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Archives For November 30, 1999

Polychromatic 0.7 Released, New UI / CLI to Control Razer RGB Lighting in Linux

Last updated: August 9, 2021

Got Razer peripherals? Polychromatic released version 0.7.0 with redesigned UI and command line interface to control the RGB lighting in Linux.

For those never heard of Polychromatic, it’s a free open-source vendor agnostic front-end for managing lighting, RGB effects and some special functionality for keyboards, mouse, keypads and other gaming peripherals.

It so far only supports OpenRazer as backend for Razer devices. Though it aims to add OpenRGB and phue for Philips Hue and more brands support.

The software now uses PyQt5 instead of WebKitGTK for its graphical user interface. And it redesigned the UI with following features:

  • New tab & sidebar interface.
  • New preferences dialog.
  • New colour picker dialog and saved colour management.
  • New “Apply to All” section
  • New “Inspect Matrix” for testing LEDs and co-ordinates
  • New DPI controls, allowing independent X/Y axis.
  • Add ability to set custom DPI stages.
  • Ability to use “native” system theme.

polychromatic new UI

The indicator menu in the release is also overhauled with legacy GTK Status Icon support, and new options.

The release also introduced a new command line interface for terminal warrior. You can get started by running command in terminal: 

polychromatic-cli --help

For any device capable of individually addressable LEDs, you can now create your own static and animated effects via the Effect Editor, by clicking & draging with your pointer to draw on a graphic representing your devices, or use a grid.

So far the device graphics are available for the following devices: Razer BlackWidow Chroma, Razer BlackWidow Elite, Razer DeathStalker Chroma, Razer Huntsman Elite, Razer Mamba Elite, Razer Mamba Tournament Edition, Razer Blade Stealth (2016), Razer Blade (2018), Razer Blade Pro (2019), Razer Firefly, Razer Base Station Chroma. While the grid is always available.

Other changes include:

  • App can run without OpenRazer, but will be limited.
  • Add support for multizoned hardware.
  • Support custom effects for all compatible hardware.
  • New troubleshooter and new configuration editor.
  • New and updated icons.

How to Install Polychromatic in Ubuntu:

The Polychromatic team maintains official Ubuntu PPA that so far supports for Ubuntu 18.04, Ubuntu 20.04, Ubuntu 21.04, Ubuntu 21.10, and Linux Mint 20.

Open terminal from start menu, paste the command below and hit run to add the PPA:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:polychromatic/stable

Also add the OpenRazer PPA for the backend package:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:openrazer/stable

Finally update package cache, install it as well as OpenRazer daemon:

sudo apt update

sudo apt install polychromatic openrazer-daemon

Uninstall Polychromatic & OpenRazer:

To remove them simply run apt command with remove flag:

sudo apt remove --autoremove polychromatic openrazer-daemon

And you can remove the 2 Ubuntu PPAs by launching “Software & Updates” and navigating to “Other Software” tab. Then remove the relevant lines from the list:

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0 A.D. Alpha 25 Released! Implement Single Player Campaigns [Ubuntu PPA]

Last updated: August 9, 2021

Real-time strategy video game 0 A.D. released version Alpha 25 a day ago. Code name is “Yaunã”.

0 A.D. (pronounced “zero ey-dee”) is a free and open-source RTS game under development by Wildfire Games, that works on Windows, Linux, and MAC. It is a historically-based war/economy game that allows players to relive or rewrite the history of Western civilizations, focusing on the years between 500 B.C. and 500 A.D.

“Yaunã” comes with the twenty-fifth alpha version that initially implements Single Player Campaigns, along with other big ones including:

  • Improved Pathfinding, Performance And Reduced Game Lag.
  • Push new orders to the front Of their production queues.
  • Improved Unit AI.
  • New Biomes incorporating wew 2k textures and normal/specular maps.
  • GUI improvements.
  • Extended Graphics options.
  • Improved Mod support and game filtering in the multiplayer lobby.
  • Ongoing civilization balancing.
  • Various other game stability bug fixes and speedups.

See video about 0 A.D. Alpha 25:

How to Install 0 A.D in Ubuntu:

The game package is available in Ubuntu repository but always old! To get the latest version, keep an eye on this Ubuntu PPA while the official one is not being updated for long time.

