Ubuntu Made Easy by Bull, Phil -- Read -- Imperial Library of Trantor

Index

Ubuntu Made Easy Dedication Acknowledgments Introduction

Version Compatibility Concept and Approach How to Use This Book About the Conventions Used in This Book About the Projects in This Book

1. Becoming a Penguinista

What Is Linux? About the Penguin Should You Use Linux? What Is a Distribution? What Is Ubuntu? Why Ubuntu Then? Hardware Compatibility

When Research Is Required

Hardware Requirements Good News for 64-Bit Machine Users Mixed News for Mac Users Speaking Ubuntu Where Do I Go from Here?

2. Wading and Diving

Going for a Dip Choices, Choices, Choices—Installation Options

Going for a Swim—Installing Ubuntu Inside Windows (the Wubi Installer) Taking the Full Plunge—Installing Ubuntu Outside of Windows Getting Ready for Action

Usernames and User Passwords

Doing the Deed

How Can I Get Back into Windows? Oh No, My Computer Won’t Boot!

3. A New Place to Call Home

Welcome to the Desktop Parts of the Unity Desktop Environment

The Panel The Desktop The Launcher

Working with the Launcher The Dash

Lenses Filters Finding and Running Apps with the Keyboard

Head-up Display Navigating a Sea of Open Windows Workspace Switcher—Virtual Desktops Why Doesn’t My Desktop Look Like That? Keyboard Shortcuts Shutting Down

4. More Than Webbed Feet

How Do You Connect? Setting Up a Wired Connection

Checking Your Connection Setting Up a Cable or Ethernet Connection for Providers Not Using DHCP

Setting Up a Wireless Connection

Hardware Activating Your Wireless Card Switching Off or Refreshing Your Wireless Connection

Connecting with a DSL or ADSL Modem Setting Up a Dial-up Connection

What to Do If Your Modem Isn’t Compatible

Mobile Broadband Connections I’m Connected . . . So Now What?

5. Slipping and Sliding

Firefox: Your Internet Browser

Controlling Browser Window Clutter with Tabs Save It for Later: Using History and Bookmarks

Bookmarks History

Keeping Up-to-Date with Live Bookmarks Pop-up Manager Multimedia Plug-ins

Flash Silverlight/Moonlight Java

Project 5: Installing Firefox Extensions

5-1: Downloading and Installing the ScribeFire Extension 5-2: Setting Up the ScribeFire Extension

Email with Thunderbird The Messaging Menu Chatting with Your Friends via Empathy

Starting a Chat Telling People When You Don’t Want to Chat

Microblogging—Twitter and Friends Other Internet Applications

6. Rounding Out the Bird

Project 6A: Installing Applications via the Ubuntu Software Center

6A-1: Selecting Applications for Installation 6A-2: Searching for Applications 6A-3: Uninstalling Applications 6A-4: Commercial vs. Free Software

Performing System Updates via Update Manager

How Often Should You Install Updates? If an Update Ruins Your Day . . . or System

Adding Extra Software Repositories

APT-URL: Installing from Websites

Project 6B: Installing Software from a PPA—Turtle Arena Project 6C: Installing DEB Packages Not Available via the Ubuntu Repositories—Google Earth

7. A Tidy Nest

Find It Fast—Searching for Files with the Dash

Recent Files and Downloads Finding More Elusive Files A Closer Look at Lenses and Filters

Files & Folders Music Videos

Nautilus: The Fully Featured File Manager

The Sidebar Now You See It; Now You Don’t

File Handling in Nautilus

Creating, Naming, and Renaming Folders Moving Files and Folders Copying Files and Folders

Navigating in Nautilus

Browsing with Breadcrumbs in Nautilus Spelling It Out—Typing File Paths in Nautilus Bookmarks Within Nautilus Understanding the Linux Filesystem What’s in All Those Other Folders? Using Nautilus as a Network Browser Using Nautilus as an FTP Client File and Folder Permissions Within Nautilus Changing File and Folder Permissions in Nautilus Keeping Your Home Folder Private

Reading Data CDs and DVDs

Burning Data CDs and DVDs Dealing with CD-RWs Burning ISO Images to Disc Creating Your Own ISO Images Burning Multisession CDs Burning Subsequent Sessions Duplicating CDs and DVDs

