UbuntuHandbook

Firefox 77.0 Released with Pocket Recommendations for UK users

Last updated: June 2, 2020

Firefox 55

Mozilla Firefox web browser 77.0 was released today with some new features and various security fixes.

Firefox 77.0 features:

Pocket’s article recommendations in new tab. If you don’t see them, follow these steps.
WebRender available by default on Windows 10 laptop with Nvidia GPUs (all screen sizes).
manage web certificates on about:certificate page.

There are also a number of bug-fixes and other changes, see the release note for details.

Download / Install Firefox 77 in Ubuntu:

For those prefer upgrading the pre-installed Firefox package, v77 package will be available in a few days for all current Ubuntu releases. At that time, upgrade Firefox via Software Updater (Update Manager):

In Howtos

How to Install Linux Kernel 5.7 in Ubuntu / Linux Mint

Last updated: July 16, 2020

Linus Torvalds announced the release of Kernel 5.7 a few days ago. Here’s how to install it in 64-bit Ubuntu and Linux Mint.

New features in Linux 5.7 include:

Support Intel Tiger Lake “Gen12” graphics out-of-the-box.
AMD Ryzen 4000 “Renoir” mobile graphics support
New exFAT driver from Samsung
Support for Apple USB Fast Charge
Zstd compression support for F2FS file-system.

How to Install Linux Kernel 5.7 in Ubuntu:

The mainline kernels do not include any Ubuntu-provided drivers or patches. They are not supported and are not appropriate for production use

The mainline kernel packages for Linux 5.7 (64-bit only) are now available for download at the link below:

Download Kernel 5.7

Select generic for common system, and lowlatency for a low latency system (e.g. for recording audio):

linux-headers-5.7.0-xxxxxx_all.deb
linux-headers-5.7.0-xxx-generic(/lowlatency)_xxx_amd64.deb
linux-modules-5.7.0-xxx-generic(/lowlatency)_xxx_amd64.deb
linux-image-xxx-5.7.0-xxx-generic(/lowlatency)_xxx_amd64.deb

Alternatively you can download and install the kernel binaries via terminal commands ( open terminal via Ctrl+Alt+T):

cd /tmp/

wget -c https://kernel.ubuntu.com/~kernel-ppa/mainline/v5.7/amd64/linux-headers-5.7.0-050700_5.7.0-050700.202006082127_all.deb

wget -c https://kernel.ubuntu.com/~kernel-ppa/mainline/v5.7/amd64/linux-headers-5.7.0-050700-generic_5.7.0-050700.202006082127_amd64.deb

wget -c https://kernel.ubuntu.com/~kernel-ppa/mainline/v5.7/amd64/linux-image-unsigned-5.7.0-050700-generic_5.7.0-050700.202006082127_amd64.deb

wget -c https://kernel.ubuntu.com/~kernel-ppa/mainline/v5.7/amd64/linux-modules-5.7.0-050700-generic_5.7.0-050700.202006082127_amd64.deb

sudo dpkg -i *.deb

Once installed, restart your computer and enjoy!

Uninstall Linux Kernel 5.7:

Restart your machine and select boot with the previous kernel in boot menu ‘Grub2 -> Advanced Option for Ubuntu’. Then run command to remove Linux Kernel 5.7:

sudo dpkg --purge linux-image-unsigned-5.7.0-050700-generic

In Howtos kernel 5.7

NetSpeed – Display Download / Upload Speed in Ubuntu 20.04 | 22.04 Panel

Last updated: August 12, 2022

Need an indicator applet to display internet download and upload speed in the top panel of Ubuntu 20.04 Gnome Shell?

NetSpeed used to be an old Gnome applet, then an indicator for Unity desktop. Now it’s a Gnome Shell extension that displays real time internet speed for all network interfaces.

For Ubuntu 22.04 LTS, please scroll down and see the update method to install the net speed indicator.

Install NetSpeed in Ubuntu 20.04:

In your web browser, simply go to extensions.gnome.org/extension/104/netspeed/

If you don’t see the toggle icon, do:

Click the link text “click here to install browser extension” and follow the pop-ups to install the browser extension:
Then open terminal via Ctrl+Alt+T and run command:
```
sudo apt install chrome-gnome-shell
```

Finally refresh the extension page, toggle on and click ‘install’ in the confirm pop-up.

To manage the Gnome Shell extension, either use ‘Extensions‘ utility or Gnome Tweak Tool, both are available in Ubuntu Software.

How to Uninstall the applet:

To remove the extension, you may either re-open the web-page via the previous link and turn off the toggle icon.

Or, open terminal and run command to install “Gnome Extensions” app:

sudo apt install gnome-shell-extension-prefs

After that, search for and launch the tool, which allows to manage all extensions installed on your system.