Usually, maintainers update the latest software packages a few days after the release note. For beginners, you can follow this tutorial to add the PPA and install 0 A.D. once the new package published.

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Enable Ubuntu 16.04 Unity Style Login Screen in Ubuntu 20.04 & Higher

Last updated: August 6, 2021

Missing the old Ubuntu Unity style login screen? It’s easy to get it back in Ubuntu 18.04, Ubuntu 20.04 and higher.

LightDM, stands for Light Display Manager, is a free open-source project by Canonical, the company behind Ubuntu. Ubuntu up to version 16.04 LTS uses it as the default display manager. And it’s present in Linux Mint 20 and some Ubuntu flavors.

For those prefer the LightDM style login screen, it’s available in Ubuntu universe repositories:

How to Install LightDM in Ubuntu 20.04 & Higher:

Press Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard to open a terminal window. When it opens, paste the command below and hit enter:

sudo apt install lightdm unity-greeter

While the installing process, it will prompt to configure the display manager. Just hit Enter on the screen.

At the next screen, use up/down arrow key to choose “lightdm” and hit Enter to apply.

Once installed, restart your computer and you’ll see the new login screen!

Configure LightDM login screen:

Uses are mostly want to remove the white dots and change the login background wallpaper.

To do so, open terminal (Ctrl+Alt+T) and run command to install dconf-editor if you don’t have it:

sudo apt install dconf-editor

Next, run command to grant lightdm user privilege to access control list:

xhost +SI:localuser:lightdm

Finally launch dconf editor via lightdm:

sudo -u lightdm dconf-editor

When it opens, navigate to “com/canonical/unity-greeter“. Then turn off ‘draw-grid’, and change background image as you want.

For more settings, see the Ubuntu Wiki.

How to Restore Gnome Login Screen:

To revert back the original GDM display manager. Firstly, open terminal and run command to disable LightDM:

sudo systemctl disable lightdm.service

Then launch the configure screen by running the command below:

sudo dpkg-reconfigure lightdm

This time choose ‘gdm3’ to handle the login screen and hit Enter.

Finally, remove lightdm as well as its dependency packages via command:

sudo apt remove --autoremove lightdm unity-greeter

That’s all. Enjoy!

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Ubuntu 21.10 Finally Removed “Standard” Theme-box, Only Light & Dark Mode Now

Last updated: August 7, 2021

Ubuntu 21.10 daily build got an update for its gnome-control-center package(System Settings) recently. The ‘Standard’ mode is finally removed from the Appearance settings.

The Yaru theme developer team submitted the request to remove the ‘Standard’ theme when in June, since both GTK3 and GTK4 do NOT support having different background / text colors for headerbar than in the rest of the window.

The development build of Ubuntu 21.10 finally apply the change in the recent update. The ‘Window colors’ options under Appearance settings are now only fully dark and fully light. There’s no longer dark header bar with light window color called ‘Standard’.

Along with the new thumbnail preview, the context menus for the desktop, file manager, and other Gnome apps also inherit the dark and light appearance setting.

They are still some apps, e.g, Gnome Terminal and Ubuntu Software, that are not implemented for the changes.

As before, the settings do not change the color of top-bar menus, notification, and left dock menu, etc. However, a patched version of gnome-control-center is available to easily toggle the WHOLE system to Dark or Light.

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DeaDBeeF Audio Player 1.8.8 Now Reads WAV RIFF Tags

Last updated: August 3, 2021

DeaDBeeF audio player 1.8.8 was released as the 8th bugfix release for the 1.8 series.

The new release introduced some new features, including reading WAV RIFF tags, handling of Disc subtitle frames in ID3v2 and APE tags, and handling samplerates higher than 192KHz to pulseaudio.

New context menu options “Play Next” and “Play Later” are now available to choose your favorite song to play next, or set one-time play order for songs in play list. It will add marks at the beginning that indicates the sequence.

It also redesigned the plugin page in Preferences. Now each plugin has the configuration along with basic info and license in tabs.

Other changes in DeaDBeef 1.8.8 includes:

  • Non-modal preferences window
  • $rgb() title formatting function
  • Group title colorization support via title formatting
  • Plugin report and filtering in Plugin list
  • Focusable playlist tabs with keyboard navigation support
  • Sorting plugin list alphabetically
  • Improved album path handling, especially for Windows
  • Drag-and-drop on the main window
  • Using scroll wheel with seek bar
  • Delete from disk dialog will highlight the Delete button as destructive action
  • And some stability fixes.

