Top 10 Things to Do After Installing Ubuntu 21.10 Desktop

Last updated: October 15, 2021

Everyone needs to tweak the default desktop environment before getting ready to work! And here are the top 10 things that I’ve done after installing Ubuntu 21.10 Impish Indri.

1. Install Media Codec:

If you didn’t enable ‘Install third-party software …‘ check-box during the installing process, you need to install the multimedia codecs for audio and video playback with built-in apps.

To do so, open terminal by pressing Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard and run command:

sudo apt install ubuntu-restricted-extras

As you see in terminal outputs, it will also install codecs for Chromium based browser, Microsoft TrueType core fonts, as well as non-free package to handle rar archive.

2. Enable ‘Click-to-minimize’ dock panel click action:

Clicking app icon on the dock panel will do nothing for the focused app window by default. Though I think most people want it act as minimize the current window.

Open terminal (Ctrl+Alt+T) and run the single command will do the trick:

gsettings set org.gnome.shell.extensions.dash-to-dock click-action minimize

3. Remove Default Firefox Snap, and install back the classic Deb package:

In the final release of Ubuntu 21.10, the default Firefox web browser has been switched to the Snap package runs in sandbox. However, it does not support for installing Gnome extensions!

So I have to remove it by running command in a terminal window:

sudo snap remove --purge firefox

And then install back the classic deb package via command:

sudo apt install firefox

4. Tweak the Dock Panel Appearance:

Also for the left dock panel, there are a few tips to tweak its appearance. Open terminal by pressing Ctrl+Alt+T key combination on keyboard, and run the command below:

  • Move ‘Show Applications’ (9 dots icon) to the top: 
    gsettings set org.gnome.shell.extensions.dash-to-dock show-apps-at-top true
  • Shorten the panel to make it compact: 
    gsettings set org.gnome.shell.extensions.dash-to-dock extend-height false
  • Move dock to the bottom, though you may do it via System Settings: 
    gsettings set org.gnome.shell.extensions.dash-to-dock dock-position BOTTOM
  • Disable USB and other removable device icons from panel: 
    gsettings set org.gnome.shell.extensions.dash-to-dock show-mounts false

For those prefer a graphical configuration tool, all the above commands can be done via Dconf Editor tool.

5. Enable Gnome Extensions Support:

The most extensions for Gnome is to be installed via web browser by visiting extensions.gnome.org, though you have to install something to enable it.

Open terminal (Ctrl+Alt+T) and run command to install chrome-gnome-shell and Gnome Extensions app:

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

After that, you may visit the web site and install browser extension for the first time and install your prefer Gnome Extensions.

And by searching for ‘Gnome Extensions’ from activities overview, you can open the app to manage them.

6. Install Gnome Tweaks:

Besides the default system settings, Gnome Tweaks is the must have configuration tool for GNOME desktop, especially for changing themes and fonts.

To install the tool, open terminal and run command:

sudo apt install gnome-tweaks

7. Manage desktop icons:

Ubuntu 21.10 now defaults the trash icon into dock panel, though the Home icon present in the desktop out-of-the-box. User may choose to hide it or change the icon size via new settings menu.

Simply right-click blank area on the desktop and choose “Desktop Icons settings” will open the page to manage desktop icons.

8. Modern desktop appearance via blur effect:

The default top bar and overview screen is a little bit ugly. To make them look good, try “Blur my Shell” Gnome Shell Extension.

After doing step 5, you may click the link below to install it:

Install Blur my Shell

Ubuntu 21.10 with Blur effect

9. Enable Gnome Shell Theme Support:

To be able to switch between dark and light menus, notifications, etc, and try out different Gnome Shell themes, you have to install the User Themes extension.

Install User Themes Extension

After that, use Gnome Tweaks to change Shell themes under Appearance tab.

10. Switch back Xorg Session:

Ubuntu defaults to Wayland session since Ubuntu 21.04. However, some applications are still not working good with Wayland. If you’re sticking to those apps, you may choose to switch back “Ubuntu on Xorg” from the login screen via bottom right gear button.

