For Ubuntu 23.04, Fedora 38 and other Linux with GNOME 44, there’s now an extension allows to change display name of audio output devices from the top-right aggregation menu (aka Quick Settings).

By default,  the speakers and headphones in the sound output sub-menu is a bit too explicit, that are not very clear to understand. To make the menu easy to read, you may rename them to just “headphones”, “built-in speaker”, or whatever that you want.

1. To install the extension, first open Ubuntu Software, search and install “Extension Manager”:

2. Then launch “Extension Manager”, navigate to ‘Other Software’ tab, finally search and install the “Quick Settings Audio Devices Renamer” extension.

For Fedora and other Linux, go to this web page and use ON/OFF switch to install the extension.

3. Once installed the extension, switch back “Installed” tab in Extension Manager (or open GNOME Extensions app). Then, click open the settings for that extension, finally click on the ‘pencil’ icon to edit the name of corresponding output device.

You can even insert emojis in the name, either by using a emoji picker or copy from “Gnome Characters” app.

Got a Logitech or SteelSeries headset? This app may help to adjust sidetone, get battery state, toggle LED, and set inactive time in Ubuntu Linux.

It’s HeadsetControl, a free and open-source application that supports:

• Logitech G430, G432, G433, G533, G535, G633, G635, G733, G930, G933, G935, G Pro.
• Logitech Zone Wired/Zone 750
• SteelSeries Arctis 1, Arctis 1 for XBox, Arctis (7 and Pro), Arctis 7+, Arctis Nova 7, Arctis 9, Arctis Pro wireless.
• HyperX Cloud Flight Wireless
• Corsair Void (Every void-version*, regardless whether Elite, Pro, HS70 Wireless)
• Roccat Elo 7.1 Air

The application is a command line tool, though it has a graphical interface for GNOME 42+ (Ubuntu 22.04 / Fedora 35 and higher).

How to Install the HeadsetControl app

The app so far does not have binary package for Ubuntu Linux, though it’s not hard to build it from source. The following steps is tested and works in my case in Ubuntu 22.04 LTS.

1. First, press Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard to open a terminal window. When it opens, run command to install build dependencies:

sudo apt install build-essential git cmake libhidapi-dev

2. Then, clone the source by running the git command in terminal, and then navigate to the source folder:

git clone https://github.com/Sapd/HeadsetControl && cd HeadsetControl

3. Create ‘build’ sub-folder, navigate to that sub-folder and start building it:

mkdir build && cd build && cmake ../

4. Finally, run make and then make install to build and install the tool:

make -j4

sudo make install

Once successfully installed, it will output that ‘/usr/local/bin/headsetcontrol‘ and ‘/usr/local/lib/udev/rules.d/70-headsets.rules‘ installed.

How to Install the Extension for graphical UI

For Ubuntu 22.04 and higher, first search for and install “Extension Manager” from Ubuntu Software.

Then, use “Extension Manager” to search and install the ‘HeadsetControl’ extension under ‘Browse’ tab.

Once installed, it should show the indicator applet in system tray area immediately with menu options to control your headset! Other Linux can go to this page to use ON/OFF switch to install the extension.

Uninstall:

To remove the extension, either go to the link page above and use ON/OFF switch, or use “Extension Manager” or Gnome Extensions tool.

To remove the command line application, open terminal and run command:

sudo rm /usr/local/bin/headsetcontrol /usr/local/lib/udev/rules.d/70-headsets.rules

Free DJ mixing software Mixxx announced the 2.3.4 release a few days ago. Here’s how to install it in Ubuntu 22.10, Ubuntu 22.04, Ubuntu 20.04 and Ubuntu 18.04 via PPA.

The new release added controller mapping for the Traktor Kontrol S2 Mk1, and initial mapping for Numark Party Mix.

It now shows ‘date added’ as local time, supports macOS 13.0 Ventura by using portaudio 19.7.0, again allows searching in external libraries. For Ubuntu, it fixed the menu bar issue when working in full-screen mode.

There are as well many other bug-fixes in the release, see the changelog for details.

How to install Mixxx in Ubuntu via PPA

The DJ software has an official PPA for Ubuntu, Linux Mint based systems. So far, it provides the latest 2.3.4 packages for Ubuntu 18.04, Ubuntu 20.04, Ubuntu 22.10, Ubuntu 22.04, and Linux Mint 20/21.

1. Add Mixxx PPA

Open terminal either from app launcher or by pressing Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard. When it opens, run command to add the PPA:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:mixxx/mixxx

Type your password (no asterisk feedback) when it prompts and hit Enter to continue.

2. Update package cache:

For Ubuntu 18.04 and Linux Mint, users need to manually refresh the package cache after adding new software sources. To do so, simply run command:

sudo apt update

3. Install or Upgrade Mixxx:

If an old Mixxx package was installed on your system, you may try upgrading the DJ software using Software Updater:

Or just run the command below in terminal to either install or upgrade the DJ software:

sudo apt install mixxx

Uninstall Mixxx:

You can easily remove the software by running command in terminal:

sudo apt remove --autoremove mixxx

And remove the PPA repository via Software & Updates, by removing relevant line utility under Other Software tab.

