UbuntuHandbook

Install XFCE 4.20 in (X)Ubuntu 24.04 & 24.10 [For Testing Only]

Last updated: December 17, 2024 — Leave a comment

For those who want to try out the new XFCE Desktop 4.20, XUbuntu developer team has made it into experimental PPA for (X)Ubuntu 24.04 and (X)Ubuntu 24.10.

XFCE 4.20 is the new major release of the popular lightweight Linux desktop. It features experimental Wayland support, client-side decoration and hamburger menu for Thunar, power profile daemon, hybrid sleep, and many other exciting new features. See HERE or the official release note for details.

Try XFCE 4.20 in (X)Ubuntu 24.04 | 24.10

XFCE 4.20 will be probably default in next XUbuntu 25.04, Fedora 42 (spin), Arch, etc Linux Distributions.

For (X)Ubuntu, Linux Mint (XFCE edition), Linux Lite users who can’t wait, XUbuntu developer team has made the new desktop release into QA experimental PPA for testing purpose!

NOTE: The PPA is for testing purpose!!! The packages will be either moved to the Staging PPA (if passed verification), or removed.

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

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:xubuntu-dev/experimental

Type user password when it asks, while there’s no visual feedback, and hit Enter to continue

2. After adding PPA, just run command to install all available updates to upgrade to XFCE 4.20:

sudo apt full-upgrade

NOTE: Linux Mint user may need to run sudo apt update first to refresh package cache.

For non-XUbuntu or Ubuntu based systems without XFCE4, you need to run the command below instead to install the new desktop environment:

sudo apt install xubuntu-desktop

Tips: It’s recommended to copy what packages it’s going to install, in case you want to uninstall them later.

After installation, restart your computer. Then, launch “XFCE About” dialog to check the desktop version.

Uninstall XFCE 4.20

To restore the previous XFCE Desktop 4.18, simply install ppa-purge tool, then use it to purge that PPA which will downgrade all the install packages.

First, open terminal (Ctrl+Alt+T) and run command to install ppa-purge:

sudo apt install ppa-purge

Then, use the command below to purge the QA experimental PPA:

sudo ppa-purge ppa:xubuntu-dev/experimental

To remove XFCE desktop (don’t do it in XUbuntu or other Linux xfce edition), then try running command:

sudo apt remove --autoremove xfce4* libxfce4* xubuntu-* xfwm4

In Howtos xfce

XFCE 4.20 Released! Hybrid Sleep, Power Profiles, Initial Wayland Support

Last updated: December 17, 2024 — Leave a comment

XFCE, the popular GTK based Linux Desktop environment, announced new 4.20 release yesterday on Sunday!

It’s a new major release with the effort of almost 2 years of development, features include initial Wayland support, revamped Thunar file manager, power profiles daemon, and more!

In News xfce

Parole media player updates with Middle Click Actions to Tray Icon

Last updated: December 4, 2023 — Leave a comment

Parole, the lightweight media player for XFCE Desktop, released version 4.18.1 few days ago.

The new release updates the app icons with 32px, 64px, 96px sizes support, so it should have a cleaner look in system menus like App Finder, Whisker Menu.

The extensions icons have been updated using newer Xfce palette, and semi-transparent borders giving it a sharper look in dark themes.

The system tray icon now is disabled outside X11. And, it now supports middle click actions to control video playback:

middle click to pause/resume playback.
middle wheel scrolling over tray icon to volume up/down.

Other changes in the release include:

Allow to built without X11 support and therefore whithout XfceSMClient.
Fix critical warning and memory leak
mpris2: Properly disconnect signal handlers
honor gtk-dialogs-use-header as Xfce 4.18 is CSD opt-in.
Small UI Improvements and many translation updates

How to Install Parole 4.18.1:

At the moment of writing, there’s no binary package of Parole 4.18.1 for Ubuntu.

But it’s not hard to compile the package from the source (tested in XUbuntu 22.04):

First, open terminal and run command to install the build dependency packages:

sudo apt install debhelper-compat gtk-doc-tools intltool libclutter-1.0-dev libclutter-gtk-1.0-dev libdbus-1-dev libdbus-glib-1-dev libgstreamer-plugins-base1.0-dev libgstreamer1.0-dev libgtk-3-dev libnotify-dev libtagc0-dev libxfce4ui-2-dev libxfconf-0-dev pkg-config xfce4-dev-tools

Then, download the source tarball by going to XFCE website via the link below:

Download Parole 4.18.1
Extract the source tarball, then right-click on the new generated folder, and select “Open in Terminal”. Finally, run the 3 commands below one by one to compile it from source:
```
./configure
```
```
make -j4
```
```
sudo make install
```

NOTE: It by default installs the parole executable to /usr/local/bin without overriding the pre-installed one. Meaning you’ll have 2 versions of the media player installed in your system, while the app icon in menu will launch the newer 4.18.1 version.

