now would be a good time before deleting the folder. To delete the folder simply do the following and it will take care of the whole Wine environment:

rm -fr ~/.wine
rm -fr ~/.cache/wine

Now if you want to actually uninstall Wine from Ubuntu, you can do the following, but note that this will NOT delete your .wine or cached folder:

sudo apt purge wine*

This would uninstall every package related to wine, including wine, wine1.9, winehq, winetricks and more. Basically removing anything related to wine.

Special note for Ubuntu 18.04 LTS (Bionic Beaver)
If you are not satisfied with Wine 3.6.x versions from official repository, then read the method below.
For such Ubuntu version the WineHQ repository misses FAudio dependencies.
I have reported a bug 48513 to WineHQ bugzilla.
So we need to follow official WineHQ guide for Ubuntu partially:
sudo dpkg --add-architecture i386
sudo apt update

Note: if you have WineHQ repository added - remove it with
sudo apt-add-repository -r 'deb https://dl.winehq.org/wine-builds/ubuntu/ bionic main'

to prevent the mess of repositories and then proceed.
Then we need to add other repository from OpenSuse Build Service to get libfaudio0 installed:
wget -q https://download.opensuse.org/repositories/Emulators:/Wine:/Debian/xUbuntu_18.04/Release.key -O Release.key -O- | sudo apt-key add -
sudo apt-add-repository 'deb https://download.opensuse.org/repositories/Emulators:/Wine:/Debian/xUbuntu_18.04/ ./'
sudo apt-get update

and only after this install one of WineHQ packages:
# Stable branch
sudo apt install --install-recommends winehq-stable

#Development branch
#sudo apt install --install-recommends winehq-devel

#Staging branch
#sudo apt install --install-recommends winehq-staging


Where is Prozilla download manager? Who is its developer? http://sourceforge.net/projects/prozilla => NO download link

ftp://ftp.tu-clausthal.de/pub/mirror/gnu/www/directory/ProZilla.html => :(

I found this ppa:tahutek-team/prozilla, but it does not support Ubuntu Trusty! (I don't know is it provided by the original team or not?)

Is Prozilla an in progress software? I mean is it still in development? Where is its source/binary package?

However, Is this app available for Ubuntu 14.04?

Prozilla has had almost no development for a couple years now except for totosugito moving the code to github. I am not aware if he is the original developer or not or what involvement at all he has had with the project. However with that said, the last update on the github page was a year ago.

I would suggest you check out uGet and you can find the Downloads for Ubuntu here. uGet is the #1 Open Source Download Manager for Linux so it is certainly worth looking into.

I downloaded this deb and installed it on Ubuntu 14.04 LTS. And it's running fine. :)

You can download it from here.


Ubuntu 18.04 doesn't see the HP scanner I have a HP 3630 all in one printer/scanner and it was working great on Ubuntu 16.04 with the HP Print manager. Now I did a clean and fresh install Ubuntu 18.04 and the printing work fine, but example Sane (or other scan software) can't find the device.

I have installed hplip 3.18.4 that I found on the HP website, but still nothing. Even to add a printer in the HP manager didn't work.
In the WiFi I tried the WIFI-direct to connect with the printer and that works fine also, but the scan is not seen.

What to do to make scanning work on Ubuntu 18.04?

I have just finished a long install/uninstall session in order to solve similar scanning problem. I can not say this is the best approach but I can give a few points I hope this saves someone time.

I have disabled cups auto adding of printers during this process, not sure this is important.
I have installed an older version of HPLIP 3.17.11. Even if it says that is doesn't support Ubuntu 18.04, this version is working... at least for my printer.
During installation, automatic is selected and I have opted out for HPLIP updates.
After installation, I have installed hp-plugin with command

hp-plugin -i

Scanner at this point started working if I start simple-scan as a root.
Need for that was fixed by executing

chmod 755 /var/lib/hp

For me that was all.