How to Install DeaDBeeF 1.8.8 in Ubuntu:

The software offers official .deb package for 64-bit Ubuntu & Linux Mint systems.

Download DeaDBeeF (.deb)

Grab the package, ‘deadbeef-static_1.8.8-1_amd64.deb’, then install it by running command in terminal:

sudo apt install ~/Downloads/deadbeef-static*.deb

There’s also an Ubuntu PPA for DeaDBeeF, though it’s not updated at the moment of writing. And note that the PPA package conflicts to the official ‘deadbeef-static‘ package due to packaging issue. Remove the old package first if you’re going to install it from another source.

Remove DeaDBeeF:

To remove the music player, simply run command in terminal:

sudo apt remove --autoremove deadbeef-static deadbeef
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How to Install and Set up Gerbera Media Server in Ubuntu / Debian

Last updated: April 26, 2024

This simple tutorial shows how to install and setup Gerbera home media server in all current Ubuntu and Debian releases.

Gerbera is a free and open-source UPnP media server for Linux, BSD, and Mac OS. With it, you can stream audio and/or video files over home network, and play on any device with a media player with UPnP support, e.g., VLC.

How to Gerbera in Ubuntu / Debian via its official repository

Gerbera is available in Ubuntu repositories but always old. It’s however quite easy to install the latest version since it offers an official apt repository. And so far, it supports for Ubuntu 18.04, Ubuntu 20.04, Ubuntu 21.04, Debian Buster & Bullseye.

1.) Firstly open terminal from start menu. Then paste the command below and hit run to install the key:

curl -fsSL https://gerbera.jfrog.io/artifactory/api/gpg/key/public | sudo apt-key add -

Install curl via sudo apt install curl if you don’t have it. Type user password when it asks (no asterisk feedback) and hit Enter.

2.) Next add the apt repository by running command in terminal:

sudo apt-add-repository https://gerbera.jfrog.io/artifactory/debian

3.) Adding repository should automatically update the package information. If not, run it manually via command:

sudo apt update

4.) You can finally install the latest Gerbera package via command:

sudo apt install gerbera

Set up Gerbera Media Server:

The media server is now simple to use since user and permission are well configured during installing process.

1.) Set user and password for Web UI.

You can skip this step, so anyone in home network can access the server configuration page via Web UI without authentication.

Firstly, open terminal and run command to edit the config file:

sudo gedit /etc/gerbera/config.xml

When files opens, go to UI section. Enable account login and set username and password as you prefer.

2.) Run Gerbera service:

Next, run command to start the media server service:

systemctl start gerbera

And check the server status via command:

systemctl status gerbera

If it’s running successfully, it will output the IP address and listening port for the web UI page.

NOTE: to make the service start automatically at login, run systemctl enable gerbera.

3.) Paste the address in web browser, http://192.168.0.108:49152 in my case, and hit Enter. Then login with the user and password you set in step 1.).

You can finally, click “Add some files” to steam your media files, and manage them as well as clients via next two buttons.

OK, you can now enjoy the music or movie in any device with UPnP client, for example VLC on iOS:

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How to Enable Game Mode for Better Gaming Experience in Ubuntu Linux

Last updated: April 26, 2024

Want to get better performance when playing games in Linux? Try GameMode!

GameMode is a free open-source Linux project allows games to request a set of optimizations be temporarily applied to the host and/or game process.

The project was originally designed as a stop-gap solution to problems with Intel and AMD CPU powersave or ondemand governors. But now GameMode supports for optimizations including:

  • CPU governor
  • I/O priority
  • Process niceness
  • Kernel scheduler
  • Screensaver inhibiting
  • GPU performance mode (NVIDIA and AMD), GPU overclocking (NVIDIA)
  • Custom scripts

1. How to Install GameMode in Ubuntu Linux:

The package is available in Ubuntu as well as most other Linux repositories.

Firstly open terminal by either searching from ‘Activities’ overview screen, or pressing Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard. When terminal opens, run command to install it:

sudo apt install gamemode

For Fedora and CentOS Linux, you can install it via command:

sudo dnf install gamemode

(Optional) Install GameMode indicator:

For choice, you can install an indicator applet that shows the current status of GameMode. It’s an extension for the default Gnome desktop.

a.) Open terminal and run command to make sure chrome-gnome-shell browser integration is installed:

sudo apt install chrome-gnome-shell gnome-shell-extension-prefs

b.) Next go to the extension web page by clicking the button below. And turn on the slider icon to install it.

