In this tutorial of Learning Linux, we will be going over the top ten tips and tricks that helped me have a enjoyable experience with Ubuntu.

1. Install Gnome themes. If you haven’t heard of this you are really missing out. The themes provided with Ubuntu are fine for the normal user but for geeks like us you may want something more suited to your taste. To begin point your browser to http://www.gnome-look.org/. Here you can find complete themes, icons, login screens, etc… In the left sidebar look for the topic you want and then scroll down (or search) until you find something you like. To install something (for example a theme-which is what you will be doing most of the time,) download it, open System/ Preferences/ Appearance, go to the “Theme” tab and click “install”. Then locate and select the file to activate it. To install a login screen go to System/Administration>Login Window and it’s basically the same from there.

If you find yourself reinstalling a theme you may see a message saying, “can’t move directory over directory.” This happens when you delete a theme then try to reinstall it. This is however very easy to fix. Just go to your home folder, and push CTRL+H to show hidden files. Navigate to the folder named .themes and delete the folder with the name of the previously deleted theme. You should now be able to reinstall the theme without any problem.

My favorite themes packages are the Moomex desktop theme with the new “Breathe” icons. (The icons come separately.)

2. Install those essential packages. Another essential thing to do upon installing Ubuntu is to install some essential packages. Open the the “Add/Remove” window. Make sure that “show all available programs” is selected from the dropdown list. First do a search for “java”. The average user will need, “Sun Java Runtime,” OpenJDK Java Webstart and Runtime” and Sun Java Plugin.” Some more packages I find essential are, “Ubuntu Restricted Extras,” and the Gstreamer Plugins which lloqa you play restricted file types such as MP3’s and others.

3. Edit what runs at Startup. Go to System>Preferences>Startup Applications. From here you can add your own program to run at startup or disable the splash screen (which I do not recommend for beginner and intermediate Ubuntu users.) Ubuntu also lets you chose whether to remember open applications from the last shutdown.

4. Install some cool fonts. To install fonts in Ubuntu, just go to Computer/Filesystem/usr/share/fonts/truetype/. (Most fonts if not all fonts you will be installing in Ubuntu will be in the TrueType format.) Then create a folder for your fonts to go into. I created a folder named “Personal” so I can remember which fonts I installed in case I need to transfer them to another computer.

5. Install restricted drivers. One of the first things you need to do after installing Ubuntu is check out if you need any restricted drivers. Go to System>Administration>Hardware Drivers to see if you do. You may not need them or you may as in my case where I didn’t have the driver for my wireless card.

6. Edit root files. Every once in a while you will need to edit some files in a root directory such as the “folder” talked about above. If you try to copy and paste a file into those folders, you will be denied permission. Do bypass this open a terminal and type “gksu nautilus”. After entering your password a window will open with root permissions to the folder. Just copy and paste through that window and it will not deny you access.

7. Install Gnome Deskbar Applet. This handy application sits in your panel and acts as an instant file searcher and it can open web pages. You can also set it to be used as a Dictionary. To install it open the Terminal and type, “sudo apt-get install deskbar-applet”. Then right click a panel, click “add to panel” and scroll down to the Deskbar Applet. From there you can set your preferences to your heart’s delight.

8. Make use of Workspaces! This is one thing in Ubuntu that once you use it you will never know how you lived without it. Add to panel and scroll down to Workspaces. (You may already have it on a panel.) Workspaces are basically multiple desktops. You click the little boxes in the Workspace Switcher and the Desktop slides to a new desktop that has no applications in the taskbar (is that the right name for it?) The programs are still running, just in the other workspace. This is really helpful is you have a lot of programs open at one time.

9. Enable visual effects. Go to System/Preferences/Appearance, Visual Effects tab. From there you can change the level of eye candy Ubuntu uses.

10. Linux has an active community that wants to help you! Finally, remember there is a great community of Ubuntu users who are willing to help you with your problems. Go to http://www.ubuntuforums.org to get started.

~ Theo

Web site Privacychoice rolls the opt-out routines for a couple dozen advertising networks into a single javascript button—so you can stop them tracking you without having to mess with cookie settings. from Lifehacker

PrivacyChoice.org.

Great Search

Integrated, or with Google Desktop.

Superb Rich Text editor

Very useful for basic formatting, to table’d email newsletters.

Also, it has spellcheck, a MUST!

Address book functionality

Pretty Good and simple

Spam filtering

No spam has gotten through it, so I’m guessing it’s pretty good

Good confirmation

Too many times you accidentally send something out without an attachment, or meant to say something else, or sent it to the wrong person.

Well, thunderbird asks if you wish to send something BEFORE you send it so you can look it over

Great Themes and Extensions

Need something? The chances for there to be an extension for it are great

If you don’t like it’s default skin, there are numerous great themes in mozilla’s addons section.

Anything else I missed?

Great IMAP integration, easy yet comprehensive settings, snappy.

It gets out of your way so you can read, sort and label email.

Phew! You can read more or download Thunderbird at MozillaMessaging.com

I recently have had a few comments about the background image changer.
This post is for those who wish to do this on their blog etc.
The code is under a creative commons license (you need to keep in the comment by blah… etc)
—
– In this demo I will be using “-your image url-” as “http://img.wherever.com/image.jpg” etc. and ” /*-your color-*/ ” as a hex color code (can get those here http://www.colorschemer.com/online.html) which are preceded by a # and are 6 digits, color names can work also. (get rid of /*- and the */ when inserting your value, repace it with the other string.

The code:

In your blogger edit layout tab there is another tab that says edit html.
Put this code right before the in the blog html add :

background-color: /*-your defalt color here-*/ !important;
background-position: /*-possible values here are top, bottom, and center, left, right-*/ !important;
background-image: url(/*-your background url-*/) !important;
/*background code changer by JPN3 Consulting, (http://jpn3.blogspot.com/, http://jpn3.50webs.com/) /*


Then, create a module called HTML/Javascript:

In that paste this code (with your modifications) (if your want to make a different background link, just copy from the <a> to the </a> and paste, you’ll have another link. if you want a line break inbetween the links, insert <br /> inbetween the </a> and <a> tags.

<a href=”#” onclick=”document.body.style.backgroundImage = ‘url(/*-your background image url-*/)’;document.body.style.backgroundColor = ‘/*-background color-*/;”> /*-link text-*/</a> | <br />

<href=”#” onclick=”document.body.style.backgroundImage = ‘url(/*-your background image url-*/)’;document.body.style.backgroundColor = ‘/*-background color-*/;”> /*-link text 2-*/</a><!– code by JPN3 Consulting (http://jpn3.50webs.com/)(http://jpn3.blogspot.com/) –>