I had similar issue with my all-in-one device from HP. For me the biggest trick to fix it was to lower the shields from AppArmor on one Python script:

sudo aa-disable /usr/share/hplip/plugin.py


Error with Graphics program using C (Ubuntu 14.04) Regarding this thread How do I use graphics.h in Ubuntu? , I executed the following program(shown below the block), but the program unfortunately ends automatically after a few seconds with the following message :

$ gcc -o DDA.o DDA.c -lgraph
$ DDA.o
[xcb] Unknown sequence number while processing queue
[xcb] Most likely this is a multi-threaded client and XInitThreads has not been called
[xcb] Aborting, sorry about that.
DDA.o: ../../src/xcb_io.c:274: poll_for_event: Assertion `!xcb_xlib_threads_sequence_lost' failed.

#include <graphics.h>
#include <stdio.h>
#define ROUND(a) ((int) (a+0.5))
#include <X11/Xlib.h>

main()
{
    int gd = DETECT,gm,left=100,top=100,right=200,bottom=200,x=300,y=150,radius=50;
    initgraph(&gd,&gm,NULL);
    rectangle(left, top, right, bottom);
    circle(x, y, radius);
    bar(left + 300, top, right + 300, bottom);
    line(left - 10, top + 150, left + 410, top + 150);
    ellipse(x, y + 200, 0, 360, 100, 50);
    outtextxy(left + 100, top + 325, "C Graphics Program");
    delay(5000);
    closegraph();
    return 0;
}

PS: I HATE PROGRAMMING IN TC++(USING DOSBOX). IF YOU DON'T KNOW THE SOLUTION THEN PLEASE RECOMMEND ME SOMETHING WHERE I CAN SAFELY RUN MY GRAPHICS PROGRAMS IN C ON :)

As I studied the programming language C/C++ we did use a library called Allegro, which seemed to be a good & easy library to do graphics programming in.

http://liballeg.org/

You can add the following function before closing the graph to see the stable output. It worked for me!

void wait_for_char()
{

//Wait for a key press
int in = 0;

while (in == 0) {
    in = getchar();
}

}


I was given a command 14.04 I was given a command that would copy the file from my root and save it to /var/www/html and if the original file was modified, it would update the /var/www/html version with the modification as it happens.

The command was ls -s /acnl/data/stats/stats.json /var/www/html/json/stats.json

It's not working how I want it to. What command would I need to use to do what I need?

I entered

ls -s /acnl/data/stats/stats.json /var/www/html/json/stats.json

instead of

ln -s /acnl/data/stats/stats.json /var/www/html/json/stats.json

My bad!


Need help in Installing Ubuntu on Laptop with Secureboot I just purchased HP G049AU whose configuration is :
- AMD A8
- 4 GB RAM

I checked that secureboot is enabled. I want to completely remove Windows 8.1 with Ubuntu 14.04.1
I would like to know :

Can I install Ubuntu without disabling secureboot ?
If it is mandatory to disable secureboot, then what are the steps ?

Plz help. Windows is pain to my eyes.

Short answer: No, you can't. You need to install Ubuntu 12.04.2 or 12.10 in order to install using UEFI.

Here you have 2 tutorials:

http://www.howtogeek.com/175641/how-to-boot-and-install-linux-on-a-uefi-pc-with-secure-boot/

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/UEFI

Have a nice day!

refer to ：
Installing Ubuntu Alongside a Pre-Installed Windows with UEFI

this may help you.
I know my classmate has installed ubuntu 14.04 on his machine,which is uefi,by disable the secure boot and fast boot.


Programs disappearing after being minimized I installed Ubuntu 11.04 yesterday using the Wubi installer and I've noticed that a few of my programs will disappear when I minimize them. For example, I can't minimize Eclipse because it will disappear and I won't be able the load a 2nd one because the 1st is using my workspace (if you're familiar with Eclipse you know that you can't use the same workplace twice as the same time). I also just noticed that if I minimize a terminal then it will disappear as well.

Does anyone have any idea why this is happening and what, if anything, I can do to prevent it?

I had this same issue as well, but for me it was solved by taking AllTray out of the equation. You didn't happen to have the programs set to automatically minimize to the system tray, did you? If you did, the tray requires the applications to be white-listed now.

Instead of just denying it, it seems to just hide the program completely. Almost as if alltray was doing it's job, but being denied an icon spot in the tray.