That’s all. If you have more tips to improve the Ubuntu desktop appearance, please leave comment in the bottom!

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How to Upgrade From Ubuntu 21.04 to Ubuntu 21.10 Impish Indri

Last updated: October 15, 2021

Ubuntu 21.10 officially released! Here’s what’s new and how to upgrade from the previous Ubuntu 21.04.

Ubuntu 21.10, codenamed “Impish Indri”, is the new short-term release with 9 months support. It features Linux Kernel 5.13 with new hardware support. And it ships GNOME Desktop 40 with a redesigned activities overview screen. Workspaces are now arranged horizontally. Three-finger touchpad gestures are supported out-of-the-box to toggle overview and switch workspaces.

For Ubuntu Server 21.10, it integrates OpenStack Xena, QEMU 6.0, PHP8, libvirt 7.6, Kubernetes, and Ceph with advanced life-cycle management tools.

Other changes include:

  • Wayland session available while using the Nvidia proprietary driver.
  • PulseAudio 15 introduces support for Bluetooth LDAC and AptX codecs.
  • Better audio quality with HFP Bluetooth profiles.
  • Toolchain update: gcc 11.2.0, glibc 2.34, LLVM, golang 1.17.x.
  • See more changes here.

Download / Upgrade to Ubuntu 21.10:

For those want to do a fresh install, download Ubuntu 21.10 from the official website.

How to Upgrade From Ubuntu 21.04 Desktop to Ubuntu 21.10:

Before getting started, it’s always recommended to backup important data and switch to open-source driver via “Additional Drivers” utility. Also, disable third-party PPAs via “Software & Updates -> Other Software”. And it’s better to purge Ubuntu PPAs that contains updated graphics & multi-media libraries, e.g, FFmpeg, Mesa.

1.) First, search for and open “Software Updater” utility and install all available updates. And restart your computer if required.

2.) Press Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard, and run command to launch the Software Updater with checking system upgrade:

update-manager -c

It will open up ‘Software Updater’ and indicate that Ubuntu 21.10 is available for upgrade. Don’t see the prompt? Try opening “Software & Updates” and select notify me for any version under ‘Updates’ tab.

3.) After clicking on “Upgrade” button, it will bring up the ‘Impish Indri Release Note’ dialog.

4.) Click “Upgrade” again and it opens the “Distribution Upgrade” wizard indicates the process.

5.) After ‘Preparing to upgrade’ and ‘Setting new software channels’, it will ask for confirm again for upgrading the system.

Now, it starts downloading the new packages and installing the updates! And, it will ask for confirm to clean up obsolete packages. After all, restart computer when it indicates restart to complete upgrade.

How to Upgrade From Ubuntu 21.04 Server to Ubuntu 21.10:

To upgrade Ubuntu Server, firstly connect to command console, and install the update-manager-core package via command:

sudo apt install update-manager-core

Make sure the Prompt line in /etc/update-manager/release-upgrades is set to normal via command:

cat /etc/update-manager/release-upgrades |grep Prompt

If the value if not normal, you need to edit the file and change it.

Finally, start the upgrade tool and follow onscreen instructions via command:

sudo do-release-upgrade
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Hashbrown – Simple Tool to Verify Your Downloads By Checking File Hash

Last updated: October 14, 2021

To verify downloaded packages, we do hash checks. And Hashbrown is a simple graphical tool to generate or verify file hash in Linux Desktop.

Software developers often provide cryptographic hashes along with downloads, for users to ensure the file or program matches the source. Usually, they are MD5, SHA-1, and SHA-256 hashes.

Ubuntu provides SHA256 hashes in its ISO download pages.

Ubuntu comes with md5sum, sha1sum, sha256sum and a few other tools to do hash check from command line. For beginners or those hate Linux commands, then “Hashbrown” may help by providing a modern GTK user interface:

Compare package and shasum file

By opening a file via the tool, it generates the MD5, SHA-1, and SHA-256 hashes with buttons to copy to clipboard, though it takes quite a few seconds in my case to handle large file.

