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Use Silverlight in Firefox, Chrome in Ubuntu via Pipelight plugin

Last updated: March 21, 2019

Pipelight is a special browser plugin allows to run your favorite Silverlight application directly inside your Linux browser. The project combines the effort by Erich E. Hoover with a new browser plugin that embeds Silverlight directly in any Linux browser supporting the Netscape Plugin API.

Pipelight consists out of two parts: A Linux library which is loaded into the browser and a Windows program started in Wine. The Windows program, called pluginloader.exe, simply simulates a browser and loads the Silverlight DLLs. When you open a page with a Silverlight application the library will send all commands from the browser through a pipe to the Windows process and act like a bridge between your browser and Silverlight. The used pipes do not have any big impact on the speed of the rendered video since all the video and audio data is not send through the pipe. Only the initialization parameters and (sometimes) the network traffic is send through them. As a user you will not notice anything from that “magic” and you can simply use Silverlight the same way as on Windows, like you can see on the following screenshot:

Install Pipelight on Ubuntu

Warning: Before you continue the installation you should note that:

It is strongly recommended to close your browser before installing! Some browsers try immediately to load the plugin which might fail or crash the browser when the installation is not complete!

Silverlight might contain (like all other browser plugins) security issues – You may want to enable click-to-play for this plugin to prevent an undesired start of Silverlight.

Pipelight needs to start Wine to execute the pluginloader. This may slow down the start of your browser.

The Pipelight PPA is available for Ubuntu 13.10, Ubuntu 13.04, Ubuntu 12.10, Ubuntu 12.04 and their derivatives. You can easily install it by running below commands in terminal (Ctrl+Alt+T) one by one:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:pipelight/stable
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install pipelight

You may need to accept a license agreement for a set of fonts during the installation. After it’s done just start your browser, type about:plugins in the addressbar and hit enter – if the installation went well you should now see Silverlight in your plugin list and everything is ready to run! Pipelight will install Silverlight on the first start of your browser, this may freeze the interface for several minutes (and you may just see a blank page without any progress). There might appear some dialog asking if Mono or Gecko should be installed during the Silverlight installation – you can safely choose no, as this is not necessary to get Pipelight running. After this step, the overall performance of your browser shouldn’t be affected any more.

More at ~~Pipelight Homepage~~

In App Review silverlight for Ubuntu, Ubuntu 12.04, Ubuntu 13.04, Ubuntu 13.10

BeatBox has gone, use Noise Music Player instead

Last updated: August 19, 2013

Try to install BeatBox music player in Ubuntu? Well, I’m here to tell you Beatbox has gone! The developer announced that he won’t take much attention on it due to lack of time. If you prefer this music player, you may go to noise.

“I’m sorry to say that BeatBox will not be seeing much attention from me at this point due to lack of time.

I’ve added elementary to the BeatBox team, which means they can merge, pull, push, whatever they want to the project. I’ve recommended that they merge parts of BeatBox. Its core and plugin API could be very useful to them, but whether or not that merge happens is up to them.” — Scott Ringwelski

BeatBox was the default music player for Elementary OS, and now it is Noise. Though there is not much of differences between Beatbox and Noise, both only differs by: Music view, Search bar, and the name of course

Install Noise in Ubuntu and Linux Mint

Due to the dependency problem, BeatBox is not working now. So here’s how to install Noise music player in Ubuntu 13.10, Ubuntu 13.04, Ubuntu 12.04 and Linux Mint 13, 15, 16.

Press Ctrl+Alt+T to open terminal. When it opens, run below commands to add the Elementary daily build PPA:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:elementary-os/daily

Then you can update and install Noise:

sudo apt-get update; sudo apt-get install noise

In App Review beatbox ubuntu, install noise in ubuntu, Ubuntu 13.04, Ubuntu 13.10

Get Email Notification When Security Updates Available on Ubuntu

Last updated: August 15, 2013

This will install a package called Apticron, which is a simple script sends daily emails about pending package updates such as security updates, properly handling packages on hold both by deselect and aptitude.

Apticron is available in Ubuntu’s universe repository. You can install it via apt-get command, or just search for and install the package from Ubuntu Software Center.

Once installed, edit the config file /etc/apticron/apticron.conf. Enter your email address by replacing root with your email address.

