News, Tutorials, Howtos for Ubuntu Linux
This is a step by step beginner’s guide shows how to install VS Code IDE and keep it up-to-date in Ubuntu 22.04, Ubuntu 24.04, Ubuntu 25.04 using 3 different ways.
Microsoft provides official code packages for Linux through native .deb (for Debian/Ubuntu), .rpm (for Fedora/SUSE), and universal Snap package run in sandbox.
For choice, there’s also a community maintained Flatpak package which also runs in sandbox.
So, there are 3 common ways to install this IDE in your Ubuntu Desktop!
Gnome Files, aka the default Nautilus file manager in Ubuntu & Fedora workstation, keeps moving with new features!
In the passed few month, there are minor but beginner friendly features merged into this popular file manager. They include “Enter Location” menu option, sidebar toggle button in sidebar, and badge icon to folder icon in ‘properties’ dialog.
NOTE: The new features introduced in this post are merged to master branch but NOT released yet! They may be available in next GNOME versions, backport to current, or even removed!
Alacritty, the popular free open-source GPU-accelerated terminal emulator, release new major 0.13.0 version few days ago.
The release introduced new features, including persist config option in hints config section, warnings for unused configuration file options, support for keybindings with dead keys, dynamically loading conpty.dll on Windows, as well as:
Back/Forward mouse buttons support in bindings-w -1) for new windowsprefer_egl to prioritize EGL over other display APIswindow.blur config option to request blur for transparent windows--option argument for alacritty msg create-windowDECRQM/DECRPM escape sequencesThe release now uses TOML instead of YAML for configuration files. Run alacritty migrate command will automatically convert all the configuration files.
Other changes include:
draw_bold_text_with_bright_colors, key_bindings, and mouse_bindings.background_opacity, colors.search.bar, mouse.url, mouse.double_click.
The Github releases page, provides official packages for Windows, MacOS, and Linux.
For Ubuntu users who are new to this terminal emulator, I’ve a tutorial teaching how to install Alacritty step by step.
Alacritty, is a free and open-source terminal emulator, written in Rust programming language. It works in Linux, Windows, MacOS, and uses OpenGL API for GPU hardware acceleration for fast response and high performance.
The terminal emulator features vi mode, allows to move around the viewport and scrollback using the keyboard. And, vi search and normal search for anything in the scrollback buffer.
For Ubuntu users, the easily way to install the terminal emulator is using the Snap package. It’s available in Ubuntu Software (App Center for 23.10), though run in sandbox.
Alacritty terminal emulator in App Center
Or, user can install it by running the command below in terminal:
snap install alacritty --classic
The terminal emulator is also available to install through Cargo, the Rust package manager.
1. Just open terminal (Ctrl+Alt+T) and run command to install Cargo first:
sudo apt install cargo
2. Then, install the required dependency packages:
sudo apt install cmake pkg-config libfreetype6-dev libfontconfig1-dev libxcb-xfixes0-dev libxkbcommon-dev python3
3. Finally, use cargo to install the terminal package:
cargo install alacritty
When done, run ~/.cargo/bin/alacritty to start the terminal.
4. The cargo package manager does not install the desktop entry for Alacritty. So, you need to manually create one by running command:
nano ~/.local/share/applications/alacritty.desktop
Then, paste following lines in the terminal window:
[Desktop Entry] Type=Application Exec=/home/ji/.cargo/bin/alacritty Icon=alacritty Terminal=false Categories=System;TerminalEmulator; Name=Alacritty Comment=A fast, cross-platform, OpenGL terminal emulator StartupNotify=true StartupWMClass=Alacritty Actions=New; [Desktop Action New] Name=New Terminal Exec=/home/ji/.cargo/bin/alacrittyalacritty
NOTE: You need to replace ji to your username in the line above. Then, press Ctrl+S to save, and Ctrl+X to exit.
For the icon to display, run single command below to download img file and save to local icon folder:
wget https://raw.githubusercontent.com/alacritty/alacritty/master/extra/logo/compat/alacritty-term.png -O ~/.local/share/icons/alacritty.png
Or, you can download the icon from github web page and manually copy to .local/share/icons directory.
For those who prefer the Ubuntu PPA repository, keep an eye on this launchpad page for all 3rd party PPAs.