Just change the login screen to Ubuntu Classic, after you login there is a small icon in the left bottom (bottom panel), right click near the icon go to preferences, select  show windows from all work spaces.
That's it, you will be able to view the minimized windows :)


Link proxy settings to particular wifi network Is there a way to automatically set proxy settings based on which wifi network you are connected to?

You might want to check out transparent proxying. Its very convenient.

Transparent proxying


How can I see all versions of a package that are available in the archive? Is there a way I can see all the versions that are in the archives that I have configured in sources.list. I can see the last version of each archive withapt-get policy, but how can I see them all?

Is there any way that this can also include PPA and anything in sources.list.d?

As far as I understand your requirements, the madison option for apt-cache does what you want:

  madison /[ pkg(s) ]
  apt-cache's madison command attempts to mimic the output format and a subset of the functionality of the Debian archive management tool, madison. It displays available versions of a package in a tabular format. Unlike the original madison, it can only display information for the architecture for which APT has retrieved package lists (APT::Architecture).

On my computer:

$ apt-cache madison f-spot
    f-spot | 0.7.2-1~ppa~lucid0 | http://ppa.launchpad.net/f-spot/f-spot-ppa/ubuntu/ lucid/main Packages
    f-spot | 0.6.1.5-2ubuntu7 | http://ro.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ lucid-updates/main Packages
    f-spot | 0.6.1.5-2ubuntu6 | http://ro.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ lucid/main Packages
    f-spot | 0.6.1.5-2ubuntu6 | http://ro.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ lucid/main Sources
    f-spot | 0.6.1.5-2ubuntu7 | http://ro.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ lucid-updates/main Sources

I hope this is what you need. It also includes the ppas.

I don't know how (or why) you said apt-cache policy doesn't show all versions! I'm using this for several years now and It always showed all versions including the priority number.

Output of apt-cache policy nautilus

nautilus:
  Installed: 1:3.18.5-0ubuntu1~xenial1
  Candidate: 1:3.18.5-0ubuntu1~xenial1
  Version table:
 *** 1:3.18.5-0ubuntu1~xenial1 500
        500 file:/media/Linux/apt-repo/xenial1  Packages
        500 http://ppa.launchpad.net/budgie-remix/ppa/ubuntu xenial/main amd64 Packages
        500 http://ppa.launchpad.net/gnome3-team/gnome3/ubuntu xenial/main amd64 Packages
        100 /var/lib/dpkg/status
     1:3.18.4.is.3.14.3-0ubuntu5 500
        500 http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu xenial-updates/main amd64 Packages
     1:3.18.4.is.3.14.3-0ubuntu4 500
        500 file:/media/Linux/apt-repo/xenial1  Packages
        500 http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu xenial/main amd64 Packages
     1:3.14.2-0ubuntu13 500
        500 file:/media/Linux/apt-repo/wily  Packages

Output of apt-cache madison nautilus

  nautilus | 1:3.18.5-0ubuntu1~xenial1 | file:/media/Linux/apt-repo/xenial1  Packages
  nautilus | 1:3.18.5-0ubuntu1~xenial1 | http://ppa.launchpad.net/budgie-remix/ppa/ubuntu xenial/main amd64 Packages
  nautilus | 1:3.18.5-0ubuntu1~xenial1 | http://ppa.launchpad.net/gnome3-team/gnome3/ubuntu xenial/main amd64 Packages
  nautilus | 1:3.18.4.is.3.14.3-0ubuntu5 | http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu xenial-updates/main amd64 Packages
  nautilus | 1:3.18.4.is.3.14.3-0ubuntu4 | file:/media/Linux/apt-repo/xenial1  Packages
  nautilus | 1:3.18.4.is.3.14.3-0ubuntu4 | http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu xenial/main amd64 Packages
  nautilus | 1:3.14.2-0ubuntu13 | file:/media/Linux/apt-repo/wily  Packages

Only difference is that madison took some more time than policy and shorter version. But, policy is more useful to see which version get installed, which version is next candidate to be installed.

That's why I'd suggest always using apt-cache policy <package-name> instead.

