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HandBrake 1.4.0 Released with 10 / 12-bit Encoding, How to Install in Ubuntu

Last updated: July 18, 2021

The open-source video transcoder HandBrake released new 1.4.0 version with exciting new features.

HandBrake 1.4.0 adds native 10 and 12-bit encoding support. Though it has limitations that some filters (e.g., Detelecine, Chroma Smooth, and more) do not currently support higher than 8-bit. With these filters enabled, you won’t benefit from the new feature.

You can select the new 10-bit / 12-bit encoder from the “Video codec” drop-down on the Video tab. For hardware encoders, the option will only be shown if the system supports it.

The release also adds new filters including Chroma Smooth and Colourspace Selection. New Media Foundation encoder for Windows based ARM64 devices powered by Qualcomm Chipsets.

Other changes in HandBrake 1.4.0 include:

HDR10 metadata passthru.
Added support for Apple Silicon based macs.
MP2 Audio Passthru support.
Added support for DVB Subtitles.
Added support for EIA608 Closed Captions.
Improved Static Previews to reduce temporary disk space usage
And much more.

How to Install HandBrake 1.4.0 in Ubuntu:

HandBrake has an official Ubuntu PPA though it’s not updated at the moment.

Besides the PPA, you can download & install the flatpak package.

Download HandBrake Linux Flatpak

First time installing a flatpak package? Make sure flatpak daemon is installed via command:

sudo apt install flatpak

Then install the downloaded package via command:

flatpak install ~/Downloads/HandBrake-*.flatpak

(Optional) To uninstall the package, open terminal and run command:

flatpak uninstall fr.handbrake.ghb

In Howtos, News video

How to Install The Latest Mesa Graphics Driver in Ubuntu 20.04 / 21.04

Last updated: April 26, 2024

For those sticking to the open-source graphics driver, the latest Mesa 3D graphics library is easy to install via an Ubuntu PPA.

Mesa is an open-source software implementation of OpenGL, Vulkan, VDPAU, VA-API, and other graphics API specifications.

Ubuntu uses Mesa as OpenGL implementation if no proprietary driver is in use. It is however always old. For users want to play some games with the open-source RadeonSI, RADV, Intel, or Nouveau drivers, you may try the latest Mesa via PPA.

Install Mesa via Ubuntu PPA:

A trustworthy Ubuntu PPA is available that contains the latest stable Mesa packages for Ubuntu 18.04, Ubuntu 20.04. It also provides packages for Ubuntu 20.10 and Ubuntu 21.04, but not tested.

1. Add the PPA:

Search for and open terminal from system app launcher. When it opens, run command to add the PPA:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:kisak/kisak-mesa

Type user password, no visual feedback, when it asks. Read the PPA description as you want and hit Enter to continue.

2. Install Mesa packages:

For Ubuntu 18.04, Linux Mint, you need to update package cache though it’d done automatically in Ubuntu 20.04 and higher.

sudo apt update

Finally install available upgrades of all packages including Mesa library via command:

sudo apt full-upgrade

3. Check mesa version:

To find out the package version, use command:

glxinfo | grep "OpenGL version"

Restore Original Mesa packages:

To restore your graphics driver to the original status, firstly install ppa-purge via command:

sudo apt install ppa-purge

Next purge the Ubuntu PPA which will downgrade all the installed packages:

sudo ppa-purge ppa:kisak/kisak-mesa

For Linux Mint 20, it’s recommended to add -d focal flag to work safely:

sudo ppa-purge -d focal ppa:kisak/kisak-mesa

In Howtos Mesa 3D graphics library

Enable Windows 11 Style Start Menu in Ubuntu 20.04 & Higher via Arc Menu

Last updated: April 26, 2024

By releasing recent update, the popular Arc Menu Gnome Shell extension finally adds Gnome 40 and Windows 11 layout support.

Arc Menu is a free open-source app menu extension for Gnome. It provides various menu layouts to choose from, as well as many options to customize the appearance. For users new to GNOME and looking for a Windows style start menu, this extension will be perfect for you!

With the extension along with dash to panel, you can make Ubuntu just look like Windows 11.

The new menu layout does not display a search bar by default. Just type and it will bring up the search box as well as results.

How to Install Arc Menu:

The extension requires Gnome 3.36 +, which means you can install it in Ubuntu 20.04, Ubuntu 20.10, Ubuntu 21.04 and next Ubuntu 21.10.