Depends on how you install the terminal emulator, either remove the Snap package from Ubuntu Software or by command:
snap remove alacritty
Or, run command to uninstall the cargo package:
cargo uninstall alacritty
You may also remove Cargo itself, if there’s no other rust packages installed, as well as some dev dependency libraries to free up some disk space.
sudo apt remove --autoremove cargo cmake pkg-config libfreetype6-dev libfontconfig1-dev libxcb-xfixes0-dev libxkbcommon-dev
Also remove the desktop entry (shortcut file) by running command:
rm ~/.local/share/icons/alacritty.png ~/.local/share/applications/alacritty.desktop
SMPlayer media player released version 23.12 few days ago, with important bug-fixes and new API.
The new released fixed the compatibility issues when using MPV 0.37 as backend. They include video playback can not be resumed from pause, as well as the issue getting the audio and video codec on mpv 0.37.
SMPlayer 23.12 also implemented the new OpenSubtitles API. Since, the old API on OpenSubtitles.org is deprecated, and to be turned off by the end of 2023. If you use the service for getting subtitles, then it’s highly recommended to upgrade as soon as possible.
SMPlayer 23.12
For Ubuntu 23.10, the SMPlayer 22.7.0 installed from system repository, either freezes or pops-up following error on video playback:
“Oops, something went wrong. MPlayer/mpv has finished uxexpectedly. Exit code: 1”
The issue has been fixed in my test by installing the new version 23.12.
Other changes in SMPlayer 23.12 include:
The player provides official .exe for Windows, .dmg for MacOS, and .rpm/.deb/.snap/.flatpak/.AppImage for Linux, which as available to download at Github releases page:
For Ubuntu, user can choose to install the Snap package (run in sandbox), directly from Ubuntu Software or App Center. Or, use the official PPA (with ARM devices support) by running the commands below one by one:
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:rvm/smplayer
sudo apt update
sudo apt install smplayer
It somehow does not provide package for Ubuntu 23.10. However, download & install the package for 22.04 works good in my case in 23.10 laptop.
For Debian from version 8 to 12 (Bookworm), SMPlayer is also available to install in both amd64 and i386 through the OBS repository.
For Ubuntu user, depends on which package you installed, either remove Snap from Ubuntu Software.
Or, remove the .deb package by running command in terminal (Ctrl+Alt+T):
sudo apt remove --autoremove smplayer
If the PPA was added, either remove it from “Software & Updates” tool under “Other Software” tab, or run command in terminal:
sudo add-apt-repository --remove ppa:rvm/smplayer
This tutorial shows how to install Oracle VirtualBox in Ubuntu 22.04 and/or Ubuntu 24.04
VirtualBox is a popular free open-source tool for running different operating systems in virtual machines.
The tool is available in Ubuntu system repositories, but old. So, here’s the step by step how to install guide for latest version for beginners.
VirtualBox VM Manager
NOTE: VirtualBox so far only support x86_64 (amd64) CPU architecture type. Meaning for modern Intel & AMD CPUs.
Oracle provides official .deb & .rpm packages for installing the software in Debian/Ubuntu & Fedora based systems.
User can select download the package by going to its website via the link below:
Next, open the Downloads folder, then either double click on the package or use right-click menu “Open With Other Application” and select open the .deb package you just downloaded via Software Install (or App Center). Finally, click install button to install it.
NOTE: The installing process may fail sometimes due to old package in your system, in the case, just uninstall the old one (go to bottom for how) then try to re-install again.
Once installed, search for and launch it either from start menu or ‘Activities’ overview depends on your desktop environment.
The .deb package you installed via ‘Step 1’ used to automatically add the repository. However, it does NO longer do the trick in recent versions.
So, here’s how to do it step by step via the new Ubuntu PPA policy.
First, press Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard to open up a terminal window.
When it opens, run command to make sure “/etc/apt/keyrings” directory exist:
sudo mkdir -p /etc/apt/keyrings
Then, run command to use wget to download key, dearmor it (so unreadable), and finally save it to that directory:
wget -q -O- https://www.virtualbox.org/download/oracle_vbox_2016.asc | sudo gpg --dearmor --yes --output /etc/apt/keyrings/oracle-virtualbox-2016.gpg
You can finally verify the key file, by running command:
cat /etc/apt/keyrings/oracle-virtualbox-2016.gpg
As the screenshot above shows you, it should outputs unreadable text.
Before adding the source repository, first run command to get system code name:
cat /etc/os-release
The apt repository so far only support Debian Stable (& old stable), Ubuntu 22.04 & 20.04 LTS (focal, jammy). For all their based systems, use the code-name you got via this command.