Note about output: I have some local repository setup and both of the command shows those as well.

Note 2 Newer apt comes with policy integrated into them. So, you can use apt instead of apt-cache directly.


How do you open a command line? How do you access the command line or run option to put the commands into the system?

It is called terminal.

You can launch your terminal by pressing Ctrl+Alt+T or search from dash by pressing Meta/Super/Windows button and type terminal.

If you're using Gnome, Terminal is probably under Accessories in your Application menu, or you can also try Alt F2 to bring up a launcher widget into which you can type "t-e-r-m-i..." to see all the terminal options.

Basic command line.

Enjoy your command line !

There are some great terminal programs like yakuake and guake that will put a drop-down terminal on your screen whenever you hit f12. I find them a little more elegant than opening a new terminal each time if you do a lot of command-line work.


unable to install git on ubuntu16.04 I am trying to install git on Ubuntu 16.04 with sudo apt-get install git:

Use 'sudo apt autoremove' to remove them.
0 upgraded, 0 newly installed, 0 to remove and 27 not upgraded.
2 not fully installed or removed.
After this operation, 0 B of additional disk space will be used.
Do you want to continue? [Y/n] y
Setting up runit (2.1.2-3ubuntu1) ...
start: Unable to connect to Upstart: Failed to connect to socket /com/ubuntu/upstart: Connection refused
dpkg: error processing package runit (--configure):
 subprocess installed post-installation script returned error exit status 1
dpkg: dependency problems prevent configuration of git-daemon-run:
 git-daemon-run depends on runit; however:
  Package runit is not configured yet.
dpkg: error processing package git-daemon-run (--configure):
 dependency problems - leaving unconfigured
No apport report written because the error message indicates its a followup error from a previous failure.
                          Errors were encountered while processing:
 runit
 git-daemon-run
E: Sub-process /usr/bin/dpkg returned an error code (1)

if you have any idea please help

Try running

sudo apt-get update

then

sudo apt-get install git

If that doesn't resolve your issue check if you can install it from the Ubuntu software center.

If still facing issues head over to the github page, download zip and install.


How to run VM's within Ubuntu Linux without Virtualbox or any other type 2 hypervisors? I am planning to move from Windows 7 to Ubuntu as it is free and due to privacy reasons. Is there any way to run VMs from within Ubuntu without any additional software like Virtualbox or any other type 2 hypervisors? I tried VirtualBox and it sucks in my opinion eventhough it is free. I heard that I could do this by installing KVM? Does this come automatically with Linux desktop version or do I have to install it manually?

If Ubuntu can't do this any other Linux distros with this ability to run VM's without installing any additional software?

KVM will be a good option - of course you still have to install proper pieces of software, KVM binaries, some extra tools etc. It integrates with Linux kernel (as modules), which make it pretty much type 1 virtualization.


how do I install Firebird 2.1 on Ubuntu 13.04 When updating form ubuntu 12 to 13 my firebird 2.1 was uninstalled. Now, when I try to install it, it seems that the package is obsolete.

root@ricardo-pc:/# apt-get install firebird2.1-classic
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
Package firebird2.1-classic is not available, but is referred to by another package.
This may mean that the package is missing, has been obsoleted, or
is only available from another source

E: Package 'firebird2.1-classic' has no installation candidate

How can I install it?

First download the package listd + +5.  Once the download is done, go to the folder where you saved the package probably the Downloads folder, and click with the right mouse button.  Select Open with Ubuntu Software Center.  Once software center opens, click on the install button

Download Firebird, then just press Ctrl+Alt+T on your keyboard to open Terminal. When it opens, go to the folder where you saved the file, probably the Downloads folder, and run the command(s) below:

sudo Tar-xzf FirebirdSS *. Tar.gz
Cd FirebirdSS *
sudo . / Install.sh

When it ask you to enter the password for the SYSDBA user, enter the default password, which is: masterkey

Source:vivaolinux

My problem Solved, try this.

http://www.itlampung.com/2016/05/solved-install-firebird-21-di-server-linux-ubuntu.html


What's wrong with this thumbnailer? I want Nautilus to generate thumbnails for my .psd files so I put

[Thumbnailer Entry]
TryExec=convert
Exec=convert %i[0] -resize %s %o
MimeType=image/vnd.adobe.photoshop;image/x-psd;

in /usr/share/thumbnailers/photoshop.thumbnailer but Nautilus is amazing and instead of thumbnails I get

(nautilus:15745): GnomeDesktop-WARNING **: Unable to create loader for mime type image/vnd.adobe.photoshop: Unrecognized image file format

It thinks /.photoshop is a file extension, throwing it off. You need to insert a VALID picture and file extension.