The lightweight DeaDBeef music player got an update recently. Here’s how to install it in Ubuntu 22.04, Ubuntu 20.04, and Ubuntu 18.04.

Just like Audacious did in v4.3, DeaDBeef 1.9.5 added the low-latency PipeWire sound server support. Meaning Ubuntu 22.10+, Pop! OS 22.04 and all current Fedora Linux users can select use the new sound output in ‘Preferences’ settings page.

The release also added new LibRetro resampling plugin, updated DUMB plugin with Chiptune voice muting support. Other changes include $itematindex(index,value) function to title formatting, improved drawing of spectrum analyzer, and various bug-fixes. See release note for details.

How to Install DeadBeef 1.9.5

The music player website provides official packages for Linux, Windows, and macOS, available to download at the link below:

However, I personally prefer using the PPA repository, which provides both GTK3/2 and Qt5 user interface, as well as a few more plugins. Sadly, the PPA so far supports only Ubuntu 22.04, Ubuntu 20.04, and Ubuntu 18.04 LTS and their based systems.

1. Firstly, press Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard to open a terminal window. When it opens, run command to add the PPA:

   sudo add-apt-repository ppa:spvkgn/deadbeef

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

   

2.  After adding PPA, update system package index by running command below, though it’s done automatically in Ubuntu 20.04+.

   sudo apt update

3. Finally, install the music player with your favorite UI interface (GTK3 for example):

   sudo apt install deadbeef-gtk3

   As you see in the screenshot, you may also install the mpris2 plugin, Qt5 UI, file browser plugin, etc.
   

Uninstall DeadBeef

To remove the PPA, use command:

sudo add-apt-repository --remove ppa:spvkgn/deadbeef

And remove the music player via:

sudo apt remove --autoremove deadbeef*

Audacious music player finally announced the release of version 4.3 after a few weeks of beta testing.

As you may already know, the new release features PipeWire output plugin. Meaning Ubuntu 22.10 + users can switch sound output using the new low-level multimedia framework.

Pop! OS 22.04 (have PipeWire support out-of-the-box) and Ubuntu 20.04 that have switched to Pipewire to replace PulseAudio are also supported.

The release also added GTK3 support again, which has much better appearance in my case compare to the old GTK2 interface. It now has a new set of tool-bar icons with both light and dark mode support. Though, the icons in the Settings page are still too big.

Other changes in Audacious 4.3 include:

• Native Opus decoder plugin, previously done via FFmpeg plugin.
• Qt6 support goes mature, though still defaults to Qt5.
• Meson built system support
• Allow copying file path in song info dialog.
• Support Ogg FLAC audio streams
• Support reading embedded lyrics tags.
• Account for album artist in Search Tool.
• Support new song length database format in SID plugin.
• Support Publisher and Catalog Number tags
• Add file filter to Export Playlist file dialog
• Remove alarm plugin.
• Add Romanian translation.

How to Install Audacious 4.3 in Ubuntu:

Without building from the source, Ubuntu users can install the audio player in 2 ways: Flatpak and Deb.

1. Flatpak

Audacious 4.3 is available to install as Flatpak package, though it runs in sandbox. Linux Mint user can easily search for and install it from Software Manager.

Ubuntu user can press Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard to open terminal and run the 2 commands below one by one to get it.

• Enable Flatpak support:

  sudo apt install flatpak

• Install Audacious as Flatpak:

  flatpak install https://dl.flathub.org/repo/appstream/org.atheme.audacious.flatpakref

2. Ubuntu PPA

For those who prefer the classic .deb package, I’ve upload the new package into this PPA repository.

It now supports the package for Ubuntu 18.04, Ubuntu 20.04, Ubuntu 22.04, Ubuntu 22.10, and Ubuntu 23.04. Besides the modern PC and laptop with x86_64 architecture type, arm64/armhf devices such as Raspberry Pi are also supported!

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/apps

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

2. Then, update system package index in Ubuntu 18.04 and Linux Mint via the command below. For Ubuntu 20.04+, it’s done automatically while adding PPA.

sudo apt update

3. If you have an old version of the music player installed, you can now update the package to the latest using “Software Updater” utility.

Or, run the command below in terminal to install or upgrade the package:

sudo apt install audacious audacious-plugins

Uninstall Audacious

Remove the Flatpak package

To remove the audio player installed as Flatpak, open terminal (Ctrl+Alt+T) and use command:

flatpak uninstall --delete-data org.atheme.audacious

Also clean up runtime library via flatpak uninstall --unused.

Remove Audacious installed from PPA

If you want to restore the music player to the stock version available in system repository. Run command below to purge PPA as well as downgrade installed packages:

sudo apt install ppa-purge && sudo ppa-purge ppa:ubuntuhandbook1/apps

Or, simply remove the software packages, use command:

sudo apt remove audacious audacious-plugins-data libaudcore5

And remove the PPA either via “Software & Updates” under ‘Other Software’ tab or use command:

sudo add-apt-repository --remove ppa:ubuntuhandbook1/apps

That’s all. Enjoy!