GameMode Extension

If you don’t see the toggle icon, click the “click here to install browser extension” link to install browser extension and reload the page.

Finally, search for and open ‘Gnome Extensions App’ from start menu. And click on the gear button to configure the status indicator.

2. How to Run Game in GameMode:

Some games and platforms have integrated GameMode support. Which means you don’t have to do anything to activate it. They are:

  • DiRT 4
  • Rise of the Tomb Raider
  • Shadow of the Tomb Raider
  • Total War Saga: Thrones of Britannia
  • Total War: Three Kingdoms
  • Total War: WARHAMMER II
  • ATLauncher Minecraft launcher
  • Lutris

For other games, you can now run the executable command by adding gamemoderun at the beginning. For example, run SuperTux2 in GameMode via:

gamemoderun supertux2

For steam, you can simply add gamemoderun %command% as launch option.

And without launching game every time from command line, write the rule into app shortcut file. They are .desktop files generally locate in “/usr/share/applications” directory.

For example, edit SuperTux 2 app shortcut via command:

sudo gedit /usr/share/applications/supertux2.desktop

When the file opens, add gamemoderun before executable command in Exec line.

For Hybrid GPU users, the GameMode supports environment variable via GAMEMODERUNEXEC. So you can run GameMode while using dedicated gpu for rendering game which will be displayed using the integrated card. For example:

export GAMEMODERUNEXEC="env DRI_PRIME=1" && gamemoderun supertux2

To set the environment variable globally, add either line into /etc/environment config file for your case.

GAMEMODERUNEXEC=optirun #Bumblebee implementation.

GAMEMODERUNEXEC="env DRI_PRIME=1"

or 

GAMEMODERUNEXEC="env __NV_PRIME_RENDER_OFFLOAD=1 env __GLX_VENDOR_LIBRARY_NAME=nvidia env __VK_LAYER_NV_optimus=NVIDIA_only"
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How to Install Linux Mint Apps (Hypnotix, Webapp-Manager, etc) via PPA in Ubuntu

Last updated: April 26, 2024

The Linux Mint team introduced many great new apps in recent releases. And now an Ubuntu PPA is available that contains these apps for all current Ubuntu releases.

Without adding Linux Mint repository and setting the priority, an Ubuntu PPA is good choice to install or receive the package updates.

And ‘Butterfly’, a top contributor of Linux Mint project on launchpad, maintains the PPA repository with packages so far for Ubuntu 22.04, Ubuntu 20.04, Ubuntu 23.10, and Ubuntu 24.04 support. And the PPA contains updated version of the following packages:

  • Bulky batch file renamer.
  • Hypnotix IPTV player.
  • Pix image viewer and browser.
  • Sticky notes app.
  • Warpinator LAN file transfer.
  • Mint’s Web App Manager.
  • And some more.

Add PPA and Install Linux Mint Apps in Ubuntu:

1. Add the PPA.

Firstly, open terminal either from start menu, or press Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard. When terminal opens, paste the command below and hit Enter to add the PPA:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:kelebek333/mint-tools

Type user password, no visual feedback, when it asks and hit Enter to continue.

2. Next install or update Linux Mint apps:

After adding the PPA, you can now install one or all of the previous apps via apt command.

For example, install the web app manager via command:

sudo apt install webapp-manager

For other apps, replace webapp-manager in the command with bulky, hypnotix, pix, or warpinator.

And if an update version is available, you’ll be able to upgrade the package via Software Updater along with system updates.

Uninstall PPA and Linux Mint Apps:

To remove these Linux Mint apps, run apt command with remove flag. For example, remove bulky via command:

sudo apt remove --autoremove bulky

As well, replace bulky in command with other package to remove.

And remove the Ubuntu PPA either via command:

sudo add-apt-repository --remove ppa:kelebek333/mint-tools

or by Software & Updates utility other “Other Software” tab.

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How to Create Restricted Guest Account in Ubuntu 24.04/22.04

Last updated: May 13, 2024

Want to enable Guest account in Ubuntu? Without switching to another display manager, you can add Guest in Gnome login screen for people to use your computer while NOT being able to install/remove app, change system wide settings, and access files outside its own directory.