And it allows to compare / verify download using either a file or the hash code in different tabs.

How to Install Hashbrown in Ubuntu Linux:

The software is available to install as universal Flatpak package.

1. Install Flatpak daemon

Open terminal by either searching from activities overview or pressing Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard. When it opens, run command to install the daemon:

sudo apt install flatpak

For Ubuntu 18.04 and Ubuntu 16.04, you may need to add this PPA first.

2. Add flathub repository:

Next add the flathub repository that hosts the software packages, by running command:

3. Install Hashbrown as Flatpak:

Finally run command in terminal to install the app via Flatpak:

flatpak install flathub dev.geopjr.Hashbrown

Like normal apps, open it by searching from activities overview after installation.

Uninstall Hashbrown:

To remove the software package, use command in terminal:

flatpak uninstall --delete-data dev.geopjr.Hashbrown

You may also run flatpak uninstall –unused to remove unused runtime libraries.

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Toggle Light & Dark Mode for Flatpak Apps in Ubuntu 20.04+ / Linux Mint

Last updated: October 13, 2021

Using Flatpak apps in Linux? You may found that Flatpak app appearance does not change when toggling light & dark mode or switching to another app theme.

As more and more apps publish Linux packages via Flatpak, I have a few of them installed in my Ubuntu laptop. However, the apps stick to the light theme whenever I switches to dark mode in Appearance settings.

Since Flatpak runs in sandbox and does not have permission to access the “/usr” directory, it does not use system theme according to the document. So, some popular GTK themes are packaged as Flatpaks. And, it detects the current system app theme and tries to install the Flatpak version of the theme if available during app installation or update.

I’m working with default Yaru theme in the most time, so it automatically installs Yaru theme flatpak package but leaves Yaru Dark not installed. When I switching to Yaru Dark, it can’t find the match theme so falls back to the default Adwaita.

Install GTK Themes in Flatpak:

As all I said, the solution is install the themes you use as Flatpak packages.

For Ubuntu 20.04 and higher that use the default Yaru app theme, press Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard to open terminal and run command:

  • Install the Dark theme by running command: 
    flatpak install flathub org.gtk.Gtk3theme.Yaru-dark
  • Or install the light theme if not exist via command: 
    flatpak install flathub org.gtk.Gtk3theme.Yaru-light

There are also elementary stylesheet, Deepin GTK theme, Linux Mint’s Mint-Y in different colors, Arc, Numix, and other themes in Flatpak package format. You can find more themes via command:

flatpak search gtk3theme

Then install your prefer theme via “flatpak install flathub app-id” command.

After that, change app theme via Gnome Tweaks or System Settings to see the magic!

Make theme working for Qt apps:

Though I don’t have Qt applications as Flatpaks, according to the document, you need to open terminal and run following commands one by one to install the required runtime libraries:

flatpak install org.kde.KStyle.Adwaita
flatpak install org.kde.PlatformTheme.QGnomePlatform

That’s all. Enjoy!

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Shorten Dock Panel & Move ‘Show Applications’ to Top in Ubuntu 24.04 | 22.04

Last updated: May 5, 2024

After installed the new Ubuntu 22.04 and Ubuntu 24.04, one of the top things to do is tweaking the left dock panel.

Via “System Settings -> Appearance”, you may change the panel position to bottom, adjust icon size, and enable auto-hide. However, the 9 dots ‘Show Applications’ (or ‘Show Apps’) icon sticks to the bottom which is not movable.

Move ‘Show Applications’ button to the Top:

Though you can not drag moving the icon, Ubuntu has hidden option to change the position. And you may run single command in terminal to do the trick.

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

gsettings set org.gnome.shell.extensions.dash-to-dock show-apps-at-top true

The icon goes to top (or left if you moved dock to bottom) immediately after running the command. So it will look like:

Shorten the Dock Panel:

The dock launcher is easy to move to the bottom, but Appearance setting does not has option to make it compact, so to have Mac OS style short bottom panel.