# apticron.conf
#
# set EMAIL to a space separated list of addresses which will be notified of
# impending updates
#
EMAIL=”root”

Save and close the file.

When updates are available you will get an email once a day. When no updates are available, apticron doesn’t send any email.

In App Review email updates, get email when updates available

bpm-tools: Calculate and Tag Tempo (beats-per-minute) of Audio

Last updated: August 18, 2013

The bpm-tools is a command line tool to automatically calculate and tag the tempo (in beats-per-minute) of music files. It reliably detects the tempo of the vast majority of popular music I have used it with, and is a useful tool for DJs and use with xwax on Linux, and scripting on the command-line.

Right now the code serves as the best explanation of the algorithm — a relatively simple application of an autocorrelation by statistical sampling. As yet, there is no scientific comparison of the algorithm with others software.

bmp-tools is available in Ubuntu Software Center for Ubuntu 13.10 Saucy. For Ubuntu 13.04, Ubuntu 12.04, Ubuntu 12.10, you may install it from PPA by running below 2 commands one by one in terminal (Ctrl+Alt+T):

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:dholbach/ppa

sudo apt-get update; sudo apt-get install bpm-tools

In App Review bpm tools for Ubuntu Linux, calculate beats per minute fo audio

Upload to Flickr, Google+, Picasa in Ubuntu Desktop via PostMan

Last updated: August 14, 2013

PostMan is a small utility allows to upload images to Flickr, Google+, Picasa, and Ubuntu one. This is done through a simple and modern intuitive user interface. Drag stamps to mark destinations, and drag images to select content.

PostMan image uploader is available for Ubuntu 12.10 and Ubuntu 12.04 in Ubuntu Software Center. Just search for and install the package. For Ubuntu 13.04 Raring, download the DEB from the below link:

PostMan-image-uploader_0.3.5_all.deb

Then press Ctrl+Alt+T to open terminal, run below command to install downloaded package:

sudo dpkg -i ~/Downloads/postman-image-uploader_*.deb; sudo apt-get -f install

Once installed, open PostMan from the Unity Dash Home. In the main window, drag and drop your services onto the envelope and then login.

Finally, drop your images onto the icon to upload:

In App Review install postman in Ubuntu 13.04, upload photos to Flickr in Ubuntu, upload photos to Google+ in Ubuntu, upload photos to Picasa in Ubuntu

Man Page Editor GUI on Ubuntu Linux

Last updated: January 23, 2015

Man Page Editor is a simple graphical tool for writing the manpage. The developer of Xfce Theme Manager wrote this GTK app and here’s why:

“I write a number of my own programs, and have always had a bit of a problem writing the manpage, I have used the excellent ‘ManEdit’ but development on this has been stalled for a number of years.

So I finally decided to write my own and this is the result. This is only the first draft and there is LOTS to be done, so bugs and suggestions are welcome, please click on the ‘About’ button in the program for my email address.”

Man Page Editor homepage: keithhedger.hostingsiteforfree.com

Source code can be downloaded from homepage.

Download the debian packages from ~~this page~~

In App Review Man Page Editor

Install Google Calendar in Ubuntu 13.04, 12.04, 12.10, Linux Mint

Last updated: August 12, 2013

Want to use Google Calendar in Ubuntu? Well, here I’ll show you how to install an indicator which provides Google Calendar integration on Ubuntu and Linux Mint desktop.

The calendar indicator is an open-source applet allows to add, edit and delete Google Calendar events as well as to create new calendars.

Once you installed this indicator, you can login your Google Account and set the automatic synchronization time in its Preferences window.

After that, you can click ‘Show Calendar’ in the indicator menu to dispay your calendar.

Install Google Calendar Indicator

The developer has added the packages to his PPA repository. So far, it supports Ubuntu 13.04 Raring, Ubuntu 12.10 Quantal, Ubuntu 12.04 Precise, and Linux Mint 13, 14, 15.

To add the ppa, press Ctrl+Alt+T on your keyboard to open terminal and then run below commands:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:atareao/atareao

After that, update the package lists and install Google Calendar:

sudo apt-get update; sudo apt-get install calendar-indicator

In App Review Google Calendar indicator, Install Google Calendar in Linux Mint, Install Google Calendar in Ubuntu

Install PAC Manager, SecureCRT Alternative in Ubuntu 13.04

Last updated: August 11, 2013

PAC is a free alternative to SecureCRT and Putty. It provides a GUI to configure connections: users, passwords, EXPECT regular expressions, macros, etc.