Then, in terminal window, run command to create & edit a sources file:
sudo nano /etc/apt/sources.list.d/virtualbox.sources
Then in the terminal window, paste following lines:
Types: deb URIs: https://download.virtualbox.org/virtualbox/debian Suites: jammy Components: contrib Architectures: amd64 Signed-By: /etc/apt/keyrings/oracle-virtualbox-2016.gpg
Replace jammy (for 22.04, Mint 21.x) according to last command output, such as noble for 24.04/Mint 22, focal for 20.04/mint20.
When done, press either Ctrl+S or Ctrl+O and hit Enter to save file, then press Ctrl+X to exit.
Finally, verify the sources file by running command:
cat /etc/apt/sources.list.d/virtualbox.sources
It should outputs the content you just added into that file.
After setup the source repository, run command to refresh your system package cache:
sudo apt update
The terminal output should print a line looks like:
“Hit:5 https://download.virtualbox.org/virtualbox/debian jammy InRelease”
If you skipped the “Step 1”, then you can install it (7.0.x series at the moment) by running command in terminal:
sudo apt install virtualbox-7.1
Finally, when a newer release is out, you’ll be able to update it through Software Updater (Update Manager) tool.
To remove VirtualBox, open terminal (Ctrl+Alt+T) window and run command:
sudo apt remove --autoremove virtualbox virtualbox-7.1
And, remove the source repository by simply deleting the key & sources files:
sudo rm /etc/apt/keyrings/oracle-virtualbox-2016.gpg /etc/apt/sources.list.d/virtualbox.sources
Also, run sudo apt update to refresh package cache.
This simple tutorial shows how to install and setup the rEFInd boot manager in your Ubuntu 22.04, and/or Ubuntu 24.04 computer.
Most Linux uses Grub2 as default boot-loader. Though, there’s a good alternative called rEFInd. It’s a free open-source boot manager for EFI/UEFI enabled computers, such as all Intel-based Macs and recent (most 2011 and later) PCs.
rEFInd with Matrix theme
Compare to Grub2, rEFInd has a more eye candy boot interface, and a simple and easy to tweak config file.
No need to update something, it auto-scans for all boot-able systems on every boot, and displays you the OS menu entries from both local disk and removable device, such as USB drive and CD-R.
It’s more reliable at booting Windows with Secure Boot active. And, it provides handy options to shutdown, restart, and/or go to BIOS settings.
The boot manager is quite easy to install in Debian, Ubuntu, and Linux Mint, since it’s available in system repositories.
1. First, launch terminal (press Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard) and run command to verify if UEFI enabled on your machine:
ls /sys/firmware/efi
The command will list content of ‘/sys/firmware/efi‘. It will show you No such file or directory, if UEFI not enabled.
2. To install rEFInd from system repository, simply run command:
sudo apt install refind
The package in system repository may be old. To install the most recent version, use the official PPA maintained by software developer.
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:rodsmith/refind
sudo apt update
sudo apt install refind
After installing rEFInd, you can now restart your machine to see the new boot menu.
In menu, use left/right arrow keys to switch menu entries, hit Enter to boot, or press Tab (or F2) for more options.
For duplicate icons issue, simply use left/right arrow to select the icon (menu entry), and hit Delete key on keyboard, finally answer yes to remove that icon (menu entry). Though, deleting icon may NOT work when 3rd party theme is in use.
The menu interface is easy to tweak by editing the refind.conf file under “/boot/efi/EFI/refind/” directory. Every option has description text telling what does it do and how it works.
To be more straightforward, you can install third-party themes. And, here are some rEFInd themes in Github.
Most themes have how to install steps in Readme file, they are usually:
Finally, apply new theme by editing the refind.conf file under “/boot/efi/EFI/refind/“, and adding new line in the end (replace rEFInd-glassy accordingly):
include themes/rEFInd-glassy/theme.conf
NOTE: the theme folder name, rEFInd-glassy in the case, is unique according to the PATH to icons/imgs in ‘theme.conf’ file.
In case the boot menu screen resolution is low, you may also add (or uncomment by removing #) resolution max line to set the maximum available resolution, or use resolution 1024 768 for certain resolution (Note that not all resolutions are supported).
To uninstall refind in Debian and Ubuntu based systems, open terminal and run command:
sudo apt remove --autoremove refind
Also remove the PPA (if added) by running command:
sudo add-apt-repository --remove ppa:rodsmith/refind
To get rid of the refind boot menu, you also need to remove all the related files:
sudo rm -r /boot/efi/EFI/refind
For more, see rEFInd in its official website.