To shorten Ubuntu Dock, press Ctrl+Alt+T to open terminal and run command:

gsettings set org.gnome.shell.extensions.dash-to-dock extend-height false

After that, it will look like:

Configure Ubuntu Dock via Dconf Editor:

For those hate Linux commands, there’s an advanced configuration tool ‘Dconf Editor’ available to do the trick.

Search for and install the tool from Ubuntu Software if you don’t have it.

Next, open Dconf Editor by searching from activities overview screen. Then navigate to “org/gnome/shell/extensions/dash-to-dock“. There you’ll see a list of options to configure the dock panel, including moving ‘Show Applications’, ‘extend-height’, ‘click to minimize’, and more.

That’s all. Enjoy!

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How to Login Remote Ubuntu 20.04 Server with Passwordless SSH Key

Last updated: April 10, 2022

For those having Ubuntu or other Linux server (e.g., Debian, CentOS and Fedora) remotely, here’s how to login without password using SSH key authentication.

Compare to user password login, SSH key authentication is more secure because only the person who has the key allows to connect, and the keys are well encrypted by different algorithms. It also make SSH connection simple by login without password.

1. Enable SSH Service (Do it in server side):

In case you don’t have enabled the SSH service in remote server. You need to first connect to the server, and run command to install openssh:

sudo apt install openssh-server

For CentOS and Fedora server, use sudo dnf install openssh-server command instead.

After installation, enable and start the service via command:

sudo systemctl enable ssh && sudo systemctl start ssh

And finally verify the SSH service status by running command:

sudo system status ssh

If you see the service is active and running, you may start connecting the server via SSH remotely using the command below in local computer:

ssh user@server_ip

Replace user and server_ip. And use -p port_number to specify the port number if it’s not the default 22.

2. Enable SSH Key Authentication (Run commands in local PC):

The authentication keys are generated in local computers. They are usually consists of private key and public key. By uploading the public key into remote Linux server, you’ll be able to SSH login using the private key in local machine.

NOTE: this tutorial is tested on Ubuntu local computer, though it should work on most Linux, including Debian, Fedora, CentOS, and Arch Linux.

1. Install OpenSSH Client:

The OpenSSH client is installed out-of-the-box mostly. In case you don’t have it, run this command in local computer to install it:

sudo apt install openssh-client

For CentOS and Fedora, use sudo dnf install openssh openssh-clients instead.

2. Generate SSH Key Pair:

The ssh-keygen command allows to generate a SSH key pair via RSA, ECDSA, and ED25519 algorithms. While RSA is widely used and best supported, ED25519 offers better security and good performance.

a.) Firstly, create and navigate to the .ssh directory in local computer terminal window:

mkdir -p ~/.ssh && cd ~/.ssh

b.) Next, run command to generate a key pair:

ssh-keygen -t ed25519 -f linode_ed25519 -C "root@linode"

In the code, you may replace “ed25519” with your prefer encryption algorithm. And “-f linode_ed25519” specifies the key name, “-C “root@linode”” is the optional comment.

c.) For security reason, it’s highly recommended to set none permission (even not readable) for other users except for yourself:

chmod 600 ~/.ssh/linode_ed25519*

Change “linode_ed25519” to the key name you set in last step. And there’s an asterisk “*” in the end so it also applies to the “linode_ed25519.pub” file.

3. Upload the public key to host server (Do in local PC):

Now upload the public key (“linode_ed25519.pub” in my case) from local computer to remote server, using command:

cd ~/.ssh && ssh-copy-id -i linode_ed25519.pub user@server_ip

Don’t remember to add ‘-p number‘ if the listening port is not default 22. And you need to type remote user password for uploading the key.

After that, try SSH login again in local computer will ask for the key password you set in b.):

ssh user@server_ip

If you select Cancel, it will instead ask for user password authentication.