1.) Firstly, open terminal (Ctrl+Alt+T) and run command to install the required tools, if you don’t have it:

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

Next go to Arc Menu web page and turn on the slider icon to install it:

Install Arc Menu

If you don’t see the toggle icon, install browser extension via “Click here to install browser extension” link and refresh the web page.

Once installed, you can toggle on / off Arc Menu by opening Extensions from system app menu.

To select Windows 11 style start menu, right-click on start icon and go to settings. Then navigate to “Menu Layout -> Modern Menu Layouts”, choose ‘Eleven’ and click on Apply button.

Arc Menu follows your system theme. For dark mode menu, set Gnome Shell theme to dark.

In Howtos windows 11

Disable Startup Animation & Show Boot Message in Ubuntu 24.04/22.04

Last updated: April 26, 2024

Since Ubuntu 20.04, it shows your computer manufacturer logo on startup. It’s however easy to remove it, as well display the blank and white boot text message.

The Grub boot-loader offers option to toggle the settings in its configuration file. You can either manually edit the file or using a graphical tool called Grub Customizer.

NOTE: This tutorial will replace startup animation with blank while text message! If you still want the animation screen, see this new tutorial instead.

Option 1. Manually configure Grub bootloader:

Firstly, search for and open terminal from system app launcher. When it opens, run command to edit the Grub configuration file:

sudo gnome-text-editor /etc/default/grub

For Ubuntu 22.04 and earlier, replace gnome-text-editor with gedit in command. Or, use nano instead that works in all other Desktop environments.

When the files opens, do:

Remove quiet and splash from line ‘GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT=”quiet splash”‘. Keep other parameters if any. In my case, it will be GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT=””.
(Optional) Enable GRUB_TERMINAL=”console” by removing # at the beginning. NOTE this will disable the boot-menu theme if any.

Finally apply changes by running command:

sudo update-grub

Option 2. Configure Grub via Grub Customizer:

The popular graphical configuration tool offers ability to change the boot parameters.

NOTE: Since Ubuntu 22.04, Grub Customizer is removed from system repository. You need to run command in terminal (Ctrl+Alt+T) to add the developer’s PPA first:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:danielrichter2007/grub-customizer

Then, refresh system package cache via command:

sudo apt update

Finally, install Grub Customizer either in Ubuntu Software (for 20.04 & earlier) or by running command in terminal:

sudo apt install grub-customizer

Next, launch the tool and navigate to ‘General settings‘ tab. There you can easily remove the ‘quiet’ and ‘splash’ boot parameters. And optionally enable ‘GRUB_TERMINAL=”console”‘.

Click on Save button. Changes will take effect at next boot!

In Howtos grub

How to Install Dukto File Transfer App in Ubuntu 24.04 | 22.04

Last updated: July 4, 2024

Missing the classic Dukto file transfer tool? The tool now is ported to Qt6 and easy to install in Ubuntu 20.04, Ubuntu 22.04, and Ubuntu 24.04 via PPA.

For those never heard about Dukto, it’s a free open-source file transfer tool for LAN (Local Network) use. With the clean elegant user interface, you can drag and drop to transfer files from one PC to anther, without worrying about users, permissions, operating systems, protocols, clients, servers and so on…

Dukto works on Mac OS, Windows, and Linux. Though it’s not being developed for years, the tool still works well and available to download at:

Download Dukto

However, the deb package does not install in Ubuntu since it requires old Qt4 libraries!

Thanks to community, the Qt5/Qt6 port is available and can be installed from the developer’s PPA. So far, it supports Ubuntu 18.04 (stuck at v6.0), Ubuntu 20.04, Ubuntu 22.04, and Ubuntu 24.04.

Install Dukto 6 via Ubuntu PPA:

Firstly, search for and open terminal from system app launcher. When it opens, run command to add the PPA:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:xuzhen666/dukto

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

Next, update package cache though it’s done automatically in Ubuntu 20.04 & higher:

sudo apt update

Finally, install the Qt5 version of Dukto via command:

sudo apt install dukto

Once installed, open the tool from system app launcher. It will automatic find other machines that have the tool opens.

Uninstall Dukto:

To remove Dukto, simply open terminal and run command:

sudo apt remove --autoremove dukto

And remove the Ubuntu PPA via command:

sudo add-apt-repository --remove ppa:xuzhen666/dukto

In Howtos file transfer

How to Remap Keyboard / Gamepad in Ubuntu Easily with This Tool

Last updated: March 29, 2023

Want to remap your keyboard or gamepad keys in Ubuntu Linux? It’s easy to do this via Input Remapper.