How can I make my shell prompt look like a cheeseburger? I want my shell prompt to look like a cheeseburger!

It would be nice if it also displayed: username, hostname, and current directory.

great choice!

$ sudo apt-get install ttf-ancient-fonts
$ export PS1="\\u@\h \\w  "

enjoy.

Aside from pasting the emoji into the prompt definition directly, you can use the Unicode code point for cheeseburger with printf and command substitution within the prompt:

$ PS1='$(printf "\U0001f354") $ '
 $ echo "Hello,my cheesy prompt!"
Hello,my cheesy prompt!
 $


Slow boot issue due to plymouth-quit-wait.service + ubuntu 18.04 This is freshly installed machine running as dual boot over Win 10.
For every reboot machine hangs for 15 secs as the plymouth service unable to start, due to some reasons.

ENv:-

    Manufacturer: Dell Inc.
    Product Name: Precision 5820 Tower
    Ubuntu 18.04
    4.15.0-29-generic
    vendor   : NVIDIA Corporation
    model    : GP104GL [Quadro P4000]

Below is the systemd-analyse output snippet

sudo systemd-analyze blame
     14.405s plymouth-quit-wait.service
      8.843s dev-sdb4.device
      8.049s NetworkManager-wait-online.service
      5.305s bolt.service
      4.889s snapd.service
      4.243s udisks2.service
      4.092s grub-common.service
      3.806s networking.service
      3.780s ModemManager.service
      3.325s dev-loop10.device
      3.295s apparmor.service
      3.190s dev-loop13.device
      3.162s accounts-daemon.service

Here is the few snippet of boot logs

Feb 18 11:37:42  polkitd[876]: started daemon version 0.105 using
authority implementation `local' version `0.105'
Feb 18 11:37:42  dbus-daemon[820]: [system] Successfully activated service 'org.freedesktop.PolicyKit1'
Feb 18 11:37:42 systemd[1]: Started Authorization Manager.
Feb 18 11:37:42  accounts-daemon[801]: started daemon version 0.6.45
Feb 18 11:37:42  systemd[1]: Started Accounts Service.
Feb 18 11:37:42  systemd[1]: Received SIGRTMIN+20 from PID 394 (plymouthd).

Here is the delay

 Feb 18 11:37:57  nvidia-persistenced: The daemon no longer has
 permission to remove its runtime data directory /var/run/nvidia-
 persistenced
 Feb 18 11:37:57  nvidia-persistenced: Shutdown (1206)
 Feb 18 11:37:57  systemd[1]: Stopped NVIDIA Persistence Daemon.
 Feb 18 11:37:58  gdm3: Child process -1088 was already dead.
 Feb 18 11:37:58  systemd[1]: Stopping User Manager for UID 121...
 Feb 18 11:37:58 systemd[1]: Received SIGRTMIN+21 from PID 394 (plymouthd)

sudo systemctl status plymouth-quit-wait.service
● plymouth-quit-wait.service - Hold until boot process finishes up
 Loaded: loaded (/lib/systemd/system/plymouth-quit-wait.service; static; vendor preset: enabled)
 Active: inactive (dead) since Mon 2019-02-18 11:37:58 +04; 7min ago
Main PID: 943 (code=exited, status=0/SUCCESS)

Feb 18 11:37:43  systemd[1]: Starting Hold until boot
process finishes up...
Feb 18 11:37:58  systemd[1]: Started Hold until boot
process finishes up.