4. Enable No Password SSH Key Login (Do in local PC):

You can tick ‘Automatically unlock this key whenever I’m logged in‘ and type the password only for one time in the last screenshot. However, some desktop environments may not provide this friendly feature. So ‘ssh-agent’, OpenSSH authentication agent, is present to do the job for your.

Firstly run ‘ssh-agent’ via shell command:

eval 'ssh-agent'

Next, add the SSH key to the agent:

ssh-add linode_ed25519

After that, SSH command will login without typing the authentication key password.

5. Disable SSH user password login (Do in server side):

After successfully setup the key authentication, you may disable the user password login, so no one else can access the server!

Firstly, connect to the remote server and run command to edit the ssh daemon config file:

sudo nano /etc/ssh/sshd_config

Next, un-comment the “#PasswordAuthentication yes” line and set its value to no, so it will be:

PasswordAuthentication no

And then press Ctrl+X, type y and hit Enter to save the file.

Finally reload SSH via 

sudo systemctl reload ssh

command and enjoy!

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How to Install The Latest Kodi 19.2 via PPA in Ubuntu 21.04, 20.04

Last updated: October 10, 2021

This simple tutorial shows how to install the latest version of Kodi media center in Ubuntu 18.04, Ubuntu 20.04, Ubuntu 21.04, and their based systems, e.g., Linux Mint 20, Elementary OS 6 and Zorin OS 16.

Kodi, formerly XBMC, is now at version 19.2 “Matrix”. It fixed some possible crashes caused by missing timer type, missing channel icons, accessing invalid PVR channel, or switching monitors, toggling on/off HDR from Windows 10 display settings.

The big one in the release it that Kodi 19.x now is available on the Xbox, along with swap chain and HEVC DXVA2 decoder performance improvements, and 4k resolution and HDR video playback fixes. For more, see the release note.

How to Install Kodi 19.2 in Ubuntu:

Kodi has an official Ubuntu PPA. It usually contains the latest packages for all current Ubuntu releases.

1. Add Kodi PPA.

Firstly, open terminal either by searching from the activities overview screen or by pressing Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard.

When terminal opens, paste the command below into it and hit Enter to add the PPA:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:team-xbmc/ppa

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

2. Install / Upgrade Kodi.

If you’re now running the stock version of Kodi package in Ubuntu, the Software Updater may refuse to update it. So it’s recommended to use the command below to install or update the media player.

Firstly refresh system package cache for old Linux, e.g., Ubuntu 18.04, by running command:

sudo apt update

Next, install or upgrade Kodi via command:

sudo apt install kodi

Once installed, you may open Kodi like normal apps by searching from the overview screen. Or log out and select login via Kodi session.

The PPA also provides more audio encoder and PVR add-ons packages. Install them as you need via either apt command or synaptic package manager.

How to Downgrade:

You can purge the Ubuntu PPA as well as downgrade Kodi to the stock version available in Ubuntu main repositories. To do so, run command:

sudo apt install ppa-purge && sudo ppa-purge ppa:team-xbmc/ppa
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How to Compile & Install Python 3.11/3.10 from Source in Ubuntu

Last updated: October 3, 2023

This simple tutorial shows how to compile and install Python 3.11, Python 3.10, or other certain Python version in Ubuntu.

For Ubuntu 18.04, Ubuntu 20.04 and Ubuntu 22.04 LTS, there’s well trusted “deadsnakes” team PPA that maintains all the Python packages. For non-LTS releases, you may build the programming language package manually from the source tarball.

NOTE: This tutorial is tested and works in Ubuntu 20.04, Ubuntu 22.04, and Ubuntu 23.04 in my case.

1. Preparation:

Before getting started, you need to install some essential packages for building the computer language package.