(Uninstall) By opening the source folder in terminal, you may also uninstall the media player by running command:

sudo make uninstall

In News media player, xfce

How to Install in XFCE 4.18 (X)Ubuntu 22.04

Last updated: April 1, 2024 — 3 Comments

The popular lightweight desktop environment XFCE4 got a new major release after 2 years of development. Here’s how to install it in (X)Ubuntu 22.04, Linux Mint 21, and/or Linux Lite 16.x.

The new release, XFCE 4.18, focuses on improving its Thunar file manager. They include image preview, Undo/Redo option, customize toolbar, highlight files with different background and filename colors.

In the List View mode, it shows how many files contained for directories, and supports for displaying ‘file creation date’ column. Other changes include split view, recursive search, new ‘Bookmark’ menu, as well as:

“Recent” in left pane for quick access recently used files.
Trash option ‘Restore and Show’
Custom action menu option can now have sub-menu entries.
Show file thumbnail for only limited size.
Verify file checksum on copy.
Restore tabs on startup.

There are as well new features for other part of the desktop, including new Clock plugin (the original DataTime and the Clock plugin combination), option to hide window decorations, new shortcut editor for Thunar file manager, Xfce4-terminal and Mousepad text editor.

It also improved UI scaling, and added support for thumbnail sizes x-large and xx-large, for better Hi-DPI displays support. Settings Editor now has a search function support. All header bars of Xfce Windows and Dialogs now rendered by default by the XFCE4 window manager. And, there’s now option to hide window decorations.

How to Install XFCE 4.18 via PPA

The Xubuntu Developers team has built the packages for (X)Ubuntu 22.04, and their based systems into this PPA repository.

NOTE 1: Ubuntu 20.04 and earlier are NO longer supported via this PPA!

NOTE 2: As PPA description said, the packages were built for testing purpose! Do NOT install in production machine!!

1. Add the PPA

First, open a terminal window either by pressing Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard or by searching from ‘Activities’ overview or start menu depends on your system.

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:xubuntu-dev/staging

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

2. Refresh package cache

Ubuntu 22.04+ should automatically refresh system package cache while adding PPA, though it might not for some based systems.

To manually update the cache, run command:

sudo apt update

3. Install or upgrade to XFCE 4.18

Finally, either run the command below to install all available package updates:

sudo apt upgrade

or launch Software Updater (Updater Manager) and click install updates to upgrade to XFCE 4.18. Finally, restart your computer and enjoy!

For non-XFCE users, run the command below to install the whole desktop environment on your Ubuntu based system:

sudo apt install xubuntu-desktop

How to Restore:

For XUbuntu 22.04, Linux Mint XFCE edition, and/or Linux Lite 16.x, install ppa-purge and purge the PPA will downgrade all installed package into stock versions in system repository.

To do so, open terminal and run commands:

sudo apt install ppa-purge && sudo ppa-purge ppa:xubuntu-dev/staging

In Howtos xfce

Install Parole Media Player 0.9.2 via PPA in Ubuntu 17.04

Last updated: July 9, 2017

Parole, a modern simple media player for XFCE, has reached the 0.9.2 release. Here’s how to install it in Ubuntu 16.10, Ubuntu 17.04 via PPA.

Parole 0.9.2 requires GTK >= 3.20. Ubuntu 16.04 won’t be able to update to this release with the default GTK+3 libraries.

Parole 0.9.2 features:

Update homepage to docs.xfce.org
Switch Xfce URLs to HTTPS
Keyboard shortcuts helper available in the Help menu
New B/N keybindings for previous and next track
Fixed null pointer dereference
Fixed adding directories to queue via commandline
Fixed shuffle functionality also repeating
Fixed display order of audio and subtitle tracks
Fixed “Clear Recent” clearing global history
Fixed Ctrl-Q keybinding when in fullscreen
Fixed string escaping in audiobox widget
Complete the Parole Plugins documentation and improved documentation quality
translation updates and code quality improvements.

How to Install Parole 0.9.2 in Ubuntu:

For Ubuntu 16.10 and Ubuntu 17.04, do following steps to add PPA and install or upgrade Parole to version 0.9.2:

1. Open terminal via Ctrl+Alt+T or by searching for “Terminal” from app launcher. When it opens, run command:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:ubuntuhandbook1/apps

Type in your password (no visual feedback when typing due to security reason) when it prompts and hit Enter.

parole ppa for zesty

2. Then upgrade the media player via Software Updater utility:

or run following commands to install / upgrade it:

sudo apt-get update

sudo apt-get install parole

For Ubuntu 16.04 users who’ve updated GTK version (no recommended for beginners), grab the .deb package for Ubuntu 16.10 from HERE.