App to Manage your extensions

(UPDATE) Install Net Speed Indicator in Ubuntu 22.04:

Since Ubuntu 22.04 defaults to Firefox as Snap, which does not support installing Gnome extensions, there’s another way to install the indicator.

1. Firstly, press Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard to open terminal. When it opens, run the command below to install extension manager app:

sudo apt install gnome-shell-extension-manager

2. Next, click the top-left ‘Activities’, then search for and open the app:

3. Finally, search for and install ‘net speed’ in the “Browser” tab of the pop-up tool and enjoy!

In Howtos internet speed

How to Install My Weather Indicator in Ubuntu 20.04

Last updated: January 2, 2022

Looking for a desktop weather application for Ubuntu desktop? My Weather Indicator is one of the great choices.

My Weather Indicator is an application especially designed for Ubuntu. It’s written in Python 3 and works on Plasma, GNOME, MATE, Xfce, etc.

The software displays current weather and the weather forecast via system tray indicator applet and desktop widget. Supported weather services include: OpenWeatherMap, Yahoo, wunderground.com, and World Weather Online.

To install the weather application, open terminal from your system application menu and run following commands one by one.

1.) Add the developer’s PPA by running command in terminal:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:atareao/atareao

Type your login password (no asterisk feedback) for sudo prompt and hit Enter to continue.

2.) Refresh package cache and install the software:

sudo apt update

sudo apt install my-weather-indicator

3.) The first launching My Weather Indicator will bring up the settings dialog. There you can setup your location, widget theme, weather services, auto-start, refresh frequency, etc.

Note: after clicking OK button, it can take a few seconds to show the desktop widget.

Uninstall:

To remove the PPA, either open Software & Update > Other Software or run command:

sudo add-apt-repository --remove ppa:atareao/atareao

To remove the weather application, run command:

sudo apt remove my-weather-indicator

In App Review, Howtos weather indicator, weather widget

How to Install Foliate eBook Reader 2.2.0 via PPA in Ubuntu

Last updated: May 30, 2020

Modern GTK3 eBook reader Foliate 2.2.0 was released today with many great new features. Here’s how to install it via PPA in Ubuntu 18.04, Ubuntu 19.10, and Ubuntu 20.04.

Foliate 2.2.0 is a new major release that features:

New library tab:
- showing recent books and reading progress.
- Search books by metadata
- E-book discovery with OPDS
New eBook format support:
- FictionBook (.fb2, .fb2.zip)
- Comic book archive (.cbr, .cbz, .cbt, .cb7)
- Plain text (.txt)
- Unpacked EPUB files
Improved layout, text-to-speech, image viewer, annotations.
Important security fix. Recommend to “Allow Unsafe Content” for old version.
Support for StarDict dictionaries.
And many other features, see release note for more details.

How to Install Foliate 2.2.0 in Ubuntu:

The software is available to install either via Snap package (in Ubuntu Software) or Flatpak package, both run in sandbox.

For those prefer Ubuntu .deb package, run following commands one by one to install it via the PPA repository.

1.) Open terminal (Ctrl+Alt+T) and run command to add the PPA:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:apandada1/foliate

Type user password (no asterisk feedback) when it prompts and hit Enter to continue.

2.) Then refresh package cache and install the eBook reader:

sudo apt update

sudo apt install foliate

NOTE if you’ve installed an old version via the .deb package downloaded from github release page, remove it first due to different package name by running command:

sudo apt remove com.github.johnfactotum.foliate

Uninstall:

To remove the PPA repository, open Software & Updates utility and navigate to Other Software tab.

To remove Foliate ebook reader, simply run command:

sudo apt remove --autoremove foliate

In Howtos, News ebook reader

How to Compress Files to Password Protect Archive in Ubuntu 20.04

Last updated: May 30, 2020

The default nautilus file browser allows to compress files into Zip, Tar.xz, 7z archive with no other options.

What if you want to compress your data into other formats (e.g., rar, epub, jar, and more) with password protection, and change the compress level?

1.) Open file roller archive manager from ‘Show Applications’ menu.

2.) Go to menu > New Archive, then you can:

create with 24 supported arhive formats.
type a filename, select location.
and set password under Other Options (click expend) for epub, rar, zip, and more.
finally click on Create button.

NOTE: you need to run sudo apt install rar unrar command in terminal (Ctrl+Alt+T) and follow by nautilus -q to enable rar support.

3.) Next click on top left ‘+‘ icon and add your files to the archive, finally close the window and done.

4.) If you want to enable maximum compression level, install dconf editor from Ubuntu Software and launch it.