HandBrake, the popular free open-source video transcoder, released a new update for the new 1.7 series yesterday.
The new release fixed encoding issue for AMD VCN, MPEG-2, MPEG-4, NVIDIA NVENC, and VP9 encoders, which could cause the creation of an excessive number of keyframes.
It fixed unintentional automatic pass through of closed caption side data when using NVIDIA NVENC encoder.
For Linux, the release includes performance improvements by removing duplicate graphic assets and reducing file size, as well as fixes to Flatpak file chooser, file destination path, and memory leaks in the graphical interface.
Other changes include:
HandBrake provides official Windows, MacOS, and Linux packages available to download at Github releases page under Assets
For Linux users, it’s Flatpak package which also available in Flathub repository, though NOT updated at the moment of writing.
For Ubuntu & Linux Mint users who prefer the classic .deb package, I’ve uploaded the package into this unofficial PPA for Ubuntu 20.04, Ubuntu 22.04, Ubuntu 23.04, and Ubuntu 23.10.
1. First, press Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard to open terminal. When it opens, run command to add the PPA:
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:ubuntuhandbook1/handbrake
Type user password (no asterisk feedback) when it asks and hit Enter to continue.
2. Linux Mint users need to manually update the system package cache, after adding PPA, by running command:
sudo apt update
3. Finally, install the new HandBrake package via command:
sudo apt install handbrake
For choice, you may also run sudo apt install handbrake-cli to install the command line tool
When installation done, search for and launch the video transcoder from either start/application menu or ‘Activities’ overview depends on your desktop environment.
To uninstall the Ubuntu PPA, either open terminal (Ctrl+Alt+T) and run command:
sudo add-apt-repository --remove ppa:ubuntuhandbook1/handbrake
or, just remove the source line using ‘Software & Updates’ tool under “Other Software” tab.
To remove the HandBrake video transcoder, use command:
sudo apt remove --autoremove handbrake handbrake-cli
That’s all. Enjoy!
Enlightenment window manager announced new 0.26.0 release few days ago.
The new release added some new features, including DDC option to backlight control of external monitors, bigger task previews, and watermark to wl mode to indicate E is in experimental wl mode.
Enlightenment 0.26.0 also added new APIs, including new eet disk sync API to ensure config it stored, logind’s lock/unlock dbus apis, API to play sound samples and support in notifications, and new eina API for EFL libraries.
Other changes include:
There are also EFL 1.27 changes include JXL Evas loader/saver, QOI Evas image loader/saver, LibreSSL 3.5.x, remove GNUTLS support due to in favor of openssl3, and support ecore exe terminate with parent on windows. See more in the News page.
Besides building from source, there seems no PPA or any 3rd repository for installing new release in Ubuntu.
To download the source, just go to its website via the link below:
Stellarium, the free open-source planetarium software, announced new 23.4 release few days ago.
The new release added experimental support for new plugin: Lens Distortion Estimator, and new sky culture: Tibetan Lunar Mansions.
With new release, user can now change the look of GUI through normalStyle.css config file. For Windows, it added new MESA for Windows packages, and package for ARM64 CPU architecture type.
Other changes include:
The software provides official packages for Linux, Windows, MacOS, as well as source code, available to download at Github release page:
Ubuntu user can search for and install Stellarium from either Ubuntu Software or App Center (for 23.10), though it’s Snap package runs in sandbox.
For Ubuntu & Linux Mint users who prefer the classic .deb package, the official PPA has built the package for Ubuntu 20.04, Ubuntu 22.04, Ubuntu 23.04, and Ubuntu 23.10.
1. First, press Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard to open terminal. When it opens, run command to add the PPA:
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:stellarium/stellarium-releases
Type user password (no asterisk feedback) when it asks and hit Enter to continue.
2. Linux Mint users need to manually refresh the package cache after adding PPA:
sudo apt update
3 Finally either update Stellarium using Software Updater (Update Manager) if an old version was installed.
Or, run command in terminal to install it for the first time.
sudo apt install stellarium
To remove the planetarium software software, simply open terminal and run command:
sudo apt install --autoremove stellarium
And, remove the Ubuntu PPA either by running command:
sudo add-apt-repository --remove ppa:stellarium/stellarium-releases
or use “Software & Updates” to remove source line under ‘Other Software’ tab.