Uninstall:

Run following command to purge the PPA repository which also downgrade installed packages to the stock version in your Ubuntu:

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

In Howtos media player, parole media player, xfce

Install XFCE Parole Media Player 0.9 via PPA in Ubuntu

Last updated: February 12, 2017

Parole, a modern simple media player for the Xfce desktop, has now reached the 0.9.0 release with a fresh set of features and fixes.

What’s new in Parole 0.9.0:

New “mini mode”, activated from the right-click menu.
New play and replay icons in the player content area. Clicking on these will play or replay your media (finally)!
Most deprecated API calls have been dropped or replaced. We’re not dropping GtkStatusIcon yet, the notification area lives on in Xfce!
Double buffering with the X11/XV video outputs has been reenabled. Ubuntu has been carrying this patch for a while now.
The window title and content title are now set to the playing filename if no ID3 tags are found.
Plugins can now be loaded by name instead of full path (plugin-name.so).
The desktop file and related AppStream have been updated to the now-standard “reverse-DNS” convention (org.xfce.Parole)
Translation updates.

How to Install Parole 0.9 in Ubuntu / Linux Mint:

Besides building from the Parole source tarball, Ubuntu 14.04, Ubuntu 16.04, Ubuntu 16.10, Ubuntu 17.04, users can install the 0.9.0 release from PPA repository (unofficial):

1. Open terminal (Ctrl+Alt+T) and run command to add PPA:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:ubuntuhandbook1/apps

2. Then upgrade the software via Software Updater (Update Manager) if a previous release is installed:

For those who don’t want to add PPA, grab the DEB package directly from THIS PAGE.

Uninstall:

For any reason you can easily restore Parole media player to the original version available in Ubuntu Software App, by running command in terminal:

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

In Howtos parole media player, xfce

How to Enable Global Menu in XFCE Desktop

Last updated: July 14, 2017

To save screen space, Ubuntu Unity uses Mac OS X style global menu that integrates applications’ menu bar into the top panel.

Thanks to TopMenu developer and Webupd8 Team for building the project into PPA, now XFCE Desktop has a plugin to enable the Mac style global menu bar.

How to install TopMenu plugin for XFCE:

For (X)Ubuntu 14.04, (X)Ubuntu 14.10, (X)Ubuntu 15.04, and Linux Mint 17/17.1, this Xfce plugin is available in the webupd8 PPA.

1. Open terminal from the application menu. When it opens, run command to add the PPA:

sudo add-apt-repository -y ppa:webupd8team/mate

2. Update system package cache, install “xfce4-topmenu-plugin” as well as other extra plugins.

sudo apt-get update
 
sudo apt-get install xfce4-topmenu-plugin libtopmenu-gtk3 libtopmenu-qt topmenu-mozilla-extension

3. After installing this plugin, you have to restart Xfce session by logging out and back in to load the Topmenu modules.

4. Finally, right-click on panel and navigate to Panel -> Panel Preferences. Under items tab, add “TopMenu” and change its position.

For issues, please reports to gitorious.org/projects/topmenu/issues

In Howtos Global Menu, xfce

Linux Mint 17.1 Xfce Released [How to Upgrade]

Last updated: January 11, 2015

Linux Mint team finally announced the Xfce edition of Linux Mint 17.1. All editions (Cinnamon, MATE, KDE and Xfce) can upgrade from Linux Mint 17 to 17.1 via Update Manager.

Linux Mint 17.1 features Xfce 4.10, MDM 1.8, a Linux kernel 3.13 and an Ubuntu 14.04 package base. The Xfce edition also features:

Out of the box support for Compiz
Xfburn received Blu-Ray support
In the application menu, categories are now placed on the left and react to mouse hover by default (these options are configurable)
Moving a window towards the edge of the screen now tiles the window by default rather than switching to another workspace
Quick launchers for Firefox and the terminal were added by default in the Xfce panel
The panel clock applet is now used by default so you can see the current date by placing your mouse over it

The iso images for Linux Mint 17.1 Xfce as well as other editions are available for download at:

Linux Mint Download Page

To upgrade from Linux mint 17 to 17.1 see the official howto.

In Howtos Linux Mint 17.1, xfce

Stop Screen Going Blank (Dark) on Ubuntu 13.04

Last updated: July 15, 2013

Ubuntu desktop keeps going blank or dark when it is idled for a certain time. That’s not good if you’re watching movies on screen. Here’s the guide to stop your screen being turned off.

Open Brightness & Lock from Unity dash search results, or from System Settings