Navigate to org/gnome/file-roller/general/compression-level, toggle off ‘Use default value’ and set ‘Custom value’ to ‘maximum’.

In Howtos maximum compression, password protect

Android Studio 4.0 Released! How to Install in Ubuntu 20.04

Last updated: May 29, 2020

Android Studio 4.0 was released a day ago. Here’s how to install it in Ubuntu 18.04, Ubuntu 19.10, Ubuntu 20.04.

Android Studio 4.0 features a new Motion Editor, improved Layout Inspector, Clangd support for C++, smart editor features, enhancements to the CPU Profiler, Java 8 language library desugaring in D8 and R8, and much more other changes. See the release note for more.

How to Install Android Studio 4.0 in Ubuntu:

The containerized Snap package is available to install in Ubuntu Software for Ubuntu 18.04 and higher:

Don’t like Snap application? You can also install Android Studio 4.0 easily via Ubuntu Make.

1.) Install the latest Ubuntu Make:

Open terminal (Ctrl+Alt+T) and run command to add the PPA which contains the latest Ubuntu Make packages for Ubuntu 16.04, Ubuntu 18.04, Ubuntu 19.10, and Ubuntu 20.04.

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:lyzardking/ubuntu-make

Then install or upgrade Ubuntu Make via command:

sudo apt update && sudo apt install ubuntu-make

2.) Install Android Studio via command:

umake android --accept-license

It automatically downloads the software package and dependencies from Google and installs on your system for single use by default.

3.) Once installed, launch the IDE from ‘Show Applications’ menu. Restart you machine if you don’t see the icon, or run sh ~/.local/share/umake/android/android-studio/bin/studio.sh command to launch it from terminal.

Uninstall:

You may remove Ubuntu Make PPA by running command:

sudo add-apt-repository --remove ppa:lyzardking/ubuntu-make

And remove Android Studio via command:

umake android --remove

In Howtos, News Android Studio

How to Enable SSH Service in Ubuntu 20.04

Last updated: May 28, 2020

This quick tip shows how to enable Secure Shell (SSH) service in Ubuntu 20.04 LTS, both desktop and server, to allow secure remote login and other network communications.

Ubuntu includes OpenSSH, a suite of secure networking utilities based on the Secure Shell protocol, in its main repositories. While OpenSSH client is installed out-of-the-box, you can do following steps to install and setup OpenSSH server in Ubuntu 20.04.

1. First open terminal and run command to install the packages:

sudo apt install ssh

Type user password (no asterisk feedback) for sudo prompt and hit Enter.

2. Once installed, SSH services start in background silently. You can check its status by running command:

systemctl status ssh.service

You may replace status in the code with stop, reload, restart to stop, reload, or restart the service.

3. The SSH service should be working good now for basic use! If you want to change the listening port, root login permission, or other authentications, run command to edit the configuration file:

sudo nano /etc/ssh/sshd_config

replace nano with gedit if you’re on Ubuntu Desktop.

Save changes by pressing Ctrl+X, then Y, and finally hit Enter. And remember to restart the SSH service via sudo systemctl restart ssh.service command.

In Howtos openssh, ssh

How to Fix ‘Folder Color’ Files Extension in Ubuntu 20.04

Last updated: May 28, 2020

Folder Color is a file browser extension allows to change the color and add emblem for selected folder.

Folder Color is available in Ubuntu universe repositories. However, it does not work very well in Ubuntu 20.04 with the default Yaru icon theme, since changing the color of folders will also change the icons.

The original developer has made the Yaru theme integration with Folder Color for Ubuntu 20.04, which can be installed via this PPA repository.

1.) Open terminal by pressing Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard, then run command to add the PPA:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:costales/yaru-colors-folder-color

Type user password (no asterisk feedback) and hit Enter to continue.

2.) Then install the extension as well as Yaru theme integration:

sudo apt install folder-color yaru-colors-folder-color

3.) Finally restart Nautilus file browser via nautilus -q command. Restore previously folders’ color if changed.

And change the colors from folders’ context menu and enjoy!

(Optional) To remove the PPA repository, either go to Software & Updates -> Other Software or run command in terminal:

sudo add-apt-repository --remove ppa:costales/yaru-colors-folder-color

In Howtos folder color

Twin-panel File Manager Sunflower 0.4 Released with GTK3 Port

Last updated: May 27, 2020

Small and highly customizable twin-panel Sunflower file manager released version 0.4 after many years of development.

Sunflower 0.4 brings new interface based on GTK3. The code is ported to Python3. As a result of this rewrite performance has gone up as well.

There are still many issues in the new release. Emblems are completely missing, drag and drop is broken and keyboard shortcuts are broken due to some upstream problems. And these will be fixed in upcoming weeks.