USB Storage Devices Working with Bluetooth Devices

Pairing Devices Sending Files by Bluetooth Receiving Files by Bluetooth

Backing Up Your Files

Recovering from a Backup

Removing Unwanted Files Project 7: Creating and Extracting Compressed Files

8. Simple Kitten Ways

Meet the Terminal Some Goofy yet Useful Fun with the Command Terminal Nontoxic Commands

$ whoami $ pwd $ df $ ls $ calendar $ exit

Commands with Some Teeth

$ mkdir $ mv $ cd $ cp $ rm $ rmdir $ chmod $ sudo $ locate $ apt-get $ finger

What Is a Shell? What Is a Plan? Other Uses of the finger Command

A Couple of Other Commands You’ll Be Using Soon

$ ln $ tar

Compressing and Extracting Compressed Single Files

Project 8A: Creating a Plan Project 8B: More Command Practice with pyWings

8B-1: Getting Ready for pyWings (Installing Tkinter) 8B-2: Getting pyWings 8B-3: Creating a LocalApps Folder for pyWings 8B-4: Extracting the pyWings Tarball 8B-5: Moving the pyWings Folder to Your LocalApps Folder 8B-6: Running pyWings 8B-7: Creating a Launchable Link for pyWings 8B-8: Running pyWings Again

Project 8C: Command Practice Review with Briscola

8C-1: Getting Briscola 8C-2: Extracting the Briscola Tarball and Renaming the Briscola Folder 8C-3: Preparing the Briscola Script 8C-4: Moving the Briscola Folder to a Global Location 8C-5: Creating a Launchable Link for Briscola Can You Do the Same Thing with pyWings? Playing Briscola

Project 8D: Compiling and Installing Programs from Source—Xmahjongg

What Is Source? The Basics 8D-1: Installing the Tools You Need 8D-2: Downloading and Extracting the Xmahjongg File 8D-3: Running configure and make for Xmahjongg 8D-4: Installing and Running Xmahjongg 8D-5: Cleaning Up and/or Uninstalling Xmahjongg

Customizing the Terminal Tabbed Shell Sessions in the Terminal

9. Dressing Up the Bird

Project 9A: Creating a New User Account

9A-1: Creating the Account 9A-2: Logging In to Your New Account

Customizing: The Basics

Changing the Desktop Background

Installing Additional Wallpapers Wallpaper from Internet to Desktop—Quick and Easy

Changing Themes Changing Your Launcher Icon Size (Unity 3D Only) Autohiding the Launcher Stretching Desktop Icons Taking Screenshots

Customizing Your Desktop Environment: The Next Level

Customizations with MyUnity

Changing Launcher Properties Changing Dash Properties Changing Panel Transparency Changing Desktop Features Changing Display Fonts Changing Themes

Customizing Visual Effects with CompizConfig Settings Manager

Project 9B: Customizing Your Desktop Environment—There’s No Place Like GNOME

9B-1: Installing the GNOME Desktop Environments 9B-2: Switching to the GNOME Desktop Environments and Back Again

Project 9C: Switching from Unity to Cinnamon

10. Gutenbird

Printers

Confirming That Your Printer Is Supported Getting Ubuntu to Automatically Recognize and Set Up Your Printer Manually Configuring Printers Setting Up Wireless-Enabled Printers Setting Up Printers Connected over a Network For the Driverless Among You

Checking the Connections Trying Your Windows Drivers Using Third-Party Drivers Trial and Error

Printing Details

Printing in LibreOffice Printing to PDF Canceling a Print Job Checking Ink Levels and Other Printer Maintenance Tasks

Project 10: Installing TrueType Fonts

10-1: Getting the Font Files 10-2: Installing Fonts Locally 10-3: Installing TrueType Fonts Globally

Scanners

Scanning, No Questions Asked, with Simple Scan Not-So-Simple Scanning with XSane Unrecognized Scanners Why Are My Scanned Images So Big? Which Resolution Should I Use When Scanning?