PAC Manager works on Debian/Ubuntu, and RPM based linux platforms. All you need to do is download and install the installer package and fix denpendencies.

Features:

Unique linux app to implement SecureCRT’s functionality (more or less!)

Remote and local macros

Remotely send commands with EXPECT regexp

Cluster connections!! Connections on same cluster share keystrokes!!

Scripting support! (vía Perl code)

Serial/tty connection via cu/tip/remote-tty connections!!

Pre/post connections local executions

TABS OR WINDOWS for connections!!

Proxy support

KeePass integration!

Wake On LAN capabilities

Possibility to split terminals in the same TAB!

Quick acces to configured connections via tray menu icon

Best linux GUI for ssh, telnet, sftp, rdesktop, vnc, cu, remote-tty, ftp, etc

DEB, RPM & .TAR.GZ packages available!!

More to come (ASA I find time!)

FREE (GNU GPLv3)

To get started, download the .deb package from SourceForge.

Then press Ctrl+Alt+T to open terminal. When it opens, run blow commands to install the package:

sudo dpkg -i ~/Downloads/pac-*all.deb

Fix dependency problem if any:

sudo apt-get -f install

Install the indicator support for Unity Desktop:

sudo apt-get install libgtk2-appindicator-perl

When everything is done, open PAC Manager from the Unity Dash.

In App Review Install PAC manager in Ubuntu, SecureCRT alternative in Linux Mint, SecureCRT alternative in Ubuntu, Ubuntu 13.04, Ubuntu 13.10

Typhoon: Best Free Weather Widget for Ubuntu 13.04

Last updated: August 3, 2013

Want to display weather on Ubuntu Desktop? Well, the best choice should be Typhoon since Stormcloud is not available in Ubuntu 13.04 due to dependency problem.

Typhoon is a free and open-source weather application, which displays a HTC-like weather widget on your Ubuntu desktop. It uses Yahoo! weather service

Typhoon is a fork of discontinued Stormcloud 1.1 with some changes. It excludes the multiple locations feature because no one can live in more than one places in a specific time except electrons! It also removes ‘chameleonic background’ as it would make the app resource hungry.

Install Typhoon in Ubuntu:

To install this weather app for Ubuntu 13.10 Saucy, Ubuntu 13.04 Raring, 12.04 Precise, 12.10 Quantal and Linux Mint users. Press Ctrl+Alt+T to open terminal. When it opens, run below commands to add the Typhoon ppa:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:apandada1/typhoon

Then update package lists and install it via:

sudo apt-get update; sudo apt-get install typhoon

Once installed, open it from Unity Dash and enjoy!

Typhoon project homepage: https://launchpad.net/typhoon

In App Review tyhpoon, Ubuntu 13.04, Ubuntu 13.10, weather app for ubuntu

LinSSID: Graphical Wifi Scanner for Ubuntu and Linux Mint

Last updated: August 2, 2013

LinSSID is a graphical and functional wifi scanner for Ubuntu Linux, which is similar to iwscanner and Inssider. It can be easily installed in Ubuntu and Linux Mint via PPA repository.

LinSSID is written from scratch entirely in C++ using Linux wireless tools and Qt4. It displays the information available from iwlist tool in graphical format. LinSSID displays a table of all of the local wireless networks that your device can receive, and information about them. It also displays charts of the signal strength of each network by channel number and over time. LinSSID will work with more than one wireless device attached to a system, but only one at a time (selectable).

LinSSID requires root privilege to run the iwlist tool. So you’ll be prompt to input the user password when start the program from Unity Dash.

Install LinSSID wifi scanner for Ubuntu & Linux Mint users

Press Ctrl+Alt+T on your keyboard to open terminal. When it opens, run below command to add the LinSSID ppa. So far, the ppa supports for Ubuntu 13.04 Raring, 12.10 Quantal, 12.04 Precise and Linux Mint 13, 14, 15.

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:wseverin/ppa

After that, you can use your favorite application manager to install the wireless scanner. Or just run below commands:

sudo apt-get update; sudo apt-get install linssid

Once installed, you’re able to open it from Unity Dash Home. Enjoy!

In App Review wifi scanner, wifi scanner for Linux Mint, wifi scanner for ubuntu

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