Guest is available by default in Ubuntu 16.04 Unity desktop. After Ubuntu switched to Gnome Desktop, the feature is removed. For those need Guest account, it’s easy to add it back via following steps.

1. Create Guest Account.

Firstly, open system settings either from top-right system menu, or by searching from Activities overview screen.

Next, navigate to Users in left pane (For Ubuntu 24.04, go to “System -> Users” in settings app) and click “Unlock” button and type your user password to unlock the settings page.

Finally, click on “Add User…” to create a new user:

  • select Standard, (for Ubuntu 24.04, leave “Administrator” turned off) so it has no sudo permission, can’t install/remove app, and no access file outside its user home.
  • set username to Guest.
  • And set password for it. REQUIRED though it’s useless. Next step I’ll tell how to enable no password login.

2. Enable No Password Login for Guest

Press Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard to open terminal, then copy and paste the command below and hit Enter.

sudo gedit /etc/pam.d/gdm-password

This command will open the configuration file. Simply add the following line at the beginning (so it will be the first line) and save it:

auth sufficient pam_succeed_if.so user ingroup guest

OK, in next boot you’ll see the Guest account in GNOME login screen. Simple click to login without typing password, and enjoy!

3.(Optional) Add more Restrictions:

The Guest account can’t install/remove apps, manage PPAs, access files out of its home directory. Any action needs authentication will ask for typing password for Admin Account.

It however has permissions to customize its own desktop appearance, access CD Rom, mount/un-mount USB and other removable devices, use audio/video devices (e.g., webcam, microphone), full and direct access to serial ports.

These permissions are handled via groups. You can check which groups that include Guest account via command:

cat /etc/group |grep guest

And the Debian Wiki tells what do the groups do. By removing Guest from a group will disable the permission. For example, remove it from plugdev group run command:

sudo gpasswd --delete guest plugdev

For even more restrictions, e.g., disable save file, lock down appearance settings, disable printing, etc., go to the Gnome Wiki.

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PyCharm 2021.2 Released with Python 3.10 Support (Ubuntu PPA)

Last updated: July 29, 2021

PyCharm Ubuntu

JetBrains announced the release of PyCharm 2021.2. Features Python 3.10 support, auto-reload for browser HTML preview.

Starting with the new release, users from Asian can enjoy the a fully localized UI in Chinese, Korean, or Japanese. And it’s going to end support for several packages, e.g., mako, buildout, web2py, in next release.

Before Python 3.10 goes stable, the IDE starts working for Python 3.10 support with following features:

  • Adjust to the upcoming Structural Pattern Matching, such as the Unused local symbols and Unreachable code inspections, smart code completion and syntax highlighting for the match and case keywords, and the Complete Current Statement action.
  • Complete match statements and their corresponding case blocks.
  • Supports type inference for isinstance and issubclass arguments with the new syntax type.

And other changes include:

  • Working in the Python console is now supported on both the client and the host side.
  • Code completion for fields and operators in the MongoDB console (Pro only).
  • Context live templates from the data editor with SQL scripts action (Pro only).
  • auto-reload for browser HTML preview (pro).
  • Auto-import for require() (pro).
  • New Onboarding Tour in the IDE Features Trainer plugin.
  • Test runner auto-detection
  • The Test Management plugin includes Python support and available for PyCharm Community.
  • New Test Data plugin to generate random data.

How to Install PyCharm 2021.2 in Ubuntu:

Jetbrains provides official Linux package. They are portable tarballs, available to download at the link below:

Download PyCharm

To make life easier, you can install the community edition from the unofficial PPA. And it supports for Ubuntu 20.04 and Ubuntu 21.04 so far.

1.) Open terminal from start menu, and run command to add the PPA:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:xtradeb/apps

2.) Manually refresh system package cache, e.g., for Linux Mint:

sudo apt update

3.) Finally install PyCharm via command:

sudo apt install pycharm-community

Uninstall:

To remove the PPA, either run command in terminal:

sudo add-apt-repository --remove ppa:xtradeb/apps

or open “Software & Updates” and navigate to “Other Software” tab to remove the relevant line.

And remove PyCharm by running command in terminal:

sudo apt remove --autoremove pycharm-community
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