Open terminal either by pressing Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard or by searching from start menu. When it opens, run the command below to install the dependencies:

sudo apt install wget build-essential libreadline-dev libncursesw5-dev libssl-dev libsqlite3-dev tk-dev libgdbm-dev libc6-dev libbz2-dev libffi-dev zlib1g-dev

2. Download Python Tarball:

You can simply download the latest tarball from the Python website via the link below:

Download Python

In case you’re running Ubuntu without desktop environment, download the source package by running the wget command in terminal:

wget -c https://www.python.org/ftp/python/3.11.0/Python-3.11.0.tar.xz

For other Python version, go and download via web browser in this page. And, change the version number in command accordingly.

And uncompress the tarball either by right-click and selecting ‘Extract Here‘ in file manager, or by running command in terminal:

tar -Jxf Python-3.11.0.tar.xz

3. Configure the source:

Depends on how you grab the source tarball, either right-click on it in file manager, extract, and open the source folder in terminal via context menu option:

Open Python 3.11 source folder in terminal

If you just did the tar command above, then you may navigate to source folder via:

cd Python-3.11.0/

The command varies depends on which Python version you downloaded.

When you’re in source directory, run command to configure the source with expensive, stable optimizations (PGO, etc.):

./configure --enable-optimizations

4. Build and install Python:

Finally compile and install it into “/usr/local/bin” by running command:

sudo make -j4 && sudo make altinstall

Here -j4 will start 4 threads to speed up the job. Depends on your CPU, you may increase the number or just skip it. And, when make command done, it will ask you to type password for running make install with sudo privilege.

5. Verify

If everything’s done successfully without error, you may verify by running command:

python3.11 --version
python3.11 -m pip --version

It should output the language version as well as the pip package manager version for you

5. Make Python 3.11 default

IMPORTANT: Change default Python3 in Ubuntu MAY cause issues!!! Do it at your own risk.

After installation, you may set it as default by creating symbolic links to /usr/bin/python3:

sudo update-alternatives --install /usr/bin/python3 python3 /usr/local/bin/python3.10 110
sudo update-alternatives --install /usr/bin/python3 python3 /usr/local/bin/python3.11 100

In the first command change system default python3.10 to python3.8 if you’re on Ubuntu 20.04. Finally, run command below at any time to select which Python to use as default:

sudo update-alternatives --config python3

Uninstall Python 3.11:

Until you removed the source directory, you may first either navigate to that folder in terminal or right-click and select open folder in terminal, finally run make uninstall command to remove Python 3.11:

sudo make uninstall

If you’ve already removed the source, or the previous command does not work for you, try removing all the installed libraries manually via:

cd /usr/local/bin && rm -f sudo rm -f 2to3 2to3-3.11 idle3 idle3.11 pip pip3 pip3.10 pip3.11 pydoc3 pydoc3.11 python3 python3.11 python3.11-config python3-config
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How to Install Blender in Ubuntu 20.04, 21.10 [All the Ways]

Last updated: October 7, 2021

This tutorial shows all the ways to install the 3D creation software Blender in Ubuntu, including Snap, Flatpak, native Deb packages, and compile from source tarball.

Blender is a free open-source software for creating animated films, visual effects, computer games. It’s available to install in Ubuntu via a few different package formats. Here you may choose the one that you prefer.

1. Blender Snap package:

The software developer team offers official snap package that works on Ubuntu and most other Linux distributions. Snap is an universal Linux package format developed by Canonical, the company behind Ubuntu.

The Snap package features:

  • Easy to install.
  • Auto update.
  • Maintained by Blender Foundation.
  • Works on 64-bit modern PC only.
  • Run in box with snapd daemon, though pre-installed out-of-the-box.
  • Take more disk space than native deb package.

Install Blender Snap package:

The package is easy to install as mentioned. Simply open Ubuntu Software, search for and install Blender. From both package details and header bar, it’s marked as Snap package.

2. Blender in Ubuntu Universe repository:

Ubuntu has the 3D creation software in its official repositories. Though it’s always old, it has multi-arch support!

stock Blender package features:

  • Easy to install.
  • Official package by Ubuntu, but no update anymore.
  • Works on 64-bit PC, arm64 (Apple Silicon, Raspberry Pi), armhf, ppc64el, and s390x processors.