11. Polyglot Penguins

Read-Only Language Support Typing Nonstandard Characters

Using the Compose Key Option Adding Keyboard Layouts

Chinese, Japanese, and Korean Input

Chinese Japanese Korean

Project 11: Setting Up Asian-Language Support

11-1: Installing IBus Input Methods 11-2: Selecting Input Method Modules 11-3: Typing Asian Languages with IBus

Setting Up IBus to Automatically Start Up When You Log In Viewing Your System in Another Language

12. Penguins at Work

Where the Apps Are LibreOffice

LibreOffice Applications

Writer Calc Impress Draw

Microsoft Office and LibreOffice File Compatibility LibreOffice Features Getting to Know the Buttons

Export to PDF Hyperlink Navigator Gallery Styles and Formatting

Word Processing Done Lightly with AbiWord FocusWriter Some Other Cool Productivity Apps

Dlume gLabels Tomboy FreeMind Scribus

13. Right-Brain Penguins

Where the Apps Are Project 13A: Importing Images from Digital Cameras

13A-1: Importing Images from Camera to Computer Somewhat Automatically via Shotwell 13A-2: Transferring Images from Camera to Computer via the File Manager

Project 13B: Working with Digital Images in Shotwell

13B-1: Publishing Images to Online Albums and Galleries 13B-2: Sending Images by Email via Shotwell 13B-3: Organizing Your Photo Collections with Tags

A Few Other Graphics Apps to Consider

RawTherapee Getting Arty with the GIMP

Using the GIMP to Resize Images and Convert File Formats Learning More

Phatch Photo Batch Processor MyPaint Inkscape gThumb Image Viewer Blender

14. Tux Rocks

Where the Apps Are Audio File Formats Installing MP3 Support for Audio Apps Rhythmbox—Ubuntu’s Default Audio Player

Adding Songs and Albums to the Rhythmbox Library Ripping Audio CDs with Rhythmbox Browsing the Rhythmbox Library Creating Playlists in Rhythmbox Ubuntu One Music Store via Rhythmbox Other Cool Features in Rhythmbox

Project 14: Listening to Streaming Media with Rhythmbox

14-1: Adding Radio Streams to Rhythmbox 14-2: Changing a Stream’s Title and Information in Rhythmbox

Creating Audio CDs

Burning Audio CDs with Rhythmbox Burning Audio CDs Directly with Brasero

Other Cool Audio Apps

Alternative Players Streaming Music with Streamtuner2 Ex Falso and EasyTAG

Apps for Music Makers

Audacity Ardour and LMMS MuseScore Amping It Up with PLUG Hydrogen & Mixx

15. Pluggin’ In the Penguin

Knowing Your Limits Mounting and Ejecting Your iPod, iPhone, or iPad (Not) Auto-updating Your iPod or iPhone Working with Android-Based Devices What About Kindles, NOOKs, and Android 3.0+ “Honeycomb”-Based Devices? Working with Other Digital Media Players and Cell Phones Managing Your Audio Device’s Audio Files with Rhythmbox

Copying Songs from Your Audio Device to Your Hard Disk Ejecting Your iPod or Other Digital Device from Within Rhythmbox

Problems Writing to Your iPod Working with Photos on Your Digital Device Converting Audio File Formats Playing Locked AAC (M4P) Files Linux on Your iPod, iPad, or Android Device?

16. Couch Penguins

Where the Apps Are DVDs Project 16: Installing Support for Encrypted DVDs Can I Play Foreign DVDs? Watching Video Files with Movie Player

Using Movie Player to Play DVDs, VCDs, and Other Multimedia Files Movie Player as an Audio Player? A Couple of Other Cool Movie Player Features

An Alternative (and Arguably Better) Video Player: VLC Transferring Movies from Your Digital Camera to Computer

Transferring Video Files from a Camera with a Storage Card Transferring Video Files from a Cell Phone or Another Mobile Device Capturing Digital Video from Cameras with Tape Storage

Editing Digital Video with PiTiVi Other Video Apps

17. Feathered Flippers

Where the Apps Are Project 17A: Expanding Your Game Collection via the Ubuntu Software Center

17A-1: Installing Classic GNOME Games 17A-2: Installing Some Linux Classics: Frozen Bubble, Tux Racer, and Pingus

3D Games

Checking for Hardware Acceleration Shooting Games Strategy Games Simulators Beyond the Ubuntu Software Center Commercial Games

Project 17B: Installing a Java-Based Game: Schnapsen

17B-1: Installing the Java Runtime Environment 17B-2: Getting and Extracting Schnapsen 17B-3: Running and Anglicizing Schnapsen

Online Gaming Searching for More Games

18. Sweet Home Antarctica

Where the Apps Are HomeBank Project 18A: Installing a Recipe Lens Personal Health Fun (but Educational) Stuff Kids’ Stuff Project 18B: Installing Parental Controls Other Home-Related Applications

19. Penguins at the Gates

Project 19A: Accessing Files on Your Windows Partition (for Dual-Booters)