Input Remapper is a free and open-source tool written in Python 3. With it, you can change the mapping for input devices, including mouse, keyboard, and gamepad.

It works on both X11 and Wayland, and supports for mapping to combined buttons (e.g., Control+A) and programmable macros.

The software has an easy to use interface. Simply start the app, choose the device (e.g., keyboard) to you want to remap, then click add new preset and do:

1. Click ‘Add’ button in left to add an item.
2. Click the pencil icon and type a name.
3. Use “Record” button to record the original keyboard key or key combination.
4. Choose device to map the input key to.
5. Finally, type the output key, e.g., letter (a, b, …, z), number (1, 2, …, 9), and/or function keys (Alt_L Control_L Control_R Shift_L Shift_R)

Presets are saved in user’s .config/input-remapper-2/presets folder. You can use them in another machine that can read these “.json” files.

How to Install Input Remapper in Ubuntu:

The software offers official .deb package for Ubuntu / Debian based systems.

Download Input Remapper (.deb)

Grab the deb package, then open terminal and run command to install it:

sudo apt install ~/Downloads/input-remapper*.deb

It should work on all current Ubuntu releases since it requires only a few python modules.

Once installed, open it from system app launcher and enjoy!

(Optional) For choice, there’s command to remove the tool from Ubuntu:

sudo apt remove --autoremove input-remapper

In Howtos key remapping

Active Line in Text Editor Unreadable in Ubuntu 20.04 Dark Mode [Workaround]

Last updated: July 10, 2021

For dark mode fans, you may found the color scheme in Gedit Text Editor is not so good! Focused line is not even readable due to the light text on light line background.

There’s already an upstream fix, though it’s not made into current Ubuntu releases. There are however workarounds and I’m going to show you how!

Option 1.) Use another color scheme:

There are a few other built-in color schemes available in the default Gedit text editor.

Firstly, open the editor and go to ‘Preferences’ in the hamburger menu. While Ubuntu defaults to the ‘Classic’ colors, you can then choose another from Font & Colors tab.

And new colors take places immediately!

Option 2.) Hack the current line background color:

Sticking to the default color scheme? It’s easy to hack the xml config file to change the current line background.

1.) Firstly, open terminal either from system app launcher or by pressing Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard.

2.) When terminal opens, run command to edit the xml:

sudo gedit /usr/share/gtksourceview-4/styles/classic.xml

Type user password (no visual feedback) when it asks and hit Enter. When file opens, scroll down to find out and change the background value of ‘current-line’ and ‘current-line-number’.

NOTE: If you stick to dark mode, color #181818 is great! However, it’s not good in light mode. So if you switch between light and dark mode regularly, use another color value, such as #99999c.

After saving the changes, the color will take place in new app window.

In Howtos dark mode

How to Install Linux Mint’s New ‘Bulky’ File Renamer in Ubuntu 20.04

Last updated: July 7, 2021

Linux Mint introduced a new batch file renamer app ‘Bulky’ in the upcoming 20.2 release. Here’s how you can install it in Ubuntu 18.04, Ubuntu 20.04, Ubuntu 21.04.

Bulky is a simple and elegant tool for renaming multiple files and folders in Linux. It’s a free and open-source tool developed by Linux Mint team.

With Bulky Renamer, you can find and replace file / folder names with regular expression support, while preview the changes under ‘New name’ section before clicking “Rename” button.

As well, it allows to remove letters and insert text with specified position, batch change filename to lower case, upper case, title case, or first character upper case.

How to Install Bulky in Ubuntu:

The tiny tool is an XApp that works on any distribution and many desktop environments. It only requires a few Python3 libraries.

Which means, you can get the .deb from Mint repository and install on all current Ubuntu releases (Ubuntu 18.04 and higher) without any issue.

Download Bulky in Mint repo

Download the .deb package from the button above, and double-click to install via Ubuntu-install. Or, open terminal (Ctrl+Alt+T) and run command to install the local package:

sudo apt install ./Downloads/bulky*.deb

For other Linux, grab and build the source tarball from the Github project page.

Once installed, search for and open ‘File Renamer’ from system app launcher and enjoy!