The stock deb package is also available to install in Ubuntu Software, though it sucks and may not work! Instead, users may open terminal by pressing Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard, and run apt command instead:

sudo apt update && sudo apt install blender

And to uninstall the package, use sudo apt remove --autoremove blender command in terminal.

3. Blender Flatpak package:

Flatpak is another universal Linux package format that was developed as part of the freedesktop.org project. Blender is available as Flatpak package in the flathub repository.

The Flatpak package features:

  • Auto update.
  • Maintained by the community.
  • 64-bit modern PC only.
  • Run in box with flatpak daemon.
  • Take more disk space than native deb package.

Install Blender Flatpak package:

To install the package, open terminal either by searching from activities overview screen or by pressing Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard. When terminal opens, run following commands one by one.

  1. Run command to install flatpak daemon: 
    sudo apt install flatpak
  2. Add the flathub repository: 
    flatpak remote-add --if-not-exists flathub https://flathub.org/repo/flathub.flatpakrepo
  3. Finally install Blender via command: 
    flatpak install flathub org.blender.Blender

And it can be easily removed via flatpak uninstall org.blender.Blender command.

4. Blender Portable Linux Tarball:

The Blender website provides Linux Tarball in its download page. Just grab the package, extract in your file manager, and right-click run the executable file from generated folder will launch the program.

No installation required, but only works for Linux on 64-bit modern desktop PC and laptop.

5. Install Blender from Ubuntu PPA:

Some Ubuntu users do NOT like the Snap and Flatpak packages. Besides portable Linux tarball, third-party PPAs is one of the choices.

The PPA package features:

  • Native deb packges.
  • Able to upgrade through “Software Updater”.
  • Maintained by unofficial third-parties.

Blender PPAs:

There are quite a few Ubuntu PPAs contains the 3D creation software package. You can find them in THIS PAGE.

So far, the Rob Savoury’s PPA contains the most recent Blender 2.93.4 (check the link) packages for Ubuntu 16.04, Ubuntu 18.04, Ubuntu 20.04 and higher for 64-bit PC. However, it was built with updated FFmpeg libraries that might break other package dependencies in your system.

To install Blender from the PPA, open terminal and run the commands below one by one:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:savoury1/ffmpeg4
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:savoury1/blender
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get upgrade && sudo apt-get dist-upgrade
sudo apt-get install blender

And to remove the PPA packages, run following commands one by one in terminal to purge the PPA repositories which will also downgrade the installed packages:

sudo apt install ppa-purge && sudo ppa-purge ppa:savoury1/blender
sudo ppa-purge ppa:savoury1/ffmpeg4

6. Blender Appimage package:

The software is also available as single Appimage binary package, though it seems not being updated regularly.

The Appimage is a non-install package works on most Linux systems. Users just have to add executable permission in file’s Properties dialog, then right-click and select run to launch the program.

The Appimage package features:

  • 64-bit PC only.
  • no installation required.
  • Runs in most Linux, like Snap and Flatpak.
  • Unofficial.

The Blender Appimage is available to download at THIS PAGE and it’s v2.90 at the moment.

7. Compile Blender from the Source:

If none of the previous methods meet your need, you can build the software package from source code, though it’s not recommended for beginners.

Build from the source features:

  • Not beginner friendly.
  • Works on all processor architecture, though Blender 2.8+ need GPU with OpenGL 3.3+ support
  • Build whatever version with optional functions as user prefer.
  • Build process may fail due to “unknown” reason, and need technical support.

How to Compile Blender from source tarball.

Firstly, download the source tarball from the link page below:

Download Blender (tar.xz)
Install the build dependencies:

1.) After downloaded the source tarball, extract it in the file manager. Then right-click on source folder and select ‘Open in Terminal‘

Blender 2.9x has an ‘install-deps.sh’ script that automatically install the build depends both from system repositories and by download and building others from source.