Graphics driver installed latest version - 415 from ppa repository

ii  nvidia-compute-utils-415                   415.27-0ubuntu0~gpu18.04.2          amd64        NVIDIA compute utilities
ii  nvidia-dkms-415                            415.27-0ubuntu0~gpu18.04.2          amd64        NVIDIA DKMS package
ii  nvidia-driver-415                          415.27-0ubuntu0~gpu18.04.2          amd64        NVIDIA driver metapackage
ii  nvidia-kernel-common-415                   415.27-0ubuntu0~gpu18.04.2          amd64        Shared files used with the kernel module
ii  nvidia-kernel-source-415                   415.27-0ubuntu0~gpu18.04.2          amd64        NVIDIA kernel source package
ii  nvidia-prime                               0.8.8.2                             all          Tools to enable NVIDIA's Prime
ii  nvidia-settings                            415.27-0ubuntu0~gpu18.04.1          amd64        Tool for configuring the NVIDIA graphics driver
ii  nvidia-utils-415                           415.27-0ubuntu0~gpu18.04.2          amd64        NVIDIA driver support binaries
ii  xserver-xorg-video-nvidia-415              415.27-0ubuntu0~gpu18.04.2          amd64        NVIDIA binary Xorg driver

Can you let me know why there is a delay happening due to plymount-quit service? Please let me know is there any other info you would require for troubleshoot?

Is it related to hardware / software /grahics driver issue?

Thanks

Plymouth is not slowing your boot-up process! Plymouth is responsible for the boot-up splash screen. Please read Plymouth.

It loads the boot-up logo at the beginning of the boot-up process and then waits until the boot-up process has finished so it unloads the splash screen. That is all it does and that is why it has to run in parallel and co-exist throughout the whole boot-up process. It does not delay anything, it just waits.

That is exactly what is happening. No more and no less. Please take a look at the output you added to your question and carefully read the following:

  ● plymouth-quit-wait.service - Hold until boot process finishes up

How to Verify?

You can verify that plymouth-quit-wait.service is not holding anything back but the graphical login screen, by running the command:

systemctl list-dependencies --reverse plymouth-quit-wait.service

which will output all the services that depend on plymouth-quit-wait.service (i.e services that are delayed by plymouth-quit-wait.service). On a freshly installed Ubuntu system, the output will be like this:

plymouth-quit-wait.service
● └─multi-user.target
●   └─graphical.target

Which means only the graphical login screen is configured to wait for the plymouth-quit-wait.service and nothing else.

On the other hand if you list the services that plymouth-quit-wait.service is configured to wait for by running the command:

systemctl list-dependencies plymouth-quit-wait.service

the output would be almost every service that should run on boot and the output will look like this:

plymouth-quit-wait.service
● ├─system.slice
● └─sysinit.target
●   ├─apparmor.service
●   ├─dev-hugepages.mount
●   ├─dev-mqueue.mount
●   ├─grub-initrd-fallback.service
●   ├─keyboard-setup.service
●   ├─kmod-static-nodes.service
●   ├─plymouth-read-write.service
●   ├─plymouth-start.service
●   ├─proc-sys-fs-binfmt_misc.automount
●   ├─setvtrgb.service
●   ├─sys-fs-fuse-connections.mount
●   ├─sys-kernel-config.mount
●   ├─sys-kernel-debug.mount
●   ├─systemd-ask-password-console.path
●   ├─systemd-binfmt.service
●   ├─systemd-hwdb-update.service
●   ├─systemd-journal-flush.service
●   ├─systemd-journald.service
●   ├─systemd-machine-id-commit.service
●   ├─systemd-modules-load.service
●   ├─systemd-random-seed.service
●   ├─systemd-sysctl.service
●   ├─systemd-sysusers.service
●   ├─systemd-timesyncd.service
●   ├─systemd-tmpfiles-setup-dev.service
●   ├─systemd-tmpfiles-setup.service
●   ├─systemd-udev-trigger.service
●   ├─systemd-udevd.service
●   ├─systemd-update-utmp.service
●   ├─cryptsetup.target
●   ├─local-fs.target
●   │ ├─-.mount
●   │ ├─systemd-fsck-root.service
●   │ └─systemd-remount-fs.service
●   └─swap.target
●     └─swapfile.swap

This confirms that plymouth-quit-wait.service is not slowing down anything but just running in parallel waiting for the system to fully boot and then it will hide the boot-up splash screen to bring up the graphical login screen.

