[Quick Tip] View Recent Notifications in Ubuntu 16.04

Last updated: June 5, 2016

notification history

This is quick tutorial for those who want to view the desktop notifications history in Ubuntu 16.04 LTS.

It can be done by either enabling logging notifications for Notify-OSD, or using Recent Notifications, a simple system panel applet.

View recent notifications via an indicator applet:

There’s a GNOME applet that displays a list of recent notifications on system panel.

To install the applet, go to:

Select install the latest version of:

  • indicator-notifications_x.x.x~xenial_amd64.deb for 64-bit Ubuntu 16.04
  • indicator-notifications_x.x.x~xenial_i386.deb for 32-bit Ubuntu 16.04

There’s also a GTK2 version available for download at this page.

Once installed, log out and log in back to see the applet on panel.

Tips:

1. The applet displays up to 5 messages, to change the number of visible items, edit the config file: ‘usr/share/glib-2.0/schemas/net.launchpad.indicator.notifications.gschema.xml’

2. To remove the applet, use Synaptic Package Manager or run command sudo apt remove indicator-notifications in terminal

Enable Logging notifications:

Another way is to log notifications history into a file. Here’s how to do it for single user in Ubuntu 16.04:

1. Open terminal (Ctrl+Alt+T), run command to open (or create if not exist) a user-local script:

gedit ~/.pam_environment

When the file opens, paste the line below and save it.

LOG DEFAULT=1

2. After restart your computer, a new file “notify-osd.log” will be created in user’s Home -> .cache folder that logs notifications history.

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I'm a freelance blogger who started using Ubuntu in 2007 and wishes to share my experiences and some useful tips with Ubuntu beginners and lovers. Please comment to let me know if the tutorial is outdated! And, notify me if you find any typo/grammar/language mistakes. English is not my native language. Contact me via ubuntuhandbook1@gmail.com Buy me a coffee: https://ko-fi.com/ubuntuhandbook1