2.) When terminal opens after clicking the previous menu option, first run command to install essential packages:

sudo apt install build-essential git subversion cmake libx11-dev libxxf86vm-dev libxcursor-dev libxi-dev libxrandr-dev libxinerama-dev libglew-dev libwayland-dev wayland-protocols libegl-dev libxkbcommon-dev libdbus-1-dev linux-libc-dev

3.) Next, run the script to start installing build dependencies:

sudo ./build_files/build_environment/install_deps.sh

NOTE: the script may fail building dependencies from source tarballs. You may skip and/or specifies what to build via flags. And, find out the command options via:

sudo ./build_files/build_environment/install_deps.sh --help

So the command might be (run scrip with --show-deps shows required libraries):

sudo ./build_files/build_environment/install_deps.sh --with-embree --build-python --skip-oiio

4.) You may need to run the script several times to install the dependencies successfully. After that, create “build” folder in the source directory:

mkdir build && cd build

And configure the source with your preferred options, for example:

cmake ../ -DCMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX=/usr -DWITH_INSTALL_PORTABLE=OFF -DWITH_BUILDINFO=OFF -DWITH_PYTHON_INSTALL=OFF

The command will generate “CMakeCache.txt” in “build” folder under source. You can edit the file to change build options.

5.) Finally build Blender if everything goes OK. Depends on how many CPU core that you have, you may change -j4 (4 threads) to -j8 to speed up the process.

make -j4

And finally install Blender via sudo make install if make succeed.

Summary:

For Ubuntu users, there are quite a few ways to get Blender running. The easiest and official way is search for and installing the SNAP package from Ubuntu Software. However, the old .deb package in universe repository support more processors, e.g., Apple Silicon, Raspberry Pi and other Mobile devices. To test without installing, there’s Linux portable tarball present in official download page. And third-party Ubuntu PPAs maintains most recent packages in native .deb format. Also, advanced users may build it from source with free options.

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Python 3.10 Officially Released with New Syntax / Typing Features [PPA]

Last updated: October 6, 2021

After several alpha, beta and rc tests, the Python programming language finally released version 3.10 today!

Python 3.10 will receive bug-fix updates in next 18 months. After that, it’s supported with 5-year security updates until October 2026.

What’s New in Python 3.10:

  • Pattern matching syntax, inspired by similar syntax found in Scala, Erlang, and other languages.
  • Support using enclosing parentheses for continuation across multiple lines in context managers
  • Allow writing union types as X | Y
  • Add optional length-checking to zip
  • Precise line numbers for debugging and other tools
  • Require OpenSSL 1.1.1 or newer
  • Remove Py_UNICODE encoder APIs
  • Add optional EncodingWarning
  • Explicit Type Aliases
  • Parameter Specification Variables

See the release note for more about Python 3.10.

How to Install Python 3.10 in Ubuntu:

The well trusted “deadsnakes” team PPA has made the packages for Ubuntu 20.04, Ubuntu 18.04, and derivatives, e.g., Linux Mint 20, Elementary OS 6 and Zorin OS 16.

1.) Firstly, open terminal by either searching from overview screen or pressing Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard. When it opens, run command to add the PPA:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:deadsnakes/ppa

2.) Then refresh system cache and install the language via command:

sudo apt update && sudo apt install python3.10

Use Python 3.10 as default Python3:

It’s possible to make Python3 in Ubuntu to be Python3.10 via following commands. However, it causes issues, such as Gnome Terminal refuses to launch. Do it at your own risk!

  • Check current Python3 version: 
    python3 --version
  • Use update-alternatives to create symbolic links to python3 (replace python3.8 in Ubuntu 16.04 with ): 
    sudo update-alternatives --install /usr/bin/python3 python3 /usr/bin/python3.8 1
    sudo update-alternatives --install /usr/bin/python3 python3 /usr/bin/python3.10 2
  • And choose which one to use as Python3 via command: 
    sudo update-alternatives --config python3
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