To understand more.

Please run the following command in the terminal:

systemd-analyze plot > ~/SystemdAnalyzePlot.svg

Then, look for SystemdAnalyzePlot.svg in your home directory and run it in the image viewer or the Internet browser. You might need to enlarge the image so that you can read the processes names. It is worth checking and will give you a better understanding on how the boot-up process works.

You can, however, reduce your boot-up time by disabling NetworkManager-wait-online.service so plymouth has one less process to wait for. This can indeed reduce your boot-up time. To do this please follow the steps in this answer.

Oh... and please leave plymouth alone, it's not the one that makes you wait...it's the one that waits for you.

I was having boot time as 3-4 minutes because of this plymouth service taking 1 minute 30 seconds. What fixed my boot time was updating the kernel from 5.4(my default) to 5.9 in Ubuntu 20.
update your kernel


Will Ubuntu Edge be available to everyone after the indiegogo campaign? I noticed that ubuntu hasn't mentioned this anywhere.  Will the phone be available after it's backed by indiegogo and everyone who backed it gets theirs?  And will it be available through carriers if it will be available?

It says in the campaign under "About our project":

  The Ubuntu Edge is an exclusive production run, available only through
  Indiegogo. All of the funding we receive goes directly towards
  producing the device for expected delivery in May 2014. The only
  pockets getting filled by this campaign will be yours when the handset
  arrives.

Main statement imho: "exclusive production run, available only through Indiegogo", so the answer is: No, it will probably not.

Actually it is mentioned in the video, that it may  be available later, but I wouldn't really hold my breath for it.


Where are the Unity Launcher .desktop files? I'd like to know which folder the Unity Launcher .desktop files are stored in, as they're not anymore in /.gconf/desktop and I need to add a custom application to the launcher bar (adding it in /usr/share/applications doesn't seem to be enough).

Where are the Unity Launcher .desktop files?

Globally in

/usr/share/applications

Locally in

~/.local/share/applications

If you want to add a custom launcher, create it in ~/.local/share/applications, make it executable, drag and drop it on the launcher*, and finally pin it (right-click on the launcher item → Keep In Launcher).

* Opening it using Nautilus doesn't seem to do the trick.

I actually found a fix myself! It is necessary to create an entry in alacarte. To customise the icon you must manually edit the icon again from alacarte.


Python 3.4 on Ubuntu 16.04 I have just installed Python 3.4 on Ubuntu 16.04 using the ./configure, make, make install process.  I am trying to install Flask, and am having issues using pip in virtualenv created with 3.4. Using pip installs to Python 2.7, pip3 installs to 3.5. Trying any other method produces errors.

How do I invoke pip for Python 3.4.3?

Revised from Creating a virtual environment with python3.4 on Ubuntu 16.04 Xenial Xerus:

  Install dependencies.

sudo apt install build-essential checkinstall
sudo apt install libreadline-gplv2-dev libncursesw5-dev libssl-dev libsqlite3-dev tk-dev libgdbm-dev libc6-dev libbz2-dev openssl

  Get python3.4 source code.

mkdir -p $HOME/opt
cd $HOME/opt
curl -O https://www.python.org/ftp/python/3.4.3/Python-3.4.3.tgz
tar xzvf Python-3.4.3.tgz
cd Python-3.4.3

  Configure and install.

./configure --enable-shared --prefix=/usr/local LDFLAGS="-Wl,--rpath=/usr/local/lib"
sudo make altinstall

  --enable-shared is necessary for some libraries. The --prefix is needed for reasons (more information in this answer).
  make altinstall keeps your python3.5 installation as the default one.
  Create a python3.4 virtualenv.

  Now we can create a new virtual environment and activate it:

python3.4 -m venv Python3.4VirtualEnv
. Python3.4VirtualEnv/bin/activate

pip3 is installed by default when the Python 3.4 virtual environment is created. List installed packages:

pip3 list

Returns

Flask (0.11.1)

Type flask --help to show Flask help. This output shows that Flask has been successfully installed in a Python virtual environment for Python 3.4.