19A-1: Mounting Your Windows Partition 19A-2: Unmounting Your Windows Partition

Accessing a Linux Partition While Running Windows Project 19B: Installing Microsoft Windows Core Fonts Dual-Booting: Changing the Boot Order and Timeout Linux Equivalents to Your Windows Applications Project 19C: Running Windows Programs

19C-1: Installing and Testing Wine 19C-2: Installing a Windows Application in Wine 19C-3: Getting Windows Apps to Work in Wine with PlayOnLinux

Installing Windows Inside Ubuntu Sharing Files with Windows Users on Your Network

Accessing Files Stored on a Windows Computer Making Your Files Accessible from a Windows Computer

20. Defending the Nest

Does My System Need Protection? The First Line of Defense Software Firewalls

Taking Control of Firestarter Confirming That Firestarter Runs Automatically Finding Out More

ClamAV: Antivirus Software, Linux Style Project 20A: Encrypting Your Files

20A-1: Creating an Encrypted File Folder 20A-2: Recovering Encrypted Files If Something Goes Wrong

Project 20B: Shredding Documents Digitally

20B-1: Trying the shred Command 20B-2: A Graphical Equivalent to the shred Command

21. A Colony of Penguins

Take Me to Your SABDFL Launchpad: Your Passport to the Ubuntu Community Bugs, Bugs, Glorious Bugs

What Counts as a Bug? Reporting a Bug Has It Already Been Reported? A New Bug What Happens Now? When Will My Bug Be Fixed? Faster Fixes

The Ubuntu Forums

Replying to a Post Creating Your Own Thread What’s All This Bean Business?

Ask Ubuntu Chatting on IRC

Registering Your Nickname IRC Etiquette More Help with IRC An IRC Alternative: Mailing Lists

Keeping Up with the News LoCos and LUGs Stickers and Other Goodies Getting Involved

Ubuntu Accomplishments

22. Wounded Wings

I Can’t Get Ubuntu Installed

My Computer Won’t Boot from the CD I Can’t Get the Installer to Run The Installer Stops Partway Through

Something Goes Wrong Before Ubuntu Finishes Booting

I Get a GRUB Error I Get a Kernel Panic or the Computer Freezes

Unplug Unnecessary Hardware Disable Restricted Drivers Check Your System Memory for Defects Use an Older Kernel Use Rescue Mode Reinstall Ubuntu

Windows Won’t Boot

Sound and Video Problems

Ubuntu Doesn’t Play Any Sounds My Microphone Doesn’t Work I Can’t Play an Audio or Video File

Internet and Network Connection Problems

Finding the Cause of a Connection Problem Installing Drivers for Your Network/Wireless Card Checking for Restricted Drivers No Wireless Networks Are Found Other Users on My Computer Can’t Connect

Problems with the Display and Graphics Cards

Games/Unity Don’t Work: Installing Accelerated Graphics Drivers

ATI/AMD Cards nVidia Cards

The Screen Looks Stretched or the Wrong Size The Screen Is Blank

Hard Disks and Storage Problems

My Disk Is Almost Full My Disk Is Completely Full I Can’t Delete a File

Software Installation Problems

I Get an Error About Unauthenticated Packages I Get a dpkg Error I Have a Broken Update A Software Repository/PPA That I Added Doesn’t Show Up in the Software Center

Common Problems with Applications

Firefox Says It’s Already Running A Program Always Crashes A Program Won’t Start

My Computer Is Running Slowly Lost Files Where Can I Go to Get More Help?

A. Installing Ubuntu from a USB Flash Drive

Preparing the Installer Files Creating a Bootable Installer Disk Booting from the USB Disk

B. Ubuntu Desktop 64-Bit Discs

Downloading and Burning Ubuntu Desktop CD ISOs to Disc

Burning the ISO to Disc in Windows Burning the ISO to Disc in OS X

Ordering an Install Disc from Other Online Sources

C. Manually Partitioning Your Hard Disk

Creating and Deleting Partitions Editing Existing Partitions Varieties of Partitions

Root Partition Swap Partition Home Partition Windows Partition Shared Partition

Example Partition Layouts

Standard Ubuntu-Only Installation Ubuntu-Only with a Separate Home Partition Ubuntu and Windows with a Shared Partition

Finishing Up

D. Resources

Forums Linux References Blogs Hardware Compatibility Issues Wireless Connections Free Downloads

Applications and Other Packages Free Fonts

News and Information Magazines Books Ubuntu CDs

Index About the Authors UPDATES E. About the CD Copyright

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