Uninstall Bulky:

To remove the tool, simply run command:

sudo apt remove bulky

In Howtos file renamer

Fix Incorrect Time in Windows 11 That Dual boot with Ubuntu Linux

Last updated: October 24, 2021

For those dual boot Windows 11 with Ubuntu or other Linux, you’ll find different time display in each system. And usually Windows shows the incorrect clock time.

There are two time standards, localtime and Coordinated Universal Time (UTC, aka GMT). The local time standard is dependent on the current time zone, while UTC is the global time standard that is independent of time zone.

By default, Windows uses localtime, but Ubuntu uses UTC. So you get the different time in the dual boot. And the solution is set the same time standard in the two systems.

Method 1.) Set RTC to local time zone in Ubuntu:

Though it’s not recommended, set the Real Time Clock (RTC) to use local time zone just works.

Firstly, open terminal either from system app launcher or by pressing Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard. When it opens, run command:

timedatectl set-local-rtc 1 --adjust-system-clock

Then you can check system clock status via command:

timedatectl

And “RTC in local TZ: yes”, where TZ means time zone, tells localtime standard is in use.

As I said “it’s not recommended“, it warns that localtime standard may cause various problems with time zone changes and daylight saving time adjustments.

You can restore UTC time standard and do method 2 instead by running command:

timedatectl set-local-rtc 0

Method 2.) Enable UTC time in Windows 11:

If you’re now running Windows 11, you can easily enable the UTC / GMT time standard via following steps.

1. Firstly, click on ‘Search’ icon on task bar. Then search for and right-click on ‘Command Prompt’ and select ‘Run as administrator’.

2. When command prompt opens, copy and paste the command below and hit run:

reg add "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\TimeZoneInformation" /v RealTimeIsUniversal /d 1 /t REG_DWORD /f

The command creates a registry key to tell Windows to use universal time standard.

Refresh the display time to apply change:

If Windows 11 shows the incorrect date and time, search for and open “Settings” from start menu. Then go to “Time & Language” from left pane, click “Date & time” and finally disable and re-enable ‘Set time automatically’ option will correct your system time.

For Ubuntu users, it may also display incorrect time when “Automatic Date & Time” not enabled. Simply enable or refresh the option in System “Settings -> Date & Time” will do the trick.

In Howtos UTC time

How to Create Bootable Windows 11 USB Installer on Ubuntu Linux

Last updated: June 27, 2021

Microsoft has announced Windows 11. Besides online upgrading, here’s how to burn Windows 11 as an USB installer in Ubuntu Linux.

The official Windows 11 iso image will be available to download soon in next week. Though it has leaked! And you can easily install it using an USB stick.

Requirements:

Before getting started, you need a 6 GB+ USB drive, as well as a computer or laptop with:

1 gigahertz (GHz) or faster processor.
4GB+ RAM.
60GB+ hard disk.
Graphics with DirectX 12 or later compatible.
UEFI, Secure Boot capable.
TPM 2.0 (Some succeed on old machines via WinPE).

Option 1: Boot Windows 11 iso via Ventoy:

It has been tested that Ventoy works for Windows 11. Simply install Ventoy on your USB stick and then copy the iso and boot it! See the link for more:

Create Bootable USB installer via Ventoy

Option 2: Create Windows 11 USB via WoeUSB:

WoeUSB is a free and open-source Microsoft Windows® USB installation media preparer for GNU+Linux.

1. Install WoeUSB in Ubuntu:

For all current Ubuntu releases, including Ubuntu 18.04, Ubuntu 20.04, Ubuntu 21.04, you can install the tool from the PPA repository.

First, search for and open terminal from system app launcher.

Next, run command to add the PPA. Type user password, no asterisk feedback, when it asks and hit Enter.

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:tomtomtom/woeusb

Finally, install WoeUSB via command:

sudo apt install woeusb woeusb-frontend-wxgtk

For Ubuntu 18.04, Linux Mint, you need to run sudo apt update command to refresh package cache first.

2. Burn Windows 11 iso image:

Now plug-in your USB drive! Search for and open WoeUSB from system app launcher.

When it opens, select ‘From a disk image (iso)’ and choose your ISO image. Then highlight the USB device from ‘Target device’. Finally click on ‘Install’ button.

NOTE you have to unmount the USB or it will pop-up an error dialog. To do so, search for and open Disks utility.
Select your device in left pane, and click on the square icon to unmount it.

Next go back to WoeUSB, click refresh and select the USB device. After clicking on the Install button, it starts to wipe USB and burn Windows 11 into it.