Try the following:

python3.4 -m pip install <packageYouWant>

The same is true if you wanted to specify 3.5 packages:

python3.5 -m pip install <packageYouWant>

Link is here: Python Docs


Can't boot into Ubuntu, keeps returning to GRUB I installed Ubuntu yesterday but it does not work when I try to access it. Instead it sends me to GRUB 1.99 . What can I do to make it work normally? What are the commands that I have to give for it to function normally?

Reinstalling the GRUB2 boot loader to the Master Boot Record often solves this sort of problem (assuming you're describing a grub> prompt with a flashing text cursor instead of a menu where you can select what OS you want to boot). You can reinstall GRUB2 to the MBR using any of the methods detailed at https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Grub2#Reinstalling_GRUB2.

Try to completely erase the hard disk, then reinstall it again.


Xrandr: Configure crtc 0 failed (Unable to add 1080p resolution to second monitor) I had Ubuntu 16 and I was able to add the 1080p resolution for my second monitor (VGA1) but after I installed Ubuntu 17, I get the error when I want to output the new resolution: xrandr: Configure crtc 0 failed.

Here's what I did:

$ cvt 1920 1080 60.0
# 1920x1080 59.96 Hz (CVT 2.07M9) hsync: 67.16 kHz; pclk: 173.00 MHz
Modeline "1920x1080_60.00"  173.00  1920 2048 2248 2576  1080 1083 1088 1120 -hsync +vsync
$ xrandr --newmode "1920x1080_60.00"  173.00  1920 2048 2248 2576  1080 1083 1088 1120 -hsync +vsync
$ xrandr --addmode XWAYLAND0 1920x1080_60.00
$ xrandr --output XWAYLAND0 --mode 1920x1080_60.00
xrandr: Configure crtc 0 failed

I've searched a lot, but couldn't find a solution.

Please open the following file and remove the # (comment) :

/etc/gdm/custom.conf or/etc/gdm3/custom.conf

The line to remove the comment :

#WaylandEnable=false

Restart the GDM service and try the following command :

xrandr

This should remove the WAYLAND and start showing the VGA or HDMI depending on your display port


VirtualBox fails with "Implementation of the USB 2.0 controller not found" after upgrading Since upgrading to Ubuntu 14.04, When I launch my VirtualBox virtual machine I get:

Failed to open a session for the virtual machine win7pro32bit.
Implementation of the USB 2.0 controller not found!
Because the USB 2.0 controller state is part of the saved VM state, the VM cannot be
 started. To fix this problem, either install the 'Oracle VM VirtualBox Extension Pack'
 or disable USB 2.0 support in the VM settings (VERR_NOT_FOUND).

Result Code: NS_ERROR_FAILURE (0x80004005)
Component: Console
Interface: IConsole {8ab7c520-2442-4b66-8d74-4ff1e195d2b6}

The solution to the same question for 12.10 does NOT fix the problem:

sudo apt-get purge virtualbox
sudo apt-get autoremove
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install virtualbox

UPDATE: Also happens when upgrading VirtualBox itself to 5.0, within existing Ubuntu 14.04.

Download and install VirtualBox extension pack from here(according to your VirtualBox version). It may solve your problem.

Because your error report says like that.

To fix this problem, either install the 'Oracle VM VirtualBox Extension Pack'

If you can't start after upgrade, somewhere along the lines of...

  A possible reason for this error is a missing extension pack. Note that
  as of VirtualBox 4.0, certain features...  VERR_PDM_DEVICE_NOT_FOUND

Download the version matching extension pack (there's only 1 link for the download, fit for all platforms):
https://www.virtualbox.org/wiki/Downloads
in your download folder (all in one line):

$> sudo VBoxManage extpack install --replace Oracle_VM_VirtualBox_Extension_Pack-………….vbox-extpack

important, also do: sudo VBoxManage extpack cleanup
possibly a right-click „discard saved status“ (in case you „hibernated“ open&running VMs)
re-starting your VMs should work now.(even w/o closing and opening the virtual box application, in my case)

Great advice found here.